Real
Name: Shigeru Ezaki TENGU
Real
Name: Shigeru Ezaki
Identity/Class: Human; Japanese citizen (World War II era to modern day - see comments)
Occupation: Shadow Warrior;
former Mayor of Ueno
Group Membership: Shadowmasters (Sojin Ezaki, Yuriko Ezaki, Phillip Richards)
Affiliations: Captain James Richards, Sergeant Dewey, Captain Higashi
Enemies: Sunrise Society (Domei, Fujimura, Ichiji, Kantaro Umezu, Techno-Ninjas, others)
Known Relatives: Sojin Ezaki (son, deceased),
Yuriko Ezaki (daughter), unidentified wife (deceased), unidentified
second wife, unidentified in-laws of first wife (probably deceased),
unidentified daughter-in-law, unidentified grandchildren (Sojin's
children), Naoichi Fujimura (son-in-law), many generations of
unidentified ancestors;
Gregor, Hutch, Leon, Mace, the Officer, dozens of others
(many deceased) (clones)
Aliases: Silent Demon of Darkness
Base of Operations: Ueno, near Iga, Mie Prefecture, Kansai Region, southern Honshu, Japan
First
Appearance: Punisher War Journal I#9 (October 1989)
Powers/Abilities: Shigeru Ezaki was an extremely
accomplished martial artist, an expert in the use of traditional ninja
weapons such as throwing knives, smoke bombs and kyoketsu-shoge (a
double-edged blade with a curved side hook, attached to a chain with a
metal ring at the end). He was a master of the ninpo arts, including
taijutsu (the basic body movements from which all other techniques
spring), moving unseen and unheard in darkness, sensing the presence of
others in his vicinity, walking on gravel without making a sound, using
the sound or lack thereof of insects to detect human movement, and
striking nerve centers to incapacitate foes. He was also very good at
sleight of hand. He sometimes utilized shūkō ("tiger
hands"), leather band worn round the hands with four small spikes
protruding from the palms used to assist climbing and gripping, but also
usable as slashing weapons. He was also an exceptional tracker across a
wide variety of terrain.
Shigeru was fluent in both Japanese and
English. He was skilled in bonsai and in meditation, to the point where
he could genuinely let his mind slip out and roam the countryside around
him, at least on a superficial level.
Height: (in his youth) 5'10"; (elderly) 5'8" (by
estimation)
Weight: (in his youth) 180 lbs.; (elderly) 110 lbs. (by
estimation)
Eyes: Brown
Hair: White; formerly black
History:
(Shadowmasters#1
(fb) - BTS) - For centuries members of the Ezaki family protected the
area around the village of Ueno in Japan's Kansai region, shadow
warriors using ninja skills and disguised behind tengu masks, giving
rise to legends that half-men, half-demon yokai (spirits) lived there.
The legend of Ueno's guardian tengu kept the crime rate to a minimum.
By the mid 1930s, Shigeru
Ezaki was the Shadowmaster protecting the village.
(Shadowmasters#2 (fb) - BTS) - He
had learned six of the nine levels of ninpo, but his instructor
died before Shigeru could progress further. His master's only
pupil as far as he knew, to the best of his knowledge Shigeru was
the only remaining practitioner of his style of ninpo, or indeed
any style. He inherited a few ancient scrolls from his teacher,
but without proper guidance and deciphering he found much of their
knowledge beyond him.
(Shadowmasters#1
(fb) - BTS) - Publicly he was the
mayor of Ueno, but at night he donned his tengu mask to patrol and to
protect his village (see comments). A couple of years into his
tenure Japan began the Second Sino-Japanese War, which then burgeoned
into the Second World War. Though he loved his home and his country, Shigeru
never shared the dreams of world conquest that Japan's rulers did.
(Shadowmasters#2 (fb) - BTS) - In 1942 he became a father when his son Sojin was born.
