Kazuo Koike (小池一夫, Koike Kazuo) was a prolific Japanese manga writer, novelist and entrepreneur.
Early in Koike's career, he studied under Golgo 13 creator Takao Saito and served as a writer on the series.
Koike, along with artist Goseki Kojima, made the manga Kozure Okami (Lone Wolf and Cub), and Koike also contributed to the scripts for the 1970s film adaptations of the series, which starred famous Japanese actor Tomisaburo Wakayama. Koike and Kojima became known as the "Golden Duo" because of the success of Lone Wolf and Cub.
Another series written by Koike, Crying Freeman, which was illustrated by Ryoichi Ikegami, was adapted into a 1995 live-action film by French director Christophe Gans.
Kazuo Koike started the Gekika Sonjuku, a college course meant to teach people how to be mangaka.
In addition to his more violent, action-oriented manga, Koike, an avid golfer, has also written golf manga.
Once you get past the ridiculous amount of nudity and unnecessary sex, Crying Freeman offers a ton of entertainment that is bold and confident that is frequently resulting to unexpected humor. This penultimate volume wraps up the arc where Freeman and the 108 Dragons defeated old enemies and starts a new one where the 108 Dragons is against maybe its strongest foe to date: the Kidnappong Organization.
Yes, expect that this volume is full of perversions and fetishes where the main characters are almost nude everytime. The plot of this KO arc starts simple from saving a family to something like this (plot spoilers ahead): a sort of tournament that pits Freeman against the best Green Berets with an army of perverted Green Berets watching while they masturbate from the action they are seeing. Thus huge army actually make up the KO, with a beautiful leader that has extreme sexual fantasies with Freeman who, during the tournament fight also masturbates from the action she is seeing. O my god, that is ridiculously crazy.
I cannot complain, because everthing is drawn so beautifully by Ryoichi Ikegami. He has a talent of drawing beautiful people poses, men and women alike, has a great knack for illustrating action scenes panel by panel, and drawing breathtaking cityscapes.
I've given 5 stars to all 4 volumes of Crying Freeman. It is my guilty pleasure in comics. I wonder how Kazuo Koike wraps it up in the last volume.
Utter ridiculousness and practically porn at this point, but this fourth volume continues to deliver the same sleazy silliness, violent action, bizarre concepts, and realistic artwork I've come to expect from this duo. It's kinda cool that these last two storylines have tied back to the first volume, but the stakes are nonexistent and the antagonists and their plans are so insanely cartoonish that one can only read this as the low-hanging fruit that it ultimately is. Ikegami's art is too damn good for the material Koike wrote for this.
It's not that I'm not enjoying this work, quite the opposite, in fact. It's very clear that Koike was just using this series as an excuse to write up some of the dumbest and most bonkers crime fiction in manga history, throwing in endless excuses for sex and nudity (sometimes even introducing characters in the nude with chapter pages before we actually meet them in the story itself) and the most out-of-the-blue sci-fi or mysterical plot elements that no one could possibly predict would show up here. And yet somehow, Freeman is just totally cool with this, and rarely caught off-guard. This manga is peak ludicrousness, and while I'm here for it, I will admit that it's getting a bit repetitive. We'll see how this ends in the fifth and final volume.
Ok, ok praticamente ormai qui siamo nel hentai. Scene di sesso continue e per i motivi più folli, nudismo a go go, un protagonista che spinge all’orgasmo qualsiasi donna, assassine e mafiose comprese. Ogni verosimiglianza viene ormai buttata dalla finestra, tra tecniche ninja sovrannaturali ed organizzazioni terroristiche nate essenzialmente per far accoppiare il Nostro ed avvenenti terroriste; devo dire che rispetto alle premesse iniziali le cose hanno preso una piega ben diversa, la poetica iniziale è andata a farsi benedire e rimane un manga molto del suo tempo che ha sicuramente un’importanza storica, ma non ha il livello di Line Wolf and Cub.
Old man of heretical bear religion thought he had Freeman in his clutches, had two doubles of him. That never happened. Read this and you’ll find out why. Freeman’s got a hell of a charisma. Of course, there’s another organization that wants take him on, the KO, Kidnappers Organization.
My feelings on this series go back and forth. I loved the first volume of highly erotic, violent crime fiction. The second and third volumes started to introduce some silly concepts that left me a little cold. The erotica was still there (in some cases it was quite bizarre, which is always a plus), as was the violence and intrigue. The fourth volume, I am happy to say, is a step back in the right direction.
There are still some ridiculous concepts in this one, but I can see where Koike is taking the story, and I like the direction he is headed in. My hope is that the fifth volume continues to go that way. The stakes for Crying Freeman are ramped up. His "sister" and wife play a more important role, and when America is introduced into the picture, things get into high gear as readers find out just what happens to those vets who can't handle being out in civilized society.
This series is considered a classic of adult manga fiction. It doesn't disappoint, and it is a title that is well-earned.
Rumpy pumpy with the body doubles in the freaky bear cult. Some pretty crazy hypnosis, cursed sword action and impaling. The 108 Dragons face a new enemy, the imaginatively named Kidnapping Organisation, KO. Bai Ya Shan finds herself in an......interesting position! Yikes indeedy. Freeman once again finds himself utterly irresistible to women. Really interesting to see Ikegami draw lots of western faces.
This is the first book in Crying Freeman saga that doesn't deserve 5 stars. Truth to say, the whole "Pomegranates" story arc is ridiculous and the story deteriorates big time. Almost feels like it was not written by Kazuo Koike. I still like it, though, still it is an above average manga and I have high hopes for the finale.
I continue to enjoy this excellent series. Though a few readers I have seen have panned the "Pomegranates" story, I did find it to be pretty consistent with the kind of stories and plots for this series. Some of the other plots were better, but this one was pretty good. Overall, I am enjoying this series a lot, and I am looking forward to the final volume.
Another interesting series with artwork by Ryoichi Ikegami. Once again he delivers realistic renderings of his characters and backdrops. Story revolves around the assassin "Crying Freeman" and the Chinese mafia "108 Dragons". NOT for kids!!
Príbeh je... vlastne ani nie je. Je tam zopár nahatých scén s popísanými zvukovými efektami (vuch, vuch, srk, srk a chvění) a potom pár zaujímavých koncov a samozrejme Freeman proti všetkým. Ok, idem na piatu časť. :)