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Cover of Issue 4, the first of the Brazilian-produced comics.
The Brazilian Street Fighter comics (called Super Street Fighter II between issues 6 and 13) were a semi-regular comic series distributed by publisher Escala between 1994 and 1997.
History
In 1994, Escala held the Brazilian distribution rights for the Malibu Comics series based on Street Fighter. Since it was cancelled with only three issues, however, the publisher attempted to carry on by licensing Masaomi Kanzaki's manga of the game. When these negotiations fell through, an in-house team led by editor Marcelo Cassaro decided to work on the series, even continuing the numbering, which meant that these comics started with issue 4 rather than issue 1.
After issue #5, Cassaro stepped down and appointed Alexandre Nagado as his replacement. Nagado's first order of business was to entirely disregard the Malibu canon and create a new story from scratch, based on Super Street Fighter II, which was out at the time, its Turbo update having been recently released. The publication carried on with successive stories and story arcs, as well as a special edition with three self-contained stories, until issue #20 in 1997, the second of an unfinished three-part series centered around Akuma.
Throughout its publication, the stories' canon drew mainly from the games, with a few liberties taken, i.e. some elements of Ryu's character were incorporated form his Street Fighter II V incarnation, such as his first fight with Guile (shown in a flashback at the beginning of issue #15). Also, while character designs had an original, manga-inspired look at first (particularly, Chun-Li's appearance drew heavily from Kanzaki's take on the character), the creative team would later incorporate the Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie designs to the characters.
Issues
- #4: Life Imitates Art: Shows Fei Long's backstory. A backup feature, made in the style of the Malibu series, tells a story of how Guile mastered the Sonic Boom (using the old canon version, which said came from an accident during a test flight, instead of him having been taught by Charlie).
- #5: My Name Is Cammy!: Shows Cammy's backstory. The backup feature hints at a sequence to the events in the American comics, where Ryu and Chun-Li discuss Ken's fate and she mentions his corpse had disappeared, hinting at him having survived.
- #6-8: Battlefield: The first of the original Brazil-made stories, is an adaptation of Super Street Fighter II, involving the new Street Fighter tournament.
- #9-10: Phantom Agent: Chun-Li and Cammy team up to defend a scientist from a shape-shifting assassin.
- #11-13: The Spheres of Power: A break from the traditional format, the story centers around two extra-dimensional sorcerers, Sasha and Kiran, recruiting the Street Fighters for a tournament to decide the next in line to rule their realm.
- #14-16: Death Island: Guile is shot down during a recon flight by unknown assailants and presumed dead, while some of the other Street Fighters deal with a growing threat: the underground syndicate Shadow Law, risen from Shadaloo's ashes (note: while Shadowlaw is the original Japanese name for Shadaloo, the writers adapted it as a new name, since this name change was not made in the SFII Animated Movie, which saw release during the time of publication).
- #17: Casino: Chun-Li and Cammy take on a mission to apprehend an Eastern European drug lord in a casino in Monte Carlo, inadvertently stringing Ken along for the ride. From this issue on to the end, Rodrigo de Góes took over the role of editor, appointed by Nagado.
- #18: Perfect Holidays: Chun-Li and Guile decide to take a vacation together, but run into an undercover Triad plot before they can enjoy themselves.
- #19-20: Akuma: Tells the tale of the presumably demonic fighter who travels the world brutally defeating opponents. Characters from the Street Fighter Alpha series make appearances here. The third part was never published due to the title's cancellation.
Notes
- In addition to the 17 issues released, there was an extra edition issued, with more pages and three complete stories (one of them a two-parter).
- The issues covering the Death Island and Akuma arcs also had backup stories involving other characters: Blanka in #14, Dhalsim in #15, Guile and Zangief in #16, Fei Long in #19 and Dan in #20.
- Issues #17 and #18 were supposed to take place after the Akuma arc, but since the latter was behind its schedule, the stories therein were released first.
- The Japanese names of the characters (which, by the time, applied only to the bosses and Akuma) were used in the comic until prior to the Death Island arc, when Romstar, Capcom's official arcade distributor in Brazil at the time, asked the team to use the Westernized names of Balrog (Boxer rather than Claw), Vega (Claw rather than Dictator) and M. Bison (Dictator rather than Boxer).
- The tournament format used in the comics is basically the same to the one that would later be applied in the UDON series, except with a different distribution of contestants.
- At the end of issue #17, leading into the next one, Chun-Li and Guile get romantically involved. While this is foreign to the series' canon mainly due to Guile being married with a child, the editors explain that the characters were brought together due to their similar personalities. So as to not contradict the games, it is stated in #18 that Julia and Guile had split up because she could not stand the life he was living.
- Ryu and Ken's power levels are consistent with what was shown in Street Fighter II Victory, having both mastered the Hado. Hence, Ken's Hadoken here is considerably more powerful than in canon (able, for example, to destroy helicopters), and in issue #16, he uses the Hadoshoryuken technique against Vega.
External links
- Santuário do Mestre Ryu' reviews and archives on the comics (in Portuguese)
- UOL Games' report on the comics (in Portuguese)