(Shadowmasters#1 (fb) - BTS) - In
1944 his wife went to visit relatives in Tokyo, and was killed during
an American air raid, leaving him a widower raising Sojin alone. With
the war's end late in 1945 Shigeru's job of protecting Ueno made
harder by renegade ex-soldiers who had refused to accept their
country's surrender and taken to hiding out in the hills, looting from
the locals to survive; to these bandits, anyone who resisted being
robbed were considered traitors and beaten, shot or tortured.
Meanwhile in his capacity as mayor Shigeru was informed by the
Japanese government that he was to cooperate with the American
occupation forces that would soon be arriving. Though he had no love
for foreigners imposing their will on his people, Shigeru recognized
the occupation was a fact and that to resist it would invite disaster.
Feeling he needed to shepherd his village through these difficult
times, he began trying to learn English.
(Shadowmasters#1) - Shigeru was doing his
evening patrol when Captain James Richards and Sergeant Dewey, the two
American soldiers assigned to Iga Province, arrived. Wanting to know
what kind of men he was going to have to deal with, Shigeru watched
covertly as their jeep pulled up outside the local doctor's clinic, and
a local boy jumped out the vehicle and rushed inside to get the
physician. As a crowd of locals that included Shigeru's son Sojin began
to gather, keen to see the newcomers, Shigeru realized the Americans had
been transporting an injured elderly woman (who had been assaulted by
the renegades), and observed as the Americans lifted the woman out of
the vehicle and onto a stretcher that had been brought from the clinic.
Recalling his wife's recent death at American hands and how it robbed
his son of a mother, Shigeru felt conflicted seeing supposedly barbarous
American now coming to the aid of another person's mother. However, as
the woman was lifted out the jeep her hand knocked against the
handbrake, and the jeep began to roll downhill with increasing speed
towards the crowd of locals. They scattered, but in doing so they
knocked to the ground Sojin, leaving the three year-old boy lying
directly in the runaway vehicle's path. Shigeru was too far away to have
any chance of reaching his child, but he witnessed Captain Richards race
down the hill, narrowly outrunning the jeep, and then risk his own life
to jump in its path, snatch up Sojin and roll out of the vehicle's way.
With Sojin now safe, Shigeru slipped back to his home through a secret
underground tunnel accessed through a nearby well, and emerged in his
role as mayor and father to greet and thank the G.I.s.
The next few weeks Shigeru split his time between security sweeps
hunting for the renegades as the Tengu, and spending time with Richards,
improving his English while trying to learn a little of his culture and
teaching the captain about Japanese ways at the same time. However, Shigeru remained conflicted, wondering what his
wife's spirit would think of him associating with the people who had
killed her. In their official capacities, the pair also met
regularly to coordinate village security, especially as the renegades'
attacks persisted. With the local police failing to apprehend even a
single bandit, Richards gave them a deadline to make progress or he
would be forced to bring in American troops to search. That night while
on patrol Shigeru witnessed several men, led by Kantaro Umezu and
immediately identifiable recognizable as renegades because they were
still defiantly in their Imperial Army uniforms, gathered near Richards'
house. Covertly observing he overheard Umezu inform the others that they
were going to murder Richards that night, intended to be just the first
"trespasser" who would be slain in their campaign to make the Japanese
people rise up and bring about the rebirth of Imperial Japan. With
insufficient time to warn Richards, Shigeru slipped into Tengu mode and
immediately attacked, slaying two renegades with throwing knives to the
neck before the group could react. As they began to open fire in his
direction he used a smoke bomb to provide cover and took up position
hanging from a branch of a tree with the aid of his shūkō. Umezu sent
two of his men to slay the Americans (unaware they had been woken by the
sound of gunshots), while he and the remaining two hunted for the Tengu.
