Writer: Mikel MilesIllustrator: Ivan Aguilar
Purchase: Peep Game Comix
Samurai Shin comes to us as a collaboration between Mikel Miles and Ivan Aguilar. The two have worked hard to create the content and get it to the people by any means necessary. They've even gone so far as to curate a sound track for the comic, showing just how dedicated they are.
Samurai Shin starts with two students training innocently enough. However Keith soon turns up the intensity and seemingly aims to kill Amir. Amir defends himself and makes a slash across the face of Keith in the process. The two are stopped by their master but Keith stabs Amir in the abdomen anyway before claiming to leave the village for good.
This is when things take a left turn. Amir awakes later after having passed out due to his injuries. His mother, a famed samurai, hears a commotion in the village and goes to investigate. Soon he finds himself surrounded by flames. Amir grabs his sword and heads outside where he sees a man in a bear costume has set fire to the village and is now holding his mother hostage while taunting him. That's all the story I'm giving you for free.
Admittedly the start of the story seemed to be a little cliche to me with students dueling and one walking away in anger. It's not really a big deal because most stories do lean on a trope or two, it's the reason they're tropes. It didn't really feel as if it had created a unique narrative until you suddenly see a man dressed as a bear standing on the mountain looking over as the town burns. No matter how silly it seems, at that moment you want to know why that man is dressed as a bear and why he's burning down the town.
The art is where this really shines. The art is a unique style. It seems like it's somewhere between Afro Samurai and The Jetsons. I know that's a strange comparison. I say Afro Samurai because of the way characters and buildings are stylistically drawn. But, like The Jetsons, there is no shying away from bright colors and unique designs. Sure it has the washed out black and white style of classic manga with some bright reds, but there's plenty of oranges, blues, some purple and even a little yellow. Also there are men dressed as bears and that's just not classic, unless we're talking Late Registration.
That brings me to another small point. Despite it not being a complete story you can already tells there's a lot of inspiration drawn from Hip-Hop which is really cool and something you're not going to see in main stream comics besides Luke Cage and Iron Fist looking like a Run DMC video or Sam Wilson rocking a platinum Falcon chain. The only thing I'd like to see in the future is that the idea is committed to fully and doesn't turn out to be just a few cheeky references here and there.
Samurai Shin leaned a few tropes early on, but it managed to develop it's own personality as well. Because of this I'm interested to see where it goes from here. It has the potential to either turn into something really unique and enjoyable or become another entry on the long list of samurai stories.
You can hear Darrell on the CP Time and Powerbomb Jutsu podcasts. He also plays classic arcade games on The Cabinet. You can also check out his playthrough of Sleeping Dogs or Skyrim
You had me at Bear
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