What was expected to be a faithful and quality adaption of one of Junji Ito’s best works has suffered a massive drop in quality and may have faced strife.
Executive producer Jason DeMarco on Uzumaki shared some of the behind-the-scenes details in a now-deleted thread on Bluesky. Luckily, this was screen-capped by multiple people and spread in multiple places, including X.
Jason touches on what many fans have been outspoken about, including the long wait for Uzumaki’s release, which has been over five years.
Also, according to DeMarco, the staff had only three choices in the matter: not finish the show and write it off, finish only the first episode and leave the show incomplete, or run all episodes regardless of the quality. Of course, the decision was made to run the series, which does seem fair considering the hard work that was put into it.
From the sounds of things, it may have been either a budget concern or some sort of internal dispute. Jason does mention that someone in particular is to blame, but he cannot reveal that information.
It’s unfortunate that such a massively anticipated series was met with internal strife, but this isn’t the first time it’s happened and likely won’t be the last.
