Ultra-Gash Inferno

by Suehiro Maruo, James Havoc (Translator), Takako Hiroishi (Translator)

With influences ranging from 19th century atrocity prints to the Sex Pistols, and obsessions with horror, scatology and human freaks, Maruo has taken the "erotic-grotesque" (ero-guro) style of manga, a unique fusion of sex and violence to its ultimate extreme. ?? Ultra-Gash Inferno is the ultimate compendium of Suehiro Maruo's most shocking and graphically precise work, containing nine psycho-nightmares never before translated and published in English. With a translation by James Havoc (author of Butchershop In The Sky ) and Takako Shinkado, and an introduction by Romain Slocombe, Ultra-Gash Inferno is a revelatory cross-cultural event in comic-book publishing. ?? Suehiro Maruo is also the author of Camelia Girl (published in English as Mr Arashi's Amazing Freak Show ). ?? Parental discretion advised. ??

Genres: Manga, Comics, Horror, Graphic Novels, Japan, Art, Erotica

216 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 2001

About the author

Suehiro Maruo ( 丸尾 末広) is a Japanese manga author and illustrator.
Maruo graduated from junior high school in March 1972 but dropped out of senior high school. At the age of 15 he moved to Tokyo and began working for a bookbinder. At 17, he made his first manga submission to Weekly Shōnen Jump, but it was considered by the editors to be too graphic for the magazine's format and was subsequently rejected. Maruo temporarily removed himself from manga until November 1980 when he made his official debut as a manga artist in Ribon no Kishi (リボンの騎士) at the age of 24. It was at this stage that the young artist was finally able to pursue his artistic vision without such stringent restrictions over the visual content of his work. Two years later, his first stand-alone anthology, Barairo no Kaibutsu (薔薇色の怪物; Rose Colored Monster) was published.

Maruo was a frequent contributor to the legendary underground manga magazine Garo (ガロ).

Like many manga artists, Maruo sometimes makes cameo appearances in his own stories. When photographed, he seldom appears without his trademark sunglasses.
Though most prominently known for his work as a manga artist, Maruo has also produced illustrations for concert posters, CD Jackets, magazines, novels, and various other media. Some of his characters have been made into figures as well.

Though relatively few of Maruo's manga have been published outside of Japan, his work enjoys a cult following abroad.
His book Shōjo Tsubaki (aka Mr. Arashi's Amazing Freak Show) has been adapted into an animated film (Midori) by Hiroshi Harada with a soundtrack by J.A. Seazer, but it has received very little release.

Reviews

[Jon Nakapalau · Rating 4 out of 5]

VERY INTENSE - not for the faint of heart. Please look up Suehiro Maruo before you buy this book; it will quite possibly contain the most horrific 'comic' images you will ever see. There is no subject that is taboo in this book - definitely not for children. Individuals with strong religious convictions will be deeply offended.

[Zenia Detishera Rianto · Rating 5 out of 5]

THE BEST EROTIC GROTESQUE MANGA I'VE EVER READ. EH-VER.

I am madly in love with Ero-guro (that stands for erotic grotesque, mainly focus on eroticism, weird fetishes, decapitation, disembowelment, sexual exploitation, well basically... more morbid than the typical horror. things that i can only stand on Manga & Anime). The first horror manga i was deeply involved with is Junji Ito's Mimi No Kaidan But i wasn't even sure if its a ero-guro, there's no erotic scene on the manga. and it's not that gore. then, i was enslaved with Junji Ito's art. And i did some research on him, collecting his art-work and all. even sometimes i fantasized about collaborating with him. (i'm not that creative though). Junji Ito's art is different from Kazuo Umezu or Hideshi Hino. They both are a respectable horror manga artist, with Hideshi Hino behind his snuff films and Kazuo Umezu with his masterpiece, The Drifting Classroom.

But my fateful encounter with Suehiro Maruo was when i accidentally found him on my cellphone screen. Then i clicked on him and went to his page. Then i searched for one of his masterpiece, Mr. Arashi's Freakshow and found the anime (Midori) which directed by Hiroshi Harada on youtube. the anime has left me dumbfounded (because the film was considered as a lost film) I watched it and shuddered in an instant. Maruo-sama has introduced me to ero-guro, and i was addicted to them. I've found a website where we can read guro mangas, and i've read Ultra Gash Inferno.

IT WAS DISGUSTINGLY BEAUTIFUL. there are 9 chapters; he divided it gorgeously. you might want to run in horror when you reach chapter 2. This book has scarred my life. a beautiful scar i left it open for people to see, how this book changed my life forever.

