H.P. Lovecraft's The Shadow Over Innsmouth

H.P. Lovecraft's The Shadow over Innsmouth #1-2

by Gou Tanabe (Adapter), Zack Davisson (Translator), H.P. Lovecraft (Original text)

In the winter of 1927-28, the isolated coastal settlement of Innsmouth, Massachusetts was assaulted by U.S. government agents—its waterfront burned and dynamited, its people taken away to internment camps.

Yet that was neither the beginning nor the end of the horror uncovered by a young antiquarian who traveled to Innsmouth in search of rumors from the town's dead past, only to find them still very much alive...and find truths lying under water deeper and colder than any earthly grave!

Genres: Manga, Horror, Graphic Novels, Comics, Fiction, Fantasy, Lovecraftian

450 pages, Paperback

First published May 31, 2022

About the author

Gou Tanabe is a Japanese creator of Manga.

Also known as 田辺 剛.

(Some prefer the spelling Gō Tanabe, but Gou Tanabe is used on his published books so far.)

Reviews

[Sophie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Von allen Gou Tanabe Adaptionen, die ich bisher las, war diese wirklich am unheimlichsten/schaurigsten. Mir ist die Geschichte wohlbekannt, ich kenne genug Zeichnungen und Illustrationen der Innsmouth Menschen und der Deep Ones, aber der Zeichner holt hier wirklich nochmal mehr raus.
Einfach nicht nachts vorm Einschlafen lesen. ;) AHHH!

[Stewart Tame · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gou Tanabe does a bang-up job of adapting Lovecraft stories. He has somehow mastered the artistic equivalent of HPL's prose. Since the originals tend to rely heavily on suggesting rather than showing, it's marvelous to me that he's able to come up with visuals to match those suggestions.

The story begins with an account of an assault by government agents on the isolated settlement of Innsmouth, MA. Buildings are destroyed with dynamite and flames. The residents are taken away to internment camps. The events leading up to this extraordinary incident, and its subsequent aftermath, are the subject of the story …

Tanabe is quickly becoming a name to be reckoned with in the admittedly limited field of Lovecraft adaptations. He has a fine sense of pacing, and a real knack for conveying an atmosphere of creeping dead. As mentioned in my first paragraph, he's also a master of depicting the seemingly undepictable.

My first encounter with the work of Gou Tanabe was The Hound and Others, which, at the time, struck me as a lackluster effort. But he showed improvement with the excellent two volume adaptation of At the Mountains of Madness. And this current volume shows further refinement of his talents. I understand his next project is to be The Call of Cthulhu. I am eagerly looking forward to that one!

[Zai · Rating 4 out of 5]

Me ha gustado mucho esta adaptación del relato de Lovecraft por Gou Tanabe, no es mi favorita; esta sigue siendo Las montañas de la locura, pero también está muy bien, y las ilustraciones son impresionantes, en algún momento he sentido hasta escalofríos.

Y el final ha sido totalmente inesperado para mí, ya que, a pesar de haber leido las Obras completas de Lovecraft, no me acordaba de ese final.

La trama comienza cuando un joven quiere viajar a Arkham para investigar sobre su familia materna, pero a causa de la escasez de fondos, viaja en autobús y hace parada de un día en Innsmouth, y allí se entera de una extraña historia acontecida en el pueblo....

[L J Field · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this graphic novel immensely. The Shadow Over Innsmouth has long been my favorite amongst Lovecraft’s works. This book was successful in conveying the horror of the story with about fifty pages of nerve-wracking suspense as the protagonist endeavours to flee Innsmouth with creatures pursuing him at every turn. Also the novel creates a bit of an alternative ending that adds to the sheer terror. 5 stars!

[Dave · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant, dark, frightening and down right scary with a tinge of noir to it is how I would describe Tanabe’s adaptation of HPL’s classic story. A stranger enters the town of Innsmouth via bus driven by a truly horrendous looking bus driver meant as a short layover stop before going on to Arkham but circumstances out of his control force him to spend a night there amidst a majority of unearthly looking people, the rank smell of dead fish, and an overall awful looking and rundown town. This leads to a horrific night in which he is being hunted. Innsmouth look indeed.

