Kinnikuman Menko Cards for Fans of Japan’s Classic Anime Era

Kinnikuman Menko Card Featuring Robin Mask and Terryman

Menko — Japan’s Original Cardboard Battle Game

Menko is one of Japan’s oldest card-based pastimes, with roots reaching back to the Edo period. By the postwar era, the format had settled into the rectangular, thick-cardboard shape most associated with the hobby today. The game is physical and direct: players slam their cards against the ground and try to flip an opponent’s card using the impact or displaced air. Whoever flips a card keeps it.

When television anime became a cultural force in the late 1970s and 1980s, menko makers began licensing character artwork and turning the format into a merchandise category. Low-priced and widely stocked at dagashiya — the small Japanese shops specializing in cheap sweets and toys — character menko were produced in bulk around the decade’s biggest franchises. Kinnikuman, Dragon Ball, and Saint Seiya were among the most popular subjects. Whether a given card was sold individually, in packs, or alongside candy or gum is often difficult to confirm from the card alone; menko circulated through several different channels during this period.

Kinnikuman and the Two Choujin on This Card

Kinnikuman began as a manga by the creative duo known as Yudetamago — Takashi Shimada and Yoshinori Nakai — serialized in Weekly Shonen Jump starting in 1979. The series follows choujin, superhuman wrestlers who compete in elaborate matches that blend action with broad comedy. It became one of Jump’s signature titles through the 1980s. A television anime produced by Toei Doga aired on Nippon TV from 1983 to 1986, running 137 episodes.

This card carries a copyright notice naming Yudetamago, Shueisha, Nippon TV, and Toei Doga, confirming it as an officially licensed product from that broadcast era. Toei Doga changed its name to Toei Animation in 1998, so the earlier company name on the card helps anchor it to the original anime run. The specific manufacturer of the card itself is not identifiable — a common situation with 1980s character menko, which were produced by numerous small companies that rarely stamped their name on individual cards.

The card depicts two of the franchise’s most recognizable supporting characters locked in a wrestling hold — an image that captures the essence of Kinnikuman’s superhuman sports action. Robin Mask is a British choujin who competes in full plate armor, distinguished by a knight’s helmet, and became one of the series’ most iconic figures. Terryman is an American wrestler from Texas, identifiable by his cowboy hat, sunglasses, and boots, and known throughout the series as the protagonist’s closest companion. Both characters appear across major story arcs in both the manga and the anime.

A Franchise That Reached Beyond Japan

In the mid-1980s, Kinnikuman reached North American audiences through an adaptation released under the M.U.S.C.L.E. brand, giving the franchise a fan base in the United States and Canada that has persisted for decades. Robin Mask and Terryman, whose names translate directly or near-directly into English, are recognized by international fans as readily as by Japanese ones.

The menko format itself has no direct equivalent in Western toy markets, which sets original Japanese examples apart as a distinct category of vintage paper collectible. Cards from this period were manufactured in large quantities, but forty years of use, wear, and disposal have reduced the number still in circulation. Paper ages naturally — edges fray, surfaces shift in tone — and those marks are part of what identifies a card as a genuine survivor from the decade that produced it.