Stan Sakai is amazing. He is so sweet, humble and good-natured in person. The mark of not only a great artist is a great human who is nice even to people who have never heard of his work. I named my pet rabbit (albino) after Yojimbo. He's gone now, but the comics will always remain. Thanks for posting!
It's nice to see how humble Stan comes across, amazing artist. Been subscribing to Usagi Yojimbo since ~95, pretty much the only comic I still regularly read.
"...there's someone in Indonesia, Poland or Czech Republic reading my books..." Well, Greetings from Czech Republic! I really do enjoy Usagi very much so thanks Stan!
I got a box set of the first seven volumes of this for this last Christmas, and my god is it amazing. I'm about halfway through, so far, and I'm finding it hard to put down.
Pretty awesome! Up until now I always thought Usagi Yojimbo was just a character from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I'll look forward to checking out the comics and his other appearances.
I'm 35, grew up on the 8O's Turtles cartoon and am a huge Turtles fan so of course I knew about Usagi. It took me until the Usagi 3 part episode of the Nick show to finally pick up the first compilation book of the Dark Horse run and all I can say is: I'm deeply ashamed I've never discovered this comic sooner. This is truly a treasure. I love all kinds of stuff: manga, superhero comics, and living in Belgium I also grew up on Tintin and The Smurfs of course, so my taste in comics has a pretty wide range. Usagi Yojimbo however is one of the very few comics that feels like more than just a comic book. And in my opinion the only comic where the stories seem to progress naturally instead of being a scripted story that goes from A to B to C. Every story surprises me, makes me laugh or tear up, and I have yet to discover the majority of the Dark Horse books and the Fantagraphics run. Stan Sakai belongs right up there with Hergé, Peyo, Carl Barks, Don Rosa, Floyd Gottfredson and yes, Stan Lee as well. So, long story short: Thank you Stan Sakai for giving the world Usagi Yojimbo.
I didn't know WatchMojo did interviews. This was really nice to watch, I just found out about Usagi Yojimbo and it looks like a story I would really love. Stan seems like a great guy and cartoonist!
He is a very nice and approachable man to meet. he goes to many conventions around the US every summer. I have meet him twice at conventions on the east coast. He lives in Hawaii, so he travels a lot.
of course there's someone in Indonesia who read your masterpiece sensei!! (me for example), such a fine balance between east and west drawings, effortlessly done!
You totally should! Usagi Yojimbo is some of the best western graphic novel content ever created. It's steeped in rich Japanese folklore and culture, which makes it a unique experience not unlike reading a manga, even though many of the stylistic choices and storytelling methods are rather Western. I suggest beginning with the Dark Horse bound publications "Grasscutter", "Grasscutter II", "Seasons" and "Demon Mask". Those are what got me into the series, and I enjoyed them immensely.
i lvoe the usag yojimbo graphic novels i got my first finally got lucky and got 24 the mother of mountains the research is very thorough and true facts is stunning highly recommend anyone who likes adventure to read usagi yojumbo it is way more than a comic.it is an actual archive of history
Such a seemingly simple style - the art, the stories - but really resonates. Certain landscape scenes so beautifully done, poignant bittersweet storylines. I read the entire run every summer...
Speaking of gaming, I would love to see a current gen level game of Usagi. Maybe by Platinum or Atlus. That would be awesome because all we have at the moment is an app game.
whoa whoa whoa whoa, wait a second, let me get this straight, you've got a comic, written by a japanese american artist/writer, about a talking samurai rabbit, which hasn't been translated to japanese????
Answering waaay late, but a lot of it I believe is less a question of the material not speaking to a Japanese person with an interest in manga, but rather that the local comic industry is just SO strong that there's too little space in the market for it to feel worth it for companies to try and compete there.
