A Look at Dragon of the Blue Sky, 1 & 2 (in Samurai Deeper Kyo, vol. 11)

If you aren't familiar with the manga series Samurai Deeper Kyo (SDK) and you glance at the first volume or two, you'll find some slapstick humor, a certain amount of fan service, sword fights against monstrous opponents - and a few elements of mystery and mysticism. The series actually gets a lot more serious as it goes on, and becomes rich in both characters and plot, but it's hard to tell from those first volumes. I wanted to get across some of the feel of the meat of the series, and I settled on talking about this two-issue "special," which is included at the end of vol. 11 in the U.S. edition.

"Dragon of the Blue Sky" covers a major incident in the youth of SDK character Sanada Yukimura, who is not the star of the series. Although flashbacks with tasty bits of character background are scattered throughout the series for all the major characters, Yukimura is the only one to have his own separate gaiden - so I think that mangaka Kamijyo Akimine likes him as much as I do.

( Read on ... Warning: spoilers for SDK vol. 3-10 and esp. for vol. 11 ... )

That's it ... hope you enjoyed this preview of the series ... and are going to read the rest!