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Day of the Flying Head
144 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2017
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About the author
Shintaro Kago
146 books361 followersKago Shintarō ( 駕籠真太郎) is a Japanese illustrator and manga artist. Kano was born in Tokyo in 1969. He debuted in 1988 on the magazine COMIC BOX. Since then his comics, usually short stories, have been published in several adult manga magazines, gaining him considerable popularity around the world.
Kago specialises in ero-guro, a Japanese visual genre that puts its focus on eroticism, sexual corruption, and grotesque body horror. Many of Kago's manga have strongly satirical overtones, and deal with grotesque subjects such as extreme sex, scatology and body modification. His unique style has been called "fashionable paranoia".
Kago specialises in ero-guro, a Japanese visual genre that puts its focus on eroticism, sexual corruption, and grotesque body horror. Many of Kago's manga have strongly satirical overtones, and deal with grotesque subjects such as extreme sex, scatology and body modification. His unique style has been called "fashionable paranoia".
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
April 17, 2025
Day of the Flying Head
A manga by Shintaro Kago that collects four stories about flying heads.
That's pretty much the longest summary I can give for this manga... None of the stories have any dialogue and even though it's 144 pages, I was able to read it in about half an hour or so. That's certainly not a negative, because it was a very fun and surreal half hour. A horror comic/manga without any dialogue or narration isn't a particularly original idea, but Shintaro Kago does it in a way that feels extremely unique. His artwork is gorgeous. It's at the same time very simple, yet detailed and cute, yet grotesque and disturbing. These contradictory qualities make his art stand out and work well enough to carry the entire story with fantastic pacing. It's hard to actually understand exactly what's happening in each story, but Kago is still able to make them fun and also horrifying, while also including a lot of social critique, with a society that uses flying heads as a source of energy (???) and reaches a state of idleness very close to the one humans reach in "WALL•E".
Overall, this was a short but fascinating read, not only thanks to Kago's gorgeous artwork, but also thanks to the fascinating story.
8.5/10
A manga by Shintaro Kago that collects four stories about flying heads.
That's pretty much the longest summary I can give for this manga... None of the stories have any dialogue and even though it's 144 pages, I was able to read it in about half an hour or so. That's certainly not a negative, because it was a very fun and surreal half hour. A horror comic/manga without any dialogue or narration isn't a particularly original idea, but Shintaro Kago does it in a way that feels extremely unique. His artwork is gorgeous. It's at the same time very simple, yet detailed and cute, yet grotesque and disturbing. These contradictory qualities make his art stand out and work well enough to carry the entire story with fantastic pacing. It's hard to actually understand exactly what's happening in each story, but Kago is still able to make them fun and also horrifying, while also including a lot of social critique, with a society that uses flying heads as a source of energy (???) and reaches a state of idleness very close to the one humans reach in "WALL•E".
Overall, this was a short but fascinating read, not only thanks to Kago's gorgeous artwork, but also thanks to the fascinating story.
8.5/10
October 5, 2024
I never thought a manga with no dialogue or wording of any kind would be such an interesting experience!
This is totally brilliant and horrifying!
Kago has such a unique style, with "cute" faces but totally disturbing gore, which I absolutely adore!
This is totally brilliant and horrifying!
Kago has such a unique style, with "cute" faces but totally disturbing gore, which I absolutely adore!
Read
April 24, 20263.25 ⭐️
This reminded me of gory OVAs from the 90s with SF novelties, such as a tribe of flying head people attacking a food processing facility. Silly, but fun.
This reminded me of gory OVAs from the 90s with SF novelties, such as a tribe of flying head people attacking a food processing facility. Silly, but fun.
October 4, 2023
READ FOR THE SPOOKY SMART BITCH READATHOON 2023, CHECK OUT THE READING VLOG HERE:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4VP_...
This is my first Shintaro Kago book like… ever! It’s a really interesting piece of art, pretty fucked up, but very fun. If you want to see my reaction to reading this check out the reading vlog hehe 😊
This is my first Shintaro Kago book like… ever! It’s a really interesting piece of art, pretty fucked up, but very fun. If you want to see my reaction to reading this check out the reading vlog hehe 😊
February 11, 2024
Junji Ito's success opened the way to the west for other Japanese authors. Shintaro Kago is one of those.
Kago's illustrations are amazing. This guy has an imagination out of this world. You think Ito is crazy? Wait to see this guy. His creativity is something else.
This is basically a group of stories around flying heads and their potential, I guess. 😅
While the drawings are grotesque, the level of nonsense is so high that it ends up being more fun than scary. Although some people might be more sensible about how graphic some things are.
I lost count of how many times I thought "what the hell". 😅
Fun read. Great illustrations.
Kago's illustrations are amazing. This guy has an imagination out of this world. You think Ito is crazy? Wait to see this guy. His creativity is something else.
