Enter our hero, Ken and his whiny girlfriend, Julia. Ken is the FIST OF THE NORTH STAR! He and Julia are wandering around the desert looking for some fertile land to plant some seeds. That isn’t a euphemism for anything; they actually want to plant a garden somewhere. They meet up with Shin, a former friend of Ken’s. Shin is the Fist of the South Star. There is no real explanation as to how and why these two were chosen to be leaders, they just are. Shin, convinced that Julia would be better off with him – challenges Ken to a duel. Ken gets his ass kicked – and punched, and thrown, and slashed and stabbed. It’s a bit embarrassing. After Ken is tortured for a while, Julia agrees to go with Shin. You see, Shin is an honorable man and he wants Julia to come of her own free will – and it’s free will if you agree after seeing a loved one tortured to the point of death. Shin leaves Ken bleeding in the desert and takes Julia with him.

The incredibly whiny Julia

Watching the fight were Ken’s two brothers – Raoh and the horribly disfigured Jagi (for the longest time, I thought this characters name was Jackie). Raoh is content to let Ken bleed to death, but not Jagi. Jagi decides it would be safer to thrown Ken completely out of the picture. So, he apparently drags him up the tallest mountain and drops him off a cliff. A really big cliff, because Ken falls for a long, long time. Thanksgivings must be a hoot with this family! While Jagi is busy dragging Ken, Raoh goes to their father and proclaims himself Fist of the North Star, destroys some priceless statues and gets himself thrown out of the Dojo for being such a dick.

A year passes. We get some nice “Road Warrior” style scenes of mohawked bandits ambushing refugees. I’m not sure where the refugees came from or where they are going to – but hey have some nice clothes. Since the one thing this anime hasn’t had yet is kids in distress, we meet some kids in distress. They are Bat of the silly hair and Lynn, who is mute. They are driving a really, really durable car and being chased by bandits. By the looks of things, every bandit left in the world has the same hairdresser and he has one style in his repertoire – the Mohawk. Bat and Lynn are finally caught (I’m telling you that car is incredibly well-made!) and threatened. Lynn does this strange mental distress call and along comes a knight in shining armor – or at least a knight covered in stone. The stone man shakes off his uncomfortable coating of rubble and reveals himself to be KEN! So, Ken was thrown off a cliff, hit the ground with such force it molded stone to his body, recovered from his wounds and grew a beard. Anyway, Ken saves the kids by using his Fist of the North Star power, his lightning punch, which makes head explode! He also does this fruity little “yeyeyeyeyeyeye” sound. It’s great! You get to see a lot of this power (unless you’re watching the edited version – then you get to see none of it). He kills all of the bandits, including the boss, and then goes for a shower and shave. By the way, the boss here is freaking huge, like 12-15 feet tall. There is no explanation as to why some of the bad guys are monstrously big; I guess it was the nuclear fallout or something. Ken is also revealed to have the power to heal minds. It seems Lynn has been mute since she saw her parent melt in the war, but Ken heals her mind and she is able to talk again. In fact, she won’t shut up. Thanks, Ken! He also gives Lynn some plant seeds, because apparently she has some special power to grow things.

This brings up a question – how long has it been since the war? Apparently Lynn, who looks to be 7 or 8 years old, saw her parent die, so it couldn’t have been that long ago. So, the entire world collapses, the Fists gain power and set up strongholds and the bandits find their one hairdresser all in a couple of years. That’s the think with anime like this – don’t ask questions, just go with the flow and enjoy the carnage!

Clean-up on aisle 7!

We meet yet another, fighting man. This is Ray, who is looking for his kidnapped sister, Alei. He thinks the Fist of the North Star has kidnapped her and is looking to pick a fight with Ken. Ray’s special ninja power is slicing and dicing, which he does quite efficiently. Ken realizes that his brother Jagi is pretending to be the Fist and agrees to help Ray find Alei.

