u/Dizzy-Economist6064

So I was having an idea one night in 2024, I had a thought of what if Arrow Video did a J-Zombie Boxset, what films would it consist? My thoughts would be films such as Battle Girl: The Living Dead in Tokyo Bay (1991), Wild Zero (1999) on the first Blu Ray, Junk (2000) and Stacy: Attack Of The Schoolgirl Zombies (2001) on the second Blu Ray, Zombie Self-Defense Force (2006) & Zombie Hunter: Rika (2008) on the third Blu Ray, Sun Of The Dead (2011) and Undertaker (2012).

That was my initial kind of idea/concept of what it *would* or even potentially in a hypothetical setting could look like, although I often swapped out Sun Of The Dead (2011) with Zombie Ass: Toilet Of The Dead (2011) due to Sun Of The Dead (2011) being a lesser known J-Horror film about zombies. Anyways, what are your thoughts?

Do you think something like this would sell? I mean I personally think so. But! I want to know what you think! Let me know.

So I believe there’s now quite a few threads, posts and videos that all point to this but these Japanese horror recs from the late 90’s and 2000’s have been recommended to death and it’s just a bit bland especially nowadays.

It’s funny because most people overlook films within or connected to some of those, for instance Ju-On: The Curse (2000) gets overlooked by the highly overrated Ju-On: The Grudge (2002) which is also a bit of a step back. Or how Spiral (1998), Ring 2 (1999), Ring 0: Birthday (2000), the original 1995 made for TV movie, Sadako 3D 1 & 2, Sadako (2019) as well as Sadako DX (2022) all get overlooked by most casual people. These are the same people mind you who have seen every Nightmare On Elm Street, Friday The 13th or even some of the fans of more modern horrors like Smile (2022), Obsession (2025), that also just happen to recommend the same milquetoast J-Horror recs

This is also coming from someone who moderates the r/J_Horror subreddit. So you can also see my frustration here, that subreddit is chalk full of people like this. I see rarely anyone mention 964 Pinocchio (1991), Rubber’s Lover (1996), Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989), Tetsuo II: Body Hammer (1992), Tetsuo: The Bullet Man (2009), Anatomia Extinction (1995) & Tokyo Gore Police (2008) just to name a few. It’s rare to see people mention those in the r/J_Horror subreddit. I think people are trying to relive a time period that… they have warped perceptions on. Because then there’s the people who try to gatekeep and define what “J-Horror” is without basis, they state such like “J-Horror is a western coined term to describe films made in the late 90’s and 00’s” and “J-Horror describes onryo ghost movies” which both these takes are just flat out wrong, made by uninformed people. J-Horror is a term coined by Japan itself to describe “horror” made in Japan, that includes “all” horror made in Japan from yes the onryo ghost films all the way to body horror films and splatter cinema.

However nothing aggravates me more than seeing the same set of 5, 10, maybe at best 20 recs although even that’s become more rare since my last post about this. I genuinely think the west has issues.

Mine so far is a tie between Vita Carnis and The Greylock Tapes. Both I thought were really really well made projects!

Would love to hear your faves in the comments below! I’m certainly interested in hearing your thoughts

we also have a discord so feel free to join!: https://discord.gg/hT9VQqgYY

Alright so I’ll be pulling from my S tier and A tiers so far respectively. Just note, I’m not including all the ones people casually just recommend and some recommendations might not be for everyone! Each post I do in this kind of vein will include about 10 titles each. Without further ado!

- Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989) (Shinya Tsukamoto)
- Tokyo Gore Police (2008) (Yoshihiro Nishimura)
- 964 Pinocchio (1991) (Shozin Fukui)
- Meatball Machine (2005) (Yudai Yamaguchi & Junichi Yamamoto)
- Violator (2018) (Junichi Yamamoto)
- Evil Dead Trap (1988) (Toshiharu Ikeda)
- Evil Dead Trap 2: Hideki (1992) (Izo Hashimoto)
- Helldriver (2010) (Yoshihiro Nishimura)
- Rubber’s Lover (1996) (Shozin Fukui)
- Organ (1996) (Kei Fujiwara)

___________________________________________

NOTE: I put the directors name’s beside each films they direct in brackets, an example would be if I were to recommend Ring (1998), I’d put Hideo Nakata in brackets just to signify who directed the film. So if you find it a bit jarring, or hard to read, just let me know.

Hope you enjoy the recs!

So, at the time I didn’t enjoy it too much, but I rewatched it a couple years later and I found I started to enjoy it more and more. Especially as I’ve gravitated more towards the splatter genre in recent years from late 2023 to now 2026.

Definitely I still need to see Evil Dead, the original 1981 film, the original short film as well, Evil Dead II (1987) and of course Army Of Darkness (1992).

Just wondering. What are some of your thoughts on the Evil Dead remake, I thought I’d make this post due to the release of Evil Dead Burn (2026). That reminds me I also need to see Evil Dead Rise (2023) as well.

Let me know your thoughts!

A 2024 Japanese found footage horror film. Be warned there’s bloody and gruesome imagery. Although this is just the trailer! so imagine what the actual film contains hahahaha XD

Hoping perhaps a distributor like New Wave Video or Error_4444 distributes this. Or at least at some point. I’m unsure if this even has a release in Japan yet. I might pick it up if it has lets say a Region 2 DVD or perhaps a niche Blu Ray release out there somewhere in the world.

for a lot of people I see it’s stuff like “rape” or “animal cruelty”. I don’t really have a no go when it comes to horror because I see everything as fair game when it comes to horror movies.

For instance I’m totally comfortable going into something like Girl Hell (1999) by Daisuke Yamanouchi or Red To Kill (1994) because I don’t really apply any semblance of morals onto fiction itself because its fiction. Another good example would be I Spite On Your Grave (1978), that I can likely watch without being upset, the only time I get upset is when a story or movie is slow paced, I dislike the amount of time it’ll waste on certain things. A good example of a film that I find frustrating to watch is Pulse (2001) or even Isola: Multiple Personality Girl (2000) due to how slow they are to get through, it feels oddly painfully slow, that’ll be the only thing to turn me off is if a movie wastes its time.

Some people may ask how I’m okay with animal cruelty in a fictional context and I just kind of am, like I know no actual animals are being hurt and that it’s just practical effects so my mind basically can discern and make that distinction. It’s different if it’d be a real scenario here but this is horror we’re talking about not reality so I guess my stance on animal cruelty in fictional contexts is a bit different than a lot of people’s. In fact I often give a film bonus points for going there.

Basically I’m attempting to understand what turns people off from a horror movie or novel or any work of horror fiction really as I feel like I operate in a different world or perception than most people. A lot of the mainstream audiences seem to have more issues with rape, animal cruelty, kids dying in horror so I’m trying to kind of understand that because that part of my brain has kinda shut off over time.

Some pretty cool Japanese horror films I’ve recommended on Instagram here.

- Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989)
- 964 Pinocchio (1991)
- Rubber’s Lover (1996)
- Tokyo Gore Police (2008)
- Helldriver (2010)
- Holy Mother (2022)

I’m going to be doing a PART 2 in future. That’ll include some other lesser known titles in my collection as well as ones I eventually get which may have to wait for PART 3.

Let me know what you all think. If you’ve seen Ju-On: The Grudge (2002) or Ring (1998), and you want something different, then check out this reel. You won’t regret it. There’s some bangers in here.