Appearing as a serial in Shogakukan 's weekly seinen manga magazine Big Comic Spirits from to , the chapters were compiled into three bound volumes published from August to September In March , Shogakukan released an omnibus edition , followed by a second omnibus version in August Viz Media then published the volumes from October to October , with a re-release from October to February , and published a hardcover omnibus edition in October The series tells the story of the citizens of Kurouzu-cho, a fictional town which is plagued by a supernatural curse involving spirals.
The story for Uzumaki originated when Ito attempted to write a story about people living in a very long terraced house, and he was inspired to use a spiral shape to achieve the desired length.
Ito believes the horror of Uzumaki is effective due to its subversion of symbols which are positively portrayed in Japanese media, and its theme of protagonists struggling against a mysterious force stronger than themselves. Uzumaki continues to receive critical acclaim, deemed by many as Ito's magnum opus. The manga has received generally positive reviews from English-language critics.
In , the manga was adapted into two video games for the WonderSwan and a Japanese live-action film directed by Higuchinsky. An anime television miniseries adaptation co-produced by Production I. As the story progresses, Kirie and Shuichi witness how the spiral curse affects the people around them, causing the citizens to become either obsessed with or paranoid about spirals, including transforming them into grotesque monsters such as contorting their bodies, making pregnant women act like mosquitoes, raising the dead, and mutating most of the citizens into snails.
The curse also affects Kurouzu's environment as it simultaneously creates whirlwinds and whirlpools, especially turning the abandoned lighthouse into a hot furnace while making whoever looks at it walk in circles.