This is basically a group of stories around flying heads and their potential, I guess. 😅
While the drawings are grotesque, the level of nonsense is so high that it ends up being more fun than scary. Although some people might be more sensible about how graphic some things are.
I lost count of how many times I thought "what the hell". 😅
Fun read. Great illustrations.
March 22, 2022
Absolute madman Shintaro Kago's take on the myths of Southeast Asia like the Thai Krasue.
Zero dialogue, as Kago lets his manic, grotesque art carry everything. Kago comes up with the most disgusting, surreal images imaginable, and this is no exception.
Not for the faint of heart, as it is violent and disgusting, but Kago is so talented and original it's worth seeing just for the absolute weirdness within.
Zero dialogue, as Kago lets his manic, grotesque art carry everything. Kago comes up with the most disgusting, surreal images imaginable, and this is no exception.
Not for the faint of heart, as it is violent and disgusting, but Kago is so talented and original it's worth seeing just for the absolute weirdness within.
February 7, 2026
This was some really solid absurdist fun. It develops a farcical series of continuously escalating bits where a strange chemical byproduct causes people's heads to shoot out of their bodies and take flight, with their entrails hanging below them Penanggalan style.
There's no internal logic to be found here but the sheer quantity of intricately rendered gorey nonsense is enough to make this a good time. The variety in settings also made for some added novelty with futurist backdrops utilized alongside wildlife populated rural villages and subterranean caverns.
There's no internal logic to be found here but the sheer quantity of intricately rendered gorey nonsense is enough to make this a good time. The variety in settings also made for some added novelty with futurist backdrops utilized alongside wildlife populated rural villages and subterranean caverns.
May 1, 2023
I don't know what I was surprised to find how literal this title was to the actual plot. Shintaro Kago's artwork screams a measured insanity that only he is capable of conjuring. There's no words, simply just the raw bizarreness that is Kago's artwork. It's disgusting body horror dialed all the way up and I couldn't take my eyes off of it for even a moment. This may not be Kago's best book, or even artwork, but it's everything people love about him distilled into one collection.
January 29, 2023
Bizarre, wildly imaginative and utterly disgusting. Everything I want and expect from Shintaro.
July 18, 2025
Grotesque but good drawings and imagination, but I just feel repulse?
April 29, 2025
8/10
In recent years the underground Italian publisher Hollow Press has commissioned comics from the Japanese cartoonist Shintaro Kago. In the Japanese comics industry all stories are the result of an interaction between the artist and the magazine/publisher editor. That happens even at the less mainstream levels of the medium, where a bizarre erotic-horror mangaka like Kago operates. On the other hand, publishing with a tiny (and a bit amateurish, see end of review) Western publisher allows Kago to go even more free than usual with his weirdness. Let's be clear: no editorial interference can be bad for most mangaka. But in the case of this experienced imaginative creator the results are pretty satisfying. I honestly prefer these recent works of Kago to his oldest more famous ones, such as the stories collected in Fraction. One reason above all: the author is avoiding balloons for these Italian publications, showcasing an impressive ability to handle wordless comics storytelling. Such narrative aspect, plus an increasing cartoony roundness in character designs and pastel colouring* on some stories, makes these recent stories somehow akin to a certain European, especially French comic scene. Kago's signature style is still retained, nonetheless.
(*The stories in the book I am reviewing here are all in black and white, though.)
Days of the flying heads collects four 32-pages long stories around the same visual theme. In south-east Asia (Malaysia, Indonesia, and so on) they have this myth of a monster which is a flying head with all the bowers and internal organs attached to it. There was a short Hellboy story on the subject, for instance. This folk ghost tale is pretty gross, perfectly in line with Kago visual obsession for 'visceral' body horror. Indeed, the guy has used the idea in a number of stories in the past. This time around, he gives a dark sci-fi spin to it: if there was a chemical allowing head and bowels of a living creature to separate from the rest of the body, which unethical screwed-up ways mankind would find to exploit this phenomenon? Warfare, genocide, exploitation of the man by the man, animal cruelty, economic greediness, you name it. Kago embeds the floating head folktale into sci-fi landscapes to explore the dark sides of civilisation. This is a book of body horror as well as anthropological horror.
In a couple of stories a young female heroine rises from the horror to seek revenge against society. You can read some feminist allure there. Alternatively, you can just interpret it as Kago's usual interest in dismembering cute young girls in anatomic and geometrical absurd ways. Maybe a bit of both? In any case, none of the four stories have a definitive happy ending, although some vaguely hopeful moments are seeded here and there.
It is impossible not to see a certain degree of social criticism in this book, but I would not over-read into it. I still think of these stories mostly as fuck-up divertissements of an imaginative visual artist. The cartoony style makes the stories a bit more digestible. Or maybe makes them even more disturbing. I guess that depends on the perspective of the single reader.
