Kenshirô y Raoh se encuentran finalmente, frente a frente. Tras un duelo a muerte, su batalla termina en dolorosas tablas. Por su parte, después de que Raoh presionara uno de sus meridianos, a Rei le quedan solo unos pocos días de vida que, por el bien de las personas a las que ama, quiere quemar luchando contra su Némesis Juda, apodado "estrella mística", ¡el mismo que llevó a las Seis Estrellas del Nanto a la destrucción! "¡Juda! ¡¡Hazte el maquillaje sangriento con tu propia sangre!!"
Okamura Yoshiyuki (岡村善行), also known as Buronson (武論尊) or Sho Fumimura (史村翔 Fumimura Shō), is a Japanese manga writer most known by his famous work Hokuto no Ken. known in English as Fist of the North Star. He graduated from the Japanese Air Force Training School in 1967 and served as an Air Force radar mechanic. In 1969 he discharged from the Japanese Navy and was soon hired by Hiroshi Motomiya as a manga assistant. He started his manga writing career when he wrote the script of Pink Punch: Miyabi in 1972, drawn by Goro Sakai. In 1975 Buronson wrote his first big hit The Doberman Detective, drawn by Shinji Hiramatsu. The famous Hokuto no Ken made its debute as Buronson's greatest hit in 1983, drawn by Tetsuo Hara. In 1989 his story Ourou was released as a manga serialized in Animal Magazine, drawn by Kentarou Miura, and in 1990 a sequel entitled Ourou Den was released by the same manga artist. Buronson also collaborated with the manga artist Ryoichi Ikegami in many works as Strain (manga) , Human (manga) and the famous Sanctuary (manga). Among his other major works are The Phantom Gang, with art by Kaoru Shintani.
Buronson was mainly influenced by movies such as Bruce Lee's, and Mad Max.
The nickname Buronson is a tribute to the American actor Charles Bronson, whose way of growing the mustache was imitated by Yoshiyuki Okamura too.
I villain di questa serie sono sempre più incredibili, uno migliore dell'altro. Comunque Rei si riconferma il mio personaggio preferito in assoluto e già piango per quello che succederà più avanti.
Kenshiro is such a great character. Every shot of him in silence are brilliant. The art & composition is so great that you see what he may be feeling or thinking. It's an intern performance through pencils. This volume is filled with some great character moments. You can feel the bond between the core characters tightening. Also, they introduced a new ludicrous villain, probably the wildest one yet, simply due his motivation and it's intentionally comical.
This post apocalyptic saga of dudes with weird martial arts powers beating the shit out of each other continues to be highly entertaining, and the art is consistently awesome.
It features the conclusion of the fight against Raoh. He and Ken battle to a stalemate, each too injured to continue. They vow to meet again. This is where the 1986 movie ends.
After the battle, mamiya goes to a nearby town to get medicine for the fatally injured Rei but is captured by dog master Galf. He’s your basic FOTNS thug with the twist that he only trusts dogs, having been betrayed by humans too many times. In his city the dogs are treated as royalty and anyone who harms them is killed. He’s defeated easily.
After the battle, Rei notices a strange brand on mamiya’s back which turns out to be the mark of Yuda, a narcissistic psychopath and, along with shin and Rei, a practitioner of nanto suichoken and one of the six fists of the south star.
At first, Yuda’s look reminded me of Griffith, but his personality is similar to Dio Brando. He’s cunning, treacherous and sadistic, and motivated by an insane vanity. The reason he hates Rei reflects this obsession: long ago, when the two were training together, Rei performed an attack so beautiful that even Yuda was momentarily awestruck. For daring to outshine him, Yuda swore revenge against Rei at that moment. It’s the inspired motivation of a madman, a vendetta of which Rei isn’t even aware.
Rei, who has fallen in love with Mamiya, wants to use his last remaining days to avenge her by killing Yuda, in the hope that she will remember his sacrifice, adding a tragic poignancy to the tale.
The Rei vs Yuda arc is one of the best so far. There are a lot of clever touches and the way it is set up exemplifies the martial spirit of Fist of the North Star. Furthermore, Ken is a bit too stoic so Rei is easier to root for.
And the art is getting even better as well.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
I feel not enough emphasis is put on the fact that Ken is fistfighting a horse. I've had a lot of terrible ideas in my time, and trying to punch a horse is one of them thanks to Chuck Klosterman's Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs in which the hypothetical is asked:
Let us assume a fully grown, completely healthy Clydesdale horse has his hooves shackled to the ground while he head is held in place with thick rope. He is conscious and standing upright, but he is completely immobile. And let us assume that for some reason every political prisoner on earth (as cited by Amnesty International) will be released from captivity if you can kick this horse to death in less than twenty minutes. You are allowed to wear steel-toed boots. Would you attempt to do this?
I just looked up how many people this would be, and it's estimated to be one million.
So I guess I'd try. Mostly because if I didn't, I'd always wonder, right? And I feel I owe it to the prisoners to at least give it a shot. I mean, god forbid I ever meet one of them, and I'm like, "Bro, you should've seen this horse. My man was HUGE."