As they passed below him, Tengu dropped down on them, taking out one man
with a kick to the jugular notch as he descended, then slicing Umezu's
arm with his tiger claws. Facing off against the remaining two, the
Tengu responded to Umezu decrying him as a traitor by pointing out the
renegades were doing their people no favors by robbing and killing them,
and when Umezu persisted with his rant proclaiming his renegades the
only true patriots left, then tried to shoot him, Tengu kicked the gun
from his hand and, telling Umezu that he saw the world through warped
eyes and offering to improve his vision, slashed Umezu's right eye with
the claws. While Umezu collapsed in agony, the last attacker came at
Tengu with a knife, which the ninja turned against the man, stabbing him
fatally in the gut. Meanwhile Richards and Dewey began a firefight with
the two men Umezu had sent to murder them. Dewey was gunned down, but
Richards shot the sergeant's killer in turn. Out of ammunition, Richards
tackled the remaining man while the renegade was reloading, and they
grappled on the ground. About to finish off Umezu with the purloined
dagger, the Tengu spotted that Richards' foe was about to shoot the
captain, so he instead threw the knife, hitting Richards' assailant in
his gun hand, forcing him to drop his pistol. Leaving Umezu, Tengu raced
to assist Richards, giving Umezu the chance to escape. The captain's
opponent pulled out the blade impaling his hand and threw it back at
Tengu, but Shigeru caught it between his palms, then moved to finish off
the renegade. Insisting they needed the man alive to question, the Tengu
and Richards got in each others' way, giving their foe an opening to
punch the Tengu a blow that knocked his mask off and momentarily stunned
him. Watching from the bushes, Umezu thus saw Shigeru's face, and as he
recovered Shigeru spotted that the renegade still grappling with
Richards had managed to grab his gun again. Before he could shoot
Richards, Shigeru fatally stabbed him.
Helping Richards back into his house, Shigeru told him to summon the police, but asked him not to disclose his identity to them, and instead come to his house once they were gone. Richards acquiesced, and Shigeru explained to the American about his family's long legacy as the region's protectors, requesting that the captain keep his identity secret lest past enemies target him and his son. Richards admitted this put him in a dilemma, since the occupation had banned the practice of all martial arts, and he was duty bound to report the mahor, but he also owed Shigeru his life. Apologizing, Richards said he would have no choice but to turn Shigeru in once morning came. Once Richards left Shigeru mulled over his options, considering killing the man who was about to ruin his life but rejecting that choice because Richards had saved his son and he was coming to like the American. Shigeru also briefly wondered about taking Sojin and fleeing, but rejected abandoning the responsibilities both he and his ancestors had so long upheld. Finally Shigeru decided he would have to stay and ride the crisis out. Two days later Richards visited Shigeru again, and offered him a compromise: The American's superior officer was willing to keep Shigeru's identity as secret known only to him, Richards and confidential army files if in return Shigeru helped capture, or if necessary eliminate, the renegades, expanding his activities outside of Ueno to wherever the renegades operated. Again Shigeru was faced with a quandary, disliking the idea of hunting fellow Japanese at the behest of foreigners, but balancing this with the growing toll of innocent civilian casualties the renegades were accruing, as well as his own freedom and security. Fate stepped in to make his decision for him: The local police officer, Captain Higashi, arrived to inform them that the renegades had just slaughtered an entire family, looting their farm and then burning it to the ground. Hearing that, Shigeru told Richards that he accepted his offer.
For several months the Tengu relentlessly hunted
down renegades, slowly whittling their numbers away with a series of
nighttime attacks. He declined the offer of modern weapons, feeling it
best to stick with what he knew best and that trying to use unfamiliar
devices without sufficient time to learn how to use them would only
invite disaster. To his regret, the renegades fanatically refused to
surrender when he offered them the chance, and he grew increasingly
weary of playing the role of executioner. By winter, though he did not
know it, Shigeru had slain almost half the renegades, forcing the
remaining scattered bands to hide out in mountain caves. Civilians who
once were willing to aid the renegades now withheld it, fearing to incur
the Tengu's wrath.
