Yaiba


Yaiba is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Gosho Aoyama. It ran in Shogakukan's Weekly Shōnen Sunday from September 1988 to December 1993. It was collected into 24 tankōbon volumes.
It was adapted into an anime television series entitled Kenyū Densetsu Yaiba, aired on TV Tokyo from April 1993 to April 1994.
In 1993, Yaiba received the 38th Shogakukan Manga Award for the shōnen category.

Story

Yaiba is the story of an adventuring samurai named Yaiba Kurogane, who knows how to be a samurai and little else. Yaiba lives with his father, Kenjurou, in the forest. One day, while Yaiba was eating, a troop of gorillas came to attack. Yaiba and his father escaped and hid inside a box, but they didn't know that the box was full of pineapples and was going to be transported into the city. In the city, Yaiba finds out that he is a legendary warrior and has to fight the evil of a demonic looking high-school student named Takeshi Onimaru.
The people that Yaiba meets along his journey to become a true samurai encourage him, train him, or inspire him to greatness, though at heart he is still a child, and his incredible skill with a sword is matched only by his kindness towards his friends. Though he tends to leap before he looks, and his thick-headedness tends to turn potential allies into enemies, his friends soon clobber him, and salvage the situation. This unlikely group embarks on a host of incredible adventures where they meet legendary figures from Japanese history, and finally overcome impossible odds, and put everything on the line, to save the entire planet from a threat not of this world.

Characters

;Yaiba Kurogane
;Sayaka Mine
;Takeshi Onimaru:
;Kagetora
;Shonosuke:
;Miyamoto Musashi
;Sasaki Kojirō
;Yagyū Jūbei
;Gerozaimon Geroda
;Namako-Otoko

Media

Manga

Yaiba is written and illustrated by Gosho Aoyama. The manga was serialized in Shogakukan's Weekly Shōnen Sunday from the issue #39 of 1988, published on September 7, 1988, to issue #50 of 1993, published on December 1, 1993. Shogakukan compiled the individual chapters into twenty-four tankōbon volumes released between April 18, 1989 and February 18, 1994.

Volume list

Anime

An 52-episode anime television series entitled Kenyū Densetsu Yaiba, produced by Pastel, aired on TV Tokyo from April 9, 1993 to April 1, 1994. The opening and ending theme songs are performed by Kabuki Rocks; "Yuuki ga Areba" and "Shinjigakunaki Tatakai" respectively.

Episode list

Reception

In 1993, Yaiba, along Ghost Sweeper Mikami, received the 38th Shogakukan Manga Award for the shōnen category.