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What Cowboy Bebop did for Jazz Music, Samurai Champloo did for Hip-Hop.
Samurai Champloo is an anime series created by Bebop's Shinichiro Watanabe.
The show is set in a fictional version of Edo period Japan, featuring elements of action,
adventure and comedy blended with an anachronistic, predominantly hip-hop soundtrack.
Its name comes from the Okinawan word "chanpurū" (e.g. goya champuru), which means to mix or blend. Thus, the title may be translated as "Samurai Remix" or "Samurai Mashup", keeping with the series' blended theme. (Indeed, even the time frame is mashed up, as episodes in the series will freely mention events 200 years apart as if both were current).
The show is unique, in that it matches modern Japanese hip-hop music with a stylized form of samurai swordplay known as chambara, much in the same way Cowboy Bebop married science fiction to blues and jazz. Champloo's score predominantly features hip-hop beats by Japanese hip hop artists such as Nujabes, Force of Nature, Tsutchie, and Fat Jon, among others.
The world of Samurai Champloo is often anachronistic. Characters' costume design, attitudes and editing methods reflect heavily towards international hip-hop culture. One of the protagonists, Mugen, even fights in a style that resembles Capoeira or break-dancing.
Furthermore, despite its setting in the Edo period (though difficult to pinpoint due to a mixture of historical events and anachronisms ) many of the words and expressions used by the characters are modern slang or English-influenced.
Samurai Champloo revolves around the journey of three individuals: The brash and rude vagabond Mugen, the quiet and stoic ronin Jin, and the young, insistent Fuu.
At the beginning of the story, Fuu helps Mugen and Jin escape from a vengeful local magistrate, and she persuades them, by flipping a coin, to help her in her search for a mysterious samurai who smells of sunflowers. In the progressing adventure she will have the trouble of keeping her two companions out of trouble and from attempting to kill each other.
Like Bebop, Champloo's episodes are mostly self-contained (which has garnered it some criticism), and the show contains an extensive cast. Apart from the main trio, most characters only appear once or twice; rarely more than three times.
Most likely due to the popularity of Cowboy Bebop, it was licensed for North American distribution nearly a year before it even aired in Japan.
Character Sheet is up.
This show provides examples of:
- Accidental Athlete
- Airplane Arms
- Anachronism Stew: And how!
- Anime First
- Anti Villain: Okuru, Sara, and arguably Kohza.
- Arrogant Kung Fu Guy: Shouryuu
- Avenging The Villain: Mariya's students.
- Awesomeness By Analysis: Mugen, though not overly given to intellectual pursuits, can be an insanely quick study when he wants.
- Axe Crazy: The three brothers, especially Denkibou
- Bad Ass: Mugen, Jin, Kariya Kagetoki, Sara, etc.
- Badass Back
- Balloon Belly: Mugen, on occasion. With Fuu, it's a case of Balloon Body.
- Big Eater: Fuu, notably so - she temporarily becomes visibly one and a half times fatter after overeating.
- Big No: From a minor character in a later episode
- BLAM Episode: The zombie episode. It starts off with the Jin and Mugen eating rare mushrooms, and ends with a nuclear explosion and Nightmare Fuel. And it is never mentioned again.
- Blind Seer: Sara shows some characteristics of this, especially when she defeats and nearly kills both Jin and Mugen with her spear skills.
- Blind Without Em: Subverted: turns out Jin's glasses were just for show, much to Mugen's surprise. The fact that he's very attatched to them probably led to this misunderstanding.
- Blood Knight: Mugen and Shōryū mainly, though Jin and Kariya Kagetoki also show traits.
- Bloodstained Glass Windows: Okay, so the church in episodes 25-26 doesn't have any glass windows, and the one in episode 19 has none at all, but they are churches, and people are fighting in them, so...
- Bodyguard Crush: Whether it's on Mugen or Jin isn't exactly clear, though...
- In fact, it's so easy to argue that they all had crushes on one another that most of the fanbase happily accepts any pairing.
- Fuu seems to idolize both Jin and Mugen at different points in the series.
- Jin is very protective of Fuu, but whether this is a romantic interest or a brotherly/fatherly interest is difficult to say. His emotional restraint also makes this even more difficult to fathom.