(Shadowmasters#1 - BTS) - The
Tengu located a relatively large group of renegades, led by
Umezu, hiding out in a cave high in the mountains north of Ueno.
Tired of killing, he decided to try another tack.
(Shadowmasters#1) - Eventually Umezu sent out four men to get provisions for the rest of their group. Though they thought to deny the Tengu the cover of darkness by venturing out during the day, and traveled single file through the snow in an attempt to appear to potential trackers like a single, innocent traveler, Shigeru immediately spotted that the tracks were too deep for just one person, correctly estimating that it was four instead, and the very fact they were trying to conceal this gave away their guilt. Checking beneath rocks, the Tengu located a poisonous viper, sluggish from the cold, and tied it to the ring of his kyoketsu-shoge, then placed the ring in a tied-off pouch. Knowing that the only potential target for the raiders was an isolated inn nearby the Tengu then hastily set off to intercept the bandits before they could attack the innkeeper and his family. Spotting the soldiers as they reached a ridge overlooking the inn, Tengu triggered a small avalanche that took out two and caused the others to drop their rifles when they scrambled to avoid the cascading snow. Though they had yet to spy their attacker, one of the remaining soldiers threw a grenade up the mountain in his general direction, then (after narrowly avoiding another that had triggered) the two renegades headed up hoping to confirm the Tengu was dead. However Shigeru was unharmed, and left a piece of cloth wrapped round a defoliated branch sticking out of the snow as a lure. As anticipated, the soldiers spotted it and went to inspect it, and the Tengu threw his kyoketsu-shoge's ring end round the neck of one, then yanked it to aggravate the attached viper. As that man fell to the ground screaming the Tengu threw the blade end at the last man, impaling him in the heart. The Tengu then went down to check on the two men the avalanche had taken out, and found one trapped beneath a fallen tree trunk but nevertheless still clinging to life. The soldier (Fijumura) expected to die, but instead the Tengu lifted the trunk off him and gave him a message to deliver to the other renegades.
(Shadowmasters#1
- BTS) - Stating that it was time to abandon the senselessly
violent past and build a new Japan, Shigeru offered to stop killing
the renegades if they disbanded and ceased their activities. If they
did not, he promised they would all die by his hands, claiming that
they could not prevail as he was immortal. Though he had no intention
of truly abandoning his goal of resurrecting Imperial Japan, Umezu
realized he needed to change his approach, and took unintended
inspiration from the Tengu's words. He ordered his men to integrate
themselves back into society, then use every means at their disposal
to work their way into positions of influence, with the ultimate aim
of taking over the country.
(Shadowmasters#3
(fb) - BTS) - These conspirators dubbed themselves the Sunrise
Society.
(Shadowmasters#2
(fb) - BTS) - Ueno continued to thrive under the Shigeru's mayorship.
After the American occupation of Japan ended in 1952 James Richards
return to the United States and married. However, having fallen in
love with Japan during his tour of duty he returned to coach in the
rapidly expanding pro baseball league, living close to his friend
Shigeru. In 1957 the Richards had a son, Phillip, who grew up thinking
of Shigeru an uncle.
(Shadowmasters#2)
- Shigeru eventually remarried and
in 1960 he became a father for the second time when his daughter
Yuriko was born. By 1972 Shigeru was spending his afternoons and
evenings training his two children as well as Phillip in various
ancient ninpo arts. He taught them taijutsu, the basic body movements
from which all other techniques sprang, and honed the older Sojin's
skills in advanced armed and unarmed weapons. James would occasionally
watch the training sessions, but never took part, because as much as
he and Shigeru had come to be, their radically different cultures,
outlooks and experiences were too vast to completely bridge. On
moonless nights he taught the children how to move unseen and unheard,
to tune themselves to their environment so they could sense others in
their vicinity, and to hide from a searching opponent using whatever
cover the terrain provided. One night Phillip, hoping to prove how
much he had learned, snuck into Shigeru's garden at night, but his
arrival caused the crickets to fall silent, alerting Shigeru to an
intruder. Making sure he remained unobserved by the intruder, Shigeru
rose quietly, but Phillip heard the sudden buzzing of mosquitoes
dislodged when Shigeru threw aside his bed's netting, so he hastily
departed. Recognizing the intruder was Phillip by his size, shape and
movements, Shigeru did not pursue, instead bringing it up the next day
when the two families were heading out to watch a baseball game for a
team James had been coaching. Later that day after James' team won
Shigeru was photographed by the press while congratulating his friend.
