“On a microscopic piece of sand that floats through space is a fragment of a man’s life. Left to rust is the place he lived in and the machines he used. Without use, they will disintegrate from the wind and the sand and the years that act upon them. All of Mr. Corry’s machines - including the one made in his image, kept alive by love, but now obsolete - in the Twilight Zone.”
-Rod Serling, “The Lonely”, The Twilight Zone (1959)
It’s that time again - ride out your hangover with the New Year’s Eve/Day Syfy TZ marathon (schedule here)
Nitori finds herself utterly alone in Gensokyo… Or is she?
This is episode 10 of the Gensokyo Zone, a Touhou/Twilight Zone crossover/spoof. Inspired by Rumia’s spell card Twilight Zone, how would it be like if Rumia hosted such a show?
“You’re travelling to another medium. A medium not only of sight, but of mind. A journey into a wondrous land whose conception is possible through imagination. You’ve just crossed over… into the Manga Zone.”
Now I’m a big fan of the Twilight Zone and anime/manga, so at some point I wondered if there’s any weeb stuff like Twilight Zone. After being completely disappointed with the anime The Laughing SalesmanandTwilight Q, I looked further, and found 4 manga. Everyone, presented for your perusal, 4 horror anthology manga hostesses: Misery (the Outer Zone), Yomi (Zekkyou Gakkyuu [Ja: 絶叫学級, “Screaming Lesson”]), Kaminuma from the Soumatoh Kabushikigaisha [走馬灯株式会社, “Revolving Lantern Corporation”], and Misa from Eko Eko Azarak. Below are my thoughts so far on these series, in the order that I enjoy them, from best to least good.
1. The Outer Zone
“Hello, everyone. I’m Misery, your guide through the Outer Zone.” - Misery
The Outer Zone is probably the closest out of the 4 manga to the Twilight Zone and it seriously excels at itself. Every chapter is its own story where we meet a character or two and we witness them as they encounter whatever strange happening the Outer Zone presents them with, ending each story with a twist and a moral lesson/message. Like the Twilight Zone, each story is bookended also with an opening and closing narration from Misery herself.
For fans of TZ and anime/manga, I think this is a must read. Now unlike TZ, Misery tends to insert herself as part of the story. At first I thought this was something the author had done to shy away from making it a fully anthology series, but as the series goes, I find that the insertion of Misery is actually a good one for some stories. There is quite a noticeable dip in quality in volumes 3 and 4, but it managed to pick itself back up in vol 5. Misery is sorta an omnipotent-ish deity who “takes an interest in the dark side of life” and isn’t evil. If anything, she presents opportunities for the good to pull themselves out of the trouble and opportunities for the bad to be punished, much like how fate leads the characters in TZ. One of my favourite chapters is the one where a couple comes across a lucky shrunken head that porports to be able to predict what to bet on, potentially allowing the owner to win and endless amount of money. But is there really no catch to this?
2. Zekkyou Gakkyuu [絶叫学級]
“Good evening. It is time for yet another Screaming Lesson.” - Yomi
I first watched Twilight Zone as a kid, and I was certainly not old enough to really understand the themes about the US-Soviet arms race and other topics like this that were contemporary issues in the 1960s when TZ aired (I’m not even American or Russian). Also, generally, TZ is really an adult show, dealing with primarily problems concerning adults, with themes such as gambling, working, nostalgia, etc. Perhaps for that reason, I dropped the Twilight Zone for a good number of years before returning to it as an adult. Personally I was more intrigued by stories about a child who kept telling lies and finding out his lies came true, and my teachers in middle school really dug a TZ-esque story I wrote about helping a granny across the road, even though I didn’t really think that story was special at all.