- On the other hand, brash Mugen is often argued to be in denial of a crush on Fuu; he rushes to her rescue very noticeably in numerous episodes while Jin often sits by or engages a different enemy. This tends to make him a more popular choice for Shipping with Fuu than Jin.
- And meanwhile, Mugen and Jin's blatant obsession with one another is often viewed as a form of Foe Yay.
- On a similar note, Fuugen or OT 3 Fanfic tends to crop up more than Fuu/Jin or Mugen/Jin.
- Born In The Wrong Century: Kariya Kagetoki and Jin
- Brick Joke: At the end of the last episode, Fuu reveals the coin she flipped to gain Mugen and Jin as bodyguards was double-headed.
- When this troper saw the last episdoe, Fuu said that it had landed on heads, meaning Mugen and Jin had been free to fight each other the whole time.
- Broke Episode: One of the three major episode situations of Samurai Champloo. Usually the responsibility for getting money/food/other necessary items fell on Jin; Mugen and Fuu forced him to pawn his swords at least twice, and his glasses once.
- But For Me It Was Tuesday: Mugen doesn't remeber many of the people who come after him in the series in a rare heroic (sort of) example of this trope.
- Carrying The Antidote: the deranged, revenge-driven Ryujiro in episode two
- Character Development: Most prominent in the last arc where it shows how much Mugen, Jin, and Fuu changed since their meeting.
- Complete Monster: Mukuro
- Crowning Moment Of Awesome: Too many to list, but any fight scene from the final three episodes deserves special mention.
- For This Troper, I'd say Fuu's wall-ricocheting dice roll.
- Crowning Moment Of Funny: Two Words: NINJA BASEBALL.
- "Maijin Fuu". Whenever Fuu gets a chance to engorge herself with food, her entire body physically changes. She becomes so bloated, that in one episode, two men were searching for her. When they saw her, they continued looking, saying that there was no chance it could have been her.
- Crowning Moment Of Heartwarming: "That is the man I am going to marry."
- In the last episode, Jin and Mugen admit they consider each other friends.
- Crowning Music Of Awesome: The opening theme is bitching good.
- This Troper also loved the ending theme.
- The whole soundtrack is beautiful, fun and awesome.
- There are soo many moments in this anime that would not be as awesome without the music, indeed the music is used to push and shape the emotion in a series, not just as background noise, AS IT GODDAMN SHOULD BE.
- Seeing as how hip hop culture is a basic element of the series, and Nujabes was involved, the music had to be good. In this troper's opinion, it may well be the best part of the series.
- Disability Superpower: Sara
- Distressed Damsel: Fuu. Given how often she gets in trouble (often being Bound And Gagged) she comes off as rather sensible for needing two capable body guards.
- Dance Battler: Mugen may very well be the ultimate example.
- Defective Detective: Manzou the Saw
- Determinator: Mugen, but only when enticed by hot ninja nookie.
- Jin as well in the very last episode.
- Eagleland: The baseball episode.
- Ensemble Darkhorse: Sara
- Evasive Fight Thread Episode: Played straight sometimes, and subverted others.
- Evil Counterpart: Mugen and Jin both have their own Evil Counterparts: Mukuro and Kariya Kagetoki, respectively.
- Expy: Mugen is an obvious homage to Spike Spiegel, right down to the hairstyle and nihilistic viewpoint.
- Field Of Blades: Seen in the opening sequence.
- Flash Step: Kariya, and briefly Jin.
- Gangsta Style: Mukuro
- Gonk: Once in a while, especially the guy who hits on Fuu while she's making scary faces.
- Government Conspiracy: Although it isn't discussed much, the driving force behind the series is essentially the shogunate's attempts to drive the Christians, of whom Fuu's father is the leader, out of Japan.
- The Grotesque: Oniwakamaru
- Henohenomoheji: The baseball catcher doll in episode 23 "Baseball Blues" has a Henohenomeheji on its face.
- Heroic Sociopath: Mugen
- Hey Its That Voice: Steve Blum, who was known for his role as Cowboy Bebop's Spike Spiegel, voices Mugen. Meanwhile, his Japanese voice actor is Kazuya Nakai, known best for his role as Roronoa Zoro.