Unfortunately the victory made the sports pages of the newspaper,
complete with the photo and a caption that identified Shigeru by name.
This was seen by Umezu, who was delighted to finally know the identity
of the tengu demon that had taken his eye and hounded his men in the
mountains.
The next night Shigeru was at
home with the two younger children, telling them of his late master
and counseling them to use the knowledge he had passed on well, and to
keep up with modern weapons and techniques, something he had failed to
do. However, later that night while meditating he sensed something was
wrong, a disturbance at his core. Unaware that he was sensing Uzemu
planning a bloody revenge, this disquiet haunted Shigeru for the next
week, to the point where he considered cancelling his trip to a
mayoral conference in Iga, but his wife insisted he should go,
believing he was merely out of sorts because Sojin, now studying
marine biology, was moving out. Though he vaguely felt the need to
remain close to home, Shigeru rationalized that it had been seven days
since his unnerving vision and nothing untoward had happened, so he
decided there was perhaps nothing to fear, and agreed to do as his
wife suggested. However the vague uneasiness continued to gnaw at him
throughout his three day trip. Returning home he paused outside his
house, feeling something intangible was amiss. Deciding to play it
safe he slipped off to the fake well that hid the underground entrance
to his gardens, but found the other end blocked by something. Pushing
at the obstacle, he dislodged it, and James' corpse fell into the
tunnel before him. Shocked at the sight of his dead friend, Shigeru
saw that a note had been pinned to the body. Clearly intended for him,
it stated that his wife, daughter, Mrs. Richards and her son were
being held hostage within the house, and that either he or they were
to die, leaving the choice of which up to him, and giving him only
five minutes to comply. The attackers then showed they knew where
Shigeru was, as they diverted a pond in the garden to begin flooding
the tunnel. Aware they probably expected him to emerge either from the
garden's exit or the well outside the walls, Shigeru instead used his
intimate knowledge of the tunnel to break through to the surface at a
weak point just outside the garden wall. Hastily applying mud to make
himself as dark as the night, Shigeru entered his house via a secret
entrance in the roof, unaware that Umezu was watching his every move
via thermo imagers that allowed him to see through the building walls,
while he coordinated his men inside from a van parked nearby.
Despite this advantage,
Umeza's soldiers found Shigeru more than a match for them. Hearing
them through a wall as they took off the safety on one of their guns,
Shigeru dodged their fire, then attacked. An elbow to the crotch
temporarily distracted one of the three assailants, then Shigeru used
Sojin's marine specimens as weapons, throwing a sharp-spined sea
urchin into one gunman's face, then knocking another one backwards
onto a stonefish, leaving the fin spines full of deadly toxin to
finish him off. Water from the broken tank the animals had been house
in caused the filter motor to short, causing sparks that triggered a
fire, which overloaded the thermo sensors, blinding Umezu to what was
happening within. Taking a radio headset off one of the slain
attackers, Shigeru heard Umezu's voice demanding updates, and
recognized him from their past encounter. However when Shigeru told
him he had lost, Umezu revealed his final trap. Entering the main room
Shigeru saw that the four hostages were standing on individual
pressure plates, all of which needed to remain weighted down or else
they would trigger a bomb; additionally, the bomb was on a timer and
would go off in ninety seconds regardless. Hastily Shigeru retrieved
one of the slain gunmen from the adjacent room and used the corpse to
weigh down three of the switches while he freed the prisoners from the
ropes binding them. Unable to get the corpse to cover the fourth
position and with insufficient time to retrieve another body, Shigeru
himself stood on the final plate, and ordered the prisoners to flee.