[Charles Dee Mitchell · Rating 4 out of 5]

If your own nightmares have not been up to par of late, I recommend you take a look at this book. Suehiro Maruo (B. 1956) is the master of ero-guro (erotic grotesque) manga. I first read his book-length work Mr. Arashi's Amazing Freak Show. It was an outrageous grand guignol of misery, weirdness, and degradation. But compared to Ultra Gash Infrerno, it was Saturday matinee material.

This volume contains nine stories from the 1980's to 1993. Possibly they have been chosen for English translation to give the uninitiated an extreme immersion into Maruo's world. Or they may be typical. Titles like "Putrid Night," "Shit Soup", and "Voyeur in the Attic" let you know what you are getting in for. I doubt that characters like Spiderman and The Hulk need fear being replaced by Sewer Boy or The Great Masturbator in the hearts of the American reading public.

Maruo's work is elegantly drawn and according to commentators has its roots in everything from 1930's Japanese children's books to atrocity prints of the 19th century. I'll have to take their word for it. He excels at gore, sex, and combinations of the two. Female characters endure sex acts that leave them bloodied and injured, but they are capable of graphic revenge. In various stories, eyes are gouged, limbs lopped off, and wounds opened for reasons I will leave to your imagination. For me the scatology and coprophilia were the most disturbing elements. Moments of "Sewer Boy" struck me as merely disgusting. But maybe that is because it is the second story in the book and I hadn't yet been mentally whipped into submission. The essentially plotless "Shit Soup," on the other hand, was a beautifully rendered nightmare of degrading, repulsive images. Often with this sort of material, when I have encountered it in films, anime, or books, I have asked myself, "Is this trip really necessary?" I think to say something like, "Maruo's elegance and economy of style elevates his material to realm of poetry," risks making one sound ridiculous. But I never felt he was asking me to wallow in filthy junk. I never felt like some teenager getting a thrill from watching Faces of Death.

"Non-Resistance City" (1993) is the longest story in the book. It take place during the American occupation, a time Maruo did not experience first hand but he would have known from the films of Shohei Imamura, Nagisa Oshima, and the photography of Daido Moriyama. Maruo's story chronicles rape, social degradation, and ultimately cannibalism. It also contains an evil dwarf, a type of character he used often.

Maruo's is a dark grotesque that reminds me of when Joel Peter Witkin first seemed like he was going to be a serious artist. Witkin isn't holding up over time. I am curious to see more of Maruo.

[Tosh · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first discovered Maruo Suehiro's art/manga comics while staying in Japan. Without a doubt I think he is one of the great contemporary artists from Japan. Extremely violent and sexual -and lot of his subject matters deal with japanese movie stars from the 30's juxtoposed with a retro-contemporary setting.

There is the cute Japan, and then there is the Japan horror - and Suehiro is a master of horror. His artwork is exceptional! Fantastic!

[Sam (superblomper) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Did not age well, but his art style is really cool.

[Talie · Rating 5 out of 5]

" اینجا جایی است که باتای با رامپو دیدار می‌کند. جایی که خون و عرق جاری میشود و با کام قاطی میشود." جایی که کیر کیهانی خورشید آشکار می‌شود. جایی که کس چشم درمیاورد و چشم خورده‌ میشود. سوپ مدوفوع و گوشت بدن انسان غذای محبوبی است. جایی که زخم های چرک ژاپن بعد از جنگ جهانی دوم زیر سلطه‌ی امریکا گل می‌دهد.

[Jon Ureña · Rating 4 out of 5]

If there was such a thing as hell, and one of its inhabitants was able to render spontaneously his psychosexual nightmares into a manga format, something like this graphic novel would pop into existence. This manga is you-can't-tell-people-you're-reading-this disturbing. Although the collection contains a curious amount of eye-related incidents, it goes way beyond shoving eyeballs into vaginas, which is almost a joke in this post-Bataille world.

Most of the short stories come close to hallucinatory non-sequiturs, but the last one, about a midget who's trying to seduce a beautiful woman left behind in post-war Japan along with her young son, is haunting me already. The author seems to have about as much faith in human beings as I do, and it's always nice to come across a kindred spirit.

For those people interested in exploring their darkest impulses even if they risk realizing, "Fuck, I'm into this", this one is a classic.

[Stefanie Von Guest · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is something to behold, how hardcore are these stories? Especially the last one, though lacking in turd eating, I found it to be more disturbing. I also very much enjoy the artwork style, detailed and deliciously grotesque in its depictions. Gotta admit I certainly have a thing for the older style of manga.. not all too keen on the big-eyed-kawaii style you see floating around a lot.

