Sanctuary

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Alternative Titles

Japanese: サンクチュアリ

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Information

Type: Manga

Volumes: 12

Chapters: 108

Status: Finished

Published: 1990 to 1995

Genres: Drama, Suspense

Themes: Detective, Organized Crime

Demographic: Seinen

Serialization: Big Comic Superior

Authors: Ikegami, Ryouichi (Art), Buronson (Story)

Statistics

Score: 8.20¹ (scored by 9,574 users)

¹ indicates a weighted score.

Ranked: #457²

² based on the top manga page. Please note that 'R18+' titles are excluded.

Popularity: #525

Members: 37,729

Favorites: 980

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Wikipedia

8.20

Ranked #457Popularity #525Members 37,729

MangaBig Comic SuperiorIkegami, Ryouichi (Art), Buronson (Story)

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Volumes: /12

Chapters: /108

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Synopsis

Akira Houjou and Chiaki Asami are childhood friends who have experienced hell and lived to tell about it. They arrive in Japan to attend school, and soon witness the corruption and apathy of the country's population. Enraged, Akira and Asami vow to create a new Japan; a sanctuary with a new form of politics, devoid of corruption, where people are empowered to participate in the politics and future of their country. To accomplish this, Houjou and Asami aim to conquer Japan through two dramatically different routes: the Japanese Diet and the Yakuza. Decided by a game of rock-paper-scissors, Houjou ventures to seize control of the underworld while Asami pursues the position of Prime Minister.

Sanctuary is a dark, political thriller that tells the story of these two friends as they attempt to change Japan from the inside out and create their sanctuary.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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Background

Sanctuary was published in English by VIZ Media under its VIZ Premiere Comics imprint in 46 issues, split into five parts, from January 1993 to March 1997. VIZ Media then compiled the chapters into nine volumes published between May 1995 and February 5, 1998. The English release was nominated for the 1995 Harvey Award for Best American Edition of Foreign Material. The first six volumes of the series were also published in Brazilian Portuguese by Conrad from June 2006 to April 2008.

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Related Entries

More characters
Characters

Houjou, Akira

Main

Asami, Chiaki

Main

Tokai

Supporting

Ishihara, Kyoko

Supporting

Isaoka, Norimoto

Supporting

Miyamura

Supporting

Tashiro, Reiji

Supporting

Don Sagara

Supporting

Ibuki, Hideaki

Supporting

Murata

Supporting

Reviews

May 30, 2025

6Tallguy

Recommended

Sanctuary is a very interesting and exciting manga that keeps you on the edge of your seat constantly. It follows two main characters trying to change the japanese society for the better via politics and the yakuza underworld. It has a serious tone and drawn in a more realistic gekiga art style, which really reminds you of the western gritty spy comics from the 70/80s. By following the yakuza code and fighting for the ideals the main characters are very symphatetic and you keep cheering for them all way through. Them always being one step ahead of everyone else makes it really interesting what their ...

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Oct 20, 2025

GrandEgotist

Mixed Feelings

Sanctuary is a story about politics, but it isn't a political story, not really. The difference is subtle, but it wasn't something I could get away from as I read. Sanctuary doesn't fail to offer a theory of politics that it endorses, as well as one that it maligns, but the details of those theories are wisp-thin and insubstantial when viewed through the creaking machinery of Politics, the verb. Hojo and Asami do believe in things, but for much of the story, those beliefs are not only unimportant, but staggeringly uncontroversial. A disdain for gerontocracy and corruption? Anti-isolationism? Constitutional reform to place more direct power ... in the hands of the public? Each of these things have their critics, and those critics are loudly signal-boosted through the antagonist Isaoka and his cronies, but ask anyone in real life about any of these things. Hell, just think about asking. That isn't politics. It's barely even populism.

For the first half or so, I was convinced that Buronson had somehow written a completely apolitical story about politics, and in fact had set out to utterly refuse to offer a perspective, on purpose. It was right around the point where one of the main two (I don't remember which one) declares loudly that the world had exited the age of ideology that I was smacked in the face with what had actually been generated, a chronic and unfortunately terminal bout of 1990s neoliberalism. It's staggering, from 2025, to think back on a time when the forthcoming establishment of a new neoliberal world order could be embodied by smooth-talking man's-man iconoclasts. Neoliberalism, like this manga, is politics-by-homunculus, an endless series of polished speeches and coalition-building backroom deals, directed at a future devoid of any real north star, moving without moving.

It's a double shame, then, that the movement is compelling. Granted, the characters are pretty same-y. Everyone written with sympathetic intentions has that same stone-faced expression regardless of their circumstances, but the way they swagger through the world and drag others into their orbit, the adrift gaining access to the stone-faced superpower once their goals are in alignment with the protagonists, is hilariously compelling. The series is wildly misogynistic, with all of three named and important female characters, each of whom is treated as a conquest by one of the main two Romeos and thinks of little else besides. But if you can somehow put that out of your mind, you'll be treated to a truly dangerous quantity of Two Men Staring At Each Other Until The Spirit Of One Is Broken By The Unwavering Moral Quality Of The Other.

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May 1, 2022

R_I_N_G_O_o_O

Not Recommended

Funny

This is technically my first foray into gekiga manga and man was this probably a poor first impression. Structurally unhinged, confusing, with the art only sometimes coming out to make a notable impression… this work left me with an impression that gekiga is arthouse manga made specifically for certain people to appreciate and everyone else can fuck off. Perhaps that’s great to the people who it’s made for, and I’m sure if I put in the effort to understand the history surrounding this work and the sociopolitical movements in Japan at the time I’d probably walk away with a different understanding. But ...

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