ALRIGHTS! i have finished watching Samurai Champloo at last!!!!!!! first thoughts first, more later...
Overall STORY rating: B+/A-
Art: A+++++++++++++
Character Design: Good ler. But erm, i must say, inferior when compared to their artwork instead... Sometimes i think that their background and scenery look more beautiful than their characters.
1) The one thing I love the most about this series is the art work... BRILLIANT. FANTASTIC. ABSOLUTELY AMAZING!
2) The music. Awesome! Used VERY effectively!
3) GREAT LAST THREE EPISODES! (not to say that the rest wasn't good but i've never seen concluding arcs as compelling before... MAYBE i don't watch enough anime that's why!)
4) Watch it in JAPANESE!!!!! (with subs of course!) and if you can, listen out for what they're saying. And often you'd catch them saying English words! I mean the whole deal of Champloo is that it mixes the old edo time period with modern day lingo and styles. and if you listen to the conversations, it's very modern cause they use english words in it (i would assume modern conversational japanese would be like this). And it's damn hilarious when you catch it! Like in one episode, Mugen, Fuu and Jin are eating Shabu Shabu and Mugen dips the meat into the hot water, then when he eats the cooked meat and exclaims "hot!" IN ENGLISH. damn! i really cracked up when i heard that!
5) I love the interaction between Fuu, Mugen and Jin. It's really endearing, cute, and funny all at the same time. Fuu and Mugen always bickering with each other (like siblings or lovers u decide), Fuu soooooooooo cute hiding behind Jin for safety, Mugen and Jin's growing up subversive commeraderie. And all three being together as a really funny loosely connected but still very loyal to each other kind of a group. If you like two really different type of guys, the silent, quiet yet serious type (jin) and the scruffy, obnoxious, loose-cannon ball type of guy (Mugen), "protecting" a younger naggy annoying but cute, caring and kind hearted younger "sister" type of senario, then Camploo is great!
6) Samurai Champloo gives very little bullshit. They're very stark in potraying that their characters are in the end, anti heroes. Because Mugen, you want to believe he is good, since he is a little affectionate and "loyal" to Fuu (and Jin), but he KILLS no matter what if the situation fits his liking, or he has no qualms about robbing people just so they can get by. Jin is also the same. While he is more noble in his cause, more apathetic, more calculated in his moves, more polite, usually kill only bad dudes, he too has no hessitation to draw his sword. At least usually for good.
My only criticism of the series is this: they did NOT develop the MAIN PLOT well enough.
Fuu mentions in episode 12 that "it seems like our quest to search for the sunflower samurai has become secondary to trying to scrape enough money to get by everyday life," and in many ways, this WAS what Samurai Champloo was about.
Unlike most series, even if they were just 26 episodes or whatever, usually a good deal of the episodes would be spent on developing the main plot, but Champloo does not, and when they do, it's very sprace and a long gap in between.
Like, i would say that the quest to search for the Sunflower Samurai is the main plot (since that's the factor that drives the characters to keep travelling). But essentially there's ONE episode dealing directly with the plot with complete significance... And this comes way in episode 19.
As for Mugen's character, which i think he was meant to be the "main dude", his plot was also not quite well developed. There were only 2 episodes (13 and 14) that were actually related to the final showdown, and even that, it was not much of a relation. Mugen's final showdown with the bad guys, albiet is like his confrontation with his murderous past and accepting the consequences of his life, the whole reason why he got into the fight, it was not AT ALL alluded to as to there are these three dudes wanting to make his life a total hell.
Jin's plot was VERY WELL developed on the other hand, because they had at least 4-5 episodes dedicated to the story of his past and the people who are out to get him which related very well to his final battle.
BUT, the one thing that Jin's character was NOT well developed was his whole motivation. In the end, their final talk together as a group, Jin admits that he's been travelling because he's searching. But he doesn't know what he's searching for. At the end, Jin tells Mugen that he's found what he's searching for, that is, a comrade (in Mugen) that he's never had in his life because he had always used his strength for his own. PROBLEM WITH THAT is that, dude, Jin has been potrayed throughout the series as not being one who used his strength for himself but always for others, to fight against injustice, to save other (shino and fuu), to do what is noble.
I think the whole comrade and learning to live and die for others would be better suited for a lesson that Mugen would have learnt (considering that he grew quite concerned over Jin sometimes and sacrificed his sword for Fuu's freedom).
Mugen's lesson, I think was quite okay... I mean, he says in the end to Jin that before this he always had to fight and kill the person who was stronger than he was, but now, it doesn't matter anymore... In that way, it does reflect that his partnership with Jin (thanks to Fuu) made this all possible, and Mugen learns the lesson of co-existance with others. As for the whole thing about Mugen giving up his sword for Fuu's freedom, i'd be damn if we're told it was used only as a plot device! But i feel that it's a significant lesson for Mugen to finally live and die for someone other than himself (yay! cause it's Fuu!)
Fuu..... well... fuu found her sunflower samurai. ha. Cause her plot was so underdeveloped, i can't say what Fuu learnt in the end. But we know that she got her peace and came to terms with her past by meeting the sunflower samurai.
And then what do they do after they had learnt all these lesson and found companionship and commaraderie in each other??? They come to a fork road and Mugen says "ja ne" (see ya) and they walk their seperate ways. THE HELL!
My favourite episodes... hmm... i liked 12, 13, 14, 18 (damn farnee), 20, 21, 23 (damn farnee), 24 - 26.
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
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