It's why the question is "Would you attempt to do this?" as opposed to "Would you do it?" Because the idea isn't about your likelihood of success, it's about whether you'd rather live with the memory of trying or not trying.
I wouldn't enjoy attempting to kick a horse to death, and I don't think I could possibly succeed.
But if Ken would try punching a horse just to fight his brother, I suppose I should go ahead and give it a whirl.
Couldn't quite get into this one as much as the previous volumes, mostly because the fight between Raoh and Kenshiro felt no more unique than the previous fights leading up to it. And Toki introduces a deus ex machina that enables Rei's earlier sacrifice to be undone. Raoh and Ken's fight ends in a stalemate and sets up yet another new baddie for Ken to face, but it feels like an odd choice since Raoh eclipses Yuda significantly in terms of sheer menace.
It's still an enjoyable volume of Fist of the North Star don't get me wrong. Ken's delivery of "I got no name to give a dead man" might be the most badass moment yet. The art is gorgeously visceral and crisp with detail. The added colors in this edition even seem sharper this time around and less garish compared to previous entries. Looking forward to the resolution to the cliffhanger ending as well.
Thankfully Ken's brother Toki is an ally and joins Kenshiro, Rei, Mamiya and co. They want to track down the eldest brother Raoh, now a larger-than-life warlord named Kenoh. Roah turns out to be the baddest of the bunch.
We learn more about Mamiya's past and introduced to yet another evil warrior the vain Yuda. Rei was seriously injured in the battle with Roah but is managing to hold on long enough to help Mamiya get vengeance. I think this volume is the first time the stakes were high enough that I thought one of the protagonists could actually fail.
The names are a bit annoying in this series! I can't helped by think Mamma-mia when Mamiya is mentioned. And Yuda is just a bit too close to Yoda.
Just then the clash was kind of inevitable. Kenoh/Raoh fought with Kenshiro. Raoh would’ve succeeded in delivering the killing blow had he been shot by an arrow. Rei, dying from the thrust from Raoh, told Ken he’s not ready to fight him. Even Toki himself said so. Later, after the bout between Toki and Raoh, the ex-emperor left with his horse to recuperate. They gang inevitably met up with Juda, from Mamiya’s dark past. Rei had one day to live, and was writhing in pain. However, Toki managed push back the pain. That way, Rei will finally confront Juda. The story continues… Well written, well translated, the graphics are well drawn, and intense. Looking forward to volume seven. Recommended.
This volume wraps up the cliffhanger fight starting at the end of Volume 5, and ends midway through a fight that should wrap in Volume 7. I really wish that these were collected in proper arcs as opposed to page counts, but such is manga. Regardless, it's more of the same - which is awesome- and if anything aspects of this have gone so bananas that it almost reads like self parody. Which is also kind of awesome since it's delivering so hard. Somehow amongst all this is more world building and what not, it's impressive really.
I don't know how many more of these are coming out, but I'm still into it to see how much farther this concept can go and how/what/if it has an ending.
Deus ex machinas notwithstanding, this is another solid volume with stellar art and some deeper themes hidden beneath a very thick layer of testosterone and ridiculously cheesy dialogue and martial arts. There is a welcome bit of depth applied to some character backgrounds, but not quite enough to slow down the whiplash-inducing pace. There's absolutely no time for any revelations or dramatic tension to settle before we're already diving headfirst into the next battle. It almost feels rushed this time around.
Still, this is a very enjoyable volume and I look forward to the next one.
Yes, these are still five star reads because they are still Fist of the North Star.
This one pits Kenshiro against a character he can't beat, and that's fun. After that, he gets some opponents he can handily best, like a guy who loves dogs and hates people, and other characters get to be fleshed out more. It's so dumb and it's a blast.
It wasn't my body's strength that freed me! It was the innocent heart of a young child just trying to survive...IT WAS HER HEART THAT SET ME FREE RAOH!
And then Ken's shirt explodes with overwhelming power...again.
Over-the-top shlocky writing like this is why I enjoy this series so much. It's incredibly cheesy but also so ernest and endearing you can't help but love it!
Primer enfrentamiento con Raoh y fue un empate terrible y gracias a que intervinieron justo varios aliados. Y, backstory de Rei y de las seies estrellas del Nanto y enfrentamiento contra el sorete de Yuda. Alto toro Rei. Me mata que cada 4 o 5 capítulos alguien le dice a Ken que tiene cojones por osar enfrentarse a el, y media página despues le está explotando la cara literalmente.
The art is incredible! The level of detail is astounding. There are several great fights in this volume and the story is also really good and paced well. This is a total classic and so well worth the investment. Kenshiro is rising the ranks as one of my favorite protagonists of all time.
Great illustrations. Incredibly violent, and needlessly so (but still less than Battle Angel Alita). A classic, written by the master himself, Buronson.
There's not much I can say about this book, that I haven't said on my previous reviews. If anything, hokuto no Ken is very consistent, both on its strengths and weaknesses.
Very action oriented, even for this series standard. It was fun, but it lack a little something, or maybe it's the repetition from volume to volume, that made it a bit less attractive for me.