With only twenty seconds left he began hurriedly chipping away at the
wooden roof support post in front of him.
(Shadowmasters#4 (fb) - BTS) - Shigeru hacked a wedge from the post and used it to jam the pressure switch, then ran for the tunnel.
(Shadowmasters#2)
- Moments later the bomb exploded, taking out the entire house.
(Shadowmasters#4
(fb) - BTS) - Caught on the edge of the explosion Shigeru
survived but was knocked unconscious. When the police arrived, one of
them...
(Shadowmasters#3 - BTS) -
the chief inspector in charge of the investigation,...
(Shadowmasters#4
(fb) - BTS) - found the seriously injured Shadowmaster; unfortunately,
he also secretly worked for Umezu, so Shigeru's survival was kept secret
from his family, and he was transported to a Sunrise Society facility
hidden on a remote island in northern Japan.
(Shadowmasters#3 - BTS) -
Meanwhile his family, believing him dead, held a Buddhist
funeral in his memory.
(Shadowmasters#4 (fb) - BTS) - Umezu
hoped to extract ninja secrets from his captive, but when Shigeru woke
he was totally amnesiac. At first believing him to be faking, Umezu
tried drugs, hypnosis and torture to interrogate him, before finally
realizing these would yield no results. Umezu considered killing his
old foe slowly and painfully, but then came up with a better plan, one
that would turn their greatest foe into an army to do their bidding.
The Society began working on cloning techniques, intending to use
Shigeru's excellent genetics to create an countless warriors raised to
be blindly obedient to them.
Shigeru spent the next couple
of decades an amnesiac captive, kept on near starvation rations.
(Punisher War Journal I#9
(fb)) - The Sunrise Society harvested cells from Shigeru during his
long captivity, and used them to grow clones programmed to serve the
Society.
(Marvel Comics Presents I#160 (fb) - BTS) - By the modern
day (and possibly from the start) Doctor Ito was in charge of the
cloning program.
(Marvel Comics Presents I#160 (fb) - BTS) - Ito decided to secretly make his newest clone both more enhanced than his predecessor clones, and with free will. This clone was codenamed Mace, and after snooping through Sunrise's files he learned of the existence of both other ninjas and that the Society was holding Shigeru prisoner, though he did not realize he had been cloned from same.
(Shadowmasters#3) - Meanwhile the now grown Sojin, Yuriko and Phillip had learned of the Sunrise Society, and began to investigate the people who (they believed) had killed both their fathers. Angered by what she was discovering Yuriko decided to meditate to calm herself down, and while doing so her mind inadvertently she made brief contact with her father's mind, something she wrote off as just a vision.
(Shadowmasters#4
(fb) - BTS) - This restored his memories all in a rush, which
disoriented him for a time, but within a couple of days he remembered
everything.
(Shadowmasters#4)
- Having learned the Sunrise Society was planning imminent mass casualty
events as part of their plans to take over Japan, the three young
Shadowmasters infiltrated the Society's base intent on destroying it.
Inside Yuriko took Umezu prisoner, so the villain tried to trade for his
freedom, informing her that her father was alive and imprisoned there.
Umezu took her to Shigeru's cell, believing he could distress her by
showing her the shell her father had become, but to his surprise Shigeru
warmly greeted his daughter, revealing he was himself once more. With
Umezu in tow, the pair headed for the base hanger to rendezvous with
Phillip and Sojin. A brief but joyful reunion ensued, but before they
could steal a plane to escape a fleet of planes carrying Sunrise
soldiers arrived. As they landed and disgorged their contents, the
Shadowmasters began to fight despite the seemingly hopeless odds.
