Flame of Recca
Plot
Flame of Recca follows the story of a teenage boy named Recca Hanabishi, who is interested in ninja and claims to be one himself. He often gets into fights due to the fact that he made it publicly known that the person who manages to defeat him will earn his services as a loyal ninja. Despite this, he eventually pledges his loyalty and services as a ninja to Yanagi Sakoshita, a girl with the innate ability to heal any wound/injury, because of her kindess and compassion. Recca soon discovers that he possesses the innate ability to control/manipulate flames, and eventually learns that he is actually the son of the sixth generation leader of the Hokage, a ninja clan that was wiped out in the Tenshō period roughly 400 years before the series' present day (possibly in the 1990's).
Characters
- Further information: List of Flame of Recca characters
- Recca Hanabishi (花菱烈火 Hanabishi Rekka?) Voiced by: Kōsuke Okano (Japanese), Scott Roberts (English)
Recca, the protagonist of the series, is a teenager obsessed with ninja and anything related to ninja. He declared that he would serve anyone who could defeat him in a fight as his/her loyal ninja. In truth, Recca was born the second son of Ouka, the leader of the Hokage ninja clan that existed over 400 years ago. Recca's older half-brother, Kurei, was supposed to be the heir to the leadership because he was the eldest and was born with the ability to control fire, but Recca also exhibited the same abilities as an infant, and is declared the true heir of the Hokage leadership. In an attempt to save him during the slaughter of the Hokage ninja clan (led by Oda Nobunaga), his mother (Kagerō) used a forbidden technique that opened a portal that would transport him into the future, where the Flame of Recca storyline begins.
Yanagi Sakoshita (佐古下柳 Sakoshita Yanagi?) Voiced by: Yuki Masuda (Japanese), Carol-Anne Day (English)
Yanagi is a teenage girl gifted with the innate ability to heal any kind of physical injury, and Recca immediately offered to serve her as his loyal ninja after seeing her compassion when she healed a severely injured puppy in a local park (in the anime series, she heals Recca after a pile of metal pipes collapsed on top of him). She is the prime objective of the series' main antagonist, Kōran Mori, as he believes that her healing powers will help him attain eternal life.
Fūko Kirisawa (霧沢風子 Kirisawa Fūko?) Voiced by: Akiko Hiramatsu (Japanese), Kris Rundle (English)
Fūko, a tomboyish teenage girl, is Recca's childhood friend and has always aspired to defeat him in battle so that he would serve her as her ninja. She initially gets jealous and infuriated by the fact that Recca chose to become Yanagi's ninja just because he wanted to, and it is this jealousy is what ultimately makes her decide to accept the aid of Kagerō, who offers to lend her Fūjin (a powerful madōgu that controls wind) in order to enable her to defeat Recca. In actuality, Kagerō implanted a stone in the Fūjin that allowed her to brainwash Fūko, but Recca manages to defeat Fūko and destroy the sphere. Fūko ends up being friends with both Yanagi and Recca after the incident, and she also keeps the Fūjin and wields it throughout the rest of the series.
Domon Ishijima (石島土門 Ishijima Domon?) Voiced by: Nobuo Tobita (Japanese), Adam Hunter (English)
Domon is Recca's schoolmate who, like Fūko, has always wanted to defeat Recca. However, he is never able to do so, and ends up befriending and joining forces with Recca. Domon wields the Dosei no Wa ("The Ring of Saturn"), a madōgu which enhances his physical strength. Later in the series, he also wields the Kuchibashi-Ō ("Beak King"), a super-sharp snapping claw on an extendable chain, and the Tetsugan ("Iron Ball"), which transmutes his entire body into a living iron golem for brief periods.
Tokiya Mikagami (水鏡凍季也 Mikagami Tokiya?) Voiced by: Hikaru Midorikawa (Japanese), Paul Hunter (English)
Tokiya is a second year student at Nashikiri High School, and he wields the madōgu Ensui ("Dark Water"), a sword that utilizes water to create it blade and is capable of creating and controlling all three states of water (liquid, solid and gas). Tokiya wanted to take Yanagi from Recca because she looks exactly like his sister, Mifuyu Mikagami, who was murdered in front of his eyes when he was young. He uses the Hyōmon Ken style which was developed specifically for the Ensui and the Hyōma En (a madōgu that also controls water, but focuses more on water in its solid form). Tokiya joins forces with Recca in attempting to rescue Yanagi from Kōran Mori's mansion, and he continues to be part of their team throughout the rest of the series.
Kaoru Koganei (小金井薰 Koganei Kaoru?) Voiced by: Motoko Kumai (Japanese), Brett Bauer (English)
Kaoru was once a member of Kurei's Uruha, but later, he becomes a member of Recca's team "Hokage" in the Ura Butō Satsujin. He wields the Kōgan Anki, a puzzle-like weapon that has five different forms. In the manga, the weapon also has a mysterious sixth form: 'Mu' (Nothing).
Kage Hōshi (影子 Kage Hōshi?) / Kagerō Voiced by: Kotono Mitsuishi (Japanese), Mariette Sluyter (English) Kage Hōshi, whose real name is Kagerō, is the first antagonist of the series, and is later revealed to be Recca's mother. She possesses the 'Eikai Kyoku' ("Shadow Ball"), which allows her to teleport through shadows, show people the past, and perform acts of scrying. She performed the time travel (a technique which allows the user to travel or send another person to a different time) to save the infant Recca from being killed along with the rest of the Hokage clan. The technique, however curses the user with immortality. '.
Kurei (紅麗 Kurei?) Voiced by: Ryotaro Okiayu (Japanese), Jonathan Love (English) Kurei is Recca's half brother who is four years older than him. He is also a flame master with the power of the phoenix, being able to capture the soul of a dead person in his flame. His character is tragic, the series portraying the fight between the two brothers as a culmination of the struggle for the leadership of the Hokage ninja clan 400 years ago. The most notable manifestation of his flame power is Kurenai (紅), his former lover whose soul he absorbed using his flame when she was killed by Kōran Mori. One of Kurenai's abilities is to hurl flame bolts which are hot enough to melt steel.
Manga
The Flame of Recca manga was originally serialized in Shōnen Sunday from October 18, 1995 – April 18, 2002, with a total of 329 chapters. The series was compiled into 33 tankōbon volumes and was published by Shogakukan. Shōnen Sunday also released the manga in 17 wideban volumes. Both the anime and manga were licensed for North American distribution in English by Viz Media and United Kingdom distribution in English by Gollancz Manga. The manga was also published in France by Editions Tonkam.
Viz did not censor nudity in their publications of the manga, but starting from volume 20, the female characters' nipples have been removed. Additionally, the manga series used to be published every other month, but Viz has begun to release the manga quarterly, starting with volume 25.
Anime
Flame of Recca was adapted into an anime series by Studio Pierrot, and aired from 19 July 1997 to 10 July 1998 on Fuji Television. The 42-episode series covers around volumes 1-16 of the manga. There are several notable differences between the anime and manga, such as the character design (e.g. Fūko has red-violet hair in the anime, but has brown hair in the manga) and in the storyline itself (e.g. In the anime, Yanagi's healing powers are first revealed when she heals Recca after he gets injured while protecting her and a child from being crushed under metal pipes,[1] but in the manga, Yanagi heals Recca when he gets injured while protecting her from a group of male students who were forcing her to go with them[2]).
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