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Fist of the North Star {Master Edition} – Full Color — Official Raijin Translation (EN) 《Manga》
Fist of the North Star (北斗の拳, Hokuto no Ken) is a Japanese manga series written by Buronson and illustrated by Tetsuo Hara.
In a postapocalyptic wasteland ruled by savage gangs, a hero appears to bring justice to the guilty.
In a postapocalyptic world, humanity has risen from the ashes of nuclear war to a nightmare of endless suffering. It is a time of chaos. Warlords and gangs of savage marauders and warlords rule the broken ruins of civilization, terrorizing and enslaving the survivors. Life has become a brutal struggle for existence and death the only release.
Synopsis:
In the year 19XX, after being betrayed and left for dead, bravehearted warrior Kenshirou wanders a post-apocalyptic wasteland on a quest to track down his rival, Shin, who has kidnapped his beloved fiancée Yuria. During his journey, Kenshirou makes use of his deadly fighting form, Hokuto Shinken, to defend the helpless from bloodthirsty ravagers. It isn’t long before his exploits begin to attract the attention of greater enemies, like warlords and rival martial artists, and Kenshirou finds himself involved with more than he originally bargained for.
Faced with ever-increasing odds, the successor of Hokuto Shinken is forced to put his skills to the test in an effort to take back what he cares for most. And as these new challenges present themselves and the battle against injustice intensifies, namely his conflict with Shin and the rest of the Nanto Seiken school of martial arts, Kenshirou is gradually transformed into the savior of an irradiated and violent world.
Fist of the North Star (Japanese: 北斗の拳, Hepburn: Hokuto no Ken, lit. “Fist of the Big Dipper“)[a] is a Japanese manga series written by Buronson and illustrated by Tetsuo Hara. It was serialized in Shueisha‘s shōnen manga magazine Weekly Shōnen Jump for 245 issues published from 1983 to 1988 and initially collected in 27 tankōbon volumes under the Jump Comics imprint. Set on a post-apocalyptic Earth after a nuclear war, the story centers on a warrior named Kenshiro, the successor of a deadly martial art known as Hokuto Shinken, which gives him the ability to kill his opponents by striking their secret vital points, which often results in an exceptionally violent and gory death. Kenshiro dedicates his life to fighting against the various gangs, bandits, and warlords who threaten the lives of the defenseless and innocent, as well as rival martial artists.
Fist of the North Star was adapted into two anime television series produced by Toei Animation, which together aired on Fuji TV and its affiliates from 1984 through 1988, comprising a combined total of 152 episodes. It has since expanded into a media franchise, including several anime films, a live-action film, OVAs, video games, and a series of spin-offs centering on other characters from the original story. It also has a number of video games and pachinko machines produced by Sega Sammy. English adaptations of the manga were published by Viz Communications as a monthly comic book, and later by Gutsoon! Entertainment as a series of colorized graphic novels, although neither translation was completed.
In October 2020, Viz Media announced that they published the title as a series hardcover editions starting in summer 2021. English adaptations of other Fist of the North Star media have been licensed to other companies, including the TV series and the 1986 film.
The manga has sold over 100 million copies, making it one of the best-selling manga series of all time. The series is considered as one of the most influential manga series of all time.
Information:
Buronson began his career as a manga writer for Weekly Shonen Jump in 1972. He gained popularity with the hard-boiled action series Doberman Cop (with art by Shinji Hiramatsu). In 1983, he coauthored the massively successful Fist of the North Star. He has also written numerous hits under the pen name Sho Fumimura, including Phantom Burai and Sanctuary.
Tetsuo Hara began his career with The Iron Don Quixote for Weekly Shonen Jump in 1982. Fist of the North Star, which began serialization in 1983, drew wide acclaim. In the 1990s, he released the historical period pieces Hana no Keiji and Tokugawa Ieyasu’s Shadow Warrior. Fist of the Blue Sky, published in 2001, ran for nine years in Weekly Comic Bunch. His most recent series, Ikusa no Ko: Oda Saburou Nobunaga-den, began in Monthly Comic Zenon in 2010.
COVER IMAGE CREDITS:
. Official Art
NOTES:
. If you find any errors in these pages, please report them on the Colored Manga Discord so they can be fixed.
. Scanned by Super Joe
. This upload contains scans of the official Raijin Comics release of Fist Of The North Star (Master Edition) from the early 2000’s.
For those unaware, in the early 2000’s, before Viz released their shonen jump magazine in North America, there was another manga magazine publishing manga in North America called Raijin Comics. Raijin was a magazine published by Gutsoon! Entertainment and published series such as City Hunter, Fist of the Blue Sky, Baki, and Slam Dunk, among others. This publisher was originally spun off from the Japanese publisher coamix which itself was formed by the old school shonen jump legends tetsuo hara (fist of the north star) and tsukasa hojo (city hunter).
Raijin Comics ran for 47 issues before becoming defunct. This was scanned by the Raijin Comics Preservation Squad and we are trying to scan and preserve as much of Raijin/Gutsoon’s manga releases in North America as we can.
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