While working for Matsumoto, Hagiwara found the time to draw an original romantic comedy one-shot of his own, Binetsu/Slight Fever Rouge, which appeared in the 1987 Shonen Jump Summer Special & shot straight to the #1 spot with readers. This resulted in Hagiwara being asked to produce a second one-shot, which would result in him having to leave Matsumoto's employment before KOR's final chapter, which was coming soon. Said second one-shot, a swords-&-sorcery fantasy story titled Wizard!!: Lord of the Fiery Explosion, appeared in Issue #47 of Weekly Shonen Jump in 1987, and was another hit with readers. After one last rom-com one-shot, Virgin Tyrant, in the Winter Special at the start of 1988, Hagiwara was asked to make a serialization & he decided to expand upon Wizard!!. It was edited by the late Toshimasa Takahashi, who Hagiwara met while assisting on KOR & would go on to become Jump's seventh editor-in-chief, before suddenly passing away in 2003 at the age of 44, due to a subarachnoid hemorrhage. So, in Issue #14 of 1988, Bastard!!: The Destructive God of Darkness made its debut, where it remains the only serialized manga that Kazushi Hagiwara has ever done. The story of Bastard!!'s serialization is honestly interesting in & of itself, and it (mostly) lines up with each new story arc, so for this review let's look at the first part of Hagiwara's epic post-apocalyptic fantasy: The Dark Rebel Armies.
"It was an Age of Lawlessness... Of Disorder & Chaos... Blood & Steel, Flesh & Bone... An Age of Magic". Fifteen years ago, an evil wizard named Dark Schneider, alongside his his "Four Divine Kings", lead demonic forces in an effort to rule the land, only to be stopped when the legendary Dragon Knight managed to defeat Dark Schneider, while Geo Noto Soto, High Priest of the Kingdom of Meta-Rikana, sealed him away; this would be known as the Golem War. Now, the Four Divine Kings are renewing their attempt to create a utopian "Sorcerer's Kingdom" with forces called the Dark Rebel Armies, and have already taken down the Kingdom of Judas, making it their base of operations. When Castle Meta-Rikana is suddenly attacked while the King, his best forces, & the High Priest are out, Geo's daughter, Cleric-in-training Tia Noto Yoko, remembers that she was told by her father that a powerful force resides in Lucien Renlen, Yoko's surrogate little brother who Geo adopted as a baby after the Golem War, one that can only be released by the kiss of a virgin... Like Yoko! Under duress, because she values her purity, Yoko kisses Lucien, releasing the seal on Dark Schneider. Unfortunately, "D.S" is still the same 400-year old, self-centered, careless, greedy, vain, reckless, short-tempered, unreasonable, crafty, pompous, horny, & violent wizard that he always was... But there's still just enough of the kind & trusting Lucien inside of him to make him willing to fight back against his old friends, even making some wonder why D.S. has become slightly friendlier & even altruistic. The Four Divine Kings ultimate goal, however, is in the form of Anthrasax, the "God of Destruction" that destroyed the world centuries ago before getting sealed away, with the four kingdoms (Meta-Rikana, Judas, Aian-Meide, & Waitos-Neiki) housing the seals themselves, as they feel that Anthrasax can help create their utopia.
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| While I am using Viz's release of the manga for review, I will be sourcing images from wherever I can find them, which won't always be from Viz's books. |
The Dark Rebel Armies is the only part of the manga to be told completely via weekly serialization, from Jump #14 of 1988 to #33 of 1989, which in turn also results in it being the second-longest arc, totaling ~7.5 volumes. Amusingly enough, this also results in this arc being literally half of the total 140 chapters that (currently) comprise the entire manga, as there are 69 chapters for this arc (which I have to believe was completely intentional by Hagiwara... nice), plus the original Wizard!! one-shot, which acts as a Chapter 0 that the rest of the manga continues off of. There's also a bonus "Intermission", titled "Legendary Tales", which tells the story of how Anthrasax destroyed the (modern day!) world, before being defeated by the original Dragon Knight, & was made specifically for the collected release. This first arc establishes the part of the world the story takes places in, revealed much later to be named Metallion, the characters, and the conflict that brings them all together to clash. One of the coolest aspects of Bastard!! is the world itself, as it's best described as "If a bunch of hardcore metal heads played a Dungeons & Dragons campaign". Aside from the countless number of music references, which I'll get to at the end of this review, there's just this feeling that the events in this series could be told in the form of a power metal anthem, along the lines of Dragon Force or Sabaton, and it'd make perfect sense. Hagiwara also goes all out with the D&D influence, with large caption boxes explaining various creatures when they first show up, & giving all of the characters specific races, classes, & alignments, as defined by the iconic tabletop RPG. Even the events of this arc feel like a variety of sequential D&D campaigns, like "Protect Castle Meta-Rikana from the Dark Rebel Armies!", "Save Yoko from Ninja Master Gara's Ninja Stronghold!", or "Defeat the Three Sorcerer Generals of 'Thunder Empress' Arshes Nei!". There's also the obviously strong 80s music influence, so the world of Metallion is one of blood, violence, gore, beautiful women, wild hair... & tons of debauchery.