This brings me to the point: I wish that there was Twilight Zone, but for a younger audience. And Zekkyou Gakkyuu is exactly that. It deals with situations that are perhaps more at home if you’re still a student, and most characters go to school. Now reading this as an adult, the final messages may make you feel like you aren’t part of the targeted demographic, with final messages like “remember to treat your friends well” and “don’t be picky with food”. But hear me out, despite the messages that are aimed at a younger audience, the stories themselves are actually very solid and compelling even reading it as an adult, so besides the final message in the end, there doesn’t seem to be compromises in the story department, so I would definitely say even as an adult, this is worth checking out. After all, even the classic TZ episode “To Serve Man” is basically like a sci-fi version of Little Red Riding Hood in any case. It’s the same message you might tell children, but the story is an enjoyable one. Like Outer Zone, each chapter begins and ends with a narration from the ghost girl host herself. And while we’re at that, I certainly am a fan of the design of the host character, who’s a ghost with only her torso…
3. Soumatoh Kabushikigaisha [走馬灯株式会社]
“Welcome to the Revolving Lantern Corporation. Look back on your life to your heart’s content!” - Kaminuma
Right off the bat, I should probably warn you that this is definitely an adult, 18+ manga.
Soumatoh (or “Soumatou”) Kabushikigaisha is said to be based on one specific Twilight Zone episode (which I have not yet watched) called “What’s in the box”, where a man finds a TV that could predict his future.
The SK is a kind of supernatural company that offers a service of allowing you to watch back on someone’s life if you provide the company with that person’s name and details. And you watch their life on a set of DVDs. Clumsy for a supernatural power, but it does come into play into the plot sometimes.
Anyway, I’m actually surprised how much they were able to milk this simple concept (and I mean this in the good way). At first, I wasn’t terribly fond of this premise, because you know the current state of the individuals, so I figured there couldn’t be anything too shocking going on, but it proves me wrong time and again. The twists usually come when you peek into the life of someone close to you and how they experience the same events. So despite the predictable setting, it still manages to deliver a TZ experience, though I would say it does so in a weaker manner than say, the Outer Zone, and there tends not to be anything supernatural going on in SK.
A word of warning if you decide to pick this up. There’s basically a sex scene in every story (each story usually spans 2 chapters), but it’s not hentai. It often feels that it contributes to the plot point, but there is quite the abundance of it, so just be warned.
4. Eko Eko Azarak
“Eko, eko, azarak. Eko, eko, zomelak.” - Misa
Eko Eko Azarak is a line from a Wiccan chant, and this manga deals with a little witch who practices black magic and goes around different schools to “serve justice”, as the manga summary puts it.
LikeZekkyou Gakkyuu, this takes place in a school setting, so some of the issues addressed feel more at home if you’re in that age range, such as wanting to get good grades and school gangs.
Now while I did find the first chapter to be a very worthy TZ-for-teens episode, I wasn’t quite as thrilled with chapters 2 and 3, and for that reason, I’ve decided to put this manga on hold for a bit. The reason? Our protagonist Misa isn’t really what I’d call a good person, and the punishments the MCs of each story (I’m distinguishing here the protagonist Misa from the MC of each story) receive don’t really feel deserved. These are in stark contrast to Misery, who tends to punish the bad. Now don’t get me wrong, TZ has its fair share of episodes where even the good get into a terrible fate, and not always as a warning either (in Time Enough at Last, I don’t think Henry Bemis has really done anything to deserve his fate, and unlike To Serve Man, it doesn’t serve [pun not intended] to warn us about trusting strangers). But I think if you’re going to put “people suffering from terrible fates without good reason” stories in, I don’t think these should be the manga starter. Many times, Misa seems to tempt the MC without good reason or just outright messes with them (this is also one of my complaints for the Laughing Salesman). Overall, with Misa not really being a good person and the undeserved punishments, this manga sits at the bottom of my list. But I still think it is nice in that it’s TZ for school-goers, and I have hope that people will face karma for bad deeds they’ve done further into the chapters.