[fonz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nueva muestra del compromiso de Tanabe con su filosofía de adaptar fielmente a Lovecraft. Tanabe sigue atrincherado en su colina de la adaptación literal, dispuesto a morir en ella si hace falta a pesar de que relatos como éste, que contiene largos tramos de investigación sin acción, extensas conversaciones y un clímax que se toma su tiempo en llegar, parecen imposibles de adaptar literalmente sin caer en el ladrillo visual. Y Tanabe es capaz de salir airoso, incluso triunfante, gracias a sus tres puntos fuertes; la ambientación (la representación de Innsmouth resulta impactante y en lo visual casi debería ser canónica), su deslumbrante capacidad de representar lo monstruoso y el momento terrorífico, y el manejo de la tensión (la famosa escena nocturna de la huida de Gilman House). En estos tres aspectos Tanabe está poderosísimo y saca el tebeo adelante con contundencia, luciéndose incluso. Lo malo es que este enfoque también genera unos prescindibles textos de apoyo extraídos directamente del relato original, o un ritmo irregular del relato en algunos tramos. También se nota, por contraste, la flojera de Tanabe en los aspectos del tebeo más "aburridos", la narración de situaciones cotidianas como personajes conversando, o la representación de un personaje principal que, quizá por imposición del giro final, resulta especialmente plano y carente de expresividad.

[Абрахам Хосебр · Rating 5 out of 5]

Велика у всіх сенсах робота.
Я особливо очікував прочитання цієї адаптації майже на 500 сторінок.
І Танабе не розчарував - мої улюблені епізоди зображені навіть краще ніж в уяві!
А також дуже подобається цікава деталь, якої не було в тексті:
Коли мандрівник вперше бачить тіару, він підсвідомо посміхається!
Щоб це зобразити треба пропустити крізь себе цю повість і пережити її заново.
Одна з найкращих манґ одного з найкращих манґак в моєму списку!

[Ignacio · Rating 4 out of 5]

Me gusta mucho cómo Tanabe maneja el fondo negro, las tramas grisaceas y las manchas blancas para capturar la claustrofobia de la noche en Innsmouth. El clímax de otro relato canónico de Lovecraft en el que, también, peca de excesiva literalidad en su apego a la palabra para subrayar las acciones del narrador. Ese monólogo interior casi continuo contando sus percepciones y acciones me ha resultado molesto, así que he pasado de él para centrarme en el dibujo. Igual de inspirado para capturar la familiaridad de este horror más mundano como lo estaba para transmitir la extrañeza de lo abisal en Las montañas de la locura y El color que cayó del cielo.

[Drew Canole · Rating 5 out of 5]

Gou Tanabe does a fantastic job of adapting HP Lovecraft. Beautiful and terrifyingly creepy artwork. I haven't compared it directly to the text, but it does seem very faithful. A potential criticism is that this could be cut down a bit, 400+ pages is a bit too much. But I don't think so, the artwork is too good and the story's pacing was fantastic in my opinion.

[Rick Ray · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gou Tanabe adapts Lovecraft's only fully published book during his own lifetime, The Shadow Over Innsmouth. Lovecraft's xenophobia has long been known to readers, especially with how it gets reflected into his stories. The Shadow Over Innsmouth is a clear example of his well established fear of immigration and miscegenation, but also dips into one of Lovecraft's lesser known fears - that of mental degradation due to the onset of a possible hereditary connection to mental illness. Both of Lovecraft’s parents died after being institutionalized, and his fear of his own genetic destiny did seep into some of his stories. As such, the story of the small, secluded town of Innsmouth serves as an unsettling reflection of Lovecraft's two major fears blending into a parable about the imminent destruction of humanity seeded by its own proclivity for devolution.

The story is a bit of a slow burn to begin, though the premise is deeply haunting. The young narrator celebrates his recent coming of age by taking a tour of New England with the hopes of connecting to his familial roots. His journey leads him to the decrepit town of Innsmouth, Massachusetts, a former seaport isolated from other nearby towns by vast salt marshes and only accessible by one bus route. The inhabitants of Innsmouth are shunned individuals due to their froglike appearance and also a dark history involving government concentration camps and a pagan cult known as the Esoteric Order of Dagon. The tale is packed with all of Lovecraft's staples - odd names, invocations to elder gods, and underwater civilizations of mythical creatures. Though bringing it all together is the atmospheric tension as the narrator begins to realize just how trapped he is in the odd town.