That last bit brings us to our main character, Dark Schneider. It's tough to properly balance a main character that's both a downright jackass & one that you want to cheer for, but Hagiwara nails that balance perfectly; he's also one to often break the fourth wall for either a joke or an insult. On the one hand, D.S. is egotistical, crass, rude, foulmouthed (Viz's translation has no qualms throwing down "F" & "S"-bombs when appropriate, because they fit), looks down on everyone, and in his first few summonings (the kiss of a virgin can go both ways, in terms of the seal) immediately threatens to let everyone die so that he can finally take over the world, and he certainly has the strength in magic to do so. On the other hand, & likely due to Lucien's influence, D.S. is steadfast, loyal, takes no crap from people who insult (or even slightly scratch) him, and is willing to do pretty much anything to protect & save those he cares for; the fact that he has insane regenerative abilities results in him taking the most damage, by far. For example, no matter how much he complains about how Yoko is bossy & orders him around, D.S. will never cause any actual harm to her, because he cares that deeply about her; plus, a common gag is her being able to simply beat D.S. into cowering submission. Another example is with Princess Sheila of Meta-Rikana, who he calls a "bitch" after she slaps him early on, only for him to later like her gumption when she suggests simply breaking down the front gate of an enemy stronghold. In essence, D.S. will generally show disdain for those around him, but if you get on his good side he will quickly be there for you, even if he'd never actually admit it to anyone.
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| Our "hero", ladies & gentlemen! |
Another major part about D.S., though, is his penchant for, to put it simply, sexing up the ladies whenever possible... Or at least being as sexual as can be allowed in Shonen Jump during the 80s. D.S. shows no shyness when it comes to women, who are pretty much all drawn to be beautiful by Hagiwara, claiming to have every woman in the world be his when he conquers the planet, and even during this first story arc does pretty much anything he can, without outright just having sex, with just about any woman that comes in his way; sensual fondling tends to be the furthest he actually goes. The only exceptions to this are Yoko & Sheila, who he doesn't touch in any sexual fashion whatsoever (at least on purpose...), though coincidentally enough both of them also unsealed him, Sheila doing so when Yoko is captured early on, so you can read into that as D.S. valuing the sanctity of those who give him life, in a sense, if you prefer. D.S. even wants his first time with Yoko to be truly special & important, & when she promises her virginity to D.S. during the final fight of this arc to encourage him to keep fighting, D.S. gets a MASSIVE power boost; screw the "power of friendship", it's all about the "power of nookie" for D.S.. While this definitely can run into intensely problematic connotations, I'd say that Hagiwara manages to just barely avoid going too far by portraying D.S. himself as either very respectful of the women he comes across (even prioritizing their safety over his, & generally refusing to actually kill any women), though his advances can definitely be a bit too pushy at times (again, his alignment is "chaotic evil, but with neutral tendencies"), or showcasing D.S. more like a horny teenager who talks about how much of a sexual tyrannosaurus he is, but never actually goes "all the way" with anyone. As the manga continues, Hagiwara pushes the line of decency as far as he seemingly can in Jump, but for this first arc it's comparatively rather tame, though Yoko (on behalf of the female readers) does call out D.S. on him being a repeated sex offender in Volume 4. It's no doubt meant to be portrayed as a semi-sexual power fantasy that's heavily influenced by the glam metal culture of the era (i.e. "Sex, Drugs, & Rock 'n' Roll", only without the drugs), so take that into consideration. It's definitely a fine line to walk, but I'd argue that Hagiwara manages to avoid going into irredeemable territory, at least by this early point in the manga.