Certainly will try to track down more of this author/artists work.

[Rahul]

I left it in middle.
WTF, goes on to the mind of the creator while creating this. I earlier found a similar kind of manga, and left it in the middle. It is pure sexual horror and definitely not recommended.

[Granit Hysiqi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eyeball after eyeball after eyeball after eyeball...

[Hagar · Rating 4 out of 5]

Grotesque beauty and surreal violence, packaged up in your psychosexual nightmares.

[Narges · Rating 5 out of 5]

The most disturbing thing I’ve ever read and seen..

[Luke · Rating 2 out of 5]

So, I've read a couple of Suehiro Maruo titles before. You know, extreme ero-guro (don't google that, frankly) manga that pushes boundaries and buttons.

I'm not easily shocked, and I knew what to expect, so I figured this one should be more of the same: perhaps not great, but interesting nonetheless.

Unfortunately, Ultra-Gash Inferno is pretty much the worst Maruo I've come across. But not because it's shocking, or full of perhaps transgressive material – Ooh, cow eyes in vaginas! Woah, coprophagy! Ripper, golden showers! – but largely because it's boring.



Yes, I am aware I'm calling a book containing stories with titles such as "Shit Soup" and "The Great Masturbator" boring, but here we are. Because frankly, it is. This collection, while executed with the same fastidiously odd art – a mix of Expressionist weirdness and Taisho chic – comes across as disjointed. It reaches for profundity, to some degree, but then undoes itself with teenage orgies and a whole lot of shit eating interludes.



(That's without getting into the dumped child that survives – nay! thrives! – in open-pit sewers who decides that bringing potential shags into his world of waste is somehow a good thing.)



I was frustrated with this collection. It spans the better part of 12 years, and while no story's longer than about 20 pages, they tend to not go anywhere, instead circling back to either surrealism, the author's peccadilloes or a trashbag amalgam of both.



"If in doubt, lick some eyeballs" seems to be a pretty well instituted rule in this collection, as does "offer women fuck-all agency and exploit the shit out of them" – this is actual exploitative work, and I suppose I wasn't as affected by it as the author might've intended because it came across as so much but do you see? do you see? posturing. It's the sort of thing teenage me, devouring slasher flicks might've found intriguing, but these days it's neither big nor clever, no matter how much fine line work goes into its construction.



(I'm pretty sure the version I read had a fair bit of censorship applied. Either that or there's some fucking woeful blocking decisions been made during production.)



There's a modicum of interest held by the last (and most recent) story in the collection, "Non-Resistance City" which I found a bit diverting. But for the most part this feels like provocation for the sake of it. It looks great, but tastes shitty.



Maruo probably likes it that way.

[Anna Kļaviņa · Rating 3 out of 5]

8 short stories: Putrid Night, Sewer boy, A Season in Hell, Shit soup, The Great Masturbrator, Putrid Night: Raven of Oedipus, Sewer boy: Paradise, Voyeur in the attic + a longer story Non-resistance City.

The short stories are meh but the Non-resistance City is really good.

Keep in mind that stories are full of violence & sex and that sex & violence are happening in the same time.

The art 5*, the short stories 2*, the last story 4*.

[Derek Royal · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of several of Maruo's short comics. Whereas The Strange Tale of Panorama Island is relatively soft or tame when it comes to ero-guro, the stories in this book are much more explicit. Yow! And as with Maruo's other books that I've read, the art is fabulous, clear and sharply defined.

[Darcofi · Rating 2 out of 5]

Demasiado. No me interesa.

[Mo Mukherjee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Most of the collection is arranged like poetry, which sort of works to soften the blow of the admirably grotesque and sexually explicit stories. Some of the stories are pretty funny: the penultimate entry (the title escapes me) and the sewer boy stories are funny in a sort of “haha what the FUCK” way.

Others, like “The Great Masturbator” aren’t so funny but feel self aware about the disturbing content. The Great Masturbator opens with a creepy narrator telling you a story about his hometown which rapidly descends into his own depraved and bewildering fantasy. It sort of makes you feel a little complicit: you opened this expecting to appreciate the art and laugh at gross poo jokes, except isn’t it a little fucked up you would seek this out at all? What does that say about you? Are you really different from the narrator? It’s a deeply uncomfortable notion that the collection toys with.

