Ju-On: Origins Season 1 Review

There's nothing really scary about "Ju-On: Origins" but that should be the least of your worries. The six episode long first season was not only a snooze-fest but a very incoherent one at that. Worse, the series left a lot of unanswered questions and the real mystery behind the cursed house is never really revealed.

A paranormal researcher searches obsessively for a cursed home where something terrible happened to a mother and her child long ago. The house, he believes brings a curse to not only who inhabit it but to also those who mistakenly step inside its premises. Fatefully, a young actress seeks his help as she and her partner has started experiencing paranormal activity after her boyfriend chanced upon a very cheap house for sale. The researcher believes that this is the house he has been looking. Will the researcher be able to finally find the house, unveil its secrets, and finally stop its evil?

We actually had high hopes for "Ju-On: Origins" that it will bring a very different kind of horror into the Netflix platform. Not that Netflix hasn't had success in previous tries as we absolutely adored 2018's "The Haunting of Hill House". Unfortunately, "Ju-On: Origins" was one of the worst horror experiences we've had. First, there's really nothing really scary here. There are pockets of ghost activity but these rarely show up - maybe a few times per episode. But our worst grievance of all for the first season was its approach on story and character development or the lack of it. There are numerous characters in the first season but we really don't get to know them well. Some key characters eventually died but we really didn't care at all for their demise. Worse, some characters conduct acts of violence and there's really no clear explanation if their motives for these are due to the house's influence or by their own will. As for the story, it was a complete mess. Not only was it hard to follow but it really doesn't explain anything at all. By the time the credits rolled in the final episode, most questions we had still remained unanswered and it doesn't help that it also involves an aspect of time-jumps or time travel similar to a Christopher Nolan film that adds to the confusion. Episodes lasted half an hour or less and with six episodes in the first season, it seemed that it needed the typical ten episode run to at least flesh out its story. Besides its outstanding sound design and gruesome and no-holds-barred gore, "Ju-On: Origins" was a total disappointment for us.

Rating: 1 reel





Why you should watch it:
- sound design was at least wonderfully crafted
- the gore was truly gruesome and satisfying

Why you shouldn't watch it:
- the story was an incoherent mess and it will leave literally a lot of questions unanswered
- lack of horror and scares