james4949

Worst Martial arts documentary ever! One, I hate bait and switch documentaries: where you spend more learning about the people doing the research than what you were told this is about. In this case they spent so much time talking about Dacascos (with his cool Brandon lee\matrix look) than Musashi. There were two 5-10 minute sections with this guy just doing Kung Fu with his shirt off. What does Kung Fu have to do with Musashi? On top of that anything that was interesting was interrupted by him, like the sword scenes at the school. Then, they wrap up with the book of five rings in like 5 minutes...the end. Isn't that the most important part? His writings? Finally, there were factual errors. One, they claim that Jujitsu was derived from Judo. Second, they claim that "bushido" was abolished during the Meji restoration. Yes it was suppressed, but it do not go away from the culture. They also claim that after some guy wrote dime novels in the 30's that suddenly, bushido became part of the new Japanese imperialism. So i guess Japan was not imperialist until the 1930's. Someone better tell the Russians, Koreans, and Chinese that Japan was not an imperial power until the 1930's Those are just the facts I found I am sure if I watched it again there would be more. Garbage!

Ok, Buy this book Korean Martial Arts Handbook http://www.karatekorner.com/index.cfm/action/productdetail/productID/11160.htm This will get you started. it is by far the best and most well rounded look at Korean martial arts history I have seen in one place. Other wise, start digging through the periodicals. The other thing you need to look at is what is TSD? It is not just Kee and Lee who associated themselves with that. Many of the Kwans at some time or another had associated themselves with the name Tang Soo Do just as many of them changed later and called themselves Taekwondo. You should also look at some of the Okinawan sources. While many people will say that Korean arts are influenced by the Japanese, they are forgetting that Okinawan Karate was being introduced to Japan during the occupation of Korea. Koreans were being exposed to it at the same time. The Occupation was really the vehicle for transmission. So while some Koreans were introduced to Karate by Japanese in Korea (Funakoshi notes one of his students teaching in Korea in his first book) other Koreans were learning in Japan and Okinawa.