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Anime Review: Rurouni Kenshin

Here we present a review that no true anime site can be without: Rurouni Kenshin, also known as Samurai X, was one of the greatest shows of its time and went to become a timeless classic. Yet there’s a dark side to all of this, a dark side many didn’t get to know…

A Trip Down Memory Lane

Those of you who read the “Manga and Anime A Broken Link” articles saw a reference to this title on the second part of the series. This review will be different because we will forsake the historical background and go straight to the root of the show. If you want some background info then you should check out the article where it was referenced because here you’ll find nothing but the truth about this show.

Samurai X was big. So big, in fact, that it made its way to Cartoon Network and many other channels down in Latin America. The show had a decent Spanish dubbing and the episodes aired with consistency day after day. And if you were between the ages of 12-25 in Latin America during the show’s run and never cared to take a look at it, then you sucked and everyone hated you.

The anime did so many things right that it just came as a surprise to all of its fans to see it fall on its ass and catch on fire. You see, the problem with the anime is that unlike the North American version of Cartoon Network and many other channels, the local ones decided to air its full run and so we saw it crumble and end without much of a real ending.

The Beginning Of Something Great

Samurai X told the tale of Himura Kenshin, a samurai that became a vagabond and a wanderer after the Bakumatsu during which he built up fame as “Hitokiri Battōsai” (referenced all through the anime as “Battōsai the man slayer”) becoming a ruthless killer who murdered hundreds who now haunt his memories. He began traveling the roads of rural Japan during the early Meiji era and served as a metaphor on how the old ways were dying and the way of the samurai came to an end.

Along his journey, he comes in touch with Kamiya Kaoru, a woman and owner of a dojo, who helps Kenshin leave his life as a wanderer behind and serves as an unifying character for the rest of the cast. He also finds Sagara Sanosuke, a brawler and former rebel with a burning hatred of the government, Myōjin Yahiko, a brat who wants to prove himself as a swordsman in Kenshin’s eyes and Takani Megumi, a female doctor rescued from the mafia and brought into the fold of the main characters. There were several more but just naming them would take an entire article in itself.

That was the greatness of Samurai X, it went on to include amazing characters, both heroes and villains that shone with originality and were presented in such a way as to allow all characters to be unique, even most villains had a sympathetic side to them as their personas stood firmly on morally ambiguous grounds, performing acts of pure evil that could easily be justified.

The show followed Kenshin as the ghost from his past came to haunt him, never letting him have a regular life as he fought on with optimism to prove that he could still be redeemed for his sins. This served to open the story to new villains, they would either come to kill Kenshin due to his fame as the manslayer or because he was the only one skilled enough to face them.

The anime was action packed, but it paced things nicely with episodes focusing on characters other that the main cast and it always built up to something epic. It sure had its fair share of crappy filler but it wasn’t enough to kill the show. Then comes the best part: Makoto Shishio, a man who became Kenshin’s replacement as a killer after he ceased fighting. He was the perfect villain in a gallery of villains that included the great Oniwabanshu, he was simply superb.

The entire season where they dealt with Shishio was epic. The battles were massive, thrilling, and brutal. Secrets were revealed and the season concluded in such a high note that to this day whenever you mention Samurai X (at least down here) you’ll get someone to say “Oh dude, remember Shishio!?” and as great as that is it’s soon followed by “Remember all the Christian crap that ruined it?”.

It Hits The Fan

Shishio’s arc was so epic that the people behind the show got ahead of the manga and were forced to meet their production schedule with filler, tons and tons of filler. It got so bad that the stories felt completely forgetful and characters were reintroduced then taken off the show so fast it was as if they were trying to ruin it with weak storylines and crappy humor.

We all thought it couldn’t get worse, until Shogo comes along; a freaking super Christian Samurai and a never before mentioned disciple of Kenshin’s master, a man who completely demolished the entire cast coming out of nowhere with a crappy background and character development tagging all his superb abilities on being a super Christian of sorts.

He came out of nowhere in a response to the show’s decline in good villains and ruined it. They made him so badass that it made Kenshin look like a complete tool but of course he ends up getting his ass whooped and gets taken out of the show. So much for that. Fans were so let down at this point that talking to my friends, with whom I grew up watching every episode, and bringing up the name “Shogo” resulted in a collective flashback of awful, as if we all witnessed a murder and the memories traumatized us.

Enter the Black Knights, a group of villains that seemed to come out of a G.I Joe rejects list, with crappy costumes and even crappier backgrounds…God it was just terrible, like watching a train wreck catch on fire and then have the survivors attacked by bears, which are also on fire.

It may be odd to read a review from a personal stand point, but I went through all of this show just like every other teenager in Latin America and we can all agree on this, avoid the third season like the plague but watch the movies. Seriously…the third season will have you gouging your eyes out in anger.

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