By Hiroaki Samura
Dark Horse, 280 pp.
Rating: 18 +

Finally! After a year-long wait, the first volume of Blade of the Immortal collecting material that didn’t see print in the single issue format makes its way to the shelves. Picking up right where things left off, Rin, Doa and the mysterious masked Ozuhan emerge from one tunnel and continue on to another as their quest to rescue their friends and allies continues and, quite possibly, begins to come to a end. Yes, that’s right Blade of the Immortal fans, the interminable “Prison Arc” which started many years ago seems to be nearing its climax. Reunions, happy and sad, along with some long-awaited confrontations abound as things begin to pick up steam once again.

First things first. Samura’s art here is fantastic. It’s been shaky over the past few years, but still quite good, and now it seems like he’s finding his groove once more. The fight sequences, including Rin’s unveiling of a variation of her signature move, look absolutely amazing once more and move along at a nice clip while still being easy to follow. Action’s not all Samura’s good at, though, and he handles the quieter, emotional and more disturbing moments wonderfully. The silent sequence with Rin and Doa battling through a horde of immortal, insane prisoners was especially chilling, and one of the quieter bittersweet reunions was heartwrenching as well. I never cease to be amazed at how good Samura is at depicting emotions alongside the swift, slick, and brutal fight scenes that populate this series.

The story itself, as mentioned before, seems to be picking up speed once more. In addition to the continuation of the “Prison Arc,” we also get some nice flashbacks detailing the history between Doa and the gigantic Isaku. That’s been a while in the making as well as they’ve been kicking around the series for quite some time now. The flashback doesn’t feel particularly intrusive or distracting, either, and it does quite a bit to fill in the blanks of the duo’s relationship and history together, not to mention explaining why Isaku is a Christian.

Also, was it just me, or did it feel like the tunnels had a vague “Circles of Hell” motif going on? It started a volume or two ago as Doa and Rin first entered the tunnels beneath Edo castle, and as they journey further into them the horrors and obstacles seem to grow. A small pile of corpses, brutal beatings, and torture give way to icy rivers, and caverns full of dismembered bodies and mindless, bestial men who are the failures in Kagimura’s immortality experiments. And, of course, at the center of it all, our protagonist, the imprisoned Manji.

The reunion between the Rin and Manji has been a long time coming and it’s certainly nice, but not quite the tearjerking reunion that Samura gave us in the Last Blood arc. Still, you can’t go to that well too often. Plus, there’s not really any time for rest as Kagimura and his allies have clued into Rin’s infiltration by the time the reunion occurs. In fact, the second half of this book essentially shows all of Kagimura’s plan falling to pieces as escaped prisoners riot within the castle, and their wives, daughters and mothers riot at the one of the castle gates. If this isn’t enough, we also get a payoff to a scene that happened so long ago that I had all but forgotten it even occurred.

As I said earlier, this volume has been a long time coming and I’m glad it’s finally here. It’s a bit pricey for most manga fans, as this massive chunk of story clocks in about $20, and it’s the ramp up to the climax for a hell of a long arc, so I can’t really see this being a good jumping on point for new readers. Still, this is an ending that’s been a long time coming and long-time fans will be quite pleased with that. Hopefully. He could be swerving us but let’s all keep our fingers crossed.

Volume 20 of Blade of the Immortal is available now.