Executive producer of the anime series “Uzumaki: Spiral to Horror” – Jason DeMarco, recently spoke out about the sudden drop in quality of the anime's second episode, which has caused strong criticism in the community fan.
DeMarco, known as the co-creator of the Toonami action block on Cartoon Network, took to the social network Bluesky to explain what went wrong with the adaptation of Junji Ito's famous horror work.
During an escape scene in episode 2, viewers noticed some terrible animation, with characters moving erratically and unnaturally.
Although he later deleted his post, fans still captured and shared his comments across social networks.
Episode 2 of the anime “Uzumaki” which aired on October 5 on Adult Swim, had a significant drop in animation quality, which was noticed by the public.
Regarding his deleted post, DeMarco said: “I can't say exactly what happened, but they ruined us, and the options were: A) don't finish, don't air anything, and take a loss, B) just air episode 1 and leave it incomplete, or C) air all four episodes, with all their flaws, out of respect for the effort that went into it, we chose option C.”
DeMarco noted that after years of waiting, he understood why fans were upset, but he hinted that someone was responsible for the production problems, although he could not reveal who. “Many people worked very hard on this series and I don't believe that the actions of one or two people are the reason the series never came out.”,” he added.
Episode 1 of the Uzumaki anime was highly praised for capturing the visual essence of Ito's terrifying style, leading fans to believe that the “curse” of failed manga adaptations of the king of horror had finally come to an end. demolished.
However, the second episode featured stiff animation, poor lip-syncing, and inconsistent drawings, causing immediate backlash on social media.
Although DeMarco did not explain in detail what happened, the production problems of the Uzumaki anime have been widely known since its announcement in 2019. After five years of development and several iterations, delayed, most recently due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the anime finally premiered in September 2024.
While episode 1 was directed by Hiroshi Nagahama and animated by studio Fugaku, episode 2 was directed by Yuji Moriyama and produced by studio Akatsuki, which created a significant difference in visual quality.
The Uzumaki mini series still has two episodes left: episode 3 will air on October 12, followed by the final episode on October 19. Despite the problems, DeMarco expressed that they did the best they could with the resources available, although the question remains whether the right decisions were made.