By Mitsuhisa Kuji, translated by Ko Ransom (Vertical)
ISBN: 978-1935654-79-7
There’s not much to found regarding pseudonymous woman of mystery Mitsuhisa Kuji other than that she has worked as assistant to both Kentaro Miura (Berserk) and Kaoru Mori (Emma, Anything and Something), but this simply means that we can appreciate her solely through her work, such as this fearsomely nihilistic and bleakly beguiling historical re-enactment of the legend of William Tell as collected in this second English-language volume of Wolfsmund…
Set in 14th century Switzerland and drawing on historical records, the serial debuted in 2009 as Ookami no Kuchi: Wolfsmund in Seinen publication Fellows! – with four tankÅbon volumes collected thus far – and details the struggle of three formerly autonomous alpine cantons, Uri, Unterwalden and Shwyz, for freedom and independence from the oppressive domination of invaders from what is rapidly becoming the oppressive and savagely rapacious Habsburg Empire.
Unconventionally, rather than starring dashing heroes, this interpretation of the oft-told folktale centres around the monolithic fortress of Wolfsmund, situated in the Sankt Gotthard Pass: an impenetrable keep, barrier and waystation between mountain passes which dictates and controls the population’s ability to move, flee and find allies, intelligence or war materiel. The castle complex forms a crucial trade bottleneck between Germany and Italy and houses a garrison of hard-hearted soldiers commanded by a human monster in angelic form.
Wolfram the Bailiff is a sadistic sentinel with a dark genius for ferreting out insurrection, disposing of freedom fighters and crushing the people’s hopes. So far nobody has survived falling under his excoriating gaze…
The horrific murderously medieval passion play resumes with ‘Hans and Eva Part One’ as another would-be rebel dies from torture and the aging innkeeper of Uri again publicly rows with his lovely and extremely young wife. Gossip is rife amongst the villagers and for once it’s all true: she married him for his money; he wanted her for her body.
Neither of them is fulfilling their side of the bargain, however…
The resistance fighters of the area are more concerned with their impossibly bad luck. Somehow, valued, experienced men keep falling to Wolfram’s agents: it’s almost as if someone is informing on them…
Eva is unhappy. She loves jewels and wants Hans to buy her more, and so the grizzled barkeep makes another secret journey to Wolfsmund to relate conversations overheard in his hostelry. In the meanwhile however Eva haughtily dons all her bling and defiantly parades around Uri where some very desperate men at last put two and two together…
The dark fable concludes in ‘Hans and Eva Part Two’ as with their cover blown the innkeeper and his repentant bride seek safe passage from Wolfram only to learn to their cost what the beautiful psychopath thinks of traitors and betrayers.
The pair are left to the tender mercies of the rebels and only the intervention of the mysterious dark prostitute who plies her trade in the inn outside the mountain keep’s gates – known as the Wolf’s Mouth – prevents Eva’s death at the hands – and nastier members – of the resistance men. The greedy child does not escape justice though…
The remainder of this increasingly dark and shocking saga relates the appalling story of ‘Cedar and Juwel’ as, with the struggle intensifying and Wolfram’s reprisals hitting ever harder, an itinerant street performer and her little girl arrive at the pass. The debased woman Cedar wants to return to her home in Germany and will happily ply the tricks of more than one trade to get there, and she doesn’t seem to care whether her daughter Juwel comes with her or not…
However, after seducing a Bishop she comes to the attention of Wolfram – a far harder audience to impress. The savage games he plays with both mother and child lead to a concatenation of tragedies which compel the mysterious Madam of the Inn to blow her own cover, heralding the foreboding return of the land’s inevitable liberator… the last son of William Tell…
This stunningly bleak and breathtakingly vicious examination of the human cost of national liberation is rendered with astounding skill in a powerful semblance of woodblock-etching (in the manner of Albrecht Dürer): stark, uncompromising illustration which perfectly compliments the daunting milieu, adamantine scenery and cruelly brutal episodes wherein heroes of “the Eternal Alliance†repeatedly try and fail to pass through the Wolf’s Maw or fool the brutally deadly cherub in command…
Harsh, uncompromising and visceral, this unhappy saga is best enjoyed by older readers, and those who realise that not every ending is a happy one…
Wolfsmund is printed in the ‘read-from-back-to-front’ manga format.
© 2010 Mitsuhisa Kuji. All rights reserved.