Lone Wolf and Cub (1970)
Lone Wolf and Cub is a 1970 title by Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima.
Ogami Itto was the Shogun's executioner until his clan was destroyed and he was branded a traitor. Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima follow him down the road of vengeance as an assassin for hire, pushing his infant son Daigoro ahead of him in a wooden cart rigged with hidden blades. Serialized from 1970, this is landmark seinen manga, spare in dialogue and cinematic in its long silences and sudden, brutal violence. Kojima's brush turns Edo-era Japan into wind, dust and steel. Its influence runs deep through comics and film, and its 28 volumes remain a high point of the form.
A few thoughts on Lone Wolf and Cub
The manga became a run of six Japanese films in the 1970s: start with Sword of Vengeance, which lays out the executioner's fall, then Baby Cart at the River Styx for its wilder set pieces. Shogun Assassin, the cult English recut stitched from the series, is the fastest way in for newcomers and the version many Western fans met first.
The Baby Cart samurai saga on screen
Lone Wolf and Cub sent Kazuo Koike's disgraced executioner and his infant son down a road of vengeance, and the manga spawned a run of stark, blood-soaked samurai films. These are that saga on screen, spare and cinematic, including the American recut Shogun Assassin that carried the story to new audiences.