What actually happens
A pottery order that gets out of hand
In episode one, Shuichi warns his girlfriend Kirie that his father, Toshio, has gone mad over spirals. Toshio demands that Kirie's father, Yasuo, who is a potter, make him spiral pottery. Then he announces that he can become a spiral and twists his tongue to prove it. Soon afterward Shuichi and his mother find Toshio's whole body folded into a spiral in the bathtub, and he has died. The smoke from his cremation forms a spiral and then his face, and his wife Yukie is hospitalized. At school, Kirie's classmate Azami has a scar on her forehead that turns into a spiral and then a vortex that spreads across half her head. The vortex swallows a classmate named Okada and then the rest of Azami.
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A giant snail moves into the school chicken coop
In episode two, classmates start to turn into giant snails. Katayama has to live in the school chicken coop, and Tsumura becomes a snail too. They mate, vanish and leave a pile of eggs, which their teacher destroys before he also becomes a snail. Two students from feuding families, Kazunori and Yoriko, try to elope but are cornered. They twist their bodies together and crawl into the sea. Kirie's hair comes to life in spirals that hypnotize everyone but Shuichi, and one classmate dies trying to impress her with a stunt. When another girl's hair fights Kirie's, Shuichi cuts Kirie's hair off. A lighthouse starts shining again, and its heat burns the people who walk inside. Kirie runs up the spiral staircase to find her brother Mitsuo and his friends, and the light finally brings the stunt classmate's body out of its grave.
The maternity ward needs mosquito repellent
In episode three, Kirie is in the hospital for her burns. Toshio appears to Yukie as a millipede that wants to crawl into the spiral of her ear, and after repeated visits she stabs herself in the ear and dies. Meanwhile mosquitoes in spiral swarms have bitten women who are about to give birth. This is the scene people dread most. One night Kirie wakes up and finds those women draining blood from patients with hand drills, and they come after her. She drives them off with Shuichi's mosquito repellent. The newborn babies can talk and want to go back inside, and they grow mushrooms full of blood from their umbilical cords. A typhoon later takes Kirie and Shuichi up into its eye and sets them down by a pond. Then a neighbor's son in the old rowhouses dies, Kirie finds him covered in spiral-shaped spikes, a family friend sprouts spikes too, and debris from a second typhoon kills the friend.
The rowhouses have been busy while everyone was away
In episode four, four more typhoons hit Kurouzu-cho, and any sound or movement now creates a deadly whirlwind. Moving slowly turns people into giant snails, and a gang cooks snail people for food. A whirlwind carries off Kirie's father, and her brother Mitsuo becomes a snail person. Every attempt to leave through the roads, the sea or the mountains fails. The rowhouses on the outskirts are packed with people whose bodies are knotted together. When Kirie, Shuichi and the reporter Chie return to town, years have passed and the rowhouses have grown into one giant spiral that leads to Dragonfly Pond. The residents pull Chie inside. At the pond, everyone else disappears and a stairwell has replaced the water.
The ending, explained
Kirie and Shuichi walk down the stairwell. A person affected by the curse pulls Shuichi off the stairs, and Kirie falls when the stairs break. At the bottom she finds a giant temple made of spirals, surrounded by the remains of everyone from the town, including her parents. She finds Shuichi, and the two of them are too exhausted to fight the curse any longer. They wrap around each other until their bodies knot together, and a giant drill rises and seals the stairwell, which ends the curse.
The post-credits ruling
There is a scene after the credits. New people build a fresh Kurouzu-cho on top of the wrecked old one, and signs of the spiral curse returning appear.
✓ Spoiled safelyDog status: fine, no dog dies.
Questions people ask at 1am
Is Uzumaki scary?
Yes. Uzumaki is a 7 out of 10 with high dread. It is a four-episode anime of body horror, with people twisting into spirals and turning into snails, and a sad ending.
How does Uzumaki end?
Kirie and Shuichi find an ancient spiral city under Dragonfly Pond and are too tired to fight the curse. Their bodies knot around each other, and a giant drill rises and seals the stairwell.
Does the dog die in Uzumaki?
No dog dies in Uzumaki. Another animal does die at some point.
Is there a post-credits scene in Uzumaki?
Yes. Uzumaki has a scene after the credits, in which new people build a fresh Kurouzu-cho on top of the wrecked old one and signs of the curse returning appear.
What causes the curse in Uzumaki?
An ancient spiral city beneath Dragonfly Pond. Shuichi concludes that the city has a will of its own and has periodically expanded, cursing the land above it.
