Samurai Champloo

[naturaljax]

Now, I'm not the biggest fan of anime. In fact I don't like most of it. But goddam this anime is fucking cool. It's got a great hip hop soundtrack, a lot of the themese in the show are hip hop related, clean-as-hell animation, and it's got a great story / charachters.

+ the way Mugen speaks Japanese is badass.

Anyone else a fan?

[turcy.]

i fell in love with this series last summer and cried when it finished, it was powerful and probably the most beautiful 2d animation i've ever witnessed

[keagan]

You cried?

[insidertrading]

cowboy bebop > samurai champloo

but samurai champloo is still oh so dope. mad props to the nujabes x fat jon soundtrack too.

[phen3N]

ya i havent seen the whole series but i love the soundtrack

[iamstarwars]

I love this show although I usually don't really care about anime either... I think the base-ball episode was my favorite, simply hilarious.

[denimdestroyedmylife]

great show, agreed.

[mizanation]

i've watched a couple episodes and i liked it.

a little bit of background info:

jin is a samurai from edo (tokyo) -- he is cool, calculated and very stoic.

mugen, the other warrior, is from okinawa -- he's wild, brash and well, wild.

okinawa is an island that was taken over by the mainland japanese in 1609. okinawa has it's own language, culture, food and music. okinawans have a very different outlook on life than mainland japanese. historically, okinawans have been considered somewhat wild and colorful, whereas people from mainland japan, particularly tokyo (edo) have been considered classy and refined.

the word "champloo" (champuru) is an okinawan word which means "to mix". it is a very important concept in okinawan culture. it's used in food, like "somen champloo" which is a mix of japanese noodles, okinawan vegetables and american canned tuna and spam (!). it's a definitive okinawan meal, even though it has many different cultural parts. this is what champloo means.

in "samurai champloo", "champloo" means the mix of cultures that make up the show. we have japanese, okinawan and american all mixed up like a dish of somen champuru.

i'm glad that this show is giving props to okinawan culture and introducing it to a whole new audience the probably didn't know that it existed.

[lil brown brother]

nice show indeed .. but i still think bebop is better .. storywise

[Pandemonium]

i fell in love with this series last summer and cried when it finished, it was powerful and probably the most beautiful 2d animation i've ever witnessed

... men don't cry... GTFO!

[mizanation]

the aesthetics of cowboy bebop are awesome. have you seen the movie?

the opening credits sequence is FUCKING BRILLIANT!!! they made it look like the beginning to an old 80's american tv show or movie. i can't believe someone from japan could flip that style like he did.

[toufu]

nice show indeed .. but i still think bebop is better .. storywise

yeah...bebop was miles deeper...while samurai champloo was just fun fun all around XD

NUJABES !! haha

[naturaljax]

miz - great info, thanks! I guess that would be a factor in why sometimes when Mugen would talk I wouldn't even understand a fucking word.

I'd +rep you, but I'm still spent from our little movie dispute

[Pogi]

I love this anime as well, I have a game of it on PS2, but dunno what the hell I'm supposed to do (Japanese illiterate).

[naturaljax]

Man, I've been sitting here listening to the soundtracks all day, it's got some great hip hop instrumentals, especially Tsuguri No Mai. What a damn good song.

for those that use imeem, listen. For those that don't, sign up and then listen!

[cuddlysheep]

only anime i ever liked was "fist of the northstar"

[mizanation]

miz - great info, thanks! I guess that would be a factor in why sometimes when Mugen would talk I wouldn't even understand a fucking word.

I'd +rep you, but I'm still spent from our little movie dispute

yeah, i haven't seen the japanese version, but okinawans have their own dialect. sometimes when i speak to old okinawan people, i don't understand half the shit they are saying. especially when they are drunk.

[drapygo]

Well, I remember watching this quite a while back, I certainly liked the integration of hip-hop culture and samurai. And also break dancing while fighting. The story is also pretty good, a girl, on a journey to find someone, basically it, but it worked. The music was spot on, Nujabes, I love his style of composeing and its been my favorite ever since.

