In Like a Dragon: Ishin Kazuma Kiryu Returns to His Samurai Roots

ign.com:

Like a Dragon: Ishin! takes Kazuma Kiryu back to the late Edo period as the imperial loyalist Sakamoto Ryōma. But the Dragon of Dojima has always been a samurai at heart.

The real-life yakuza make a show of their connection to the samurai’s feudal attitudes and bushido code as proof of their connection to Japan’s ancient warriors. But in truth, it’s Kiryu’s kindness and determination to protect the weak which set the Yakuza series apart since the very beginning. That makes him the true descendent of a long line of samurai kyōkyaku (which translates to ‘chivalrous commoner’) characters who fought oppression and injustice in Japanese cinema and drama for centuries.

With series creator Toshihiro Nagoshi’s background, that’s no accident – his illustrious SEGA career was a fallback after he failed to find work in movie production ­­­– and the emotional core of one of gaming’s most endearing characters has a lot in common with cinema’s Robin-Hood style figures.

Sakamoto Ryōma was a low-ranked but formidable samurai who played an important role in toppling the Tokugawa Shogunate before his assassination aged 31. The figure was adapted on screen numerous times and had become so mythologized, anyone could see themselves in him, according to actor Masaharu Fukuyama who played Sakamoto in 2010. Ishin! plays out in a similar fashion, letting Kazuma Kiryu loose on a highly embellished retelling of Japanese history. But while they definitely share similarities, Kiryu would have been better cast as a kyōkyaku.

Kyōkyaku were popular heroes in the Jidaigeki period dramas set in the same Edo period as Ishin! These films, set in early-modern Japan, depicted the gambling criminals who preceded the yakuza as outcast samurai with strong moral