Still, I can safely say that that most sexual thing about Bastard!!, at least during this first story arc, are the Japanese lyrics to the ending theme for the OVA adaptation of said arc. Seriously, those lyrics leave little to the imagination.
Moving on, we have the rest of the major cast for this arc, most of which do become recurring characters as the story moves on. Yoko is a feisty & strong-willed teenage girl, effectively becoming the second main character in many ways, though she often winds up getting (understandably) annoyed whenever D.S. starts getting a bit too wild, perverse, & cocky for her comfort; her smacking around D.S. never gets old, especially in how it makes D.S. look so meek & pathetic. Her father Geo only makes the occasional appearance after his introduction, but has absolute trust & belief in both his daughter & even D.S., showing that had D.S. never been a villain in the past the two would have likely been good allies. Meanwhile, Lucien makes for an amusing alternate side to D.S., as the boy is so utterly innocent & pure, to the point of being downright hapless, but his absolute love, respect, & attention towards Yoko seeps through to D.S. himself, leading to moments where our lead essentially becomes a grown up Lucien in front of Yoko; there are also small indications that there's more to Lucien than anyone really knows. D.S. also winds up getting a mascot-esque sidekick in the form of Lars, a small dragon that is hinted at being the reincarnation of Prince Lars Uhl Meta-Rikana, the very "Dragon Knight" that defeated D.S. 15 years ago.
Easily the biggest recurring cast though, after Yoko, comes in the form of the Four Divine Kings. First up is Ninja Master Gara, a ninja who's essentially as strong as he is a dumb pervert (even acting like instantly regrowing a limb is a totally normal thing), but in the long run is easily likable because of how straightforward & honest he is; you can't really buy him being a true-blue "bad guy". After that is "Thunder Empress" Arshes Nei, a human/dark elf mix who D.S. had raised for over 100 years, when he found her abandoned as a small child, teaching her as well as being a simultaneous father-figure/lover. Her relationship with D.S. becomes a notable part of the story during the second quarter of this arc, as she sends her Three Sorcerer Generals (talisman user Sean Ari, warrior/wizard Kai Harn, & the vampiric Di-Amon) to take out D.S., only to then have to do the job herself. Complicating matters here is when she willingly accepts a curse to prove that she holds no love for her "Darsh", lest she turn into a toad for the rest of her life. D.S., in turn, is truly honest about his love for Arshes, even being willing to die if it saves his surrogate daughter from harm. Naturally, there winds up being a slight triangle between D.S., Nei & Yoko, though it never really goes beyond Nei wondering if she's "just a daughter" to D.S., who naturally remains oblivious to it all; there's also some hinting that Gara has feelings for Nei, but it's not really developed in any way.
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| Like I said, Hagiwara tends to portray D.S. more like a hyper-hormonal teenager than an outright rapist. |
Finally, we have the remaining two Kings: Ice Wizard Kall-Su & Dark Priest Abigail. The former sadly doesn't really do much of anything in this story arc, though he does get established as being a powerful ice-based wizard when he single-handedly freezes the Kingdom of Waitos-Neiki in Volume 5, claiming its seal. "Prophet of Hades" Abigail (or just "Abby", if you're cheeky), on the other hand, winds up being the primary villain, a dark high priest who has more knowledge over things than he lets on, with his main threat being the usage of three "Infernal Arms", the Demon-Mail, the Devil's Mace, & the Ring of Satan, first individually via special monsters (an undead warrior named Lynch, a cyclops, & Eddie the Lich) before uniting all three together to turn himself into "Omega Abigail", the closest equivalent this series has to a giant robot; D.S., in turn, summons a golem first shown early on & rides it like he's Daisaku from Giant Robo. Overall, the Dark Rebel Armies is a fun fantasy story that keeps things fresh by only taking itself just seriously enough to allow for proper stakes & risks to feel relevant, but through the various characters knows to still carry with it a sense of just having fun & throwing caution to the wind. There's also a nice variety in terms of battle, both from the various spells being cast as well as the strategies being used; the fights aren't simply just hitting each other with ever-stronger attacks until one gives in. Also, while D.S. obviously takes the lion's share of focus, both Nei & Gara do get their own fights, allowing them to really showcase what they're each capable of when push comes to shove. Naturally, though, Hagiwara plays around with standard expectations in some ways, like Gara using the full power of his Murasame Sword's "Blade of Mystery", which should steal his own life force to power the final attack... But Gara is literally called in the manga someone who wouldn't die if he was killed, so take that as you will.
