Samurai Champloo, Volume 3 (2005)

Mugen, Jin, and Fuu careen through time and cultures like pool balls on a wild carom as Shinchiro Watanabe's Samurai Champloo continues. In the accompanying notes, writer Dai Sato comments that he and Watanabe "like counterculture and rebellious music." No wonder Mugen stumbles onto an anti-government cabal of medieval warrior-priests--and shares a Jimi Hendrix song with them. In the darker episode 11, taciturn Jin falls for a woman who has been sold into prostitution to pay her husband's gambling debts. Mugen and Jin finally realize that they're getting no closer to finding the mysterious "samurai who smells of sunflowers," so they take advantage of a lull to read Fuu's diary. Her blunt comments about their looks, demeanor, and behavior don't please her prying companions, but they add a dose of humor to an episode comprised of flashbacks. (Rated 16 and older: violence, profanity, brief nudity, sexual situations, alcohol and tobacco use) --Charles Solomon Amazon.com

Samurai Champloo & Kung Faux are good to go!

Order Samurai Champloo & Kung Faux on dvd and learn the ways of BentoBox.TV in your own 36th chamber. March 27, 2006

meditate under a waterfall? screw that.

samurai champloo has been a great series, and this third dvd has kept that tradition. though the last episode was weak, as most recap episodes are, the other three episodes made up for it, and then some. around the time this came out, fans of the series were starting to buy the dvd's more due to the shortage of episodes on adult swim, as the last episode on this dvd is as far as adult swim would broadcast(they did start to broadcast more shortly after dvd six). below are my ratings for this dvd and it's episodes.


episode nine: beatbox bandits- this episode, though not very good, still has some funny scenes and some action. mugen jin and fuu are caught trying to pass through a checkpoint with counterfiet passes. the checkpoint officials find out that they did not make the forgeries, and cut a deal. mugen is sent to do one of their croked errands. will mugen stay true to his companions? watch and find out.
i rate this episode a 5/10, simply because it lacked action and plot, plus the man telling the story is looking back thirty years to when the episode occured. i don't know, maybe it's the thought of jin mugen and fuu being old, but i don't dig the old man looking that far back.

episode ten: lethal lunacy- one of my favorite, if not my all time favorite, SC episodes! this episode kicks anus in every way possible! i dont want to reveal to much of the story line, but i reccomend watching this episode! even if this dvd just had this episode and was still full price, i would still buy it!
i rate this episode a -/-, or infinite. if you really want stars, it is 10/10, though i find that underappreciating the episode to give it a finite rating

episode eleven: gamblers and gallentry- jin falls in love with a depressed woman who has been forced to work in a whore-house to pay off her husbands debt. still a good episode, but not the best. lots of great humor.
i rate this episode 7/10.

episode twelve: the disorder diaries- recap episode. jin and mugen read fuu's diary while she takes a bath. this episode has a lot of funny dialogue, but that's the only thing it has working for it.
i rate this episode 3/10

well, that's it for this review. check out my next review on volume four of samurai champloo.
i hope this review helped.
peace. January 14, 2006

more of the best...

keep 'em coming cause this is one the best anime series ever. Shinichiro Watanabe rules! August 10, 2005

Good but last episode on DVD was lacking.....

I really love this series but was very disappointed by the flashback episode. I felt a bit cheated by it. However, I stand by the animation and storyline. Both are strong and hope that the rest of the series, when released in the US, will continue to be great. The style of the series and the animators are what drew me to the series to begin with, Kill Bill VOl 1 and more importantly (to me) Cowboy Bebop. The music is great too. July 13, 2005

Fans of Cowboy Bebop and people new to anime will love this title

This is an excellent series that I think all anime fans will enjoy, in addition I think this is a particularily good series for someone who has only recently developed an interest in anime because it is fairly westernized. Backed by an all hip hop soundtrack that lends the series a feeling of familiarity for americans (younger ones anyway) the characters use slang and converse in short concise manners, making the story easy to follow. This allows the series to avoid the long voice-overs that reveal key parts of the plot, something which is common in anime and may turn some younger or newer fans off. The art is beautiful and the direction of Shinichiro Watanabe is on pace with the rest of his projects, which to say the very least is excellent. Enjoy! July 10, 2005

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