Momoyama Jirou

One of the most creative, if incredibly bizarre, if not maniacal, mangaka whose works I am familiar with is 桃山ジロウ/Momoyama Jirou, prolific creator of a long string of mainly BDSM themed manga, the content of which is conspicuous in originality and strangeness, even in a genre which is already saturated with such. If ever there was an artist whose works embodied the very animating spirit of /d/, it is he.

Peaches are a recurrent motif in his works.

The famous “Where’s Waldo” tableau.

It seems barely a day goes by without someone on /d/ asking about this or another of his works, so hopefully this article can help with that.

Most of the themes he works with are variations on the “confined sex slave” theme, although he does have some almost normal titles published. I’m not sure many are going to be interested in these when his scrappy art is considered; it’s really the bizarre with which he excels with. He occasionally ventures (lightly) into content which is scatological or guro (I suppose this would be a plus if you had an interest in such), but not to an extent which would put anyone likely to read this sort of thing off their stroke.

You’ve probably already gathered by now that the stories he employs are absolutely demented, though this is also perhaps his crowning achievement.

His art style is a little rough at times, and this coupled with some of the unsightly things he likes to draw perhaps detract from the artistic side of things, but the sheer perverse creativity flowing through his illustrations surely makes up for any deficiencies; his art has also aged quite well, with the style not managing to look dated despite many of his works being quite old by now.

Getting hold of his works (exclusively manga, and mostly published in compilations) is unlikely to present any difficulties whatsoever, as although his compilations may largely be out of print or otherwise difficult to obtain, the Internet, as ever, can readily provide instead. Scanlated versions also seem to be apparent, so enjoying the depraved stories in all their glory is possible for all readers.

Momoyama Jirou’s works are practically required reading for anyone who frequents /d/, but whether they can appeal outside this group is another matter; my suspicion is that they can, perhaps chiefly through their sheer novelty.