The other stories feel like very disgusting haikus, that make disturbing observations about sex and violence. The opening story toys with the idea of the pornography of power, where a wealthy man tortures his wife from an impoverished family, allows her to falsely believe her lover can save her, and then he gets off on his wife and her lover comforting each other as they bleed to death. It’s FUCKED, though I felt like the gore wasn’t being used for no reason: Maruo’s eye for composition is never beautiful, but it feels just calculated enough to suggest a deeper intellectual and artistic depth to his stories.

Another story that struck me was about a girl taking care of a man (her father?) with no limbs. Fans of the film Audition will be familiar with the image. It sort of plays on the codependency of caring for a disabled person and the disturbing nature of a dynamic. This one got under my skin a little, since I’ve taken care of people and have people taken care of me and the resentment/worry/needling codependency is familiar, though not to the extremes that Maruo takes it.

The centerpiece and best story in this collection is by far “Nonresistance City”. At 82 pages it’s about 4x longer than most of the other stories in this book, and roughly half the length of the collection. This story made me think to myself “I’m going to hell for reading this, aren’t I?” Which I think is in a sense the sought after feeling when looking up extreme art, though it’s not one I’d wish upon an enemy. I’ll summarize it below since I wouldn’t recommend you read it lest you feel as awful as I do now.

Broadly, this story is about the relationship between a wife of a missing soldier and a dwarf porn star in the days after Japan lost world war 2. It considers and portrays the extreme poverty and the disturbing, insect logic of surviving under what amounted to American imperialism. The dynamic between the woman and the dwarf was intriguing: the dwarf wants her to love him, but she wants to survive with her son until her missing husband returns from the war. Eventually the dwarf’s desire for her leads him to commit what is somehow the most unspeakable and awful act in this comic full of unspeakable and awful acts. He kills and cannibalizes her son and sleeps with her by manipulating her fear af her son’s disappearance.

Perhaps this felt horrific because every other bad thing in this collection happens to paper thin characters that work as stand ins for abstract concepts. Both the dwarf and the woman feel real— and that’s why it sucks the air out of your lungs to see this story end the way it does. Eventually, the dwarf is caught and is chased away. The best page of the collection is during this sequence: Maruo zooms in on flies picking apart a dead cicada(?) only to shift to an image of a crowd of Japanese people waving the rising sun flag. It’s a powerful image. The crowd is chasing after the dwarf to kill him, but he disappears— he’s just one more violent man lost to history. A stain on a wall like the shadows of Hiroshima. The story ends with the woman’s husband returning, and the woman realizes she is pregnant with the dwarf’s child. She disembowels herself and thinks about disappearing into the wall like all the others that died before her.

This story made me queasy and uncomfortable in a way I don’t think any art has. It’s probably the grittiest and most unflinching look at one of the ugliest periods of human history. It made me consider how I’m complicit in evil— am I an insect picking apart a corpse? Am I going to hell for reading something this sadistic and seeing artistic value in it? Is my belief that I got something intellectually profound out of the book enough to redeem the fact that I just looked into the depths of human depravity *for fun*? Any work of art that makes me introspect this much has to be doing something right— Maruo’s nihilistic and incisive art speaks to *something* real and undeniable, it’s just that whatever it is is something we probably are happier not facing.

It’s capital G Great Art— I had a miserable time reading and reviewing it. The introduction by Romain Slocombe describes the sensation of reading these stories as “falling in to [Maruo’s] world”. I think that’s a good way of putting it. I’ve fallen into Maruo’s world— I wonder if I’ll ever be out of it.

[Yureka Eric Johnson · Rating 4 out of 5]

inspired ass to ass AND poop back and forth forever

[Taeriza Jadezy PLOYZ · Rating 1 out of 5]

1.25 / 5

ส่วนตัวคือเรื่องนี้โหดสุด โหดกว่าเรื่องที่ Midori อีกเป็น 9 เรื่องสั้น อ่านแล้วชวนอาเจียน หดหู่ไม่ไหว ติดตาไปหลายภาพเลย วิปริตขยะแขยงมากๆ เข้าไม่ถึงแนว Ero Guro แบบนี้จริงๆชวนอาเจียนหลายรอบ ชอบแค่งานศิลป์ล้วนๆ ส่วนตัวขอให้คะแนนเท่านี้เพราะเข้าไม่ถึงแนวรุนแรงหรือเนื้อหาประมาณนี้ โหดกว่านิยายหรือมังงะฆาตกรรมหลายๆเรื่องที่เคยอ่านเลย

ปล. ขอบคุณข้อมูล Salmon Podcast มากทำให้เข้าใจแนว Ero Guro มากขึ้นมีการอธิบายประวัติและงานศิลป์ได้ดีมาก และขอบคุณช่อง Uncanny Boy ที่สรุปสปอยได้อย่างเข้าใจ เพราะบางตอนคือไม่อ่านไม่จบข้ามไปทนดอ่านไม่ได้

[rob · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a quiet piece full of subtle restraint and well-rounded female characters.

