"Samurai chanpurû" (2004) TV series 2004-2005

User Rating:

9.0/10   

Seasons:

1 | 2

Release Date:

11 January 2005 (USA)

Genre:

Animation | Action | Adventure | Music

Tagline:

Death, betrayal, and... hip hop!

Plot:

Fuu, a waitress who works in a teahouse, rescues two master swordsmen, Mugen and Jin, from their execution to help her find the "samurai who smells of sunflowers."

Plot Keywords:

Samurai | Baseball | Ronin | Fighting | Blind Woman

Cast

Kazuya Nakai	...	Mugen (26 episodes, 2004-2005)
Ginpei Sato	...	Jin (26 episodes, 2004-2005)
Ayako Kawasumi	...	Fuu (26 episodes, 2004-2005)
Steve Blum	...	Mugen (26 episodes, 2004-2005)
Kirk Thornton	...	Jin (26 episodes, 2004-2005)
Kari Wahlgren	...	Fuu (26 episodes, 2004-2005)

Also Known As:

Samurai Champloo (International: English title)

Runtime:

Japan:23 min | Japan:30 min

Country:

Japan

Language:

Japanese | Dutch | English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.78 : 1

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Certification:

UK:15 | South Korea:18 | Australia:MA | USA:TV-MA | Argentina:18

Company:

Fuji TV

Trivia:

The series was only allowed to be aired past 12:00 am in Japan for the network deemed it too graphic for prime time television.

Quotes:

Shige: "There were men on top of horses and horses on top of men, piled one atop the other. The valley was laid open before the men. Its depth was great and wide. But the number of soldiers that died that day would line its two rock walls from side to side. Corpses stacked up to build a mountain of death and it gushed rivers of dead men's blood." The Tale of Heike, Volume seven, Descent into Kurikawa.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "The Boondocks: Guess Hoe's Coming to Dinner (#1.3)" (2005)

Soundtrack:

Who's Theme

Lightning I don't know about, but genius sure can strike twice.

Let me begin by saying I am a huge Cowboy Bebop fan. Spike Spiegel is my hero, okay? So as much as I was dying to see this new work from the mind of Shinichiro Watanabe, I was apprehensive from the standpoint that I didn't want to see any subsequent work destroy any luster or afterglow that Bebop left behind in its wake. I was downright scared, I mean, how can you mix samurai action with hip-hop? I know Bebop's atmosphere of 1940's noir and 2071 spaceships didn't seem possible at first, but I was proved wrong by that. Maybe Watanabe-san had stepped too far outside the box this time.

I'll just come right out and say it: Shinichiro Watanabe can make anything he dreams up work. ANYTHING.

Samurai Champloo is one of the absolute coolest series I have ever seen. And by ever I mean live-action, animated, whatever. "Ever" ever. If you like anime, this is required watching, a new classic for the medium. If you don't like anime, watch this and you just might start to.

The story centers around two rogue samurai and the girl they're somewhat assigned to protect. Fuu, the young damsel who always seems to get in and out of distress; Jin, the serious samurai, and Mugen, the samurai who's seriously un-serious. The three travel around Edo-period Japan in search of the mysterious "Sunflower Samurai". And if I told you any more than that, I'd ruin so much of it for you. Just know this - the first episode will hook you like Tyrone Biggums to crack.

If you're a fan of anime or Cowboy Bebop or just really bad-ass shows/movies in general, you owe it to yourself to check this one out. You can pick up the DVDs or just check it out Saturday nights on Adult Swim.

Oh, and if you watch Adult Swim regularly and haven't caught Samurai Champloo yet, shame on you. You should know better.