[soraanaam]

samurais with afros kick ass

[munkyballz]

I don't watch a huge lot of anime either, but Bebop and Champloo were definitely two dope series. Love the soundtrack to both, esp. the latter.

Speaking of anime, recently got into Death Note recently by accident. Different animal than Bebop/Champloo, but I find myself enjoying it quite immensely. Doesn't even feel like I'm watching anime half the time...

[naturaljax]

bump 'cause I just saw the last episode and goddam that was powerful!

great story, I'm sad it was only 26 episodes.

[Ahlvahroe]

dont really like anime, my brother is a fiend though, but i loved samurai champloo

from the other thread, also i couldnt get into cowboy bebop, its seems like champloo is 'friendlier' to non anime'ers

[thelion1856]

wow this is by far my favorite cartoon/anime. i too am not at all a fan of anime except i downloaded episode 1 and 2 a couple years ago and for 4 days straight i downloaded the complete 2 seasons. Season 2 is where it really picks up and goes crazy. The story ends at season 2. wish they would come up with a 3 but how would they do it.

Yeah Mugen has the dopest voice i've ever heard. No joke. The way he talks is crazy. I remember i would remeber lines and say them over in his voice. So i guess i knew japanese except i didnt know what exactly i was saying. Mugen's japanese voice is on some Darth Vader level shit.

Samurai Champloo was written by the same writters of Kill Bill i heard. The same artists also did cartoon sceens for kill bill.

miz you should blog on samurai champloo (i'd love to read it) or even anime in general. I know nothing of it except that when i saw the first 2 episodes of champloo the japanese version i got the entire collection. Checked out a couple other random anime's but they were not Champloos.

[Crillz]

Paranoia Agent > Champloo

[choice_genes]

Awesome series, and I love the soundtracks. Naturaljax, you are spot-on re Tsurugi No Mai, it is probably my favourite track of all four soundtracks. There are some really great beats there, and I love the mix between straigh-up sample-based beats, and more electronic/synthesised sounds.

Thanks for dropping knowledge on the okinawan side of it Miz, I didn't really appreciate that before now. It sounds like a really interesting place/culture. (Can't rep you coz computer says I need to spread it around, haha )

I was so disappointed when the series ended, I just wanted the story to keep going on......

[hamham3001]

i heard that in japan, samurai champloo wasnt very popular, with the mix of hiphop and samurais.... so it was stopped airing on TV in the middle of the series(ep 15 or 16).. ??

i think this anime is freakn great.. especially the music...

[naturaljax]

i heard that in japan, samurai champloo wasnt very popular, with the mix of hiphop and samurais.... so it was stopped airing on TV in the middle of the series(ep 15 or 16).. ??

i think this anime is freakn great.. especially the music...

Yeah, I have a friend from Japan who hadn't even heard of it. He explained that Samurai movies / anime etc. are supposed to be, or at least usually are very quiet, little or no soundtrack. So that might have been a contributing factor to its unpopularity in Japan.

[Servo2000]

Paranoia Agent > Champloo

Agreed.

Best part was that they actually had an ending, and they didn't take 3,000 episodes to get there.

I love a good ending, and Paranoia Agent has by far one of the most surreal / awesome endings of all time. Samurai Champloo was good, too.

I think I'm going to start a Paranoia Agent thread.

[mizanation]

i'm actually not a huge fan of samurai champloo--or a huge anime head in general, so i probably won't do a blog article on it. plus i'm lazy . samurai champloo is dope but it's not something that i'm crazy about. i do appreciate the whole okinawan/japanese thing, plus the hip hop.

i haven't met anyone from japan who's heard of it, even okinawans.

my wife told me that we're having somen champloo for dinner tonight.

[ktothe]

Cowboy Bebeop ruined anime for me. It set the bar so high that I can barely watch anything else. The only thing that comes close is Champloo. Even with Champloo though, I get bored after 1 episode.