Gou Tanabe does an incredibly faithful adaptation of the story, no different than his other Lovecraft adaptations. The moodiness of the story is well served by his artwork, which juggles the balance between showing just enough to elicit a sense of dread and also concealing what doesn't need to be seen. Lovecraft's novellas evoke a subtle horror that Tanabe simply understands really well. While this isn't quite as strong as his adaptation of At the Mountains of Madness , I still really enjoyed getting to read another well executed Lovecraft adaptation.

[B.J. Swann · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hands down the best graphic adaptation of a prose work I have ever encountered. Gou Tanabe's visuals are such a perfect realisation of HPL's prose that the result feels uncanny, almost eerie in it's perfection, as if Tanabe is channelling the graphic essence of the story through some form of witchcraft. This doesn't feel so much like an adaptation as like an organic extension of the original. Flawless.

I can only hope we are lucky enough to see an adaptation of The Dunwich Horror.

[Vicente Ribes · Rating 5 out of 5]

Una adaptación magnífica. El relato es el más terrorífico de Lovecraft y Tanabe capta el ambiente de la historia y la dibuja de diez.

[Przemysław Skoczyński · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tak jak poprzednio - Tanabe wie jak przerobić Lovecrafta na komiks, żeby nie wypadło sztucznie czy nudno. Całą tę serię najlepiej opisuje określenie "sprawna". Dobra rzecz

[Alberto Martín de Hijas · Rating 2 out of 5]

Una adaptación correcta pero con sus defectos: El dibujo representa muy bien Innsmouth y los que viven en ella, pero creo que el cómic tiene demasiadas páginas y un ritmo demasiado lento lo que la hace un poco pesada. Además, muchas veces se nos muestran los horrores del pueblo demasiado pronto y de forma muy explícita, lo que rompe el suspense y anula una de las virtudes de Lovecraft que era la creación de atmosferas más por la sugerencia que por la descripción. En fin, que no me termina de convencer.

[DRugh · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read Lovecraft’s story in its original form, and I found this graphic version deepened my appreciation of the work, especially the setting. I liked the original version better for internal dialogue of the protagonist, but I realize that graphic novels are limited in this aspect. I recommend reading both.

[daph pink ♡ · Rating 4 out of 5]

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️¼

Tanabe Gou really nailed The Shadow Over Innsmouth. Across these two volumes, he takes Lovecraft’s gloomy seaside paranoia and cranks it up with his signature inky, grotesque artwork. Volume 1 does a fantastic job setting the stage—slow, eerie, and dripping with atmosphere as we wander through the decaying town with its uncanny residents. Then Volume 2 slams the pedal, delivering a frantic chase through shadowy alleys and distorted faces that practically leap off the page.

The balance works beautifully: dread builds in the first half, then explodes in the second. Tanabe’s paneling is so cinematic it feels like watching a black-and-white horror film flicker to life. If I had one tiny gripe, it’s that the second volume barrels ahead so fast you barely get to soak in the creepiness before the chaos takes over—but maybe that’s also the point.

Overall, this duology is one of the most faithful and chilling manga takes on Lovecraft I’ve read. It captures both the atmosphere and the sheer panic of the story while still being accessible to manga readers. Highly recommend if you’re into horror, cosmic dread, or just beautifully grotesque art.

[Adrian · Rating 5 out of 5]

The insane yarn I was hearing interested me profoundly, for I fancied there was contained within it a sort of crude allegory based upon the strangenesses of Innsmouth and elaborated by an imagination at once creative and full of scraps of exotic legend. Not for a moment did I believe that the tale had any really substantial foundation; but none the less the account held a hint of genuine terror, if only because it brought in references to strange jewels clearly akin to the malign tiara I had seen at Newburyport. Perhaps the ornaments had, after all, come from some strange island; and possibly the wild stories were lies of the bygone Obed himself rather than of this antique toper.