Then we have Kazushi Hagiwara's artwork, which at this early point definitely shows the influence Izumi Matsumoto had on him. While characters like D.S., Gara, & Abigail are definitely unique enough, others like Yoko, Sheila, & Lucien look almost exactly like characters from Kimagure Orange Road, so much so that I could easily see them hang out with the likes of Madoka Ayukawa, Kyosuke Kasuga, & Hikaru Hiyama. One thing of note is that Gara does bare a respectable resemblance to another, more iconic, fantasy manga character, Guts from Berserk; it's not 1:1, but they look close enough to be brothers, especially early on. However, Kentaro Miura's series didn't debut until 1989, while Bastard!! was on its weekly run, so could Miura have been influenced by Hagiwara somewhat? (Trust me, I'll be getting back to Bastard!! & Berserk's interesting similarities for a later story arc...) Hagiwara also has a great knack for making the more sensual & sexual scenes look good, but without going "all the way" (for obvious reasons); Hagiwara no doubt learned a lot from Dirty Matsumoto. Beyond that, Hagiwara really does a great job with the various creatures, many of which he received assistance from other artists for the designs, & his environments are all well done. He really manages to make Metallion feel like a real place, and the flow of the story, both in action & exposition, is easy to follow. As the manga would go on, Hagiwara would grow into his own overall style, & the artwork would become more & more detailed & beautiful, but for this early period Bastard!! is still a great looking manga, regardless of when one reads it.
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| This image is from the OG version, as Hagiwara redid the Minotaur for the Complete Edition re-release. |
That being said, Hagiwara has always been notoriously slow & obsessive over his artwork, and with this being a weekly serialization at the beginning there are moments where he goes "lazy" & even resorts to mere scribbles, he even included an "extra panel" in Volume 4, though he makes up for this by having those moments be done explicitly for comedy; his little 4-koma gag strips in the books poke fun at this, showing it's all self-inflicted. Viz's release also partially uses the Complete Edition, which featured redone artwork in some spots, as its source for Volume 1 & the first half of Volume 2, and the redone pages obviously look even better there; sadly, that's all we get from that 2000-2009 Japanese re-release. Finally, Hagiwara also has an almost-obsessive penchant for adding in little notes in the margins between panels, either tossing in quick thanks to various people & assistants or simply poking fun at his own manga at numerous points. Viz even has to put some at the back of the book, because they can sometimes be too long to properly maintain in the margins when translated. It just shows that Hagiwara always had fun making Bastard!!, and reading them while reading the manga itself is pretty much essential for getting the full experience.
Finally, let's just get probably the most infamous aspect of Bastard!! out of the way here: The music references. Similar to what Hirohiko Araki does with JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, which had debuted just a year prior, Kazushi Hagiwara tosses in a metric ton of music references for Bastard!!, with almost every single character, locale, & magic spell being named after a person or band, mostly from within the heavy metal genre, though there is the occasional non-metal reference. Just like JoJo, this has resulted in most of these references being altered in some way whenever Bastard!!, both in manga & anime form, has seen release outside of Japan... But is that actually the case here? Were the changes to names that Geneon did for the OVA, like "Meta-Rikana", "Anslasax", & "Aian Meide", actually more accurate than the more blatant "Metallicana", "Anthrasax", & "Iron Maiden"? This has been a bit of a confusing thing about the series, and even Viz seemingly couldn't decide on which to use, as come Volume 8 the translation reverts spells like "Guns & Roses" & "Stryper" to "Gan san roa" & "Stryver", as indicated in the Spell Book section at the end of that volume, while the various kingdoms revert to the names that were used in Geneon's release of the OVA. Well, I have the Bastard!! Data Book that came out in 2003, which has a complete catalog of all names up to Volume 23, with major characters even having getting romanized forms... And the end result is a little bit of both, honestly, with even some of Viz's translation choices technically being a bit off from what Hagiwara chose. Let me just quickly state that, due to the looseness of katakana, both "Anslasax" & "Anthrasax" are technically accurate, but almost everything else is pretty well defined; Viz sticks with the more blatant referential spelling throughout, though.
