Hide and Seek Manga Review

My introduction to Hide and Seek went thusly: 70's shoujo manga focusing on children who meet horrible ends. I heard “70's” and “children who meet horrible ends” and immediately thought of Ringing Bell, which (cold take, I know, but) to this day is still my gold standard of old-timey animanga horror stories, rich in both its antiquity and unhinged ability to plunge into the darker side of children's fables. Now, “happy to report” is far from the most appropriate response when it comes to reading such narratives. Perhaps chillfully delighted? Horribly amused? Twistedly joyful? Either way you want to look at it, the bottom line is that Hide and Seek provided a similar thrill I got out of Ringing Bell, and for that, I applaud it. This is a merciless story penned by a long-forgotten mangaka, resurrected to provide a chilling venture into shoujo manga's past. Given that you have the heart and stomach for it all, of course.

Hide and Seek is the seventh volume of Smudge, an ongoing anthology of vintage horror manga collected and reprinted by the publishing company Living the Line. Naono Yoshiko's manga serves as an anthology within an anthology; a trove of short stories she penned for various shoujo magazines in the early 70's. And it stands as a calculated blend of traditional ghost stories and horrifying odes to the Kafkaesque. Stories involve everything from sibling rivalry gone horribly wrong, to a haunted house and a headless demon, to schoolyard gossip and diaries, and to a reimagining of the tale of Orochi.

Connecting all of them is the recurring theme of making a childhood mistake so severe and traumatic that it bars one from experiencing happiness ever again. Children who thought that the worst thing to happen to them was, say, embarrassment brought on by grandma's overalls, or not being born into the right family, lead to drownings, beheadings, disappearances, and so on. Naturally, all of Yoshiko's stories end on downer notes, made even darker by the sudden, dramatic last-second twists. Some are a bit too open-ended and quick of a rug pull—I still don't know what to make of the endings of “Rainy Days,” or the eponymous “Hide and Seek.” Might just be me, though.

The ghost stories read like standard stuff. Not to discredit them (I still like them!), but if you've read even a single ghost story, then you already know that Yoshiko's more or less on the note of “and they were never heard from again.” The story of the headless Lady Otsuta is the best instance of this; a tale of survival horror where two young girls have to defend themselves against an evil spirit who stalks them at night. It lacks the same twisted morality as a lot of other Hide and Seek's stories do, since our two leading lasses do not sin. It is, however, bleak and well-paced enough to remain interesting enough to keep our attention.

The Kafkaesque stories have more originality to them. Barred from anything supernatural means that the situations and the characters are handled with an everydayness that feels more real and hits harder as a result. Really, they almost feel like they could happen to you.

Here's what I mean. My favorite story of the bunch (and massive spoilers, by the way) is titled “Our First Family Trip.” You can tell right away that the flowery title is done in jest; no family would actually want to keep this in the memory log. The story involves the young girl Sachiko, who is about to embark on a big vacation that her family can barely afford. Right as she's leaving for the ferry to Kyushu, Sachiko goes through the very real fear any paranoiac will have: she forgot to turn everything off in the house. Specifically, her iron, which threatens to burn her house down. Sachiko can't tell her parents what happened, otherwise they'd have to turn back home and cancel the trip. She is left with a look of wide-eyed terror that looks like Edvard Munch's Scream for a panel (the manga wisely uses this image on the cover of the book). A seemingly wise old man tries to reassure her by saying that praying will solve Sachiko's problems, since praying solves his. Sachiko is left relieved, thinking that God will protect her and the house. But unbeknownst to her, the old man doesn't pray to God; he prays to the whiskey bottle he constantly sneaks sips of. The story ends with Sachiko's house burned to the ground, juxtaposed with a panel of a relieved Sachiko enjoying her vacation with her family, completely oblivious to the scorched reality that awaits her. It begs the question of what is worse: immediately knowing your house might burn down, or delaying that revelation in exchange for short-term denial and fleeting joy? This story is even more impactful and horrifying when you have family on vacation. Which I did at the time of writing this review. No, really.

Yoshiko's art here isn't groundbreaking, but it is still very interesting. Characters' mortified faces, bleak environments, and psychotically, spirally speed lines make for a horror show art style. In an afterword essay included at the end, Yoshiko writes that despite her early love of shoujo, she eventually became “turned off by the big starry eyes and saccharine stories.” Her manga's art style, combined with some extra and more detailed (if not also violent, creepy, and sexual) illustrations included in her afterword essays, can be interpreted as a direct contrast to the flowery shoujo she read during her childhood. Is it no surprise that her first work, Experiment, was published in the same Garo magazine that housed the ultraviolent The Legend of Kamui?

Victims of childhood traumas have stories to tell that they would very much rather not. Hide and Seek doesn't shy away from telling those dark stories. It goes to the very end with them. This is a manga so unabashed in its darkness, so shocking and dramatic in its presentation, that you can't help but be in awe over the sense of fear and depression it leaves.