Once again Gou Tanabe has created something truly outstanding. I have previously enjoyed his adaptations of H.P. Lovecraft's The Hound and Other Stories, H.P. Lovecraft's At the Mountains of Madness, Volume 1 and H.P. Lovecraft's At the Mountains of Madness, Volume 2

The artwork is beyond belief and really brings the story to life, including some stunning 2 page colour pieces which appear after chapter 5.

The story is a favourite of mine. A lone traveller is seeking to find out more about his family history by visiting Arkham. On his way he come across some strange artifacts when in Newburyport and learns of strange going-ons in the nearby port town of Innsmouth. Unable to afford the train fare, he instead chooses to use the local bus service which will pass through Innsmouth and allow him to investigate the tales he has heard.

On arrival he finds there is much more to the strange stories and is thrown into a nightmare beyond belief. What lurks below the Devil's reef?!

I took my time with this and savoured every page. The details draw the eyes back to previous panes and you find yourself going back over pages to pick up the subtle details contained within. I was left wanting more and luckily there is only a short wait until his take on H.P. Lovecraft's The Call of Cthulhu is released. 5 stars!

[Melissa Bresolin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a masterpiece that I will return to often.
Iä! Iä! Cthulhu! Fhtagn!

[Alicia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Delightfully spooky!

[Ryan 🪷 · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favourite so far of the Gou Tanabe adaptations. I still have “H.P Lovecraft’s The Hound and Other Stories” to read, but damn, this book was good!

[Dutchess · Rating 5 out of 5]

A brilliant adaptation of the original story. The manga remains expository, faithful to Lovecraft, but the exposition feels far more organic, and is often accompanied by grotesque and detailed illustrations.

Though I believe Lovecraft's most iconic work, The Call of Cthulhu, is worth reading on its own—no adaptation necessary—I hesitate to recommend many of his other stories. If you'd like to read one of the most influential horror stories of the last century but don't have the patience for Lovecraft's prose, read this instead.

And if adapting Lovecraft's best stories becomes Gou Tanabe’s life's work, I'm here for it.

[Hannah · Rating 4 out of 5]

gou tanabe's adaptations are the only way i want to read lovecraft. you get all the creeping cosmic horror without having to spend quite so much time in lovecraft's head/with his words, and the illustrations are stunning. tanabe does an excellent job capturing tension with the layout of his pages, sharply contrasting shadows, and unsettling imagery. i'll be thinking about that picture of the man hunched over the door with spiky shadows on the wall for a while. as i understand it, the whole point of a lot of lovecraft's work is that the beings are supposed to be unfathomable/you see it and you go mad, and I think adapting that can be pretty hit or miss. tanabe finds an excellent way to convey this by making the images both physically hard to look at and incredibly compelling. there's a staticky grid overlay on each panel, and the images themselves are grotesque. the detail is so fine and small and draws you to look closer to comprehend what's happening. many scenes - and not just those depicting the crowds of sea monsters - seem to move and writhe on the page. i was much more impressed by this one than the mountains of madness adaptation, and I'll definitely read more.

[Franziska (tintenklexxe) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eine wirklich gute Adaption mit schaurigen Zeichnungen.

[Paul Spence · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lovecraftian horror is its own currency. Many have attempted to tap into it and accrue its value, but the list of failures is longer than the list of successes. H.P. Lovecraft’s signature prose, dread-filled in its descriptions of unspeakable horrors, sets the bar high for those looking to bring the author’s Cthulhian gods into a visual medium. It takes a certain kind of nightmare vision to capture the essence of it. Japanese artist Gou Tanabe has proven to be on of the best one in achieving this. His latest Lovecraft adaptation, The Shadow Over Innsmouth, solidifies this claim.

The story, the only one to have been published in book form during Lovecraft’s lifetime, stands as one of the most popular from the author’s body of work. It follows a man who decides to stop at the fishing town of Innsmouth on his travels, a place known for housing a cult that runs by the name of The Esoteric Order of Dagon. The man is interested in the stories of deformed townsfolk and the strange artifacts they’ve accumulated over the years amidst rumours of devil worship and human sacrifice. His decision visits upon him a series of terrors that’ll consume not just his sanity but the very essence of reality as well. And then come the fish people.