Closing narration
Overall, I’m happy that there are a handful of enjoyable manga based off of the Twilight Zone. OZ is definitely the strongest in my opinion, and ZG and SK are also good reads. They deliver the suspense, the twist ending, and the lesson (though perhaps less so in SK). I hope you could give the first 3 a read too, and if there’s any anime/manga that give TZ vibes, please do let me know, and I’d be happy to check them out! (And I don’t just mean episodic manga, I do mean the whole TZ package as I described). I’m also doing a little Touhou/Twilight Zone crossover Youtube series, and I hope you could also check it out if you like this sorta thing. Regardless, just don’t get too engrossed into the books… or you may find yourself sucked into, with no way out… of the Manga Zone.
“You pass through the Hakurei Barrier from being spirited away. Beyond it is another realm. A realm not only of fantasy and illusion, but of magic. You’ve just crossed over… into the Gensokyo Zone.” - Ex Rumia
The Gensokyo Zone is a Touhou/Twilight Zone crossover fancomic/fanimation video series I’ve been working on. Inspired by Rumia’s LostWord spell card “Twilight Zone”, how would it be like if Rumia hosted such a show?
The series is an anthology, similar to the Twilight Zone, and generally has no continuity between episodes.
“You pass through the Hakurei Barrier from being spirited away. Beyond it is another realm. A realm not only of fantasy and illusion, but of magic. You’ve just crossed over… into the Gensokyo Zone.” - Ex Rumia
The Gensokyo Zone is a Touhou/Twilight Zone crossover fancomic/fanimation video series I’ve been working on. Inspired by Rumia’s LostWord spell card “Twilight Zone”, how would it be like if Rumia hosted such a show?
The series is an anthology, similar to the Twilight Zone, and generally has no continuity between episodes.
“The name is Grady, five feet short in stockings and boots, a slightly distorted offshoot of a good breed of humans who race horses. He happens to be one of the rotten apples, bruised and yellowed by dealing in dirt, a short man with a short memory who’s forgotten that he’s worked for the sport of kings and helped turn it into a cesspool, used and misused by the two-legged animals who’ve hung around sporting events since the days of the Colosseum. So this is Grady, on his last night as a jockey.”
“I know I had a mental breakdown. I know I had it in an airplane. I know it looks to you as if the same thing is happening again, but it isn’t. I’m sure, it isn’t.”
“Sports item, circa 1974: Battling Maxo, B2, heavyweight, accompanied by his manager and handler, arrives in Maynard, Kansas, for a scheduled six-round bout. Battling Maxo is a robot, or, to be exact, an android, definition: an automaton resembling a human being. Only these automatons have been permitted in the ring since prizefighting was legally abolished in 1968. This is the story of that scheduled six-round bout, more specifically the story of two men shortly to face that remorseless truth: that no law can be passed which will abolish cruelty or desperate need–nor, for that matter, blind animal courage.”
“Submitted for your approval, one Max Phillips, a slightly-the-worse-for wear maker of book, whose life has been as drab and undistinguished as a bundle of dirty clothes. And, though it’s very late in his day, he has an errant wish that the rest of his life might be sent out to a laundry to come back shiny and clean, this to be a gift of love to a son named Pip.”
“You’ve just witnessed opportunity, if not knocking, at least scratching plaintively on a closed door. Mr. Julius Moomer, a would-be writer who, if talent came twenty-five cents a pound, would be worth less than car fare. But, in a moment, Mr. Moomer, through the offices of some black magic, is about to embark on a brand-new career.”
“Love has its own particular point of view. It sees everything larger than life. Nothing is too ornate, too fanciful, too dramatic. Love demands the theatrical, and then transfigures it. It turns the grotesque into the lovely, as a child does. With it, we can see what we wish to see in other people. Without it, we can’t see anything at all. We can search forever, and never find.”
“ William Benteen, who had prerogatives: he could lead, he could direct, dictate, judge, legislate. It became a habit, then a pattern, and finally a necessity. William Benteen, once a god–now a population of one.”
