Baki the Grappler

• 1. Introduction

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  Baki the Grappler is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Keisuke Itagaki, and it has sold in numbers few comics ever reach. By May 2021, the various Baki series had more than 85 million collected volumes in circulation. By May 2024, that figure had passed 100 million. The story follows a teenager named Baki Hanma, who trains his body into a weapon and tests it against opponents in deadly, no-rules, hand-to-hand combat.

  What pulls a boy into that world? How does one author keep a fight story alive across six series and more than thirty years? And why do critics describe the same pages as both very compelling and demented? The answers begin with a boy, his mother, and a father who is not interested in being loved.

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• 2. A Boy and His Father

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  Emi Akezawa is wealthy, and she pays for the training of her son, Baki Hanma. She hopes he will grow into a powerful warrior like his father, Yujiro Hanma. Yujiro is ruthless, and Baki eventually outgrows traditional training to follow the harsher path his father set.

  At 13 years old, Baki trains to defeat Yujiro in battle, hoping to earn his mother's love. He is beaten without a challenge. Emi tries to save him and interrupts the fight. Yujiro kills her, and Baki swears revenge.

  Baki then travels the world to keep training. Years later he finds an underground fighting arena beneath the Tokyo Dome stadium and quickly becomes its champion. The arena's promoter, Mitsunari Tokugawa, arranges the Maximum Tournament to decide who is the strongest fighter in the world. Baki wins every fight, including one against Jack Hammer, a half-brother who is also a son of Yujiro.

  After a later fight against Mohammad Alai Jr., Baki challenges his father to a rematch that will close out his career as a fighter. Yujiro accepts and declares Baki worthy to be his "prey". Later still, father and son dine in a high-class restaurant, and Baki asks how his mother died. The question sets off a battle that runs through the whole night in Shinjuku.

  When that night ends, the fighters of the story are left with a peak that nobody expects to see matched.

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• 3. Strange Opponents

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  Five death row inmates escape confinement and head for Tokyo with one stated aim, to "know defeat". They are Kaioh Dorian, an American kung-fu fighter, and Hector Doyle, a British assassin. Sikorsky is a Russian convict with a powerful pinching ability. Spec is an American with a formidable lung capacity, and Ryuko Yanagi is a Japanese poisoner.

  After Baki fights Yanagi, he is fatally poisoned and flown to China to enter the Great Raitai Tournament. A Chinese poison master reverses the poisoning, and Baki fights on alongside his allies. Afterward, Mohammad Alai Jr., son of Mohammad Alai, challenges him over the heart of his girlfriend, Kozue.

  An elementary school student named Rumina, pushed by bullies, challenges Baki to a fight. Baki shows him a shadow boxing match against a 100-kilogram praying mantis. Soon after, Baki kidnaps George W. Bosch to get into Arizona State Prison, home of Biscuit Oliva, the strongest man in America. Inside he meets Jun Guevara and later fights Oliva.

  Scientists in Colorado find a man from the Jurassic era and bring him back to life. He is called Pickle, and he eats only those he defeats in battle. After he assaults a news reporter on live television, the story's fighters take an interest and go to fight him. Baki also faces him and drives him to his limits.

  Musashi Miyamoto, the legendary Japanese samurai of the 17th century, returns when Tokugawa uses cloning technology to revive him. His unique way of fighting produces results that some of the world's strongest fighters did not expect.

  Nomi no Sukune II, a descendant of Nomi no Sukune, the figure said to have founded sumo wrestling, then enters Tokugawa's arena. Former yokozuna Kinryūzan persuades several active professional sumo wrestlers to compete against the arena's regulars, including Baki.

  Jack Hanma, Baki's half-brother, comes next. He challenged most of the cast near the end of the fifth series and now fights with his own invented art, Goudou, "The Way of Biting". He wants Pickle to suffer in despair, as he did after losing to the ancient man in the third series. Their rematch takes place in the underground arena.

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• 4. Itagaki's Method

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  Asked how he has kept the series going for over 30 years, Keisuke Itagaki credits its eccentric characters. In his words, "It's not me who comes up with the story, the characters create it." He says he learned how much interesting characters matter within his first ten minutes at Kazuo Koike's Gekiga Sonjuku, a school for aspiring manga artists he joined in 1987.

  Itagaki also thinks hard about how fights end. He wants to avoid the endless parade of stronger and stronger opponents common in battle manga. He points to the fight between Baki and Yujiro as a good example of a different kind of ending.

