Afro Samurai

Afro Samurai I really had high expectations for this anime, and they were crushed for how bad the story is presented and yeah, Samuel L. Jackson is here but, that doesn't make the anime good, the story and the characters should, not a big movie star. Story The story is mediocre at best, the story follows a vengeful, full of hatred man named Afro, who saw his father the bearer of the n.1 headband being killed by the bearer of the n.2 headband named Justice just for the sole reason of becoming a god (don't know how a headband will grant you that but...ok) and he tells Afroif he wants revenge he'll be waiting, that's where the 5 eps. anime starts with one problem, nonsensical bulls**t, what happened to the earth? why is technology only used by a group of old guys? why people can only kill the n.2 so they can kill n.1 and not directly? why those headbands are important anyway? or why those thing aren't explained? don't know and i couldn't care less now, it was boring, the only thing they were focused on was the past, in every eps. 15 min. of his past and 3 of action but they forgot the present and the unexplained. Art & Animation It wasn't bad but i didn't like it, it's a combination of western cartoons and anime (like Tokyo Tribe), it was ok. Sound The music was fine, the sound effects were bad, the voice acting was ok because only Jinno and Ninja Ninja (the one with white afro) had good voice acting and Afro (Samuel L. J.) didn't talk much and when he did it was ok. Character Mediocre characters, not appealing for me, i felt Jinno more than Afro, other than that, the characters were rushed, needed more eps. to be really good. Enjoyment It was boring, i didn't get why this is liked and popular maybe just because of Samuel L. J. and that's it, i was going to watch the movie but only if i liked this so no movie for me, mediocre enjoyment.

When I started watching this anime, I wanted to hear the voices in japanese, thing that I never managed to, because I therefore learned that this anime was an American answer to Japan.... And I'll tell you what, they were very successful, one of the best dubbed anime I ever heard. They managed to fit everything like the art... I mean look at the details of the characters' drawings, their particular portraits, the dark "aura" they managed to bring from this dark world and look at cool gore scenes! A nice fitting music, enjoyable action moments and all in 5 episodes. What about Samuel Jackson's voicecoming from Ninja's mouth? It is just... Awesome!! So basically, the story goes around a futuristic feudal Japan where there are two headbands: Headband no.1 and Headband no.2. The fighter who holds the No.1 is considered god-like, the best of the best and can only be challenged by the one who holds the No.2 one. However, everyone, but literally everyone, can challenge the No.2 holder for the headband, meaning lots of trouble for that guy. Afro's father was the No.1 holder and died against a character named "Justice". Seeking revenge, Afro got the No.2 headband and is now heading to where "Justice" is waiting for him. He goes on as some people try to stop and kill him to get the No.2 title and at the same time we learn about Afro's past as he was training to be a great samurai. The fighting scenes are very enjoyable and the story is very simple but it is the typical good samurai revenge story. However, the characters are not that much deeply explored and explained, unlike Afro, but I personally think that it's not necessary in this case. A nice 5-episode anime to watch in a row. Everything it needs to be an awesome samurai-way entertainment. And the final scene... It just gave me chills! :P "It's nothing personal... It's just revenge" ~ Afro

When I first started watching Afro Samurai, I was blown away by the action scenes early on, as well as how contrived and generic the plot was. My early theory was that the plot was mostly around in order to set up more fights. As I got a few more episodes into the show, I was extremely disappointed to realize that the show creators didn't seem to realize how weak their own plot was, as flashbacks from Afro, and the main plot actually take up a very good chunk of the screen time, and those parts are pretty consistently boring. Afro's plot is just plain stupidreally. It starts off with the always reliable revenge story, but then it turns into a lot of stupid crap about trying to be #1 in the world. The character motivations to kill the hell out of each other never really make sense, so it's frustrating that so much time is spent on them. They try really hard to make Afro the coolest man ever, but well, he ends up not really standing out from any "badass" character I've ever seen. Pretty much every other character in the show is basically annoying. Afro's main redeeming point is the fights, in which there are sadly not enough of them. All the fights in Afro are ridiculously gory, stylish, and satisfying. I might even say jaw-dropping. It's easy to look forward to the fights, but sadly, they don't occur nearly as often as they should. The amount of the fights on the show do start to increase a bit as the show goes on, but for the most part, they don't seem as good as the show goes on. I think that after the initial shock and awe of the blood and gore, the fight scenes kind of lose their effect, but they are still pretty fun. Afro Samurai's attempts to be stylish and cool really work when it comes to the fights. When it comes to the plot, the attempt to make a classic tale super cool and stylish end up falling completely flat. Afro Samurai was a shot with high potential to be an awesome guilty-pleasure. Instead, I just felt guilty that I devoted an hour and a half of my life to it. I wouldn't reccomend watching this, even if you are a total action freak.