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| Another non-Viz source, but a perfect example of the kind of amusing crap Hagiwara was pulling during this run of the manga, on rare occasion. |
For example, it's actually "Meta=Llicarna", with the "=" being a common piece of Japanese typography that can mean either a space or a dash, while "A=Ian=Meide" is the (technically) correct spelling for that kingdom, not Iron Maiden; Aian-Meide is close enough. Meanwhile, Hagiwara preferred "Tiara Nort Yoko", "Geo Nort Sort" (though Viz's use of "Soto" is actually more accurate here), "Rusie Renren" (Viz would eventually use "Lucie" as a pet name Yoko uses for him), "Lars Ulu Meta-Llicarna", "Sheera Tuel Meta-Llicarna" (which is actually meant to be reference to both Aura Battler Dunbine & Laputa: Castle in the Sky), & the kingdom of "Waitos Neiki". Others, like Dark Schneider, Kall-Su, Arshes Nei, Kai Harn, Captain of the Meta-Rikana knights Bon Jovina, & Di-Amon have always been altered somewhat from their namesakes. As for spells, the katakana indicates names like "Ganzun=Rou", "Rai Otto", "Skid Roa", "Ray Bow", "Fou Bi Doun", "Hallo Iin", & "Stry=Ba", though there are still plenty of unchanged names, like Impellitteri, Damned, Dio, Venom, Hellion, Sodom, Tesla, Anthem, Accept, Accused, U.D.O, & Manowar (this one just barely); even Abigail & Eddie the Lich are direct references. There are also deities who are only mentioned by name that are references, like Yngwie & Blackmore. I could honestly keep going, too, because Bastard!! just has that... many... references; the spells alone take 30 pages in the Data Book to fully catalog! Still, what does all of this mean, in the end? First, Bastard!! is complex as all hell when it comes to the music references, and I feel for anyone who has to tiptoe their way through that translation minefield; Viz even waffles back & forth with some names at times before finally settling on things. Second, Hagiwara did indeed alter many names to various extents of his own volition, so anyone who complains that "Viz & Geneon ruined all of the music references that were in the original Japanese!" isn't actually all that correct, because many were already altered in the first place. At the same time, though, some references are more direct than some of the previous official translations wound up going with, so the complaints do have some merit, if only ever-so-slightly. As for what I'll be doing with the reviews, I'll be sticking with whatever choices Viz settled on from Volume 8-on, for simplicity's sake.
Though, to be fair, Hagiwara also decided this first story arc should be called "The Illegal Treason Army", so it's not like the translators had to be 100% accurate to what Hagiwara decided upon.
Out of the entire Bastard!! manga, The Dark Rebel Armies is the most like the swords-&-sorcery, D&D-influenced, high fantasy that most people tend to associate the series with. It's easy to see why, too, because the 1992 OVA adaptation is of this arc specifically (& even then it only adapted through Volume 5, with some skipping), and the 1994 video game adaptation for the Super Famicom similarly takes only from this arc. To most, this arc is Bastard!! in a nutshell: D&D-style fantasy mixed with lots of sexuality, some notable gore, & tons of heavy metal references, all while tossing in plenty of silly comedy. And, to be fair, this does result in Bastard!! feeling very much unlike most Jump manga, even to this day. Though Hagiwara does stay true to some of the tried & trusted elements of Jump, Dark Schneider's final stand against Abigail is absolutely true to the "Jump Style", its high fantasy execution is something that just isn't seen in Shonen Jump, and even its closest modern equivalent, Black Clover, is wildly different from nearly every angle, outside of both being swords-&-sorcery stories. While the manga never seemed to be a "high ranking" series in Jump, at least going off of Table of Contents placement, it still received notable attention from readers... Even if a fair portion of it were complaints from females about D.S.'s predilection for sex offenses. Going off of the fact that The Dark Rebel Armies storyline does have something that could be treated as an "ending", even if there are still loose ends left unaddressed (namely Kall-Su & Anthrasax), it's likely Hagiwara took a precaution, just in case his editor told him that the manga would end after this story finished up.
However, Hagiwara was allowed to continue making Bastard!!... and it'd be treated as its own sort of special attraction. Come back next time for the second story arc in Hagiwara's fantasy epic: Hell's Requiem.
Manga © Kazushi Hagiwara 1988-1989
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