The feud between two soy sauce makers ends in “Usagi Yojimbo†144. This time we get to see some swords fly.
When we last left Yojimbo, he was stuck in between a feud between two soy sauce brewers, Mitsui and Hata. The situation escalates when one of Hata’s men murders one of Mistui’s employees. Yojimbo has had enough and now must put an end to this madness.
Unlike the last issue where there was no action and more about soy sauce, here there’s plenty of action. It’s still Zen in a way that Sakai manages make one part meaningful and one part action. The action parts are well made and even funny at the same time. Seeing the little spirits coming out of the corpses is funny no matter how you look at them.
Just because there’s action that doesn’t mean the characters aren’t interesting. Yojimbo is always well written no matter what Sakai makes him do. Hata is a good villain in a cute sort of way.
Sakai’s Saturday morning cartoon art style still shines here. It makes a serious scene like a bunch of anthropomorphic animals killing each other look funny. That doesn’t mean that the fight scenes aren’t well done. They look like what you’d expect from a Saturday morning cartoon except more violent. Seeing Yojimbo fend off a katana wielding attacker with a little wakizashi and winning is worth the price of admission.
“Usagi Yojimbo†144 manages to finish a nice little story about two rival soy sauce brewers nicely. Using great action and Saturday morning cartoon style art work and a hint of humor this arc in the long running “Usagi Yojimbo†comic series is not one to miss.
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