Bamboo Blade, Vol. 14

By Masahiro Totsuka and Aguri Igarashi. Released in Japan by Square Enix, serialized in the magazine Young Gangan. Released in North America by Yen Press.

Throughout the 14 volumes of Bamboo Blade, we’ve seen its heroine, Tamaki Kawazoe, grow and evolve. She’s always been an amazing kendo student, but that’s not her goal, or her passion, or even her hobby – it’s just what she does. Meeting with Kirino and the others has helped bring her out of her shell, and she’s learned the value or true friendship, but they aren’t able to challenge her enough in regards to kendo. Now, after her defeat by Erina in Vol. 13, we come to the final volume, where Tama-chan spends half of it asking: why do people do kendo?

Everyone’s answer is slightly different, but they all end the same. Azuma uses kendo to improve herself (and make up for her hopeless study habits); Miya-Miya, in addition to finding beating the hell out of everyone fun, wants to see how strong she can be and how far she can go. Saya, who’s suffered from being the ‘comedy character’ in a manga filled with them, finally admits that kendo gives her discipline she needs to grow up. Kirino, of course, simply lives and breathes kendo. It’s surprising to realize that, like Tama, she hasn’t had a real reason for doing kendo beyond “I love it!”, but given her simple and direct personality, this fits. Yuuji and Kojiro-sensei both chime in briefly, but are savvy enough to note that Tama-chan has to find this answer by herself.

Everyone’s final ‘real reason’ for doing kendo is elided out at first, and we only hear it once Tama-chan is back in her bedroom, watching a tape provided for her of her mother on a kendo TV show years ago. Her mother is asked the exact same question, and notes that she wants to make everyone feel the same joy and satisfaction in kendo that she does – its ideals, it’s disciplines, its purity – and that she teaches to to this. And then we flash to the end of everyone’s answer, the one thing all the other girls said. They want to be like Tama-chan. She is their goal, what they are pushing themselves to. And as she breaks down in cathartic tears (part grief over her mother’s death, part simply feeling the weight of everything, and part because she now has that goal), she knows what it is she wants to do kendo for. To be a teacher.

And this ties back in with Kojiro-sensei. I’ll admit, when the series began I had little time for him, putting up with his waffling and goofball tendencies because I liked the rest of the cast so much. But he’s grown just as much as Tama-chan has, and it’s also due to kendo. Seeing him strive to teach the girls how to use kendo to further themselves, and realizing what he can and cannot do in that regard (much of the series has been his angsting about not finding the right way to teach something), he knows he wants to keep doing this – but not with these girls, who he feels have learned all they can from him. He’s leaving for a different school to start with a new class of beginners. We only see Kirino’s reaction to this (and she outright says she’s refraining from saying what she thinks…), but I think they’ll understand his reasoning, just like they did with Tama-chan.

Despite the comedy throughout (even the last climactic battle features Saya (of course) getting herself in trouble by not having eaten for 48 hours prior out of nerves), Bamboo Blade has been almost the pinnacle of idealistic sports manga. If someone is at a loose end in life, or trying to make a change, or needing to find something within themselves… all this can be found through kendo. It’s a trend we see in a lot of sports manga, be it baseball, soccer, or what have you. but despite the idealism (or because of it), this is a manga that really makes you feel good about yourself, and have confidence in the lives of its cast. And it’s not just our 5 heroines – even the ‘rival’ characters such as Sakaki and Erina find strength and fulfillment in kendo, and in bringing kendo to others. Filled with emotional moments, goofy comedy, and of course awesome sports battles, anyone who likes to see humanity striving for a goal should read Bamboo Blade, where kendo will have the answers.

Bamboo Blade Volume 9

By Masahiro Totsuka and Aguri Igarashi. Released in Japan by Square Enix, serialized in the magazine Young Gangan. Released in North America by Yen Press.

I had mentioned in my review of Volume 8 that much of it was a setup for this being a meeting of two mismatched teams, and that I expected our heroes to spend most of the competition kicking asses. And indeed, that’s pretty much what I get here – well, at least until 3/4 of the way through it. But for that 3/4, it’s pretty much fantastic kendo action.

We begin with Azuma versus Chikamoto, which manages to be one of the few tense matches here, mostly as Chikamoto is the exception to most of the rest of her team. We can see her frustration as she realizes that Azuma is much, much better than she is – to the point where she recalls Azuma winning against someone who had previously beaten her in a competition, but can’t recall who beat her.

We then get what is, for me, the highlight of the volume. I’ve not tried to hide the fact that Miya-Miya is absolutely my favorite character in this series, and her split personality, angry snarling, and blunt honesty have been quite refreshing compared to her honest and forthright kendo leads. In Volume 8 we saw her training, and it was noted that she was shaping up well for a total novice. More to the point, Reimi has a cold, so is sick at home and not there to be a horrible distraction. As we see her fight, she scores a point, and is wise enough to realize that it only just barely landed, so didn’t feel “good enough.”