- High Pressure Blood
- Honorifics: Seen in the third episode between a Yakuza boss and his former employee.
- Ho Yay: Actually played straight (no pun intended). The Dutchman comes from a sect who believes that enlightenment can be obtained through homosexuality.
- Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: English translation attempt to recreate the original poetic Japanese titles with full on alliteration.
- Implausible Fencing Powers: But they're used tastefully.
- Instrument Of Murder: In the first part 'Hellhounds for Hire' Jin is disguised as a woman carrying a shamisen (a traditional Japanese instrument similar to a guitar). When asked to play a song on it, he pulls his katana from the neck, and reveals that he is actually a samurai. He also happened to have smoke bombs hidden in the body of the instrument.
- Jidai Geki
- Ki Attacks: With a twist: the main characters don't use them (save for Mugen on one single, lucky occasion), and your garden-variety bad guy doesn't, either. Only a handful of villains have them, and they're the toughest mofos in the Champloo universe. An additional twist from the final episode: Jin defeats the most powerful of the ki users NOT by using the same tactics, but through a very zen kendo move that requires allowing oneself to be run through. Force of will comes out stronger than fancy magic tricks.
- The Last DJ: Jin
- Large Ham: Bundai
- Lemony Narrator: Several episodes have one who makes anachronistic references to the future; all of those narrated by Manzou definitely count.
- Loads And Loads Of Characters: Seventy-three named characters. Many of them only appear once, while the rest crop up in, at most, five episodes.
- Look Behind You
- Mama Bear: Sara. Too bad her son is dead.
- Mistaken For Gay: At one point, an old man comes across Jin in a hot spring. They have a (largely one sided) conversation about fireflies, until the stranger gives a rather weird smile and comments that sometimes the male fireflies can attract other male fireflies instead of females. Jin promptly excuses himself.
- This does not stop the Yaoi Fangirls from portraying Jin as out-and-out gay, despite him sleeping with several women, and possibly falling in love with one, over the course of the series.
- Basically, he's either straight or bisexual and simply not turned on by that man. I probably wouldn't have been either.
- Mister Danger: Francis Xavier III, who is actually a subversion given that he's actually Japanese but disguised as a European.
- The Momo: Trope Namer.
- Moral Event Horizon: Umanosuke. Chased down Fuu, molested her, knocked her out, then tied her to a cross in the last episode.
- Mushroom Samba: Incident involving a burning field of pot, and maybe the episode where they ate mushrooms and were attacked by zombies, died, and got hit with a nuke. Maybe, because so far no-one has a concrete explanation for what the hell happened. Most believe the mushrooms they ate were bad.
- Although Fuu didn't eat any...
- My Life Flashed Before My Eyes: In Episode 14, as Mugen is drowning, he has flashbacks of his hellish childhood in Ryuukyuu, and of Kohza and Mukuro, while a tear jerkingly beautiful song plays in the background. Though technically he does die at this point, he comes back to life through sheer force of will.
- My Master Right Or Wrong
- Narrator: Detective Manzou - a.k.a. "The Saw" - in three episodes.
- Negative Continuity: The two episodes right before the 3-part finale show everyone getting either severely injured or possibly killed while the finale shows everyone in perfect health.
- Never Found The Body: Repeatedly. Just who did they think they were kidding after four or five "Mugen or Jin falls off cliff/waterfall/exploding pirate ship" types of incidents?
- Never Learned To Read: Mugen
- Nightmare Fuel: Zombie episode, especially the credit ending.
- Also, the way the counterfeiter was going to torture the secret police in episode 15. It involved molten gold and a funnel.
- Not to mention their terrified muffled screams as the molten gold was being poured into the funnel.
- Truth In Television, to boot.
- Ninja: Yatsuha and Kagemaru.
- No One Could Survive That: Said word for word after the Rope Bridge incident. Probably implied elsewhere.
- Not So Harmless: Ogura Bunta
- The Only One Allowed To Defeat You: Jin and Mugen, mutually.
- Oh Crap: Mugen, involves explosives.
