I haven't talked about anime in quite a while, but Samurai Champloo deserves some recognition. This was a very highly anticipated series for me since it was the follow up from Shinichiro Watanabe, the director of Cowboy Bebop (which still holds the title as my favorite anime series ever). With Samurai Champloo Watanabe once again displays his devotion to artistry of the highest caliber.

All I really need to say about Champloo is that it's hip-hop and samurai woven together. Does it get any better than that? I think not. The basic story is that Fuu, Mugen, and Jin are a trio on a journey to find the sunflower samurai. Like Bebop, most episodes can stand on their own but do come together to provide a loose framework story. Champloo's story doesn't offer quite as much cohesion as Bebop and the ending isn't all you'd hope for, but the real enjoyment comes from watching the episodic storylines anyways.

As you'd expect from Watanabe, the soundtrack is amazing. The series is littered with great, original hip-hop beats which change from episode to episode. I guarantee you'll be astonished at how well the hip-hop beats fit in with the 17th century Japanese visuals.

At the end of the day Champloo isn't at the same level as Cowboy Bebop, but what anime is? Despite that, Champloo is still top notch. Definitely a highly recommended series.

"White clouds rush under us,
cold winds brush against our cheeks,
together, up here in these blue skies,
we can fly as high and as far as our hearts will take us."

That was the closing line of the series. I had somehow found myself on a break from anime over the past months and about 3 weeks ago it dawned on me ... "hey! you haven't watched any anime in quite a while. mmm, that sounds fun."

Last Exile was definitely a top notch series which actually reminded me a lot of Escaflowne. Similar type of old world meets new world style of hybrid fantasy which i always love. Throw in a group of great characters, a solid story, and some beatuiful artwork and you've got yourself a winner.

I recently picked up a couple of the new Miyazaki dvds, Porco Rosso and Nausicaa, neither of which I had seen before and I must say that Nausicaa is definitely one of Miyazaki's best films. Of course it's hard to rank them since they are all so damn good, but this film just blew me away.

Miyazaki's films are nothing short of genius and I would say I easily place him among the top 5 greatest filmmakers of all time. So if you've never seen one of his films then you've been missing out. I highly recommend checking out Nausicaa or any of Miyazaki's films, you won't be disappointed.

I actually finished this before my Australia trip, but didn't write anything. Anyways, this was a very good little series. It falls under that category of anime called "Everything is a metaphor for the meaning of life." Honestly though, this is another pretty heavy anime, much like "Now and Then, Here and There" it presents a whole string of themes about the cycle of life and figuring out where you fit in.

I thought the whole concept of the town and the Haibane and everything was very slick and really made for an interesting setting. As is becoming a bit of a trend, I actually thought the ending would be a bit more tidy and wrap up more of the storyline. We do have a climax and resolution at the end of the series, but I guess I just imagined things would end in a different time and place.

All in all it's a very well done anime and totally worth watching. plus it's a short 13 episode series.

-- AG

I just finished up this series today and was a bit disappointed. The show started off really well and showed a lot of promise. The characters are very well written and I really enjoyed all the crazy use of super deformed and other animation techniques used. However, after you get past the second disk things start to move about as fast as dragonball z ... and that just doesn't work for a drama series such as this. Every other episode started with "a synopsis of what's happened so far", and there must have been about 4 full episodes devoted to recap.

The ending is non-existant as well. I actually finished the last episode and immediately went to my computer to lookup if there was additional dvds that continue the series. I guess that the anime caught up with the manga and that's why the ending sucked, lame.

I can still appreciate that this was a neat anime in a lot of ways, but I don't think I would recommend it to anyone but hardcore anime fans.