Counterpointing this is her arrogant opponent, who can tell that she'[s a beginner by her footwork, but can’t actually seem to do anything with that knowledge. And so, after giving up a point to stay even, Miya-Miya strikes, and gets the win. This is, in fact, her first win in the entire series. And she realizes… it’s an incredible feeling. Seeing the look of pure joy on her face, unshrouded by cynicism or anger, is worth the price of the book.

And so it goes through the match, with even Dan and Yuuji getting to play this time – and thrashing their opponents. And so finally we get Tamaki versus Takeshi, the sullen boy whose poor attitude has symbolized the spirit of the entire team. He has the most talent on the team, but lacks any will to fight. But even with that, Tamaki crushes him far too easily. So he notes the cords in his padding were loose, and asks for a rematch. And she does it again. Then the cords are actually too tight. So she beats him AGAIN. Then he stops trying to find excuses, and just starts demanding match after match. And slowly but surely, has a complete nervous breakdown as it becomes apparent just how far he’s fallen.

For the kids on the team it’s a vaguely happy ending – Takeshi is quitting, but he’s going back to a dojo to relearn the passion he had lost. And the rest of the team, now led by Chikamoto, is training much harder than before. I wish I could say that was it for the volume, but of course we have the match between Kojiro and Ishibashi. Which after the fantastic kendo action of the prior chapters, is a complete washout. The writer apologized in the afterword for there being too much focus on guys in this volume, but I had no issue with Takeshi’s plotline. Making Ishibashi into a complete comedic idiot, however, simply doesn’t work, and devoting almost an entire chapter to his and Kojiro’s post-match shenanigans makes it end on a poor note.

Still, it’s 3/4 of a volume of awesome, and you get to see the whole of Kojiro’s kendo team do an excellent job. Which is good timing, because the cliffhanger for Volume 10 suggests television might be in their future…

Bamboo Blade Volume 8

By Masahiro Totsuka and Aguri Igarashi. Released in Japan by Square Enix, serialized in the magazine Young Gangan. Released in North America by Yen Press.

I had been somewhat dissatisfied with Volume 7 of Bamboo Blade, and asked that the next volume focus more on the girls and kendo. And for the most part that’s exactly what I get. Yes, there’s still a lot of Kojiro here, still dealing with trying to recover his fighting spirit, but it’s balanced out with a lot of stuff with the girls, and the entire volume is filled with kendo.

We’re still gearing up for Kojiro’s second match with Ishibashi, as it turns out he also coaches a second group of students. Sadly, this group lacks any drive or passion for kendo whatsoever, mostly typified by their captain, Takeshi, an ex-kendo fan who got completely destroyed by a girl and thus has lost any will to improve himself. His attitude carries over to the rest of his team, much to Ishibashi’s dismay, and we are reminded of what Kojiro’s kendo situation was like at the start of Vol. 1 of Bamboo Blade, where it seemed that he and Kirino were the only ones who cared. More importantly, it shows that Ishibashi is, in many ways, just like Kojiro – witness his ‘two-blade technique’ imagine spot. Kojiro, maturity may be closer than you think!

Most of the book is taken up with everyone going over to Tamaki’s dojo for some training and study. This allows everyone to get a little bit of plot and character development – even Azuma, who gets lost and ends up in a different prefecture for the majority of the day. We see Tamaki, head and shoulder above everyone else. We see Kirino and Saki, who are generally equal, though Saki is suffering from a bike injury (I feel bad for Stephen Paul, the translator, for attempting to try to vary the translation of Saki’s whining about her butt hurting – though I note that using the British variation ‘bum’ didn’t quite work). We see that, despite her attempts at using more vicious techniques above her skill level, that Miya-Miya is also getting better at kendo, almost despite herself.

There are tons of scenes in this volume that are simply funny. Starting right off with Miya-Miya accidentally attacking Dan with her kendo sword (and her over the top reaction to doing so), Tamaki’s hideously embarrassing father, and Tamaki’s ensuing humiliation (attempting to conceal her father’s video of her at the athletic festival was actually her best move of the volume, topping all the kendo ones), Tamaki the otaku explaining the best scenes of this season’s anime to her friends (instead of doing homework), and Miya-Miya easily destroying the three smoking students who Saya was haranguing. And there’s even a bit of drama. Once we actually get to the match itself (which hasn’t quite started – most of it will be in Volume 9), we see an ambivalent Takeshi zero in on Tamaki, and try to convince her to drop out of kendo as it will ruin her hands with calluses. We then cut back to Yuuji (remember him?), who just has this LOOK OF DEATH on his face that is amazing to see. Don’t mock kendo!

In all honesty, this volume spent a lot of its time preparing us for the fact that Volume 9 will *not* be an epic struggle between evenly matched teams – not even close. Everything is being set up to allow our heroes to perform a complete beatdown on the other team – though Reimi may show up, so whether Miya-Miya can be a part of that is still in question. Still, it would appear that next volume will be entirely devoted to the kendo match, so that will be great. Till then, this volume was a lot of fun, filled with all the things that make Bamboo Blade great. And even the Kojiro stuff wasn’t too bad this time.