- Otaku: Isaac
- Parental Abandonment: All three in various ways: Fuu, literally her parents; Jin, his master; and Mugen, his whole family.
- Perma Stubble: Mugen
- Pettanko: Fuu
- Pirate: Mugen, formerly. Mukuro and Kohza as well.
- Platonic Prostitution
- Plucky Girl: Fuu
- Power Trio
- Pretty Fly For A White Guy: Isaac
- Prisoner Of Zenda Exit: An early episode has an assassin dueling with Jin. After Mugen kills his employer, he tells Jin that there's now no need for him to kill, and gives a We Will Meet Again before calmly walking away.
- Psycho For Hire: Ryujiro Sasaki, the Three Brothers
- Purely Aesthetic Era: The series opens with a title card declaring that it is not historically accurate. It then gleefully throws everything it can get its hands on, from hip-hop to baseball, into the Edo period of Japan.
- The Quiet One: Jin
- Rain Aura
- Recap Episode: Episode 12
- Red Oni Blue Oni: Mugen and Jin are major examples.
- Rock Paper Scissors: It's the samurai way of doing things!!
- Rope Bridge: Episode 21
- Samurai
- Schizo Tech: Pretty much the entire premise, really.
- Shirtless Scene: Several, but Jin's in the last episode is especially memorable.
- Shout Out: Lots of 'em.
- Shrouded In Myth: The Ghost of Yoshitsune. Sort of. It all turned out to be a combination of rumors about Anti Villain Okuru and Jin (including one about how handsome he is), deliberately spread by Yukimaru.
- Single Stroke Battle
- Sinister Scythe: Umanosuke, leader of the three brothers.
- The Stoic: Jin, and how. Sara too, enough to give Jin a run for his money and his life
- The Kawara boss as well. The two engage themselves to a very charming conversation in the fourth episode.
- Surprisingly Good English: The baseball episode and the opening song "Battlecry"
- Your Milage May Vary on the baseball episode; while the commanding officers posess extremely good American accents, the rest of the crew isn't so lucky.
- Also Surprisingly Good Dutch: Though red-haired foreigner Isaac is played by a Japanese voice actor, his lines in Dutch seem to be grammatically correct. The other Dutchmen in the episode are played by native Dutchmen delivering lines in their own language.
- While it is true that the Dutch in the episode was grammatically sound, it does fall prey to some weird choice of vernacular. The foremost example is addressing Isaac as 'opperhoofd', which does literally mean 'highest head' but is used more often for, say, an Indian chieftain, rather than the president of the East India Company's Japan branch.
- Swipe Your Blade Off
- Sword Beam: Shoryuu
- Sword Fight: Inevitably, up to and including many of its subtropes.
- Flynning was notably averted. It's the speed of the action that adds excitement to the fight scenes, not the amount of movements. The movements used were often very carefully choreographed into the script, making each fight scene very different and unique.
- Barehanded Blade Block: A subversion, in the 25th episode Mugen kills the first of the three brothers by allowing his lance to go through Mugen's hand in order to deliver the killing blow.
- Thematic Theme Tune
- The Stinger: Shige rising from the grave during the end credits of Episode 22.
- The Unfunny: Jin
- True Art Is Incomprehensible: Fuu meets a struggling artist named Hishikawa Moronobu (an actual historical figure who helped make the Ukiyo-e art style famous), who can't seem to find a good inspiration for his works. He see's Fuu, and is inspired to create a famous painting called "Backwards Beauty". Fuu said she liked the painting because he gave her very large breasts.
Mugen and Jin: "He did?"
- Victorias Secret Compartment: Fuu has a pet flying squirrel named Momo who lives in her cleavage
- What Do You Mean Its Not Awesome: Learning to read.
- When A Jerk Loves A Tsundere: How fans of Fuugen often justify the pairing; based primarily on their constant arguing/making fun of/insulting each other despite repeatedly rescuing (Mugen, moreso)/crying over (Fuu, obviously) each other.
- You Gotta Have Blue Hair: Completely averted.
- Youkai: The crazed mountain-priests in episode 9 disguise themselves as tengu.
- Zombie Apocalypse
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