Blade of the Immortal: Manji's Movie; Rin's Manga

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Blade of the Immortal: Manji's Movie; Rin's Manga

11/16/2017 9:00am

If you're interested in seeing Takashi Miike's Blade of the Immortal film adaptation, but you haven't read the original manga series by Hiroaki Samura that it's based on, you'll be fine. But if you want to enjoy more of the story after the film, be sure to check out the manga!

Director Takashi Miike didn't finish reading the manga series, as he admitted in a recent interview, but his team did an excellent job of compressing approximately the first half of Samura's epic tale into a two-and-a-half-hour spectacle. (The epic manga series is collected into 30 Japanese volumes, 31 Dark Horse Manga volumes, and now a series of Blade of the Immortal Omnibus Volumes, which would be a lot to cover in just one film.)

Screenwriter Tetsuya Oishi did an excellent job of pulling a few elements from the mind-blowing final volumes of the manga series into the movie. Overall, though, the film focuses on roughly the first half of the original manga series before going its own way and cleaving itself a new ending that doesn't quite match up with the manga.

The film focuses on the sensationalism of Manji, his possible immortality, and the other colorful warriors and weapons in this reimagined Edo-era world. Action. Swordplay. Blood. And then it wraps up.

This is all Manji's movie, but I feel the manga series is ultimately about Rin finding herself and evolving into a confident leader who will revive her family’s sword school one day, filling her father's shoes.

The Blade manga series takes a turn about midway through and more obviously becomes a tale of Rin turning into a confident leader and a strong warrior in her own right—and on her own timeframe and her own terms—after much self-doubt and questioning.

The movie has a perfect cast, and it delivers plenty of the gore and violence that Samura seemed to relish early in his career, but unlike the manga series, the movie never takes its eye off Manji and the sacrifices he makes to help Rin with her quest. Leaving the film, my wife asked me, "Rin looked badass, but wasn’t she supposed to BE badass too?"

Without spoiling the second half of the manga series for anyone, the film seems to stop around Hiroaki Samura's "Shortcut" story arc (Dark Horse Manga Volume 16), which basically sees several doctors experimenting on a captured, weakened Manji and his bloodworms to try and find a "shortcut to immortality."

By chaining up and incapacitating Manji, Samura is able to move the focus of his tale to Rin finding her confidence and her ability to use her intelligence to achieve victory over brute strength. What Rin does to Edo Castle aboveground and belowground to free Manji proves that no force can keep her from her goals once she sets her mind to conquering a problem. I also love how she realizes how her guile can be used to overcome being outnumbered.

Enjoy Blade of the Immortal—the film—for its spot-on characters and costumes, fun action choreography, and inventive gore, but keep in mind that Samura's full story hasn't yet been adapted. If you want to see Rin's transformation, her coming-of-age moments, and her realization of how pointless yet unavoidable her cycle of revenge is, pick up our new, value-priced Blade of the Immortal Omnibus volumes—collecting multiple original volumes into each omnibus. We have plenty more story for you to enjoy—Rin's story!

—Philip R. Simon, Senior Editor

Dark Horse Comics

Blade of the Immortal: Manji's Movie; Rin's Manga

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