Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Writer: Stan Sakai
Artist: Stan Sakai
Release date: May 13, 2015
Price: $3.99

Reading an issue of multiple award-winner Stan Sakai’s Usagi Yjimbo is like eating sherbet: it cleanses the palate.

One of the few Dark Horse Comics still published in black and white. And like a German expressionist film director, Stan Sakai takes advantage of the medium to contrast light and black in stimulating ways. In the style of Kike the master comic strip artists of old; Stan Sakai mixes anthropomorphic characters drawn in a cartoon style with serious action and adventure. Stan Sakai is the Japanese Carl Barks. Even if you don’t read the words, the art tells the story. And is that not the hallmark of a great artist?

And at a time America continues to celebrate Japanese popular culture, Stan Sakai’s work is honest and authentic.

This issue launches a three-issue story arc, “The Thief and the Kunoichi” (a female ninja or shinobi). Hero Usagi-san accidentally encounters a pair of playful burglars and a humourless female warrior. What mystery has brought them all together?

As the ladies take center stage the pages and action come as fast as a hot katana through butter. When guards discover the shinobi and attack, her reaction is simple: “Brazen it out!” she says, swinging her sword. The burglar, in contrast slips away, tricks other guards, and escapes.

It will be too long until the next issue comes out. Domo arigato to Stan Sakai.

Reviewer: Joe Lovece
Reviews Editor: Steve Hooker