[Analysis] Baoh

Perhaps the name Hirohiko Araki is not very familiar among Westerners, but if we were to ask any Japanese person with even the slightest idea about manga, it is very possible that they would immediately recognize that name, since Araki has been very popular for decades thanks to his work. Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, one of the most influential and long-lived mangas in Japan, since it began its journey in 1986 and still continues thanks to the fact that Araki has known how to innovate at each stage, adding new concepts and changing the protagonists with successors of those from the previous stories, who are commonly members of the Joestar family.

Thanks to Araki's taste (or fanaticism) for everything Western (especially music), he currently jojo Doors are opening outside of Japan at a good pace, after all there are not many stories in which you are going to meet a supreme being called AC/DC or two warriors called Dire and Straits. It's pretty easy to find Jojo's influence in Japanese manga or video games. Where do you think Capcom got the “inspiration” for the designs of many of its Street Fighters such as Guile, Rose, Gill or Yuri? It is less common to find it in its Western counterparts, however, not long ago I discovered that a Hulk comic paid tribute to the series, an unmistakable sign of its arrival in the West.

All this nonsense only serves to put you in the situation, since in this analysis I am not going to talk about jojo, but from a previous work by Araki, where you can see some concepts and ideas that were later included in Jojo's Bizarre Adventure.

Baoh came to the West in the early 90s, a time when manga was very popular thanks to series like dragon ball, Mazinger Z, Sailor Moon, Saint Seiya either Dr. Slump. Viz Comics was in charge of distributing it in the USA, in 8 volumes of about 48 pages, the same format it had in Spain, where it was published by Planeta de Agostini and Viz itself.

Ikuro and Sumire, the fugitives

The story begins with a black train that travels through Japan. Inside are scientists from the Judas group (or Doress, depending on the version you see) who are specialists in experimenting on animals and humans in order to use them as weapons and thus be able to impose itself on other countries if necessary or willing.

Sumire, a 9-year-old girl, and her pet Nottsuo (a type of marsupial) are some of the subjects held against their will on the train. The reason Sumire is under observation is her ability for premonition, since the girl is able to feel and see future events. In addition to having this gift, Sumire can also guess security keys, thanks to which she manages to escape from her captivity and travel the black train in search of her salvation, which ends up arriving when she frees a boy that the scientists had submerged in water and trapped in a capsule.

Thanks to the boy's superhuman speed and agility, they both manage to escape and begin a life as fugitives, where they only have each other to live with. The boy in question is called Ikuro Hashizawa and the only thing he remembers about his life is that He suffered a car accident with his family and woke up in the laboratory, in which they experimented with him.

Initially the idea of ​​both protagonists is to flee from those who were holding them, but they will soon realize that this option is not viable, since different assassins come out to meet them to eliminate Ikuro and kidnap the girl.

Baoh, the ultimate weapon

We discover the reason for this rush to eliminate the boy in the laboratory, when the doctor responsible for his creation says that Ikuro is in the first phase of his transformation and that with each passing day new abilities and powers will awaken in him, becoming the ultimate weapon. The same scientist will also show the shareholders of his laboratory (millionaires who retain their anonymity behind a mask) what abilities Baoh can obtain, pitting a dog that underwent the same experiment as Ikuro, against a huge tiger. Finding itself in danger, the dog enters a “trance” in which it changes its appearance and obtains incredible abilities, killing the tiger without any effort and having to be sacrificed immediately to prevent it from escaping the laboratory and killing those present, which also shows us the way to kill Baoh (shooting its head and burning its body).

After surviving the attack of the first assassin (thanks to Sumire's premonition) Ikuro discovers that his body acts instinctively when in danger and that in addition to his superhuman strength and agility, he also has the ability to heal his wounds and secrete a powerful acid with his hands.

However, the situation remains incomprehensible to the protagonists. What is happening to Ikuro and why does his abilities increase every time he is in danger?

They will have little time to stop and think about these issues, as they are constantly stalked by various (and colorful) assassins who seek to eliminate Baoh before he reaches his final form. One of those enemies will be a giant baboon named Martin, who also comes from the laboratories where Baoh was created, where he managed to increase his strength, skill, and size.

Believing that they will be more difficult to locate, Sumire and Ikuro hide in the mountain where they will be taken in by an elderly couple. Unfortunately, the assassins find them again and, although they fail in their mission to kill Baoh, they manage to kidnap Sumire, knowing that without her gift of premonition, Baoh will not be able to foresee enemy attacks and that, due to the friendship that the two have developed, he will go to look for her in the laboratories where they are holding her, thus facilitating the task of eliminating him.

As it could not be otherwise, Ikuro will head to the laboratory, even knowing that it is a trap, not only to save Sumire, but also to settle scores with her creators and end everything once and for all.

Araki showing his first glimpses

In general terms, Araki's work can be considered pretty typical by manga standards, including the teenage protagonist with special powers. It is clear that the author had not fully developed his ability to include unpredictable scenes and unthinkable characters that populate his works today, although I will not deny that in Baoh There are several moments that are worthy of the best Araki. The dialogues aren't much and in many moments border on the stupid, but this is what happens when you try to justify impossible things (like why Baoh is able to do certain things).

Regarding the artistic section, the drawing is quite simple despite the abundant use of plots for textures. Although the drawing style is quite similar to other artists of the time,  the main characters and some of their enemies have very interesting and striking designs. The most notable thing about the drawing are some close-ups and the action scenes, where a fairly high dynamism is shown, despite the strangeness of some situations.

And since I'm talking about the action scenes I have to mention that in this There are some pretty violent scenes in the play., since we will see people melted, mutilated and cut in half. It is not that the work is totally gore, but the fighting is fierce and is shown to us with all possible clarity, including blood.

I would also like to comment on one last detail about the drawing, specifically about the illustrations on the covers, since the style we see in them is not entirely identical to that seen within the manga. Because Baoh se publicó inicialmente en la revista Shonen Jump y no fue recopilado en tomos hasta años más tarde, imagino que  Araki dibujó esas ilustraciones cuando ya se encontraba haciendo Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, ya que el estilo y las poses que muestran son más propias de esa obra que de lo visto en Baoh.

En resumidas cuentas, Baoh es un manga entretenido que llega a ponerse muy interesante en algunos puntos, no es excesivamente largo ni complejo, lo cual puede ayudar para atraer a lectores que busquen algo que puedan terminar rápidamente.

Debido a que encontré estos mangas recientemente en una tienda de segunda mano, no soy consciente de lo difícil que puede ser localizar esta obra en la actualidad (al menos en español) pero me temo que no es demasiado común, ya que (por el momento) no se ha reeditado.

Afortunadamente también existe un anime donde se narra la historia de manera recortada y ligeramente modificada, aunque siendo bastante fiel al manga pese a la exclusión de algunos personajes y la simplificación de los poderes de Baoh y la relación entre Ikuro y Sumire. Dicho anime puede encontrarse fácilmente por internet, en Youtube está incluso subtitulado al español. Pese a que considero al manga bastante superior al anime, creo que este último es una buena alternativa para descubrir la obra de Araki (y si no, siempre podéis empezar a ver el anime de Jojo's Bizarre Adventure).