Vinland Saga (manga)

Vinland Saga (ヴィンランド・サガ, Vinrando Saga) is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by YUKIMURA Makoto. The series is set in a historical depiction of Europe during Viking times, and depicts the life of Thorfinn, a young warrior who joins the mercenary band of Askeladd to get revenge on his father, Thors.

The Series is divided into four Story Arcs: the War Arc, the Slave Arc, The Eastern Expedition Arc and the final arc, currently unofficially dubbed the Vinland Arc.

History
Originally Vinland Saga started in the 20th Issue of Weekly Shonen Magazine in April 2005. But since the author wasn't able to keep up with the weekly schedule, after the 16th chapter released in the 45th Issue in October, the manga was moved to the monthly magazine Afternoon, starting in 2006-02 Issue in December 2005. The first 2 volumes containing the first 16 chapters were released under Weekly Shonen Magazine, but later after the manga changed magazines, they were also re-released under Afternoon imprint, having different covers and some additional extra pages.

In 2008, the series was one of the nominees of the 2008 Manga Taisho Award. And in 2009, it was awarded the Grand Prize in the manga division of the Japan Media Arts awards. In 2012, the manga won the 36th Annual Kodansha Manga Award in the Best General Manga category.

In 2013, the manga was licensed by Kodansha USA and the first volume was released in October 2013. The English releases have a hard cover and combines 2 Japanese volumes, with average 450 pages per book. The edition also contains some additional extras and talk with the author.

In late January 2014, the editorial department of Monthly Afternoon, gave an answer of the rumor of an anime. The anime rumors surfaced because of a misunderstanding about a "big news" ad placed near Vinland Saga news in one of the previous issues. The editorial department cleared out that so far there is no offer for anime adaptation and even wondering what's happening with the anime producers in Japan.

In July 2019, season 1 of the anime started airing, which concluded in December 2019.

In January 2023, season 2 of the anime started airing.

Trivia

 * Supplemental Material at the end of Volume 3 (following 21.5's Bonus Story: Ylva at Work) includes Artist Introductions, presenting four of Yukimura's Vinland Saga assistants at the time: Haito Kumagai, Kazuoki Suzuki, Tomoyuki Takami, and Daiju Watanabe
 * Yukimura Makoto has cited Vicky the Viking as inspiration for his series, particularly in the case of the character Hild. This is also the same series which gave Eiichiro Oda the inspiration for his own legendary series, One Piece.
 * As of 2019, Yukimura had five assistants involved in Vinland Saga
 * Vinland Saga has been fully drawn digitally since Chapter 168 or 169 (the shift was due to COVID-19 restrictions). Prior to this, Yukimura would do the inking in analog, then scan and do the finishing work digitally