Ju On Origins on Netflix: I'm confused

I really enjoy Japanese horror. In many ways I feel as though it is superior to a majority of horror films that originate in the USA. American has attempted to capitalize on this "vision" but almost all of the USA remakes of Japanese classics are pretty terrible and this is almost without exception. When it was announced that Netflix was going to make an original series about the Ju-On story, which is one of the most terrifying horror films ever made, and have it made in Japan and done by an almost entirely Japanese cast and crew, I was delighted.

The show is now available and there are 6, 30-minute episodes.

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I'll proceed by assuming that you know the story of Ju-On to a certain degree and say that you need to be aware that the story is about a lot of things but mostly it is about this cursed or haunted house that has some ghosts in it that aren't necessarily malicious, especially not the main ghost that was presented in the film.

In this series, we are given more backstory as to how the house ended up that way and after watching the entire series in 2 days, I can say that I am really not any wiser about what that might actually be. It seems as though they are going to try to milk this for multiple seasons because we are not left with any sort of conclusion.

The story is extremely confusing, involves multiple timelines that are sometimes not very clear about which one is the past and which one is the present, and this makes for a very disjointed story that might require a greater level of attention than I am willing to give towards this.

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We are introduced to 3 sets of people that have at one time or another been involved with the haunted or cursed house but not really shown a great deal about why the house is haunted to begin with, which is what the idea behind the show being named "Origins" would indicate. Instead, we are simply shown 3 sets of horrible events that take place as a result of the house being haunted, rather than discovering why it is. It takes some serious attention to even realize what "generation" you happen to be dealing with at the time because the show jumps from one occupant of the house to the next without really letting you know that we have just jumped 10 years in the past or something like that.

There are some truly scary moments, that much is for sure. The Japanese are experts at taking horror simply beyond jump scares and for the most part this series doesn't even use that tactic to scare you at all. As is true with most of the great Japan horror flicks I have seen, their fear-factor is more of slow-burning dread than it is anything that jumps up with a "scare track" sound affect that we are so accustomed to from Hollywood films. This much I can applaud.

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What I don't really enjoy is the fact that by the end of the first season, I wouldn't say the story has progressed very far in terms of explaining the actual "origin" at all. Instead we are treated to the experiences of multiple people in the same house, all of which suffer from hallucinations at some point or another. It becomes difficult to determine what is real and what is only being seen by the person in question. It also isn't answered why it is that these particular people are subjected to these hallucinations but other people are not for some reason, such as police officers in the house, movers, and real-estate agents all seem to get a pass.

This doesn't mean that it isn't entertaining: It definitely is that. The big problem I have with the entire production is that I think you need a masters degree in Ju-On to have any idea what the hell is going on most of the time.

This show is very violent and involves a lot of situations that kids certainly shouldn't be subjected to. I would say that is is scary moreso because of the violence than the actual supernatural horror, which is something that Japanese (and Korean) films excel in but might be considered taboo for USA audiences.

Should you watch it?

I would say yes, but be prepared to give it your undivided attention of you want to even have a chance at following what is going on. This is not a show to watch while you are browsing Twitter on my smartphone at the same time. I would say if you aren't digging it by the end of the 2nd episode you can safely turn it off because the pacing remains the same throughout.

It's not as epic as I had hoped but it is still much better than 3/4 of what else is out there.