Lone Wolf and Cub (TV series)
By Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima
Originally published for DVD in 2008
·
As stated on Wikipedia, this adaptation of Lone
Wolf and Cub for television is the most faithful to the original works of Koike
and Kojima, with the son Daigoro actually being part of a number of
assassinations.
·
The order of the TV series is more liberal than
that of the manga, with the assassination of the guy with the hawks and several
other ronin targets plus a love affair maiden having their stories intergraded
together in the first episode. In addition, they note Ogami’s back story with
the government and the Yagu clan very early on in the series whereas the manga
had him fighting people anonymously for some time.
·
The opening notably uses art similar to the
manga for the theme song as it depicts the Father and Son similar to the manga
leading up to the reveal of how the characters look live action.
·
This adaptation is notable for being live action
as opposed to an anime series, with the actors looking masculine and rough
compared to how contemporary Japanese actors look, making this adaptation much
like the samurai films of older Japanese cinema.
·
The actor of Daigoro notably has his hair in a
similar style, even cutting a good number of his hair and having that “eyebrow”
look on his head.
·
The sound used in the TV series notably has
disco bass beats to it, much like samurai movies in the 1960s. This is a noted
subtle touch to the series that makes it fee like an authentic retro samurai
film.
·
As a minor thing, I liked the vigilante feel of
the TV series, much like pulp fiction and Western cowboy films in America. The
protagonists go into town and kill some trouble makers without the question of
morality as our protagonists and their values are always seen as moral. Thus,
we do not once consider necessarily if the bandits or the prostitutes that are
in the series are in the wrong and so the writers could focus on the violence
as opposed to the social matter.
·
The fight scenes take much longer to kill off
villains than in the manga, though this may be due to the fact that this is a
live-action adaptation so real martial arts and real-time physics played a role
in how the characters interacted.
·
Most of each episode for the first thee episode
goes down to the characters in the environment being shocked by the premise
that Daigoro is following his assassin/mercenary father so loyally into the
jaws of death and that Daigoro is so calm at watching people die in front of
him. Based on the DVD description, Daigoro is one year old or slightly older so
it is even more improbable than the manga in that Daigoro can do so much like
make a fishing line with a horse’s tail, wield his father’s sword, or pick a
lock.
·
The baby cart was tricked out even more in the
TV series with pole arms and bullet proof padding on it more so than in the
manga.
·
Overall, the TV series was a great adaptation of
the manga as the theme of a father and child assassin team was done extremely
well.
Bibliography:
Lone
Wolf and Cub: Live Action TV Series 1.
Perf. Kinnosuke
(Nakamura) Yorozuya, Katzutaka
Nishikawa. Tokyo Shock , 2008. DVD.
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