Here is yet another manifestation of Kanu Unchou, the preeminent poster girl of the Ikkitousen franchise. Some people – probably a lot of people, actually – would say that Kanu is ridiculously overrepresented and that the plastic used to manufacture Kanu figures could be better used elsewhere. Like on that Black Rock Shooter girl, for instance. I wouldn’t be among them, myself; I like Kanu, I’ve liked Kanu since she first appeared in Battle Vixens. I initially thought Hakufu and Kaku Bunwa were going to be the series’ main characters, so I’m quite happy that Kanu has received the love that she has. While there are about a billion figures of her out there, this version of Kan-san is a little bit different than the rest.
This particular Kanu is from Yamato and is part of their Project Dynamite lineup. Kanu is sculpted in a giant 1/5 scale by Toshirou of Cobra Kai. He’s sculpted several works that have received PVC treatment, such as Mai Shiranui, Saber, Koyori and a few figures derived from Tsukasa Jun’s artwork. I find it a bit amusing that his sculpting group takes its name from The Karate Kid, a white man’s take on Asian martial arts from the 80s.
At 38 centimeters long from the ends of her hair to the toes of her left foot, Kanu takes up a considerable amount of space. After breaking out the trusty tape measure, I’d guess that she’d stand about 35 centimeters tall if she were standing. Or capable of standing, anyway, being that she’s all chained up.
This particular version of Kanu comes from a scene in volume 12 of the manga where Kanu is subdued and captured by some of Sousou Moutoku’s goons. She also goes through some mild torture. And gets sexually assaulted. By another girl. As one might imagine, it’s a pretty cool scene.
It’s my can of sliced pears! I’ve talked about my can of pears before, and here it is, making its first appearance before the camera. Really, the can of pears deserves its own review, but one review wouldn’t be enough to do justice to its majesty; it would need an entire fan site devoted only to it to fully describe just how awesome it is.
The lewdness of this figure is readily apparent, but once you get past that I think its most distinctive element is the face. Toshirou’s faces are his trademark, and here you can see – once you get past the bangs – the heavy-lidded eyes and full lips that he favors. It’s an exceptionally expressive face and Kanu looks rather like she’s crying, which doesn’t entirely fit her character as a stoic, imperturbable warrior. Then again, the anime series also dispenses with that depiction by having her act like a lovesick fool when around Ryuubi, so I suppose the liberty can be excused.
I like the sculpting job quite a bit; Kanu’s given a reasonably realistic sculpt, with powerfully-muscled thighs, a well-defined stomach, and flowing tendrils of hair. The paint is more of a mixed bag; her skin has a very glossy appearance, and I’m not certain whether I like it or not. She’s got a nipple peeking out from under her shirt, but it’s painted the same color as her skin, so it’s both difficult to see and rather strange-looking once you do notice it. As for a base, no such thing is included or needed.
Her accessories include her chains, which attach without too much difficulty. The manacles on her wrists are split in half and are held together by small pegs; they separate easily. Additional chains attach to her upper arms via some small D-shaped clips, which are packed in their own little plastic baggy and are easily overlooked when unpacking the figure. I’ve seen an alternate version of this figure which includes a disembodied arm and hand complete with a staff to poke and prod Kanu while she’s down, but no such coolness is included here. I’m a bit disappointed by that; I can think of a bunch of ways that a free-floating arm would enhance my figure reviews.
It’s obvious that this figure is going to appeal only to a certain type of figure collector, and that quite a few people are going to be turned off by either the unusual sculpt or the figure’s context. I surely don’t mind its mature theme – heck, the name of this site is partially inspired by a peculiar anime subgenre – and I like how this Kanu looks. Admittedly, it’s not my favorite interpretation of her and I wouldn’t have purchased her at full price, but she was on sale at HLJ the other week and for the price I paid I’m pretty happy with this figure.
The only other review I’ve seen of this Kanu is over on Heisei Democracy, and Shingo’s enthusiasm is positively effulgent as he makes no bones about how much he likes it. You can also see the disembodied arm I spoke of in his pictures. Doesn’t the backdrop there look a bit like a bathroom?
Hi,
I saw this figure (the original one) some time back on E-Bay and it was darn pricey.
As usual, I enjoy your photos. I used to like this Dynamic Project’s Kanu. But, no longer now. That would save some money from my pocket 😉
Btw, how many figures you have in total? More than 200?
Ahhh Kanu…
Shes actually a Character I have a huuuuuge dislike for and yet I buy figures of her.This happens often when I have the urge to complete a set ^^;;
The only real Kanu my collectors heart is now aching for is to own one of the Daiki Kanu`s
The Manga Kanu is a totally different thing though.Im really cool with her
First off I really,really pity you that youre stuck with Tokyopops horrible,horrible translation that reads like everyone is on best terms with 50Cent.I still cant understand that they even changed some of the content of the speech bubbles to fit te ghetto theme.
Luckily our German Version is big in Size and is just the usual a bit wonky translation.
TP`s is barely readable.I own the second Issue of Tokyopop and my stomach turned when I read it.I only bought it because the Tokyopop Edition runss at 5€ while the German Edition runs at 10€ but i gladly pay double the price ^^;;
Truth be told Ive been glued to the monitor quite a few times when the different versions of this particular Kanu were on Sale on HLJ.
In the End I never really made the Jump because Im not a real Kanu fan.
I actually think that the scultptors did a very fine job with catching Kanus face since her Manga face is alot more mature and asian.Most people did her moe-fied Anime face <.<
Nice Catch Brother!
>> softz
Nah, I’ve got less than 100 scale figures; 95 by my count, actually. I’ve also got two Figmas, two Medicom RAH dolls and a bunch more 1/6 scale dolls (mainly from Takara Cool Girls and Aoshima Lady’s Mission brands).
I had the feeling that this figure probably wasn’t super popular, which is why I put this review up on a holiday XD
>> Blowfish
I hear what you’re saying about the translation. I actually like it a lot, and I know I’m in a tiny minority. Part of that’s because I don’t read much manga; I actually pretty much only read Battle Vixens (a ridiculous re-naming in my opinion, I thought we were past the time when anime and video games with Japanese names needed to get Westernized titles). A big part of it is also because I grew up listening to rap music and still do, although not as much as I used to. Tokyopop replaced Keith Giffen with a different writer after the first few volumes (edit: actually, it was after volume 8, so his replacement was more recent than I thought) and the characterizations seem to be more in line with what I’ve seen in the anime. I still have a hard time seeing Ryomou as anything other than a psychotic nymphomaniac, though, thanks to the first volume.
Speaking of music, thanks to a commenter on my Tsuki Board profile I discovered that “Tier” is the name of a song by Rammstein. I didn’t actually know that (or that “tier” means “animal” in German), but it’s a pretty cool song. Funny how you sometimes discover new music to listen to in the strangest places.
You didnt knmow that Tier means Animal in German?I actually thought that you chose your name because of that. ^^;;;
I dont like Rammstein since they only sell stuff through controversy and provocing instead of doing good music <.<
Tokyopop kicked out that Writer?Thank God!
This could be because I am not an native english speaker but I often had absolutely no idea what they were trying to say in that slang.
I just dug out some lines from the TP Translation and a Fan Translation:
TP: "Hm… Maybe I am a pervo…" "Then again… related or not, she is a looker… No harm in looking, right?" "Koukin?" "You're staring at them again." "Me? Stare?" "No, no… I was… Um…" "Please, god–don't let me pop a rod now!"
FT: "Sheesh…" "I guess she's still just a kid." "Huh?" "What's wrong, Koukin?" "Eh… Ah…" "N..nothing" "Or maybe not."
TP: "Just the way I like 'em… Big 'n' dumb 'n' black 'n' blue." "Multiple orgasms all around, eh, big boy? Mmmm…"
FT: "Nothing but an obnoxious masochist." "Ah, you're pathetic."
I wont say that the Fan Translation is perfect but Giffen completley turned the Manga into a slugfest of profanity.Certain things do get lost in translation but changing characters and storyline is something that should NEVER EVER happen.
Ikki Tousen has a different Name in Europe aswell.Over here the Manga is called Dragon Girls and the Anime is called Ikki Tousen.
I took Spanish in high school XD I used to use the handle “Tiercel” back when I played Ultima Online and it just got shortened to Tier.
Rammstein sounds like my sort of band! Kinda. I have to keep an open mind about music since so much of what I hear these days sucks. I never thought I’d be like my dad, where he only listens to stuff that he listened to decades ago, but as I get older, that’s what’s happening to me.
Haha, yeah, the adaptations for the first few volumes really took some liberties with the source material XD Admittedly, when I first read the manga, there wasn’t an anime out yet and there weren’t any signs that it was going to become a big franchise with serious characters, so I took it as good trashy fun. I thought that in a few years, nobody would remember anything about Ikkitousen other than big boobs and pantyshots, so the blatant, exaggerated sexual themes didn’t seem too out of place. (At the time, I thought Tenjo Tenge was going to be the more popular manga; it had hot girls, lots of action, and a set of dudes to attract female readership. Funny how it just faded away while Ikkitousen exploded in popularity.)
It is not my figure style, but your picture are great. I think that i don’t like the real face, and the position of Kanu. But thanks for this news presentation
Oh gosh Ultima Online…I still remember playing that when the Internet was still in the stoneage.
So tiercel is spanish huh?
Rammstein is a band that always sold music through their image and does their best to keep that shocking image up.I dont have a problem with their music itself but how they are fabricating their songs with a formula,thats calculating in various factor for maxumum commercial success.
They simply arent a genuine band that pick up the thematics of their song out of interest but to drive listeners to them because its “taboo”
The Song Tier for example is from 1997 and has incest a thematic.They basically become more and more radical from album to album since society adapts and people nowadays arent shocked anymore by things from 10 years ago.
They recently released their new album over here and made an over the top porn music video and as their marketing machinery predicted it became banned which results in even more interest of media and population
Click the link only if youre fine with Adult Themes:
http://www.rocktube.us/index.php?module=content&id=adlcRffweae
You could of course say that they are genuinely criticizing Sex Toursim but I highly doubt that.
Another Fact I hate about Rammstein is how they are playing with our German Idenity.As you can probably guess we arent very happy about the things that happened the last Century and therefore most of us have an identity crysis as that we dont identify with our country at all and that were usually contra anything military etc.
This is a direct trauma that results from WWII and we try to prove the image that many still have in their head as wrong through all kind of actions.
As a result anyone expressing some sort of proud about germany in general will get weird,disapproving looks.Its borderline okay to be proud as a german when were doing good in soocer worldcus/eurocups
This is kinda a stigma well never get rid off.
Yet,Rammstein plays alot with those Imagery and alot with the Nazi Imagery many Foreigners associate with Germany.In the Video I posted youll see the singer do some speech infront of our german flag.
There are quite a few No Nos in that video ^^;;;
Gosh this post has now become a big Why I hate Rammsetin comment >.<
Its hard to describe our relationship with our country.I hope you somehow got a bit insight into this and how Rammstein is using it for their record sales.
A last example to show our weird relationship:
Other countries soldiers that died during duty are regarded as "heroes".German Soldiers that died wont get praise.Its their own fault after all they went to play war.
As for the Music and getting older Theme…
Thats only natural since youre slowly using the touch to the scene and new music genres take over the popmusic.In the end youll only be able to stay in touch via genre specific media or youll stick to the stuff you know.
Ahhh…Tenjo Tenge…Thats such a classic I always hear about yet I never read/watched.I am actually not a big fan of fight themed manga/anime yet I love my Ikki Tousen ^_^
I love you Tier, you’ve used the word “Effulgent” 🙂 I’m a word-geek, which I’ll readily admit, and this makes me happy.
My main beef with this figure is the glossy sheen. Maybe one could take it to be sweat, after the strenuous activity of molesting and torturing had been applied to Kanu, but still, it’s way too strong.
My main beef with your review is that you tell us how good the face is, and even describe the full lips, but we only have one shot of her face, and while we can see the eyes, we can see neither the aforementioned lips or the full-face composition. I trust this issue will be rectified! 😀
As for Kanu, I don’t think people’s real beef is the ridiculous amount of figures that she receives, but that most of these figures are not worth their plastic. Heck, it wouldn’t mind which other figures the plastic would be used for, so long it’ll remain in the incapable hands of Taki Corp., it is likely to not be worth the plastic. We want to like these ecchi figures, so give us more by other companies 😉
And go canned pears? 😛 Or is it the can itself that you like? Heh.
>> Leonia
My next figure review will be much more cute XD
>> Blowfish
Nah, I guess it’s British English or something. I got my handle from page 1234 of the edition of Webster’s Dictionary that I had at the time (note to kids: in those days, we didn’t have no dictionary.com or Wikipedia to help us out. We had to go get big heavy books from the library to write papers. And we had to look them up using a card catalog! No Google for us.) Pretty much every kid who goes to college has to take a foreign language in high school, and usually French, Spanish, and German are offered. Out of those languages, I think German is usually the least popular; I took Spanish for its practical usefulness, since a lot of people here speak Spanish, and a lot of students take French since it sounds sexy. (Unfortunately, since I’ve graduated from high school I’ve pretty much forgotten any Spanish that I may have learned.)
Ah, so basically they’re a pop band! That reminds me a bit about something I read about the Japanese rap industry. In the US, rap music through the 80s and early 90s was a vehicle used to describe the sociopolitical conditions of urban African-American life. Some artists – like Public Enemy and Paris – described the politics of said people in a militant sense. Other groups like NWA documented the violence and drug culture which was a very real part of inner-city life. Others like a Tribe Called Quest attempted to lift the black consciousness by recounting their ethnic heritage and connecting rap music to other notable elements of their culture, such as jazz.
Of course, when the music gets exported internationally, all of this context is lost, and what you’re left with is pop music. Then again, over here mainstream rap is pretty much pop music too, so I suppose I have no room to criticize.
I understand a bit about not having a definite national identity. I’m half-Japanese (an aggressor in World War II) and half-Korean (which was invaded and occupied by Japan), and I hold US citizenship and neither speak nor read Japanese or Korean. On top of that, my father’s side of the family lives in Hawaii, which has its own unique culture. I usually just identify as being American if anyone asks.
I always thought it was weird that Tenjo Tenge and Ikkitousen came out at around the same time and one was successful and the other is forgotten. I even remember seeing some pages where Ikkitousen’s creators lifted scenes directly from Tenjo Tenge. I guess it didn’t help that there was a big stink about how the US publisher censored numerous scenes from Tenjo Tenge (a major reason that I didn’t buy it).
>> Guy
Yeah, I think her skin paint looks rather plasticky, sort of like figures from maybe about three or four years ago, back when figures were more akin to toys.
I tossed in another shot of her face. It’s pretty hard to get a good picture of it, since her bangs cover her face and they also cast some pretty strong shadows. It’s a little easier to see under normal room lighting, but room lighting makes for some awful-looking photos.
Yeah, there are some real bad Kanu figures out there. I’ve read some comments from people going through Kanu fatigue, although I wonder if it’s that specific character they’re tired of or the entire Ikkitousen franchise. I get the sense that people who don’t like Kanu’s character design probably wouldn’t like many of the other characters in Ikkitousen.
It’s the can itself! This particular can is awesome. It can stop locomotives. It can dunk on Jordan. It is the alpha and omega, the Kwisatz Haderach of canned fruit.
Kobra-Kai is a bit of a mixed bag when it comes to their sculpts depending on who does it.
Generally speaking, I’m not a massive fan of these designs by toshirou but, at the same time, they are capable of great stuff like their Bunny Haruhi sitting on a musical note! The only Haruhi sculpt which can compare to BUBBAs IMO.
Tenjo Tenge also has much better female designs but a much smaller cast. Oh Great! might not like the idea of figures for his works so might be “difficult” to get permission. That would also explain the lack of Air Gear stuff as well. There’s been, what, 1 ringo and 2 simcas. That’s it!
But I do agree that Kanu is overexposed in terms of the number of figures. but then, so are Saber, the evangelion girls and, arguably, yoko but you don’t hear people complaining about that.
Yeah, I like a few of Toshirou’s figures (like Mai Shiranui and the big Saber figure) and don’t like some of his other ones (like Mina Majikina and Tamaki, although the latter is due more to her elongated body than her facial sculpt). I’ve read (on Heisei Democracy, I think) that Ikkitousen’s properties are really easy to license so that could be it. I’m really looking forward to Oh Great’s Spider Girl figure which is supposed to be coming out pretty soon XD
Funny that you mention the bunny girl Haruhi now …
Should be “Kfitzat HaDerech”, that’s in Hebrew 😉
The unusual spelling comes from Dune. Or so I am told … I actually haven’t read the books myself. One of ESPN’s sportswriters (the dearly-missed Ralph Wiley) used to call Tracy McGrady alternately the Kwisatz Haderach and Muad’dib, which I thought was hilarious.
This time, i don’t like that figure. First i’m not a fan of Ikki. Second because of the skin and face shiny effect that leave me perplexed.
One positive point, figure’s hight that was necessary, for me to handle that position.
Your photos are great but i have the feeling you didn’t enjoyed doing them as much as your old figures, right ?
Hehe, yeah, you can sorta tell how much I like a figure by how much effort I put into the background. Although here, I was sort of aiming for a prison effect. I like this figure (I wouldn’t have spent the money for it if I didn’t) but I wouldn’t put it in the top half of my favorites list.
It comes from Dune, it’s true, but not all of the spelling there is right 😉
Price had no meaning for me. I was going to get this staue, period, Both for who it was, AND the subject matter. (I paid for it in instalments.)
I have the alternate version of the statue, including the arm.
Painting is much more subdued, with a lot less gloss, and flater tones. The nipples are only faintly so, but are a differnt color than her skin.
A very nice piece. Well designed and assembled.
Ah, that is pretty cool, I wish I had the freestanding arm and its poking tool. The less glossy sounds much more appealing; I wish they would’ve done the same for this normal version, since the shiny skin is really conspicuous and distracting, when the focus should be more on the pose and body shape.