Violence Jack
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Violence Jack | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| バイオレンスジャック (Violence Jack: Evil Town) |
|
| Genre | |
| Manga | |
| Authored by | Go Nagai |
| Publisher |  Kodansha Chuokoron-Shinsha (Tankobon) Dynamic Italia |
| Serialized in | Weekly Shonen Magazine Monthly Shonen Magazine Manga Goraku |
| Original run | 1973-07-22 – 1974-09-29 |
| No. of volumes | 18 |
| OVA | |
| Directed by | Ichiro Itano |
| Studio | Studio 88 |
| No. of episodes | 3 |
| Released | 1986, 1988, 1990 |
| Runtime | |
Violence Jack (バイオレンスジャック Baiorensu Jakku) is a manga by mangaka Go Nagai from the late 1970's that was adapted into an anime series of three OVAs which were produced between 1986 and 1990.
Contents |
[edit] Story
The series takes place in a world destroyed by a devastating earthquake in which the remnants of humanity are divided between the strong and the weak in an underground city called Evil Town. Violence Jack is uncovered amongst the rubble and demolished granite by the inhabitants of this city where he is let loose upon them until he finally confronts the most ruthless of all the warlords, the Slum King.
[edit] Characters
Jack
Half-man, half-giant; Jack is large and incredibly strong and wields a large jack knife. Jack scours the underworld and lends his strength to good causes, protecting the weak and bringing justice to the post-apocalyptic world.
[edit] Censorship backlash
Although Manga Entertainment has a reputation of stretching the boundaries of what's acceptable and what's not in the medium of animation, Violence Jack was far beyond anything that they had ever released in its content.
Two versions were released on VHS in the USA. An edited version by Manga Entertainment, featuring only dubbed audio, and an uncensored version by Critical Mass in both dubbed and subtitled formats. An English-dub only DVD of the edited Manga Entertainment versions was also released in the UK, and uncut, bilingual DVD sets collecting all three OVAs were released in France and Italy. There is also a Japanese release that is split into 3 separate volumes.
Note that the episodes were released in English out of their original order—"Slumking" was originally released in 1986 as "Violence Jack Harlem Bomber" (バイオレンスジャック ハーレムボンバー)[1], "Evil Town" was released in 1988 as (バイオレンスジャック〜地獄街〜, "Violence Jack ~Hell Town~")[2], and "Hell's Wind" was released in 1990 as "Violence Jack Hell's Wind Chapter" (バイオレンスジャック ヘルスウィンド編, Violence Jack Herusu Uindo hen) [3].
A note on censorship: It is generally cited that this anime series is one of the most shocking and violent ever, but in the UK Manga Video releases, what we see on screen is nowhere near as bad as other titles of the time such as 'Legend of the Overfiend' or even 'Fist of the North Star', so it stands to reason that, like most of the UK OAV releases, Violence Jack was VERY heavily cut.
[edit] Episodes
[edit] Episode 1: Harlem Bomber
Completely different to the other episodes, you now learn two very important things.
1)The world is ruled by a powerful man called Slumking. He controls an enormous army which captures young women and turns them into sex slaves. 2) Right at the beginning of the episode, you learn that death comes in many forms, but in this savage age it also comes in human form. This then is Violence Jack, dispensing death indiscriminately with the aid of a jack knife. So basically Jack is the incarnation of Death. so he can never lose a fight.
Also in this episode, Jack says and does very little indeed. He speaks only one line in the whole thing, when the villain, Mad Harlem Bomber says "I'm going to send you straight to hell!" Jack replies "Sorry, I'm not ready to go home yet!"
The episode revolves around a girl being captured by the army and sent to a sex camp. Her boyfriend rescues her with the help of Violence Jack.
At the end, Jack is challenged by the Mad Harlem Bomber, whom he kills relatively easily by stabbing him in the back with a helicopter blade.
[edit] Episode 2: Hell City
The world has been destroyed once again(it is related to Devilman). Humanity is hiding out in rat-holes and caves. Episodes 1 features a story of such a cave, an underground hideout known as "Hell City".
Hell City is split into three "sections":
Section A: The men. Section B: The women. Section C: The baddies.
When Evil Town was formed, the men of Section A decided to abuse the women, causing them to form their own breakaway splinter group called Section B. This led to them both being vulnerable to attacks by the utterly deranged biker villains, Section C. Section C is led by Mad Saurus, an enormous giant of a man with a deformed face. His second is a transsexual called Blue.
Once this set up has been established, the following things happen:
Section A find Violence Jack strangely entombed in a rock wall.
They invite him to stay with them to protect them against Section C.
Jack meets the women of Section B, who are trying to dig an escape tunnel to the outside world.
A traitor from Section A is doing a dodgy deal with Mad Saurus.
Section C attack.
The men of Section A think Jack has betrayed them and lead a sneak attack on the women.
Section C seize the opportunity to attack, and kill all the men of Section A and
The nice leader of Section B is in a terrible predicament, because the police officer from A section is going to rape her, but then the bondage queen Blue stabs him in the back, strips down and intends to rape the girl herself. However, Jack quickly subdues her shortly before she can do anything.
Violence Jack slaughters all of Section C in a rage. Mad Saurus, however, limps away, vowing immediate revenge.
Jack faces Mad Saurus head on. However, Mad Saurus has devoured Blue's corpse, and he transforms into an devilish red creature to battle Jack. Mad Saurus manages to catch Jack off guard and disarm him, and then proceeds to try to kill Jack with his own weapon. Jack is heavily wounded in the fight but manages to wrench his knife out of Mad Saurus's claws and toss him to the ground. Mad Saurus, unfazed by this move, makes one last charge at Jack with intentions to kill, but Jack moves quicker and stabs deeply into Mad Saurus's forehead. Defeated, Mad Saurus reverts to his original human state and falls lifeless to the ground, Jack's knife still embedded in his head. Jack, wounded and covered in blood, disappears without a word.
The survivors of Section B stand looking at the destroyed outside world in the nude.
[edit] Episode 3: Hell's Wind
This time, there is a peaceful post apocalyptic town in the middle of nowhere. Everything is lovely there—until the bike gang Hell's Wind show up and ransack it. Violence Jack makes his entrance here. The episode starts as we see a young woman kidnapped and raped by Hell's Wind, and this woman has become a tough-as-nails crossbow fighter who tries to stop them. Luckily, Jack turns up just in time.
He fends off the gang by taking several gunshots which seem to have no effect on him.
Hell's Wind capture a young teacher and take her to their base which is an abandonded airfield. They take her top off and strap her to a fighter jet. At the behest of the little orphan boy, Jack goes to rescue her. They try shooting him with a rocket launcher, but Jack tunnels under the ground and bursts out whilst being set on fire. He kills everyone. The bike leader tries to escape, but Jack throws his knife at him and cuts his legs off.