Lovecraft stories tend to hold back on the expected eldritch horror in favour of mounting terrifying closing sequences that reveal their monsters in momentous fashion. Hints of the scarier things are sprinkled throughout, teasing the dimensions of the dark entities that hide on the edges of the seen. Innsmouth pulls the veil back earlier on, letting its monstrosities be a more present danger and a more constant reminder of the horror that’s taken residence in the corrupted fish town. Gou Tanabe takes full advantage of this to drop in as many creatures as possible whenever the opportunity arises.

Tanabe gives the town, its fish-looking inhabitants, and the demonic fish creatures that congregate around the infamous Devil Reef out in the sea a scaly texture that makes each page feel cursed. The town’s decrepit spirit is captured in meticulous detail and allowed to take command of the overall mood. Characters ooze dread, carrying a sense of cursed existentialism about them that comprehensively captures the essence of Lovecraft’s adjective-heavy prose. Tanabe has already proven to be a great student of Lovecraft’s storytelling inclinations and tendencies with adaptations such as In the Mountains of Madness. The Shadow Over Innsmouth is evidence of further mastery.

Special mention is owed to the creature designs. It’s here that Tanabe succeeds with confidence where many others falter. The otherworldly and ancient quality of Lovecraft’s monsters are given the twisted and macabre visualizations they deserve. In The Shadow Over Innsmouth, the amphibian look that permeates over the townsfolk and the sea creatures is given life with details that communicate centuries of story on visual level first. One look at them and you know a very old and wise kind of evil has taken over. They just possess a presence that makes holding the very pages they’re in a test of bravery.

Rows of sharp teeth, vicious claws, and menacing eyes feature in each individual drawing of the creatures, regardless of whether they’re at the forefront or in the background. Tanabe bottles that sense of myth and history Lovecraft imbues the cursed town with to the brim, producing one of the most faithful interpretations of the lore in existence. Only Stuart Gordon’s 2001 adaptation Dagon (which is an amalgamation of the titular short story with key parts of Shadow Over Innsmouth) comes close to reproducing Lovecraft’s terror as close to the original. The town and the creatures’ look in that film benefit from well-researched set designs and practical effects, which allowed Gordon to stick quite close to Lovecraft’s descriptions in his attempt to sell viewers on the terrors Lovecraft put on paper. But Tanabe goes further by giving a more complex sense of terror to the town’s backstory and the deals it struck with cosmically dangerous beings for bountiful but deceptive riches. In other words, Tanabe’s take is scarier.

Gou Tanabe’s The Shadow Over Innsmouth is a superior example of horror adaptation. It shows complete understanding of the source and an eagerness to terrify even further. It’s only second to the original, which is saying something. Replicating prose horror into sequential art horror is no small feat. That is, no small feat for anyone except Gou Tanabe.

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eigentlich gehört »Schatten über Innsmouth« gar nicht so recht zu meine Lovecraft-Lieblingsgeschichten. Ich glaube, es ist der Plot, der mich nicht so mitnimmt. Er ist schnell erzählt.

Ein Mann strandet in einer Stadt und stößt dort auf Monster.

Klar, Lovecraft baut in diese kurze Geschichte eine Menge Verweise auf seine anderen Storys ein, da stimmt schon. Aber in diesem Fall ist es trotzdem Gou Tanabe, der den Tag (oder besser: Die Atmosphäre) rettet.

Denn erst die Zeichnungen haben mich davon überzeugt, dass »Schatten über Innsmouth« auch richtig, richtig gut erzählt werden kann. Reduziert auf das Wesentliche und gehalten in Tanabes dunklen, farblos (lies: ohne Kolorierung) kann der lebensbedrohliche Druck des Protagonisten, der dicht unter der Oberfläche liegende Wahnsinn so richtig zur Geltung gebracht werden. Die Stadt selbst – wie viel besser der japanische Künstler sie zeigt als ich sie mir hätte vorstellen können! Ernsthaft … das hätte ich nicht gedacht. Auch seine Variante der Monster, ihre Gesichter und ihr Gang – der Mann hat die Essenz des Horrors verstanden.

