Samurai Executioner, Vol. 7 (v. 7)
The protagonists of the two long, linked stories inShinko the Kappa(2005) return in the first of two long, linked stories here. Shinko and the policeman who apprehended and then married her are both drawn into the case of "The Bamboo Splitter." He nearly captures the culprit, and she becomes a hostage who turns the tables on the felon. Thereafter, the clever murderer is sent to "Toothless Yoshichi," a torturer who extracts a full confession with unusual, quasi-erotic techniques. The linked stories share with their predecessors plenty of eroticism that is more gritty and sordid than loving and that is resolved in compassion. Compassion is, of course, the touchstone characteristic of the figure common to all the stories, Asaemon the executioner, and the three shorter pieces herein demonstrate his exercise of compassion for prisoners he eventually beheads. If writer Koike seems less inspired in this volume's offerings than in those ofShinko, artist Kojima is in top form, especially in the utter narrative clarity of the many wordless sequences.Ray OlsonCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved