Free Comic Friday: Street Fighter Back to School Special

Street Fighter: Back to School Special #1
Writer/Lettering: Matt Moylan
Art: Gonzalo Ordonez Arias, aka “Genzoman,” and Edwin Huang
Cover: Hanzo Steinbach
Published by: UDON
Released: Aug. 14, 2021

It's still technically summer, but most schools are going back in session, if not this week, then soon. It still seems weird to me that kids start classes this early, but maybe officials are just trying to limit the number of days they have to walk uphill both ways in the snow to attend classes.

Even if this wasn't a Back-to-School-themed issue, I feel like the timing would work because “Street Fighter II” was such a huge part of my scholastic years. Of course, the fact that those years took place so long ago is probably why I recognize almost none of the characters in this issue.

I started to say I got in on the ground floor with “Street Fighter II,” but clearly it's a sequel. I'm not sure I ever played the original because I keep seeing “Karate Champ” in my head when I think about it. At the arcade with the sequel, I gravitated toward Blanka, 'cause he was the most science fiction-y of the eight World Warriors and because his “shock treatment” was the easiest special move to figure out. Being able to play as the bosses in Champion Edition was cool, especially Vega, since he had a mask and a Wolverine claw. Then came “Super Street Fighter II,” where I initially gravitated toward Dee Jay before settling on Cammy as my favorite, which probably had little or nothing to do with the fact that she did not wear pants.

I even attempted to translate the Street Fighter characters into the old TSR Marvel roleplaying game. And I eventually discovered “Street Fighter – The Storytelling Game.” Some friends and I had a long-running campaign in high school, for which I once used a GamePro strategy guide to come up with character sheets for a slew of Mortal Kombat characters to drop our characters into. I do love crossovers.*

Despite all this, I never ventured far beyond the iterations with a “II” in the title, outside of the Marvel vs. Capcom games.** I knew there were additional characters introduced, of course, but I was rather lost when it came to identifying the folks in this issue.

I only recognized two: Ken, who is only referenced by name a couple of times, and Sakura, for whom I initially mistook Makoto because they're both girls with short hair who do karate.

In the various iterations of “Street Fighter II,” there were only two female fighters, Chun-Li and the aforementioned Cammy. In this issue, only three male fighters make an appearance.

The story begins with some folks I, of course, didn't recognize, chatting about past fights at a gas station, when the helmeted figure from the cover races by on her motorcycle. Then we cut to Atago Gongen High School, where Makoto appears to be winning a wrestling match against Elena, a 6-foot-tall exchange student from Kenya. The girls head to the courtyard for a college fair where they find a trio of fighters they recognize attempting to recruit students to their schools.

There's Sakura, who has grown up a little since I met her in the UDON Street Fighter comics collections on Hoopla. She's representing Tamagawa Kita College, which places an emphasis on physical activity, education and excellence. Her frenemy*** Karin Kanzuki is recruiting for the business school bearing her family's name. And Makoto and Elena's former classmate, I believe, Ibuki is extolling the virtues of Sarusuberei University, where she's part of a secret group of ninjas she probably shouldn't have told Makoto about.

They're interrupted with an aggressive flyer drop by Zaki and Yurika on behalf of Seijyun Girls' University. The Street Fighter Fandom wiki informed me they're from the “Rival Schools” game series, which apparently takes place in the same universe as Street Fighter. As the first three recruiters take offense as Zaki and Yurika's aggressive tactics, a third Seijyun representative arrives on the scene – Akira Kazama, the motorcyclist from the opening pages.

Soon the six fighters are duking it out, until a couple of their less pugilistically inclined acquaintances point out that Makoto and Elena aren't paying attention anymore. They're listening to a sales pitch from Dan, who I vaguely recognized from another Street Fighter installment I didn't play. He wants to sign them up for his pro wrestling promotion, and the girls seem intrigued, much to the chagrin of their fighter friends.

We don't see if they ultimately make a choice though, because the scene shifts back to the Seijyun trio as Akira gets invited to go riding with (checks comic) Rufus, Maki and maybe some other folks from another game I haven't played.

I could do the research and share all these characters' backstories, but I would basically be regurgitating what much more knowledgeable fans have already put together on the Fandom pages. Besides, part of the guidelines I made up for #FreeComicFriday is to assess how effective an issue is at getting readers to maybe check out more of the material and perhaps eventually even spend money on it. A reader who is only passingly familiar or not familiar at all with the subject matter is part of the target audience.

So it's authenticity, not laziness.

Even though I didn't recognize these characters, I certainly recognize the Street Fighter brand. The only Street Fighter comic I remember buying was the second installment of a Malibu series that was a lot darker. That issue ended with Ryu getting Ken's scalp in the mail after it looked like Sagat had killed him. This one featured high school hijinks, a fighting game by way of “Saved by the Bell.”

I enjoyed this, and I like that there's room for multiple tones. The backstories of a lot of the Street Fighter II characters revolved around the criminal organization or possibly rogue nation Shadoloo and life-or-death struggles. Sure, there were exceptions, but even though I appreciated the Hundred-Hand Slap and other easier-to-master moves of E. Honda, him wanting to prove sumo was a valid combat style lacked the narrative urgency of Guile's search for his missing friend Charlie or Cammy's quest to find the truth about her past.****

Since this seemed aimed at, or at least accessible to, a younger audience than me (an ever-lowering bar), I wanted to see what my youngest thought of it. She was willing to give it a shot until she saw the angle of the cover art and what appeared to be Sakura's underwear. Then she noped out. Although it's actually shorts, at least in the interior art, and even the cover provides more coverage than similar angles that occurred quite a bit in the UDON Street Fighter trades I read on Hoopla, I can't say I blame her. In spite of that, the issue doesn't feel like it was written by and for teenage boys.

Since I was already predisposed to Street Fighter content, I'm not sure this issue can take credit for me seeking out the previous trades. But nothing in it dissuaded me from reading more. It also strikes a balance between letting you know there is plenty of other material featuring these characters and being accessible.

* - But not so much Mortal Kombat.

** - That's where I finally executed Zangief's spinning, 360-degree piledriver move,
many years after anyone else I knew who might actually aspire to do it had already done so.

*** - I bestowed this status based on minutes of reading Karin's bio on fandom and seeing her and Sakura
clash on the cover of another Street Fighter Free Comic Book Day issue. Research!

**** - And maybe those elusive pants.