Tomie

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Story - All I knew when I started this manga was that 'Tomie' was a woman who could make men fall madly in love with her at first sight. As you can imagine, I wasn't really expecting much and was very impressed by what I read. I loved every chapter and felt they were all very original and well thought out to how each 'Tomie' manipulated and charmed each character in the manga which eventually ends in her own demise.

Art - As the other review has mentioned, the one strength to this anime is that Tomie is truely beautifully drawn in the manga with her ... beautiful eyes and shiny hair and there is a lot of attention to detail, especially when her beautiful form is distorted by the 'monster' beneath.

Character - The smaller characters are simply prop to the many 'Tomies' that prop up in all the stories. It is especially unkind to the men who fall madly for Tomie in each arc. Not much is known about Tomie except for her supernatural abilities and as you get more and more used to her character, the stories seem to get more complicated and baffling. Great! And a real challenge for the mind!

Enjoyment - I throughly enoyed 'Tomie' and despite it not being as 'terrifying' as I thought it could be, I found it was a very interesting concept about a strange multiplying girl with no purpose but to make people love her as much as she loves herself.

Overall - Definitely an interesting manga if you like different story arcs and strange characters and plotlines. It can be a little gory/strange in places but hey - what can you do?!

STORY: 6/ART:6/CHARACTERS:5/ENJOYMENT:6/OVERALL:6

I would consider Tomie to be an interesting mange to read when you are waiting for another mange chapter to be released. It it definitely good to pass the time but it isn't anything to write home about.

STORY: The story is very simple. There is a succubus (Tomie) that has immense beauty and charm. She goes around seducing men and driving them to murder and driving women to insanity. The victim of the aggravated violence is usually Tomie herself. When she gets murdered she spawns more of herself and regenerates, continuing her curse. It is even alluded to towards the end of the manga ... that "Tomie" has been on Earth long before the time represented in the manga. Every chapter is episodic leading to a different group of people being effected every chapter. The first couple of chapters were really interesting but after maybe chapter 9, things started to get really repetitive.

ART: This is Junji Ito's first manga so in the beginning the art wasn't that great but as it progressed there was a huge improvement in style and it looks more like what everyone else is familiar with if you have read his other works. At moments Tomie was drawn very beautifully and a lot of the gore scenes were really well drawn out and they were very powerful moments but again the manga itself isnt totally outstanding.

CHARACTERS: as far as art goes, some where unique enough to temporarily remember. most of the high school boys look practically identical. because the story is episodic, the characters in each chapter switch so there really is no importance in knowing who they are anyways except for obviously Tomie and her teacher Mr. Tagaki as he often comes back to forward the plot.

ENJOYMENT: There were some chapters that were genuinely interesting and i was very invested in the plot, other chapters barely had me engaged because of the very flat story arc. It will tend to get flat towards the end because you can predict how to chapters are going to play out.

OVERALL 6: it wasnt awful but it wasnt amazing. Junji Ito definitely found his niche in horror manga and continued with it in his later years. If you read any of this other works (which i highly recommend) you can see the amount of improvement he underwent as a artist and a story teller. It's a good intro into Ito's other works and it passed the time but I wouldnt put it as my favorites

The story started out great, and I was really engaged in who and what the main character, Tomie, was. There is constant dread and disturbing imagery as one can expect from a Junji Ito story. Unfortunately, the story became very repetitive about halfway through, and I felt like my patience didn't pay off by the time I got to the ending. The fact that most if not all of the characters were unlikable did not really help. Without spoiling it, I can say that it does a good job of providing commentary on certain issues like victim blaming and jealousy for example. It's definitely not ... just a gory and shallow manga, but it ran a little too long for me, only to end when things became slightly more interesting again. I love a lot of Junji Ito's works but I struggled with this one.