Samurai Champloo #3 Pioneer 100 minutes English/Japanese English Subtitles Released: 05/31/2005 Reviewed: 12/13/2005

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Fresh and new is something I patently enjoy. It is one of my greatest fears when approaching a member of the fairer sex that I will tread on ground I have already marked, retell stories that have already been told, that at some point in the relationship I will set the bar much too high and create a pinnacle far too early in a relationship that I will never be able to reach again, setting myself (and my lovely maiden) up for a disappointing fall that all the $1.50 drafts and mal-attempted sexual liaisons in the world won't be able to fix. It is for this reason, maybe, that my romantic dalliances last only a few weeks while those around me forge stronger bonds with the ones they love. It is a peculiar curse of mine, I suppose. So this relates to my hackneyed style of writing. It's always a complicated experience to expound further about a show you like after having done two, or three or even as many as seven write-ups of the very same thing. It's not always my style to reread what has come before, and because of this I often find myself falling into the trap of repeating myself. This dread compounds itself when I have already etched into the vast and infinite parchment of the internet just about everything I want to say on a given subject. My previous foray into Samurai Champloo was something I could wholeheartedly be proud of. Equal parts human drama and nostalgic emotions, even browsing over it now causes a lump in my throat that I would be reticent to admit to in casual conversation.

It's been our intent to talk about Samurai Champloo in our still-young podcast for quite some time. But we wanted to do this in a way that would do a show like this justice. You already know that Shinichiro Watanabe made this, and it would not be unfair to say that I have a bit of a schoolgirl crush on the man. Joel echoes my thoughts in our 30-some minute rambling on the subject. Whatever this guy touches just seems to turn to anime gold, stuff that makes you proud you decided to share your time with. It's a beautiful thing when you can sit down to something animated and not feel the overwhelming desire to turn it off and run out of the room crying. As of late my experiences have been overwhelmingly of that nature, with those animes I can out and out say I enjoy numbering in less than a dozen. Over the course of a year, that doesn't seem like a very productive way to spend your hobby. The reason anime fans like me preservere is for anime shows like this. Shows that don't act like they're talking to the lowest common denominator, shows where the characters aren't cardboard pastiches of a thousand other clichés slammed into one. There is not a stammering blue-haired thirteen year old girl with a secret crush in any of the episodes of Samurai Champloo that I have been privileged to watch, and I think it's a safe assumption to make that if there were it'd be something treated with the dignity it rightly deserves and not just as a segue into more cleavage shots and pratfalls into a girl's posterior.

I really like Samurai Champloo, of that you could be pretty well assured. It is a show designed with a specific viewership in mind, but what I like about it is that it is a show that transcends intelligence. It appeals to the mass market in a way that doesn't cheapen the brand. Through the machinations of [Adult Swim] there are scores upon scores of Champloo fans who I would not demure to spend even a moment's breath in the presence of. Does this bother me? Of course not, their enjoyment of my show does not dilute my enjoyment of it. In fact, it is the acclaim of the mass market that allows shows like this to be made. I am not a common factor in the anime market, this fact is one that I have come to accept over the years. All I ask from my cartoons is that they treat me as if I had more intelligence than a pair of house cats. If they can do this and still be appealing to the anime viewing populace then who am I to complain? I don't know if you know this, but I really like cartoons too. Whatever route gets my favorite cartoons made over and over again is fine by me, as long as they continue the level of quality they've been doing. If you can find a tasteful way to make a poop joke then I will readily eat it up.

I'm quite aware of the double entendre in that sentence, thank you. You don't need to be told again how much I enjoy this show. Over the course of three reviews I've spent a good bit of time making my feelings on the subject quite apparent. Understand, though, that you will like this show too. So many times anime sits down with the singular intent of rehashing what's already gone before it. It makes me wonder if there was an ideal time in anime's formation where stuff like five girls obsessed with a jerky milquetoast guy was actually something funny instead of outright irritating. Somehow I doubt it, but it's a nice thing to think. Just like those idyllic first few hours that I spend with a woman where I can throw out charming stories about lying to elderly ladies, cigarette burns on my tender skin, and $400,000 falafel sandwiches that stupid vegetarian girls didn't even eat. Samurai Champloo occupies a nexus such as this, a time in anime that I'm hesitant to believe ever even existed, a time where everything goes right. If Samurai Champloo was me, it'd totally be getting laid at the end of the night.