Kurosawa Kiyoshi and “Ju-on” director Shimizu Takashi are among the seven filmmakers behind “Night Tales Club,” a six-part Japanese supernatural anthology series set to premiere on Disney+ and Hulu in January 2027.
Yamada Takayuki leads the series as Hojo, a high-flying businessman fixated on the unexplained who acts as its storyteller. Each episode adapts a different tale from author Sawamura Ichi’s collection of short horror stories. Sawamura also adapted the material for the screen.
Hojo is convinced that ghosts, curses and other paranormal events are “bugs” – glitches that point to a hidden conspiracy. To get to the bottom of it, he offers JPY20 million ($126,000) in gold to anyone willing to come to his gathering, the Night Tales Club, and present a firsthand account of the supernatural along with proof. Six such accounts make up the series as Hojo chases the truth behind them.
Kurosawa, whose credits include “Cure” and “Wife of a Spy,” and Shimizu, known for “Ju-on” and “The Inugami Family,” each take one episode. So do Katayama Shinzo (“Gannibal,” “The Human Vapor”), Sode Yukiko (“Aristocrats,” “All the Lovers in the Night”), Sakashita Yuichiro (“I Can’t Cry With Your Face,” “Blonde”) and Nakamura Yosuke (“Higuma!!,” “Poison Girl”). Nakajima Kenji (“The Naked Director,” “Tokyo Swindlers”) directs the Hojo sequences.
Wakabayashi Yusuke and Yamamoto Teruhisa produce.
“As the original author of these stories, I feel an enormous sense of surprise and joy that they will soon be available on screen to scare audiences around the world.” Sawamura said.
The show joins a growing lineup of Japanese series on the streamer. Disney+ already carries “Gannibal,” in which a police officer stumbles on something sinister in a remote village, and “Land of Tanabata,” about a college student with an apparently pointless power who looks into a murder. Lighter fare includes cross-cultural romantic comedy “Merry Berry Love” and comedy variety show “The One Shot.”