Do I even need to talk about this show? It pretty much speaks for itself. Samurai Jack is hands down one of the best animated shows I’ve ever seen, next to Ed, Edd, n Eddy this is my second favorite show on the network. It was created by Genndy Tartakovsky the same guy who made Dexter’s Laboratory. The show centers around a samurai named Jack who tries to save the world from an evil entity known as Aku. When Jack is about to land the finishing blow on Aku, Aku rips open a portal in time and sends Jack into the distant future where Aku has completely taken over the world as well as other planets. Now, Jack must find a way to return to the past and defeat Aku to save the world. That premise alone makes this show great as this opens up so many possibilities for the writers but they take it up a notch and then some. Jack is just a badass swordsman, the things that he fights against, and the armies he single-handedly takes down is just awesome. He only had a few lines of dialogue in each episode but every time he talked it was great. He was wise, a hero to the helpless, and was always kind and respectful to everyone he met in this strange yet awesome futuristic world where even though evil has pretty much taken over the world he’s still holds a strong sense of justice and trust in people. Aku was also a pretty menacing villain he was afraid of Jack but he never showed it. He had this calm evil voice that made you fear him but he also had funny moments like there’s one episode where he’s telling his rendition of Christmas to all the children in the world because they keep talking about Jack and from there he goes into other fairytale stories putting himself as the main character in each one to win over the affection of children. That’s just funny, he could of just threaten to destroy them and that would have been the end of the episode but instead he literally goes out of his way to get the kids to like him showing a little hint of jealousy in the process. Speaking of episodes my favorite episode is “Jack remembers the Past”. It’s a slow episode, there’s not really that much action but it’s probably the most heartfelt and touching one out of all the episodes. Jack returns to ruins of his birthplace and begins reminisce about his childhood remembering how he overcame a group of bullies to get back his toy, his first crush and kiss, and we even see his inspiration for wanting to be a samurai which is a major shout out to the manga Lone Wolf and Cub. While it’s not really all that big on the action and there’s like only 4 or 5 lines of dialogue spoken throughout the episode it’s nice to see good flashbacks from Jack’s past and see that before all this Aku mess he lived like a normal child and acted like one as well. It almost brings a tear to my eye.
The show was heavily influenced by feudal Japan so a lot of the music, fights, philosophy and themes of the show can be credited to them and they are great. In most of the episodes there’s barely any dialogue during the fight scenes in fact there’s barely any dialogue in any of the episodes it just music and you just fully enjoying the fight and the animation. Oh yeah, the animation is amazing. My God is that animation awesome. Hand drawn animation with lineless characters that makes it look like the characters have blended into the background and become a part of an old Japanese painting. It literally feels like I’m watching a manga come to life. As for there being little dialog it really works out great in this show. You don’t need to hear the characters talk to understand how dire the situation is you just have to look at their faces, see what’s going, and you know what’s going on. There is so much creativity and imagination in this series that it really does feel like I’m watching an anime. Speaking of anime the show made a few references to popular anime movies and characters. For example, in one episode Jack is followed by a friendly mysterious creature who accidently thwarts Jack’s every move. This is homage My Neighbor Totoro one of Miyazaki’s most popular movies. In another episode Jack and a thief compete in a labyrinth to steal a diamond that could send Jack back to his time. The thief looks, acts, and pays homage to Jigen from Lupin the Third. Outside of that there were a few other references such as Disney, Hanna-Barbara, 300, and even Star Wars references. I don’t know how they manage to work that in but they did I’m surprise they didn’t make a shout out to Dexter’s Laboratory.
The only thing that stops this series from topping Ed, Edd, n Eddy is that the series got cancelled in 2004 leaving the series unresolved and us waiting and hoping for the day when Cartoon Network will get their asses in gear and revive this great series because the world needs this show. I keep hearing a movie is in the works that will resolve the whole series but it’s stuck in development and trust me things stuck in development almost never turn out great. While the show may be unresolved it’s still a great series that everyone I’ve talked to who has seen it loved it and if you haven’t checked it out yet stop what you’re doing and watch it. The show is right up there with Avatar in terms of characters, animation, and overall story. It is worth your time and each day I pray that I hear news that the show will be returning but until that day comes I’ll just have to watch the current episodes to satisfy my hunger for the show.