Benkei in New York manga by J. Mori and T. Jiro (.CBR)

Emeritus Moderator
Inactive Poster

Posts 11951
Location Paris van Java
WRZ$ 58928.59
Device Not Specified

Feb 25th, 2011, 4:51 pm

#717173 by Ojay

Benkei in New York manga by Mori Jinpachi & Taniguchi Jiro
Requirements: CBR Reader. 43 MB.
Overview: Expatriate Japanese artist Benkei lives in New York. His secret? He may be the only artist in town who isn t entertaining fantasies of being a hitman — he s living them.

Warren Ellis: "Diabolically well-told, occasionally harrowing, Benkei is better than 96% of the crime fiction coming out of America right now"

Benkei in New York

Manga

Action Drama Seinen

Jinpachi Mori

Taniguchi Jiro

Shogakukan

Big Comic Original Zoukan (Shogakukan). 1995.

Viz Media, September 9th 2001

Reviewed by Jeff Lester @ http://www.lazybastard.com/benkei.html:

Killing the Butterfly: Art, Vengeance and Failure

Reading and enjoying Benkei in New York made me feel like a Czech teenager, the kind that considers themselves really super cool because they know all the words to Michael Jackson's songs. By the time I reached the end of Benkei, I had the feeling that a throwaway piece of manga craftwork had been passed off to me, Mr. Ignorant American, as a groundbreaking work of "diabolical hard-boiled stories."

But I feel like I'm ruining things already; for me, the primary joys of reading Benkei in New York were the joys of surprise and discovery. For those who are almost on the verge of buying this book, but want none of its odd charms diluted, you should read no further than this paragraph. Allow me to simply recommend Benkei, with this paraphrase from the Gin Blossoms as a caveat: If you don't expect too much of it, you may not be let down.

Now, for the rest of us still reading: Benkei in New York opens with two gentlemen in New York waiting out a rainstorm. One of the men, a pleasantly broad-faced man, offers the other a sip of very expensive Scotch, and invites him to the very private bar that he owns. This pleasant looking man is Benkei, who in the next scene, is in his apartment negotiating the price to perform a forgery for a gangster. The gangster tries to warn Benkei away from his "that dangerous line of work." "I'm a multi-businessman," Benkei replies.

Less than 20 pages later, the story wraps up neatly after exposing the reader to murder, cannibalism, hurtled knives, and an "adauchi" (a vendetta). Pleasant-faced Benkei turns out not only to be a forger and master artist, but somewhere between a hitman and an instrument of divine vengeance.

This sort of stuff rings my chimes in a big way. Benkei reminds me a lot of Tezuka's Surgeon-at-Large Black Jack; a character both of society and outside, straddling the line between divinity and mortality. And there is more than an echo of Charles Willeford and his art-loving noir heroes here as later stories involve stories of violence and forgery (my favorite has a denouement where Benkei stabs people in the face through a painting of Munch's The Scream. I knew it was going to be good when Benkei, bloodied and his studio destroyed, vows, "He's finally going to get a taste of Munch's Blood!" But I had no idea it was going to be that good).

Both the art and the writing, like the best manga, are surpisingly subtle and nuanced even as they're rolling up their sleeves and throwing about the blood and caricaturization. Although Jinpachi Mori writes Benkei as a force of nature, Jiro Taniguchi gives him a broad friendly face, thin lips, and intensely sad and humorous eyes; the unassuming face of an artist. Kudos to Viz's translator who either heightens or adds a touch of understated nuance to Mori's dialogue: "You know you're getting involved with a freak." "Ha. Well maybe I am." goes a final exchange between Benkei and his new girlfriend--an exchange already given ambiguity by it taking place against a shot of New York's skyline. It could be either character speaking either line, and it could be gentle amusement or quiet resignation in that last line for either of them. It underscores how well suited the characters are to each other.

Sadly, though, as Viz's website calls this "The Complete Collection," Benkei in New York was abandoned by its creators--I suspect at least in part because the material didn't entirely gel with them. Several of the stories feel like little more than sketches--the story of Benkei stalking a man through New York as told through the eye's of Benkei's prey and little reason is given for the hunt, no spin on the initial premise. In a larger body of stories, it could be seen as an interesting diversion, an attempt to shake up the status quo. As one of seven stories, however, it suggests that the creators are having difficulty figuring out how to frame their character. Benkei is a character that seems to demand more attention than as the enigmatic figure of vengeance of the original conception. But too much focus on Benkei easily drives all the other elements out of the picture--the later stories with Benkei's art skills forming the center of a gang war have nothing "diabolical" to them--only a character that seems increasinbly more fantastic and unbelievable the more closely he's examined.

For me, the problem seems to ironically mirror difficulties in criticism: Benkei, an artist turned killer, is the engine and the most essential component to the stories, but quickly overwhelms everything if too much attention is paid him. Likewise, in art, the role of the artist in creating and understanding the work can be essential for the work's fullest appreciation, and yet the work itself is done a disservice when the artist overshadows it. Additionally, the artist rapidly turns from a vital enigma to an unlikely and familiar contrivance under too much scrutiny. Benkei in New York, then, is an uneasy study of an artist-killer and his work that turns out, ultimately, to be an acknowledgment of the difficulty (if not outright failure) of uneasy studies of artists and their work. For those of us who like some blood and melodrama in our contemplation, Benkei in New York is a rich an moderately enjoyable failure.

# Note: Other Manga Stories:

Daichouhen Doraemon Manga by Fujiko F. Fujio

Eden: It's An Endless World! by Hiroki end

Monster by Naoki Urasawa

Manhole by Tsutsui Tetsuya

Planetes by Yukimura Makoto

Homunculus by Hideo Yamamoto

Berserk Manga by Kentaro Miura

Harukana Machi e manga by Jiro Taniguchi

Vagabond manga by Takehiko Inoue

MPD-Psycho by Eiji Otsuka and Sho-u Tajima

Samurai Executioner by Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima