Shadow Skill holds a special place in my heart as a young child watching the hero's journey of its protagonists.
Not as well known as Dragon Ball Z and is classified as a Shonen series that revolves around martial arts.
Created by Megumu Okada and aired as an anime on TV Tokyo in the year 1998. I watched this in cable in Animax where its action sequences and the storyline awed me.
Shadow Skill
It takes place in the Kingdom of Kuruda, a martial arts-based country that is rich in Soma, the life force and power of the planet. The Kuruda style martial arts is boosted by the use of this energy thus making energy and projectile type of attacks that are very destructive.
You have the Shadow Skill (Eigi) which uses the legs and feet to create attacks and the Open Skill (Kyougi) which uses the hands and arms for striking motions and defensive techniques.
We are introduced to the female protagonist of the show, Elle Ragu, known as Shadow Skill. This muscle bound woman is the 59th Sevaar of the Kingdom of Kuruda. A Sevaar is the strongest warrior of the kingdom and is unmatched often being said to be a match for a thousand.
Alongside her is Gau Ban, her adopted younger brother, who trains with Elle and hopes to become a mighty warrior following in the footsteps of his Idol Scarface.
Scarface is the fighting name of Vy Low who is known as the strongest Sevaar ever and is emulated by all the warriors of the kingdom.
We follow them on their adventures around the kingdom as they fight monsters and men.
Martial Language
Oh man I still get goosebumps when I see the martial language commence. Each warrior has a unique one that they say and it is part to boost their fighting spirit, as if a declaration of strength and power as well as you know that a special technique would be used.
Some viewers laugh at this but to me this is one of the things that made it so memorable. It is similar to Goku saying Kamehameha as he charges his attack.
Elle's chant is as follows:
I am invincible
My shadow skills are unmatched
The power of my blow has no equal!
Man hearing that just made my jaw drop as a kid!
Other characters
The show has other characters that are given some time to provide their backstory and motivations.
Faurink Maya - she uses Soma in the form of talismans and invoke the elements sort of a magic caster. She has an interesting story on why she follows Elle.
Iba Stol - also known as Hawkeye, he is the current king of Kuruda.
Dias Ragu - Elle's older brother and one of my favorite characters in the story. He has such a great backstory and when you see him in action, I remember needing to rewatch it again and again because it was just awesome!
Development
A lot of these martial arts animes tend to use enemies as means to drive character development or actually just power and strength development.
We have seen this as the protagonist will encounter the villain and needs to become stronger so we usually see a training and motivation on why they would need to win. Either to save someone, save the world or overcome their enemies strength.
This is where I liked the treatment of Shadow Skill. Sure there is an imminent threat and several villains shown to be so powerful but aside from the strength development, I saw how there was a mental and character development especially between the Elle and Gau.
There are several pivotal moments that made me hold on to my seat and feel my heart stop. Often I watched with my mouth open to what was happening in the storyline.
I watched it as a kid and later on rewatched it as a young man and still it held the same fascination and awe as when I first watched it.
A match for a thousand
If you do decide to watch the show, this is one of my favorite instances. Even the prelude to this was just awesome and was well worth watching it.
I didn't really want to spoil so much because to me it is one of those hidden gems in anime. In no way was it perfect but it remains as one of my favorite animes so far.
Tell me what you think of Shadow Skill.