Once again, last episode blues have hit me having just finished the series, Samurai Champloo. The show's about a waitress named Fuu (played by Ayako Kawasumi), an un-cultured, un-refined vagabond named Mugen (played by Kazuya Nakai), and the cool and collected samurai, Jin (played by Ginpei Sato), whose lives happen to cross one fateful day. After being roughed up and thrown in prison, they all manage to escape and set off on a journey of Fuu's request to search for a samurai who smells of sunflowers. Likened to Cowboy Bebop, this series is incredibly episodic, having the occasional two-parter. As the title of this entry mentions, Samurai Champloo also does a good job of mixing traditional Japanese settings and culture with a modern hip-hop influence; most of the music has a hip-hop, rap, jazz, or r 'n' b flavour to it. The character designs also have a very western feel to them, often reminding me of shows like Witch Hunter Robin. The attention to detail is what I really loved about Champloo; the artists always made it a case of making Fuu look physically obese after any time she over-indulged; everybody's hair and facial features bring the characters to life, so on and so forth. Two very big thumbs up from me, here!
Other than that, it's been fairly slow in anime land this Easter; a number of promising new shows starting in the next 2 weeks with the new season kicking off and that's about it really. Mai-HiME's still wowing me and with one more episode to go, I hope it doesn't disappoint. One silly show I recently began to watch is Ultimate Girls. Three girls befriend an Ultraman look-a-like who grants them super powers and the ability to grow in size like all those sentai shows you see out there. Full of fanservice and innuendo (to defeat the monsters, one has to destroy their core which is conveniently located in the groinal region...), it's guaranteed to draw out a laugh, or a groan, or both!
My short-lived run as Cup-man is now over much to my approval. For anybody who hasn't seen the photo yet, here it is:
I received wipEout Pure for my Sony PSP recently though sadly, I've not spent much time on it. I completed Ridge Racers far too quickly so I'm pacing myself with this one. Playing very much like 2097, it's back to form for the futuristic racing franchise. I'll write up a review of sorts once I've spent another day or two on it since I've only played on the lower classes so far.
