Ultimate Muscle:  The Kinnikuman Legacy, with 23 volumes and seven million copies sold in Japan, will be published in English for the first time by Viz Communications.  This action/adventure/sports story, with an anime series already in its second season on the Fox Box, will be published in the Shonen Jump line of graphic novels on a bi-monthly basis, with the first volume scheduled to be in stores by mid-April.

 

Ultimate Muscle is the sequel to Muscleman, which was created in 1979 by Nakai Yoshinori and Takashi Shimada (as a duo known as Yudetamago).  The original series featured King Muscle and his band of wrestlers who battled their equally muscle-bound evil alien counterparts to save the earth.

 

Kid Muscle, the son of King Muscle but lacking his father's courage and charisma, must turn his life around and form a team of well-muscled wrestlers to once again protect the earth from over-muscled evil alien wrestlers in Ultimate Muscle.

 

In addition to the successful Ultimate Muscle anime series on Fox Box being renewed for a second season (see 'Fox Box Releases Fall Schedule') and Ultimate Muscle video games, Bandai has manufactured a variety of action figures based on the manga/show and a trading card game (see 'Bandai Adds Two Series of Gundam Toys').  The anime and licensed products have paved the way for the manga to be released to an eagerly waiting audience.