Souichi's Beloved Pet by Junji Ito

I figured that since the last story I reviewed was a Souichi story, another Souichi story would be appropriate. Let's begin our journey through Souichi's Beloved Pet!

A girl finds a cat on the side of the road, and it follows her all the way home. Cute!

The Tsujii family welcomes the sweet little cat and names him Colin. I'm getting diabetes from how sweet this is.

Colin foolishly wanders through the house, and meets up with Souichi. And then farts. Rude.

SOUICHI NO

SOUICHI DO YOU DO THIS TO EVERYTHING THAT FARTS?
So you can see early on that Souchi has always been weird and cruel.
Because of the interruption, Colin escapes and gives Souichi a deep scratch on his face. His family scolds him for being a huge dickweed.

And being the enormous turd he is, Souichi decides to curse poor Colin. This curse initially taking form as static shock given off whenever someone pets the cat.

Colin (or Colon) suddenly takes a liking to Souchi. Souichi finds a dead snake on the road and uses it as a macabre cat toy to gross out the rest of his family.

The snake's spirit is mentioned. In Shinto, the indigenous religion of Japan, it's believed that everything has it's own spirit. If something is killed or has it's body treated with disrespect, its spirit will hold a grudge. I'm pretty sure the Tsujii family isn't deeply religious, but Shinto traditions seem to still have a presence in their daily lives. Or something.

Anyway, Colon's starting to do super-gross things now and it's starting to freak all the normal people out.

And Souichi is pleased by this development.

At this point, Colon's just doing normal cats things, though.

But... Uh... What the hell is THAT?!

Colon is becoming greasier and nastier, and I'm pretty sure that thing's from hell.

His face in that last panel is GREAT.

So the Tsujii family boards up the house to Colin can't get out and bring in nasty-ass things anymore. Unfortunately, this means the air in the house becomes stale and filled with cat hair and the smell of cat crap. Adorable.

Colin's nowhere to be found, even though the house is sealed. That is, until they think to look in Souichi's room.

Oh. Gross.

Colon has become Pikachu!

Souichi tries again and again to throw Colon off of him, but the cat loves him so much he won't leave. 

Just like his other tricks, Souichi's curse on Colin has turned against him.

A crack of lightning is seen across town. Colin is freed from his curse, and Souichi is left with burns all over his body.

Good job, Souichi.

GOOD JOB.

The End

So, now you have a better idea about who Souichi is. He's a trickster brat that is into magic and the occult, and his magic always turns against him at some point. Junji Ito has written many stories about Souichi. Unfortunately, many of them are untranslated, and they will probably never be sold stateside. If I could buy them in English, I would. I WOULD BUY ALL OF THEM. Dear publishing companies: PLEASE RELEASE THESE STORIES SO I CAN GIVE YOU MY MONEY.

JUST TAKE ALL OF IT DAMN YOU

Anyway, these stories are a departure from Junji Ito's usual work. Usually his stories have a regular Joe as the protagonist, and that's obviously not the case here. Also, other than a few creepy elements, this is a comedic story. Comedy and horror are very similar, I think. They are both based on punchlines!

Is it weird that I can relate to Souichi? I too am a huge jerk that is interested in the occult, and we both wear shorts with a button-up shirt tucked in.

So, a cat was a huge part of the story. Cats have a large role in Japanese culture. Cats have been used as pest control on farms for centuries. Cats are featured in a lot of Japanese folklore. Maneki neko, nekomata, etc. Cats are believed to have supernatural powers, as well. There is a lot of love and respect for cats. Cats are awesome!