Samurai Champloo, you want anime?... look no furhter

Samurai Champloo (サムライチャンプルー, Samurai Chanpurū?) is a Japanese animated television series consisting of twenty-six episodes. It was broadcast in Japan from May 20, 2004, through March 19, 2005, on the television network, Fuji TV. Samurai Champloo was created and directed by Shinichirō Watanabe, whose previous work, Cowboy Bebop, earned him renown in the anime and Japanese television communities.[1] The show was produced by studio Manglobe.




The series is a cross-genre work of media, blending the action and samurai genres with elements of slapstick comedy. It is also a period piece, taking place during Japan's Edo period. The series is interwoven with revisionist historical facts and anachronistic elements of mise-en-scene, dialogue and soundtrack. The series' most frequent anachronism is its use of elements of hip hop culture, particularly rap and the music it has influenced, break dancing, turntablism, hip hop slang, and graffiti. The show also contains anachronistic elements from the punk subculture and modernism, but less prominently. It is one of the first anime TV shows based on hip-hop (Afro Samurai is the other, having been released in 2007).

A young lady named Fuu is working as a waitress in a tea house when she is harassed by a band of ruffians. Another customer, Mugen, offers to take care of them in exchange for food, but ends up instigating a brawl. Jin, a stoic young ronin in samurai garb, enters the tea house in the midst of the fight. Mugen attacks Jin after he proves to be a worthy opponent and they begin fighting one another, ignoring a fire that started during the brawl. They both faint from smoke inhalation. When they awaken, they find they have been arrested for the murder of Shibui Tomonoshina, the magistrate's son who had burned to death in the fire, and are to be executed. With help from Fuu, they escape and Fuu asks them to travel with her to find "the samurai who smells of sunflowers," a mysterious man Fuu can give little description of, but whom she insists she must find. They agree to join her, with Fuu making only one condition: they are not to duel one another until the journey is done.
 
Incorporated within this are signature elements of modernity, especially hip hop culture, such as rapping ("Lullabies of the Lost, Verse 1"), graffiti ("War of the Words"), bandits behaving like "gangstas" (both parts of "Misguided Miscreants"), censorship bleeps replaced with record scratching, and much of Mugen's character design, including a fighting style influenced by breakdancing. Samurai Champloo's musical score predominantly features hip hop beats. Aside from hip hop, anachronisms include mon resembling Adidas and Converse logos, baseball ("Baseball Blues"), and references to the atomic bombing of Nagasaki ("Cosmic Collisions").
 
Samurai Champloo tells the story of three strangers in the Tokugawa era (also known as the Edo Period) who come together on a journey across Japan.




Mugen: A brash vagabond from the Ryukyu Islands, Mugen is a wanderer with a wildly unconventional fighting style that fuses elements of breakdancing. He wears metal-soled geta and carries a Japanese sword on his back (although, historically, the Tokugawa government prohibited unauthorized men from carrying daishō (traditional samurai arms) or any of its components). In Japanese, the word "Mugen" means "infinity" (literally, "without limit" or "limitless").[2]

Jin: Jin is a mild-mannered ronin who carries himself in the conventionally stoic manner of a samurai of the Tokugawa era. Using his waist-strung daishō, he fights in the traditional kenjutsu style of a samurai trained in a prominent, sanctioned dojo. Jin wears glasses, an available but uncommon accessory in Edo era Japan. Spectacles—called "Dutch glass merchandise" ("Oranda gyoku shinajina" in Japanese) at the time—were imported from Holland early in the Tokugawa period and became more widely available as the 17th century progressed. In Japanese the word "Jin" means "benevolence" or "compassion."

Fuu: A feisty young girl of approximately 15 years of age, Fuu recruits Mugen and Jin to help her find a sparsely-described man she calls "the samurai who smells of sunflowers." A flying squirrel named "Momo" (meaning "peach" in Japanese and also short for "momonga," meaning "flying squirrel") accompanies her along the way, inhabiting her kimono and frequently leaping out to her rescue when she encounters trouble.

Apart from this trio, the other characters tend to appear only once or twice throughout the entirety of the series.

Samurai Champloo is considered to be an example of the popular chanbara film and television genre—the trademarks are a setting in the Edo period, a focus on samurai or other swordsman characters, and lots of thrilling, dramatic fights.[3] Chanbara was used in the early days of Japanese cinema (when government political censorship ran high) as a way of expressing veiled social critiques.[citation needed]




The word champloo comes from the Okinawan word "chanpurū" (as in gōyā chanpurū, the Okinawan stir-fry dish containing bitter melon). Chanpurū, alone, simply means "to mix" or "to hash."

The Blue-Ray just came out so go and enjoy it.