Manga Review: Gun Frontier

Guns akimbo!

There are truly few settings with such potential for horror, fantasy, mystery and action as the Wild West of long ago. The very words "Wild West" are synonymous with the garish imagery of gunfighters and gamblers, of harlots and heart-breakers and the eternal war of the "Indian" against the White Man.

Time and again the Wild West has been masterfully explored through films, initially in spaghetti westerns famous for their hammed acting and bad dialogue dubs, and then by mainstream Hollywood cinema. Most famously this was done of course by Clint Eastwoood, the veritable Spirit of the West himself.
But films are not the only medium of entertainment to have embraced this style. Manga has time and time again found its way to the bleak deserts and ghost towns of the Wild West. There are many gems in this particular genre and indeed I intend to touch upon them all. But today, we begin with a series that is unique even within this limited style of manga.

Cowboys are cool, mmmmk?

Gun Frontier is Matsumoto Leiji's foray into the classic story setup of the stranger trekking across the wasteland. Only, in classic Leiji style, there is not one stranger but three.
Those who recognized the name of the mangaka will undoubtedly be able to predict the three strangers - for the three protagonists are the eerily familiar titular characters from Leiji sensei's famous space opera compilation, The Harlock Saga. We start the story in typically western fashion, with the face-shadowed and keen-eyed gunfighter Harlock making his way into town with his partner/buddy/conspirator Tochiro in tow. The two characters could not be more dissimilar and yet so much alike. Tochiro, a loudmouthed dwarf, is blessed with a terrible eyesight and is useless with a gun. However give the man a blade and he will reap whirlwinds of blood in his wake. Harlcok meanwhile speaks very little and prefers not getting his hands dirty, however he is a devil with a gun and his eagle-eye and inhuman reflexes allow him to cut through his opposition effortlessly. Tying the two together is the mysterious and enigmatic Shinunora, a whore by profession - and a spider by nature. The beautiful and mysterious Shinunora accompanies the two on their various adventures making it abundantly clear that she is not on their side.

This manga pulls no punches and although it is not graphically over-the-top in terms of brutality, the storyline itself is merciless. Do not expect the common comic book courtesies you might have grown accustomed to. The humor is dry, the script is all pragmatic and yet the storyline is epic in its scope and telling. Like all works pertaining to the Harlock saga, this one too does not fail to evoke a lingering sense of sadness and melancholy within the reader. As you turn each page and sink deeper into the madness, you will grow to love and cherish these characters. If only for their starkly honest lifestyle. Harlock and Tochiro are men among men, and Shinunora is a woman like no other. And although the various shorts seem connected by the thread of a greater storyline, they serve equally well as complete short stories on their own.

Read the Gun Frontier for a lesser known member of the epic Harlock saga, or read it anyway if you like cowboys and injuns. Either way, you wont come away disappointed.

Fo' Sho