[Bit of a rant: I commend Hollow Press for bringing these new Kago works to light, but I have some criticisms on the product of the book. Hollow Press uses very thick stock paper, which combined with alleged 'limited prints' (1000 copies for this one, for instance), makes these books slightly pricey. Personally, I would prefer to have thinner paper and spend 10 euros for just 140 pages, rather than 20 euros. But ok, fair enough. My real problem is with the poor quality of the reproduction. I can clearly see the pixellation of the lines! This printing is quite amateurish. I would suggest Hollow Press to find a better balance in the production. Maybe spend less on the thick semi-gloss paper, which is not really necessary for a black and white book and spend a bit more attention on properly print files in higher quality resolution? Another problem with the publisher is the absence of a barcode, which makes these stuff unavailable in regular bookstores or online places like Amazon. The only way to buy Hollow Press books is from the publisher itself. Basically, from one dude who runs the thing. This makes shipping costs significant outside of the EU. No, even just outside of Italy! Am I a romantic naïve in thinking that comics - especially self-proclaimed 'alternative' comics - should be easily accessible, rather than being produced to quickly become 'collectors item'. Because this is the vibe that I get from this publisher.]
In recent years the underground Italian publisher Hollow Press has commissioned comics from the Japanese cartoonist Shintaro Kago. In the Japanese comics industry all stories are the result of an interaction between the artist and the magazine/publisher editor. That happens even at the less mainstream levels of the medium, where a bizarre erotic-horror mangaka like Kago operates. On the other hand, publishing with a tiny (and a bit amateurish, see end of review) Western publisher allows Kago to go even more free than usual with his weirdness. Let's be clear: no editorial interference can be bad for most mangaka. But in the case of this experienced imaginative creator the results are pretty satisfying. I honestly prefer these recent works of Kago to his oldest more famous ones, such as the stories collected in Fraction. One reason above all: the author is avoiding balloons for these Italian publications, showcasing an impressive ability to handle wordless comics storytelling. Such narrative aspect, plus an increasing cartoony roundness in character designs and pastel colouring* on some stories, makes these recent stories somehow akin to a certain European, especially French comic scene. Kago's signature style is still retained, nonetheless.
(*The stories in the book I am reviewing here are all in black and white, though.)
Days of the flying heads collects four 32-pages long stories around the same visual theme. In south-east Asia (Malaysia, Indonesia, and so on) they have this myth of a monster which is a flying head with all the bowers and internal organs attached to it. There was a short Hellboy story on the subject, for instance. This folk ghost tale is pretty gross, perfectly in line with Kago visual obsession for 'visceral' body horror. Indeed, the guy has used the idea in a number of stories in the past. This time around, he gives a dark sci-fi spin to it: if there was a chemical allowing head and bowels of a living creature to separate from the rest of the body, which unethical screwed-up ways mankind would find to exploit this phenomenon? Warfare, genocide, exploitation of the man by the man, animal cruelty, economic greediness, you name it. Kago embeds the floating head folktale into sci-fi landscapes to explore the dark sides of civilisation. This is a book of body horror as well as anthropological horror.
In a couple of stories a young female heroine rises from the horror to seek revenge against society. You can read some feminist allure there. Alternatively, you can just interpret it as Kago's usual interest in dismembering cute young girls in anatomic and geometrical absurd ways. Maybe a bit of both? In any case, none of the four stories have a definitive happy ending, although some vaguely hopeful moments are seeded here and there.
It is impossible not to see a certain degree of social criticism in this book, but I would not over-read into it. I still think of these stories mostly as fuck-up divertissements of an imaginative visual artist. The cartoony style makes the stories a bit more digestible. Or maybe makes them even more disturbing. I guess that depends on the perspective of the single reader.
[Bit of a rant: I commend Hollow Press for bringing these new Kago works to light, but I have some criticisms on the product of the book. Hollow Press uses very thick stock paper, which combined with alleged 'limited prints' (1000 copies for this one, for instance), makes these books slightly pricey. Personally, I would prefer to have thinner paper and spend 10 euros for just 140 pages, rather than 20 euros. But ok, fair enough. My real problem is with the poor quality of the reproduction. I can clearly see the pixellation of the lines! This printing is quite amateurish. I would suggest Hollow Press to find a better balance in the production. Maybe spend less on the thick semi-gloss paper, which is not really necessary for a black and white book and spend a bit more attention on properly print files in higher quality resolution? Another problem with the publisher is the absence of a barcode, which makes these stuff unavailable in regular bookstores or online places like Amazon. The only way to buy Hollow Press books is from the publisher itself. Basically, from one dude who runs the thing. This makes shipping costs significant outside of the EU. No, even just outside of Italy! Am I a romantic naïve in thinking that comics - especially self-proclaimed 'alternative' comics - should be easily accessible, rather than being produced to quickly become 'collectors item'. Because this is the vibe that I get from this publisher.]
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews