Mystery ultraviolent manga from/before late '80s
April 25, 2013 2:52 PM   Subscribe

Hoping to ID an incredibly violent manga that I read a few pages of, back around '88 give or take a couple of years. I've had some images seared in my then-impressionable brain. Lots of blood and gore but not explosively cartoonish like, say, Hokuto no Ken / Fist of North Star. More cruel than anything. Set in modern times. The main character was some sort of vagabond/wanderer/assassin, and was drawn in a Golgo 13 style, with longish hair and maybe a leather jacket. Episodic stories as far as I can tell of him going around fighting baddies.

I had borrowed it from a Japanese girl - I believe it was a tankobon. I didn't speak Japanese then so I can't relay non-visual details. Some scenes I recall:

- The "hero" is being attacked by a "villain" who is trying to mow down the hero using a big rig truck with a bulletproof glass protecting the driver's seat. Unfazed, the hero jumps almost superhumanly, and dive-kicks the glass. Cracks appear to the speechless shock of the villain. Another kick, and the hero smashes thru the glass, jump-kicking the villain straight on the forehead. An x-ray-like frame shows the villain's skull, now with cracks. He dies.

- The hero is fighting off multiple villains. He beats them, but not before 2 baddies have driven their swords into the hero, from the back, around waist-level. He is bleeding profusely, but still walks away after saying some words to a female character nearby in that Japanese manga-hero macho way. Next frame shows him in a hospital though, barely surviving.

- A villain is able to control snakes to attack and murder people. He learned this in some sort of training camp for evil folks. He kills a bunch of people at a gathering (party?), sending his snakes into the house/building and having them bite and choke people to death. A woman who trained with him at the camp is involved in fighting him, and eventually she throws a short knife into his forehead/skull to kill him.
posted by shortfuse to Media & Arts (1 answer total) 1 user marked this as a favorite
 
Riki-Oh (The Story of Riki) might be what you're looking for but it does have some overly cartoonish violence. Also, the wiki says it wasn't published into tankobon until the nineties.
posted by coolxcool=rad at 8:39 PM on April 25, 2013


« Older What do you think of these work benefits? And tips...   |   Any advantage to IRA if I can't deduct... Newer »
This thread is closed to new comments.