(Shadowmasters#4)
- Umezu used the distraction to make a break for it. Spotting this,
Shigeru pursued. Reaching a Sunrise soldier, Umezu snatched his rifle
and shot at Shigeru, who dived to avoid the shot; however, age and
long captivity had slowed his reflexes, and he failed to fully avoid
the blast, which shattered his right leg. Despite this his leap turned
into a roll which carried him barreling into his opponent. Seizing the
gun, Shigeru shot the soldier, then strangled Umezu to death. Yuriko
fought her way over to her father, but he informed her he had lost too
much blood to survive. Dying, Shigeru informed her that the Society
leaders carried remote activators to trigger explosives in the
soldiers' backpacks (a way to eliminate any disobedient or disloyal
minions). His final words were to tell his daughter that he loved her,
then he died.
(Shadowmasters#4
- BTS) - Yuriko used the information her father provided to kill the
remaining Sunrise Society soldiers, though not before Sojin was
slain. She and Phillip escaped, and their actions publicly exposed
the Society, but also forced them to flee overseas to avoid arrest
or Society retaliation.
(Punisher War
Journal I#8 - BTS) - Hiding out in NYC while seeking a new grandmaster
of the ninpo martial arts to lead them, the Shadowmasters were attacked
by a Sunrise Society assassin in a high-tech battlesuit.
(Punisher War Journal I#8 - BTS/Punisher War Journal I#9 - BTS) - Managing to drop him several stories down the side of the building, the assassin's helmet was dislodged, and Yuriko was horrified to see that their slain enemy looked identical to her late father.
(Punisher War Journal I#9 - BTS) - As the Shadowmasters tried to flee another of the armored assassins renewed the assault, only to be slain by the Punisher, who had stumbled across the conflict. Again to Yuriko's horror, the assassin was revealed to look like Shigeru. A third assassin took up the attack, but the Black Widow, who had heard the explosions, arrived and slew him too.
Comments: Created by Carl Potts, Dan Lawlis and Russ Heath.
Shigeru's first appearance ties him very
deeply to being an adult during World War II, and his son being a young
child shortly after the war. This was fine when the story was published
in 1989, as that meant he could be as young as his mid-sixties and no
older than perhaps his eighties, but time in the real world has
inexorably moved on, and now the very youngest he could be during the
modern day sections of Shadowmasters would be around ninety, which is
still just barely feasible, and his son Sojin around 75, which is even
harder to believe given how young Sojin looked. At least not without
some sort of explanation. In theory you could apply the sliding
timescale to the first couple of issues of Shadowmasters and move them
forward in time; instead of being just post-War, with James Richards an
American officer stationed in an occupied Japan and Kantaro Umezu and
his followers being Japanese soldiers who refuse to concede Japan's
defeat, James might just be an American officer stationed at a U.S. army
base in Japan and Kantaro and co. just uber-patriots still sore about
Japan's defeat decades after the fact. However, that would lose some of
the weight the unique post-War circumstances brings to the story. The
alternative is that everybody significant in the tale on both sides
somehow has their aging slowed. That's not as improbable as it might
seem, not in the Marvel universe anyway. The Shadowmasters might have
access to ancient Japanese herbs known only to ninjas (or some other
hand-wave excuse of that ilk) that slow aging, ones that continue to act
even at least somewhat after you stop taking them (to explain why
Shigeru didn't suddenly age to death while in captivity), and the
villains were experimenting with all manner of high tech sciences, so
perhaps they concocted a version of the Infinity Formula that slowed
Nick Fury's aging. Or maybe the legends that the Shadowmasters were half
demon was true, though that alone wouldn't explain why the unrelated
Phillip Richards wasn't visibly getting old. The point is, there's a
problem now with the dates the first two issues are set in because so
much time has passed in the real world, and that problem is only going
to grow, so either the first half of the tale has to be severed from its
original dates so it can slide forward in time like the second half
does, or else we have to explain why the Shadowmasters don't all look
like the Cryptkeeper on a bad day.