  He believes even the toughest male characters have a kind of beauty, and his drawings show it. He created Baki Hanma by copying an illustration of a girl by Keibun Ōta, then adding masculine touches such as raised eyebrows and a thicker neck. For the eyes of Kaoru Hanayama, he borrowed the feminine eyes drawn by the artist Pater Sato. Hands are always large in this series, but Hanayama's are big enough to hide his entire face.

  Before Yujiro got the demon face on his back, Itagaki considered a dragon tattoo whose limbs blended into the body. Then he saw a photograph of a bodybuilder whose back looked like a Heikegani crab, a species with shells that resemble human faces. He deformed the idea further and gave it a more ferocious expression.

  Film shaped at least one fight. For the match between Antonio Igari and Mount Toba in Grappler Baki Gaiden, Itagaki imitated the ending scene of the 1982 American film Rocky III.

  When the Baki Hanma series was announced to end in ten chapters, Itagaki had not yet thought up what he would draw. He had originally decided that it would close the whole franchise. Then, just before the fight between Baki and his father was to begin, he asked himself, "What would happen if Musashi Miyamoto was born in the modern day?"

  With the story of parent against child concluded, Itagaki moved to the theme "What does it mean to be strong?" The title Baki-Dou grew out of that theme.

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• 5. Serial Run and Spinoffs

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  On the 30th of September 1991, Baki the Grappler began running in Akita Shoten's Weekly Shōnen Champion. It continued until 1999 and filled 42 tankōbon volumes.

  The second series, simply titled Baki, ran from 1999 to the 24th of November 2005 and filled 31 volumes. Baki Hanma followed on the 1st of December 2005 and ended on the 16th of August 2012, at 37 volumes. Baki-Dou ran from the 20th of March 2014 to the 5th of April 2018 for 22 volumes. The fifth series, Bakidou, shares the fourth series' name but writes Baki in katakana instead of kanji. It ran from the 4th of October 2018 to the 15th of June 2023 and filled 17 volumes. Baki Rahen began on the 24th of August 2023.

  Side stories multiplied around the main line. Grappler Baki Gaiden, set right after the Maximum Tournament, shows a wrestling match between Antonio Igari and Mount Toba. Its nine chapters were collected in one volume in 1999, and an epilogue for Igari ran in the 48th issue of Weekly Shōnen Champion on the 27th of October 2022. A one-volume story published in 2008, set after volume 10 of the third manga, introduces Pickle.

  Yukinao Yamauchi wrote and drew a spinoff about Kaoru Hanayama's yakuza adventures. It began in Champion Red in March 2005 and was collected into eight volumes. Eiji Murai illustrates an isekai series in which Retsu Kaioh is reincarnated in another world. It began in the 6th of November 2020 issue of Monthly Shōnen Champion and reached fourteen volumes by June 2025.

  The novelist Baku Yumemakura wrote a five-volume spinoff novel series, serialized from 2018 to 2021. It follows Mumon Katsuragi, the older brother of Katsumi Orochi, who is responsible for capturing the five most dangerous criminals seen in Baki. It also borrows characters from Yumemakura's own Garōden and Shishi no Mon novels. A manga adaptation illustrated by Fugita has run monthly since 2022 and had eight volumes as of August 2025.

  Akita Shoten published two guidebooks on the 26th of August 2004, covering characters, events and battles through volume 23 of the second manga series. The artbook Baki 30th: The Artwork of Baki appeared on the 6th of December 2024. It gathers art from the series' 30-year run, including fight scenes and famous quotes, plus work created for a 2022 anniversary exhibition at Tokyo Dome City Hall.

  Gutsoon! Entertainment brought the original series to English readers in its anthology magazine Raijin Comics, whose first issue appeared on the 18th of December 2002. The magazine printed the first 46 chapters before it was discontinued in July 2004. Media Do International released the second series digitally from August 2018 to August 2019. Kodama Tales announced a worldwide English license in May 2025 and began publishing the kanzenban edition in October 2025, both in print and digitally. In April 2026, Kodama said it would begin publishing the second series in November under the title "New Grappler Baki".

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• 6. Anime Adaptations

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  In 1994, Knack Productions released a 45-minute original video animation directed by Yuji Asada. It closely adapts the first few volumes of the manga, including the Karate Tournament arc, which the later TV series skipped. It also covers Baki's fight with Shinogi Koushou, which the TV series later adapted in episode 18. Central Park Media released it in North America as Grappler Baki: The Ultimate Fighter, on VHS on the 1st of December 1996 and on DVD on the 1st of December 1998. Manga Entertainment later released it in Australia and the United Kingdom.

  Between the 8th of January and the 25th of June 2001, a 24-episode anime series aired on TV Tokyo. It was produced by Free-Will, a music record label. A second 24-episode series followed in the latter half of 2001 and ended on the 24th of December. A group called Project Baki wrote and composed all the music, and Ryōko Aoyagi performed every theme song.

