Violence Jack
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| Violence Jack | |
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 Cover |
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| バイオレンスジャック (Baiorensu Jakku) |
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| Genre | Horror |
| Manga | |
| Author | Go Nagai |
| Publisher |  Kodansha Chuokoron-Shinsha (Tankobon) d/visual |
| Magazine | Weekly Shōnen Magazine Monthly Shōnen Magazine Manga Goraku |
| Original run | 1973-07-22 – 1974-09-29 |
| Volumes | 18 |
| OVA | |
| Director | Torao Arai (1986), Ichiro Itano (1988), Takuya Wada (1990) |
| Studio | Studio 88 |
| Episodes | 3 |
| Released | 1986, 1988, 1990 |
Violence Jack (バイオレンスジャック Baiorensu Jakku?) is a manga created by mangaka Go Nagai from the 1970s that was adapted into a three episode OVA series, 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. 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. In CB Chara Go Nagai World, it is revealed that Jack is Akira Fudo (Devilman) after his battle versus Satan.
Slum King
The ruler of earthquake-devastated Kanto. He was created by Satan as a punishment for himself after he felt remorse for killing Akira. The Slum King keeps Ryou Asuka and Miki Makimura, who are now quadruple-amputees, as his pets. He has two children, Zubaban and Jannu. While he faces off against Jack multiple times throughout the series, he is finally killed by a newly-revived Satan.
Slum Queen
The personal bodyguards of Slum King, made up of twelve beautiful assassins. All twelve look exactly the same. Their leader is the Slum King's lover. In the final volume, she betrays the Slum King, only to have her razor sharp whip impale her due to the Slum King mentally controlling it.
Zubaban
The Slum King's son. He secretly plans to betray his father. His real name is Ban Douma.
Ryou Asuka
In Devilman, Ryou Asuka was Akira Fudo's best friend and the one that told him about the demons' plan to take over the world. It turns out he was really Satan and battled Devilman to the death. It was their battle that caused the earthquake that devastated Kanto. Even though he "killed" Devilman, he felt guilty about what he had done. He created the Slum King to punish himself. In Violence Jack, Satan returns to human form. He survives the earthquake, along with Miki Makimura. The two try to evade the Slum King and in the process fall in love. However, Ryou is captured by the Slum King and his limbs are removed. He is treated like an animal by the Slum King and is routinely abused. His younger sister, Honey (borrowed from Nagai's prior work Cutie Honey), tries to rescue him, but dies trying. With the death of his sister and girlfriend, Ryou is able to return to his true form as Satan and kills the Slum King. He then resumes his battle with Devilman.
Miki Makimura
While she died at the end of the Devilman manga, Miki is still alive in Violence Jack. She manages to survive the Kanto earthquake and evades the Slum King with Ryou Asuka. She falls in love with him and the two are captured by the Slum King while having sex in a cave. Miki is tortured by the Slum King and has her limbs removed. Like Ryou, she is treated like an animal and a sex toy by the Slum King. Miki dies in the final volume when the Slum King's spear impales her during his final fight with Jack.
Ryou Takuma
A young boy who survived the Kanto earthquake. His mother was crushed under the ruins of their home and his father and sister were burned to death when Mount Fuji erupted. While he starts off as frail and weak, he gradually begins to grow stronger, especially thanks to Jack's influence. He leads an army of children against the Slum King's army early on in the manga.
[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. Manga Entertainment Australia put an application form for Violence Jack, and had a shipment of Violence Jack VHS' coming from the UK, but when the OFLC of Australia banned it, Customs seized most of the Violence Jack stock, that was among other Manga Entertainment VHS being shipped from the UK, but some went missing and went into circulation, and ended up in Blockbuster Video stores and independent video stores. 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 Baiorensu Jakku Haaremu Bomaa)[1], "Evil Town" was released in 1988 as Violence Jack- Hell City (バイオレンスジャック〜地獄街〜, Baiorensu Jakku ~Jigoku Gai~)[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, Baiorensu Jakku Herusu Uindo Hen) [3].