With the above paragraph in mind, I've
included dates as provided in the story, but it is uncertain which might
be accurate and which might be topical references.
Given he was in his physical prime during
World War II it would have seemed logical that Shigeru should have been
conscripted into one of the Japanese armed forces during the conflict.
However, the story states that the night the Americans arrive in Ueno
will be the first night in almost a decade that he will have to cut
short his patrol of the area, so he clearly didn't. I'm not sure that
being a mayor of a small village would have gotten him an exemption from
the draft, so presumably he fell into some other protected category,
such as working in a vital industry.
Though Shadowmasters#1 and Punisher War Journal I#9 both came out the same month and with the same cover month, Marvel Age#78's Coming Attractions pages confirm that PWJ was released a week earlier than Shadowmasters#1.
We know Shigeru's height as a young man because we know the height of his clone, Mace. He was probably slightly lighter than Mace, because the clone's body was augmented. As an old man he would have lost a little height, and his entire ribcage was visible, presumably because he was kept on starvation rations.
Shigeru's brief appearance in Mace's origin
story in MCP I#162 is problematic, since there's really nowhere it seems
it could reasonably fit within the events of Shadowmasters#4. Shigeru is
with Yuriko from the entire time he is released from his cell until they
reach the hanger, and they are not spotted nor challenged during their
journey between those places. Then the battle in the hanger ensues, and
Shigeru dies only moments into that without ever leaving that location -
the incoming planes are spotted, Umezu uses the distraction to try and
run, prompting Shigeru to leave the others in order to give chase,
catching his prey after he's only run a few feet. I guess we just have
to accept that the hanger fight lasted longer than Shadowmasters#4
depicted, and there's a gap somewhere between the planes landing and
Umezu's escape attempt.
Shadowmasters#1, and hence also the
Shadowmasters handbook entry in OHOTMU Update'89#7, state that Shigeru's
mask was a tengu mask. However, a tengu is a hybrid bird-man yokai
(spirit) and tengu masks either have beaks (Karasu-tengu, or crow tengu)
or large noses (daitengu - you can see one of these in Psylocke
II#8-10). Shigeru's mask looks closer to the style of an oni (demon)
mask, though it lacks the wide-mouth and fangs those normally have, or a
samurai mask.
This profile was completed on 08/28/2026, but its publication was delayed as it was intended for the Appendix 25th anniversary's celebratory event to represent Shadowmasters.
Profile by Loki.
CLARIFICATIONS:
Shigeru Ezaki should not be confused with:
images: (without ads)
Shadowmasters#1,
p39, pan1 (main image)
Shadowmasters#1,
p22, pan2 (headshot)
Shadowmasters#1,
p14, pan3-5 (hanging from tree using tiger claws)
Shadowmasters#1, p15, pan1 (dropping from
tree)
Shadowmasters#1,
p19, pan6-7 (catching thrown knife)
Shadowmasters#4,
p24, pan1 (released from captivity)
Official Handbook of
the Marvel Universe Update '89#7, p6, pan1 (older Shigeru)
Appearances:
Shadowmasters#1-4 (October
1989-January 1990) - Carl Potts (writer), Dan Lawlis (pencils),
Russ Heath (inks), Allen Milgrom (editor)
Punisher War Journal I#9
(October 1989) - Carl Potts (writer), Jim Lee (art), Don Daley (editor)
Marvel Comics Presents I#162
(September 1994) - Carl Potts (writer), Barry Crain (pencils), Hilary
Barta, Philip Moy (inks), Richard Ashford (editor)
First Posted:
09/03/2026
Last updated: 08/28/2026
Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.
Non-Marvel
Copyright
info
All other characters mentioned or pictured are ™ and © 1941-2099
Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved. If you like this stuff, you
should check out the real thing!
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