Ken goes to Jagi hideout and basically creates havoc, exploding the heads of bad guys until he finally finds Jagi and Alei. Alei has apparently lost her eyesight….and her mind. While Ray tries to convince his sister that he isn’t her new “master”, Ken fights Jagi. We get some family history, letting us know that it was Ken who disfigured Jagi (and apparently gave him asthma). We also learn that Jagi was the one who told Shin that Julia was in love with him and wanted to be with him and not Ken. After this not-so-big reveal, Ken kills Jagi in an explosion of gore. He then heals Alei’s mind, though he can’t do anything about her eyesight since she just refuses to see anything. Bat and Lynn show up with a plant they have grown and basically shame Alei into seeing things again, so she has that going for her. Ken then leaves to find Shin and Julia.

Jagi’s story complete, we check in with Raoh. Raoh is now a very powerful warlord and has a huge armada. I’m not sure where he’s getting all the gas for his vehicles, but that doesn’t matter. Raoh is cutting a path of destruction throughout the land and he has set his sights on Shin’s stronghold.

Shin is still trying to convince a sill-whiny Julia that she should marry him and be happy. Dude, it’s been a year, give it up and kill her! Shin and Julia learn that Raoh is at the gates of the city. They also learn that Ken is alive! Julia, in a fit of happiness, rips her clothes off (AH! She has no nipples!), dresses in the clothes she was wearing when she was last with Ken and runs off to find him. She attempts to make her escape through an underground subway filled with skeletons, where she is quickly captured by Raoh’s men.

Shin, rather stupidly, pulls guards from the fight at the gate to go look for Julia. This leads to a Raoh victory and the fall of the city. Shin and Raoh agree to fight, but we don’t get to see it.

Ken arrives at Shin’s fortress and finds everyone dead except Shin. Shin seems to be a bit injured, so I guess he did fight Raoh, just not to the death. Shin and Ken fight for a bit, but Ken easily wins. Shin bitches about an ungrateful Julia, cries and finally dies in Ken’s arms. Through all of this, his hair stays perfect!

Does my hair still look okay?

Raoh brings Julia to the dungeons of Cassandra, parading his victorious troops through the streets. Ray and kids just happen to be there to watch. Bat and Lynn decide to save Julia – or at least bring her the flower they grew to cheer her up. They ditch Ray and break into the dungeon. Ray just isn’t cut out to baby-sit.

The kids find Julia and give her the pretty flower, giving Julia hope that the world will repair itself. This doesn’t sit well with Raoh, who isn’t keen on the whole “hope” thing. So, he crucifies Julia, tying her on the world’s tallest cross and saying she will die if the person who gave her the flower doesn’t step forward. Ray; brave, stupid, Ray, steps forward. Ray and Raoh fight. Ray, of course, doesn’t stand a chance.

Ken FINALLY shows up. He slowly walks through the street (all the while, an awesomely bad 80’s rock tune play), while Ray is getting the shit kicked out of himself. Hey, Ken, if you move your ass a bit faster, you might be able to help Ray out! No such luck, as Ken arrives just in time for Ray to give a really long speech about the benefits of running away and living another day. Ray dies.

Ken and Raoh fight and it is awesome. Buildings are destroyed, people are thrown everywhere – including Julia on her cross. Blood is splattered, bones broken…..and Ken LOSES! That’s right, our hero lost the fight! Just as Raoh is about to kill Ken, Lynn steps up and tells him to stop. Incredibly, Raoh stops! Lynn gives a nice little environmental speech and Raoh decides to leave. He just walks away. Well, he spits blood all over the place, then walks away. It’s kind of odd.

Afterward: Bat and Lynn say that Ken went looking for Julia - apparently, she just wandered off, still attached to a huge freaking cross – and we get scenes of Ken wandering around. He stumbles across a beautiful forest (well, that grew quickly!) and sees visions of Julia everywhere. But, she is not there. He wanders again while credits roll.

I’m thinking that in the original Japanese, Julia died. It would make a bit more sense than Julia wandering off, dragging a cross. But since that seemed like a downer ending – but bad guy lives, the love interest dies – they changed it for the English dub. However, there is an anime series that came after this (The New Fist of the North Star), so maybe they left it ambiguous so they could continue to the story.

Either way – epic 80’s anime.