A Cop Tries to Survive a Creepy Small Town in This Dark Disney Plus Series

(SPOT.ph) You know the trope. A seemingly good guy ends up in a new place, adjusting gets extra hard because of how creepy everything seems, and bam, of course they unearth something downright insidious, whether or not the townspeople are aware or are the perpetrators themselves. It's a damn good trope, and when done properly, makes for one hell of a watch. If you can't get enough of it, then allow us to whet your appetites for Gannibal, an upcoming Japanese thriller series coming to Disney Plus on December 28. 

Also read: 10 Must-Watch Asian Titles Coming to Disney Plus

Put Japanese thriller series Gannibal on your Disney Plus watch list

Daigo Agawa (Yuya Yagira) has just arrived at Kuge, a fictional countryside village in Japan. It's a new assignment for him, which means a fresh start, and a promising one at that in this seemingly idyllic place. Until, that is, a murder springs forward a very strange and dangerous turn of events. Nothing is as it seems in Kuge. 

This Star Original is just one of many titles that mark a more diverse set of content from the Disney we once knew. It is based on a manga of the same name by Masaaki Ninomiya and was directed by Shinzo Katayama. Central figure Daigo Agawa you might recognize as Yuya Yagira, who in 2004 was awarded Best Actor at the Cannes Film Festival for his work in Nobody Knows. He was just around 14 years old then, making him the youngest to ever win the award. We got to chat with the director and the star about what this new tale will bring, apart from thrilling gore, of course.

"His eyes are scary," director Katayama cheekily says in Japanese about Yagira and why the star was chosen for the role. "Everyday I was more and more convinced that Daigo Agawa had to be played by him." It is this natural-ness that the two aimed for when working on set for this series, the sort that would have you believing what you were watching, strange possibly cannibalistic rituals included. 

"The cannibalism is one of the motif that I was attracted to," Katayama says, but it wasn't what truly had him board the project. "The foundation of the old conventions, or the customs of the village, why did it start, the Goto family [and] their past," were all concepts that had his attention. The family he mentions are comprised of the people who appear to be at the center of all the strange goings-on in Kuge. " All these human relationships that I was interested in, maybe more than the cannibalism, and then I wanted to make a drama out of it."

So while the story does indeed sound very fantastical in a gorey sort of way, Gannibal will have you believing every bit. As Yagira himself points out, what he wanted was to play the lead as naturally as possible. "I like that moment when the character overlaps the person, who he or she is. I try to be very natural on the set and I'm hoping for the moment that even when I'm not really aware, that people will see me and say 'Wow, that person is really like that role.'" Yup, prepare your hearts and mind your blood pressure when this series drops. 

Also read: 10 Princess Movies on Disney Plus for When Your Life Needs a Little Fairy Tale Magic