Publisher: Bandai Entertainment (USA)Format: Region 1 DVD, NTSC, Japanese Dialogue with optional English Dub and English Subtitles
Length: 13 Episodes x 25 mins
Production Date: 2000
Currently in Print (as of writing): No
Story Outline: Sometime towards the late Edo era, a female ronin (masterless samurai) called Ran, wanders the countryside righting wrongs and forever in the search of her next bottle of sake. Howeber one day she is brought together accidently with a young female Chinese martial artist called Myao (Meow in the subtitled version). Though Meow is a practitioner of the Iron Cat Fist style of martial arts, she isn’t all that bright. While they free one small town from a criminal group extorting money from businesses, they soon find themselves working together, often much to each other’s annoyance (though Ran is always happy to see Meow to pay for her sake fix). However the reluctant duo always leaves a wake of justice peace in their wake.
Mini Review: Though “Jubei-chan: The Secret of the Lovely Eyepatch” is the Akitaro Daichi samurai show that people always remember, personally I think this one is superior. The main problem that “Tsukikage Ran” had against it was it began screening at the tail end of Jubei-chan’s initial broadcast and was seemingly ignored to a degree. Unlike the complete silliness of Jubei-chan, “Ran” is played a lot straighter and more realistically. In fact the show is based on a 1965 jidaigeki (Edo period drama) TV series called “Su-ronin Tsukikage Hyogo”, with the two male leads swapped out for females. While “Ran” is considered by some as a parody, I think it’s more of a homage. It’s played relatively close to genre type right down to the situations and episode titles. Even the opening theme is an enka song. I think having female leads was a genius move on Daichi’s part. It gives a whole new twist on the very well-worn genre. Plus the women have flaws with Ran being a lush and Meow being a gullible but kind hearted fool. In way I think the show is a very feminist one in a lot of ways. Sure they may be flawed, but Daichi treats them with respect and there is no exploitation. Plus hardly anyone questions that Ran is a female samurai. It really is just a jidaigeki show with the roles reversed.
The show is also episodic, which may not sit well with some. However I think this works very well in this type of show. Plus with only 13 episodes, there’s more than enough variation in the show. While there is quite a lot of comedy in the show, there are also quite a lot of dramatic moments; however unlike the live action drama genre it borrows from, there really aren’t any overwrought sentimental mushy moments. One thing which got me was how consistently well produced the show was. The animation (by Madhouse), writing, fight choreography and comedy never dip at any stage. I recall getting fansubs of this how, but for some reason never watched the last tape. It was only in 2008 I decided to get the DVDs, which by that time were out of print for a couple of years and a little hard to acquire on the second hand market. Thank god I did. I really, really enjoyed this show. Probably the most fun I’ve had watching an anime in quite a few months. 8 out of 10.
Remaining Backlog: 19 months (it's much easier this way than listing the number of discs).
No comments:
Post a Comment