[edit] OVA Episode Summaries
[edit] Episode 1: Harlem Bomber
A great comet hurls from space and collides with Earth, causing a cataclysmic earthquake that rocks the Kanto Plain of Japan, killing several and reducing the cites to rubble. In this time of weakness, a ruthless man known as the Slum King took control of the Kanto Plain with his brute force and rules it with an iron fist. However, in the middle of a trek across the land with his great forces at his side, he encounters a mighty beast-like man wearing a battered green jacket and a yellow ascot who slaughters his men and then targets the Slum King himself. They clash, but their fight is interrupted by a sudden massive tsunami that separates the two.
The Slum King survives the wave and returns to his immense fortress where he tells his men that no one can dare oppose him and be permitted to live. With that said, he promptly orders his men to kill one Violence Jack, the man whom he confronted before.
The episode revolves around a girl, Mari, being captured by the army and sent to a sex camp. Her boyfriend, Ken'ichi, rescues her with the help of Violence Jack.
At the end, Jack is challenged by Harlem Bomber. With great difficulty, Jack manages to defeat Harlem Bomber, but at the price of the life of Ken'ichi, who is killed when he is hurled out a helicopter which Jack used to subdue the Harlem Bomber.
Mari awakens to witness a bright, shining bird soar into the air. Without hesitation, she pursues it as it glimmers high above.
[edit] Episode 2: Evil Town
Due to a massive earthquake, an underground portion of Tokyo has been separated from the outside world. Because of the limited supply of food and the constant threat of intergroup warfare, the underground city's survivors have dubbed the area Hell City. When the story begins, Evil Town has been in existence for several months.
Evil Town is split into three "sections." Section A consists of businessmen and ordinary citizens, and is the most regulated section due to the presence of police officers. Section B, which consists of criminals and lunatics, is controlled by the huge gang leader Mad Saurus and his second in command, the transsexual Blue. Section C, a former modeling agency, avoids contact with the other groups except when necessary.
Section A is attempting to dig their way back to the surface when they uncover Violence Jack, who has apparently been sealed in a rock wall since the earthquake. Section A's leaders invite Jack to stay as their protector, but the other sections have also learned of Jack's existence and call a meeting to see him for themselves.
At the meeting, the Section C leader Aila Mu offers to hire Jack as their guardian and tells him a disturbing story: After the earthquake occurred, the men of both A and B ran wild, capturing and raping the women until they learned that there was enough food for long-term survival. Many of the worst offenders are current Section A leaders, who would revert to behaving like animals if another disaster occurred. Convinced by Aila Mu's story, Jack agrees to aid Section C.
Riled by the lingering presence of Jack, Section B launches a surprise attack on Section A; as Aila predicted, A's leaders turn on one another in an attempt to survive, resulting in the near total destruction of the group. The survivors flee to Section C just as the women finish their own tunnel out of Hell City. Section B raiders arrive and finsh off Section A, then begin assaulting the women. Jack defeats the raiders, killing Blue and severely wounding Mad Saurus.
Mad Saurus mourns the loss of Blue, who accepted her despite Blue's differences. In order to combine their power, Mad Saurus consumes her corpse, transforming into a devilish red creature to battle Jack a second time. Jack is heavily wounded in the fight, but manages to kill Mad Saurus by stabbing him through the forehead, returning him to his human form.
The battle between Mad Saurus and Jack gives Section C enough time to make their way to the surface, which is now a flattened ruin instead of a city. Aila Mu laments that her skills as a model are useless in the ruined world, but the rest of Section C assures her that she is a capable and beloved leader. Heartened, Aila Mu returns belowground to find Jack, but he has disappeared without a trace.
[edit] Episode 3: Hell's Wind
This time, there is a peaceful post-apocalyptic town known as Hope Town. The biker gang Hell's Wind show up and ransack it. Violence Jack makes his entrance here. The episode starts as a young woman, Jun, and her boyfriend, Tetsuya, are attacked. Tetsuya is murdered by Hell's Wind, and they assault and rape the terrified Jun soon after.
Jack 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 abandoned airfield. They take her top off and strap her to a fighter jet. At the behest of a little orphaned 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 to kill everyone. The bike leader tries to escape, but Jack throws his knife at him and cuts his legs off.
Jack departs, strangely heartened by speaking with the orphaned boy, who vowed to become stronger than anyone to protect the people around him.