Ich habe Lovecrafts Kurzgeschichten sicher schon einige Male gelesen. Und ich habe inzwischen einige von Tanabes Adaptionen durch. Aber einen Fall, wo ich den Manga deutlich vor dem ursprünglichen Text bevorzuge, hatte ich noch nie.

Daher meine ganz klare Empfehlung: Dieser Manga ist es absolut wert, 400 Seiten mit ihm zu verbringen. Fünf bis sechs davon mögen unnötig sein – aber der Rest war zumindest für mich ein wahrer Augenöffner.

[Jonathan Houle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Il est complexe de traiter de ce livre sans révéler la conclusion, comme tout se joue dans les derniers chapitres. C'est le récit adapté de l'auteur d'horreur H.P. Lovecraft en mode BD, réalisé par le Japonais Gou Tanabe. L'intrigue suit un jeune homme passionné par l'histoire qui découvre l'existence d'une commune non répertoriée appelée Innsmouth, située sur sa trajectoire initiale vers Arkham. Cette ville est entourée de mystères sur son passé et les habitants restants, en plus d'être évitée par les habitants locaux de Massachusetts qui sont apeurés par les rumeurs de satanisme, sacrifices et plus encore. Par simple curiosité sur son histoire, son architecture et son anthropologie, il empruntera le bus afin d'y effectuer un court arrêt dans l'objectif d'y obtenir davantage d'informations. Bien que le récit comporte quelques passages assez lents, l'adaptation visuelle et la conclusion sont tous les deux significativement captivantes.

[Jose San · Rating 3 out of 5]

“Un clásico por atmósfera, irregular por ejecución: interesante para fans, prescindible para neófitos.”

“La sombra sobre Innsmouth”, funciona mejor por su atmósfera que por su historia. Lovecraft compone un pueblo costero decadente lleno de miradas huidizas, fachadas podridas y ritos innombrables.

La historia o viaje del narrador va deshilando un secreto antiguo ligado al mar que termina alcanzándolo a él mismo, a través de su familia.

Lo mejor es el ambiente opresivo y la sensación de amenaza creciente, más la forma en que integra el mito de Dagón/los Profundos dentro del ciclo de los Mitos de Cthulhu.

No me parece una obra imprescindible, pero sí una pieza curiosa para quien disfrute del horror cósmico y los pueblos malditos; recomendable para completar el mapa de los Mitos, no como puerta de entrada.

[Jonathan de Regt · Rating 4 out of 5]

You know I think that good horror comics are often the ones that conceal rather than show everything. Take Junji Ito for example, another Japanese horror manga artist. When he draws his abhorrent-looking creatures, the artist shows us every little detail. This way, there's an initial moment of shock as one sees a grotesque drawing, but this feeling is fleeting, it doesn't last. The way Gou Tanabe draws Innsmouth and its fishy inhabitants, makes the horror last until the last page. By concealing a lot of his drawings in black shadows, one starts to wonder what other horrors might be Lurking in the darkness. And as all Lovecraft fans know, "The greatest fear, is the fear of the unknown."

[Mr. Twinkie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I believe most horror stories benefits from a visual media. Most writers don't seem capable of conveying fear that is in any way equal to what movies or drawings can do. This go for whether you are Stephen King or Lovecraft. Without the film adaptation of King's many novels I would have forgotten most of his stories. Thus seeing a Manga version of Lovecraft's classic Innsmouth story made me curious.

It is a pretty solid adaptation. Drawings are black and white, and the zoom-in effects works exceptionally well. I enjoyed reading the story which was clear and understandable through the whole book.

Whether the same can be said about Tanabe's adaptation of At the Mountain of Madness remains to be seen, but I am looking forward to reading it as well.

[Benjamin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perfect Adaptation of Lovecraft's Story

Gou Tanabe has been making probably the best manga/comic adaptations of Lovecraft's works recently, and this depiction of "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" is by far the best.
Tanabe really captures visually what Lovecraft was conveying via the text of the original story. Innsmouth is decrepit and rotting, the locals are sinister, and the deep ones are hideous. And, as always, Tanabe's art is of the highest quality.
I can't recommend this enough, and I eagerly await whatever adaptation he does next.