[Review] Vagabond: Kyoto arc

Manga: Vagabond バガボンド
Mangaka: Inoue Takehiko 井上雄彦
Volumes: 2-4
Chapters: 22-32

Miyamoto Musashi travels to Kyoto in his quest to challenge the strongest fighters in the country. As luck would have it, he very soon encounters the members of the renown Yoshioka dojo and decides to gauge his skills against this new set of opponents. Also appearing in this arc is Matahachi who has only been living a miserable life since running off with Oko, wallowing in his incompetency. The childhood friends would briefly ‘meet’ again in the most inconceivable of situations and this encounter motivates Matahachi to better himself.

The Yoshioka are an interesting bunch. They are not your usual ‘evil’ antagonists just because they fight against the hero of the story but have a somewhat grounded set of convictions that’s reflected in the way they fight. Yoshioka Seijuro, the head of the dojo, is a very carefree character and deemed unfit to be master of the Yoshioka school by his younger brother Denshichiro, due to his cavorting ways. However, Seijuro seems a little bit of a pacifist and would prefer to ‘defeat’ an opponent by a brief display of lethal moves to discourage his opponent from pursuing a fight.

Denshichiro, at first, appears resentful of his brother’s status but his displeasure also stems from a concern that the image of the Yoshioka be tarnished by his brother’s womanizing, and a childhood that saw a lack of appreciation in his efforts by his father. There’s also Gion Toji, who seems very loyal to Seijuro. When the Yoshioka dojo is burnt to the ground, he declares himself the assassin for the school and sets off to locate Musashi.

Matahachi’s presence provided some amusing scenes, especially when he was still oblivious to the fact that his ‘hero’ battling inside the dojo was his childhood friend. Inspired by his friend’s daring, Matahachi vows to straighten his act and even saves Musashi’s life when the latter staggers out of the burning school.

The artwork is, as one would expect, incredible. There’s an increase in the use of brush strokes, giving the panels a very unique style of antiquity.

Final rating: 8.1/10

This entry was posted on February 10th, 2009 and is filed under Vagabond. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or Trackback from your own site.