  Funimation Entertainment licensed both series for North America and released them together on 12 DVDs, four episodes to a disc. The first arrived on the 14th of June 2005, and the last on the 27th of February 2007. The show was one of the launch programs of the Funimation Channel, which debuted on the 19th of June 2006. Its English version used the song "Child Prey" by the Japanese metal band Dir En Grey, which is signed to Free-Will, as its opening theme.

  On the 25th of June 2018, Netflix began streaming a 26-episode series titled Baki in Japan, with the rest of the world following on the 18th of December 2018. TMS Entertainment produced it under director Toshiki Hirano, and it covers the "Most Evil Death Row Convicts" arc. Sentai Filmworks released it on Blu-ray with a new English dub on the 25th of May 2021. A 13-episode second season, covering the Great Chinese Challenge and the Alai Jr. arcs, arrived on Netflix on the 4th of June 2020.

  The third Netflix series, Baki Hanma, debuted with 12 episodes on the 30th of September 2021. A second season followed in two halves, on the 26th of July and the 24th of August 2023. At AnimeJapan 2024, Netflix announced a crossover with Kengan Ashura, and Baki Hanma vs. Kengan Ashura premiered on the 6th of June that year.

  The Baki-Dou manga received its own TMS Entertainment adaptation, announced in March 2024. Its 13 episodes premiered on Netflix on the 26th of February 2026, and a second cour is scheduled to premiere on the 18th of June.

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• 7. Games and Stage

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  Tomy developed a fighting game for the PlayStation 2 that reached Japan in 2000 and the United Kingdom in 2003, where it was titled Fighting Fury. Baki the Grappler: Ultimate Championship came to Android in 2017. Browser players could try Typing Grappler Baki, and Yahoo! Mobage hosted another browser game. The fighting game Baki Hanma: Blood Arena came out on the 11th of September 2025.

  Yujiro Hanma also turns up as a guest elsewhere. He is an unlockable character in the PlayStation 2 game Garōden: Breakblow - Fist or Twist. He is also set to join Tekken 8 as a downloadable character in the third season pass, in early 2027.

  On the 4th of December 2024, a stage play based on the underground arena arc opened at Shinjuku Face and ran through the 8th. Daisuke Tanaka wrote and directed it, after earlier adapting Sakigake!! Otokojuku. Hideaki Okuzumi handled the fighting and action scenes. Yugo Sato played Baki, Momoka Onishi played Kozue, Sho Higano played Katsumi, and Haruto Sakuraba played Hanayama. Actual martial artists took two roles. Taishin Kohiruimaki played Shuumei Kanou, and Kozo Takeda played Doppo.

  A second play will run at Shinjuku Face from the 23rd of July to the 28th of July 2026.

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• 8. Critics and Echoes

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  Anime News Network gave the series short, blunt descriptions. Allen Divers called it "very compelling", while Jason Thompson called it a "demented fighting manga".

  The network also had four writers review the first volume of the second manga series, and their scores differed. Faye Hopper gave the highest, four out of five. She wrote that the appeal lay in "its absurdity held up by its absolutely incredible artistry." Amy McNulty gave it 2.5 and praised Itagaki's art. She felt the volume "succeeds in identifying the stakes, but it completely fails in anchoring the reader with characters to care about." Rebecca Silverman and Teresa Navarro each gave it a 2, calling it a "set-up book" in which every new character is introduced the same way. Hopper and Silverman both said it reminded them of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.

  Mark Thomas of Mania Entertainment reviewed the first 24 episodes of the 2001 anime and gave them a B-. He said fans of shōnen and fight series would enjoy it, since it had plenty of good, realistic fight scenes. He thought the story fell short, and that the many arcs mostly felt like a setup for the second season. He gave the final 24 episodes the same grade and "mildly recommended" them. Action pleased him more this time, but the show never delivered Baki's final fight with Yujiro, though it had built toward it the entire time, and that ruined it for him.

  Baki's influence reached other works. It shaped the look of the character Gai Tendo in the 1999 video game Buriki One. The 2012 comedy film Graffreeter Toki is based on a March 2011 play of the same name, which was itself inspired by Baki the Grappler. In terms of sales, a Scarface spinoff series had 3.5 million copies in print by February 2019.

  Sociologist Junko Kaneda read the series as homoerotic and wrote an essay book about it. Its title is Notes of a Girl Who Spent 30 Hours a Day for 300 Days Thinking "So Baki The Grappler Is BL, Right?" Wowow adapted the essay into a live-action television series called A Story of Grappler Baki and Me, broadcast in August 2021.

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