OK, I can't do that. The problem with ero-guro is that it doesn't "scare" like other comix because, well, I really don't give a shit about his characters, and with women afforded no dignity, it's just skraight-up exploitation, and why have a story at all if you're just going to shit all over the people you draw so beautifully (sometimes literally)? Maruo is an artist with his pencil, but a porn director with his mind. If you think art mimics life, I guess you'd be scared to know Maruo. Th best piece is probably the most unsettling ("Non-Resistance City") but even this doesn't have a money shot like Maruo's insides would like to see. I also like the exploits of SEWER BOY as well as a story about infanticide and the hide-and-seek after party. Nemoto out exploits and out creeps Maruo, but Satan draws me in with his beauty.

[Bish Bosch · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's really hard for me to comprehend genius and artistic value of this piece. It is one of the most vile things that i have seen in my life, but that's just human life. We as people, are the most evil and perverted creatures on this planet. I consider this a gate into hell - hell that is our world.

Maruo's art is based upon many cultural references and inspirations, creating something extremely influencial, unique and one of a kind. I don't have a lot of research done on his works, i don't understand some of the references that he makes in his books, but i highly appreciate this, as a piece of erotic, surreal, horror story. I admire his creativity and imagination, dearly. His art style is very cool and aesthically pleasing.

My favorite stories are probably "Putrid Night" (1981) and "Shit Soup" (1982).

[Nick · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this because I know this artist is really good, and I was not disappointed on that end. The art is very precise and eerie, and its set in immediately post-war Japan, so the environment is really aesthetic. Some of the plots are a bit thin, but its horror so its really supposed to be more atmospheric more than anything. And some of the plots were really good. Very dark. It kind of reminds me of Kafka in how sometimes it flows into semi-disjointed scenes or uses dream logic, but with the eroticism and psychological hellishness turned up all the way.

[jeanne · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is classic Suehiro Maruo and something I have dubbed "weird shit that can only come out of Japan". This is a book of short stories with chapters that have classic titles like "The Great Masturbator" and "Shit Soup". Ultra-Gash Inferno was weird by my standards but not by Suehiro Maruo standards. This is not for the faint of heart of squeamish. This can be read online, because like most Suehiro Maruo manga it is very expensive.

[Zac Hawkins · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is only my second Maruo, and already I'm convinced he's destined to become one of my all time favourite comic creatives out there. Nobody has complete mastery of the Rampo mode of eroguro as he does and I'm absolutely here for all it's sinful delights, the fact almost his entire library has slipped out of print in English is criminal. Someone, anyone, be it Seven Seas, Fakku or and independent needs to remedy this injustice.

[Dies · Rating 2 out of 5]

No, actually, it's not okay. It is disturbing and very explicit. The erotism and violence is not really my taste, but somehow I fascinated by how odd the stories could go, and it keeps on going to the next level, and to the next level. And, inspite of the unpleasant scenes, I kept on reading it. I think the "Non-Resistance City" is what I like most. A very well illustrated comic book, as always.

[La Luz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very sick and depraved. This is not for the light-hearted, this is pretty heavy when it comes to psychological distress storyline next to grotesque illustrations that remind you of Georges Bataille 'Story of the Eye' mixed with BDSM smut. Also, if subjects like cannibalism, infanticide, incest, and rape bother you, I highly do not recommend this who can't handle the horrors of reality.

[Freddy Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

For many years Suehiro Maruo was the king of ero-guro manga, and to have a number of his uniquely twisted tales translated into English was a real treat. Other volumes have appeared since. If your interests extend to sexually perverse, surrealistic Japanese comics, "Ultra-Gash Inferno" should be required reading.

[Laurance · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this some years ago, and wasn't as impressed as I'd hoped to be considering how much I liked the imagery Zorn took from the author for his Naked City project. There's a lot of strong, vulgar, and well done imagery, but next to nothing in the way of narrative.

[Michael X · Rating 5 out of 5]

Super disturbing, violent, erotic, disgusting and foul manga. I recommend it, if you can find it.

[Perry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Genuinely unnerving, upsetting extreme horror harsher than almost anything I've ever read., all captured with a distinct, unsettling art style and breakneck pace. Absolutely not for civilians.