After a long time, I opened Netflix to watch something interesting. So, being an anime fan my eyes saw something interesting in the anime section. The title read ‘Onimusha’ having a AOT-like creature in the background. Without much waiting, I clicked to see what is all about.
Not much synopsis was given yet I started to watch as I was curious. It has total 8 episodes. From the episode 1 I get to know it’s about Miyamoto Musashi (1584-1645) – a famous Japanese swordsman who lived in the early part of the Edo period.
He is said to have been the strongest man in Japan’s history and is a popular figure even today.
Storyline
During the Edo period, farmers of a small village had some skirmish which led to death of some village people, the lord of the land sent a scout named Lemon to resolve the disputes. But instead of resolving, he rebelled with his men and turned villagers against the lord and tortured the spy sent by him.
This rebellious act of Lemon made the lord furious and raged. To deal with the matter he arranged his trusted men including Miyamoto Mushashi who was visiting the domain as guest. As the lord couldn’t sent the army to quash the rebel as that would led him into harsh punishment by the Shogun so he had to rely on this small group of underlings to assist Musashi and Kensuke Matsuki, who trained lord’s trusted people including Lemon, in their journey.
In episode 1 “Demon”: Mushashi learned that the way the spy was tortured, was not the work of some ordinary human and certainly involved some kind of demonic thing. To kill that kind, he needs something to match up to their strengths. So, he heads away to a temple where after beating 11 temple guards he proves his worth to handle that ‘Thing in the box’ and as per him, he earned it for 33 days. The monk after giving him a proper warning, hands him the box for 33 days but on one condition that Mushashi would be accompanied by his fellow trainee monk named Kaizen, to keep the box safe to which Mushashi agrees.
Miyamoto Mushashi with 6 other characters including the monk embarks on a covert mission that unfolds many mysteries and reveals the traitors in groups.
Throughout the journey they encounters many formidable adversaries but Armed with the mythical “Oni Gauntlet” and incredible swordmanship, Miyamoto Mushashi and his team overcome them one by one that enables them to confront their prime enemy.
Directed by Miike Takashi, Netflix’s Onimusha, animated series is based on the Capcom video game series of the same name. Since I’m not an avid fan of videos games so I would avoid going into details of that except from this excerpt from Wikipedia to help myself and others.
- Onimusha : Warlords; Oni-Warriors is a series of video games developed and published by Capcom.
- It makes use of the historical figures that shaped Japan’s history retelling their stories with supernatural elements.
- Genre : action-adventure, 3rd person hack-and-slash, Combat + Puzzle elements.
- Plot: The player protagonist wields the power of the Oni, enabling them to fight the Genma, the main enemy in the series.
The anime series has total 8 episodes of about 25-36 minutes long so it’s quite manageable to watch over the weekend. As I already told you neither I’m an avid video games user nor I have seen the Onimusha video game series, so my mind wasn’t doing any nitpicking or any sort of comparison to the video game while watching the series.
It has given me a sort of ‘Blue Eye Samurai’ vibes, the characters with the the background animation, combat scenes, violence and beautiful scenery all along. Everything blends so nicely together, the beautiful scenery of the 2D animation and the quick violent sequences of 3D style that match the plot so well to be able to keep up with its pace.
The people who are fans of such work would find it very immersive because as the series progresses, they also feel a sense of urgency in some scenes like other characters including Mushashi with that use of Oni-Gauntlet.
Onimusha is a slow but intriguing experience thanks to the amazing direction of Takashi Miike ( 13 Assassins) and Shinya Sugai ( Dragon’s Dogma) whose Innovative depictions of cinematic swordplay that blend with sleek animation if you’re like me who enjoy seeing such action-sequence in animes, it makes your eyes crave for more of such visually appealing scenes.
Throughout the series, it focuses on Mushashi Miyamoto who has to utilise that powerful gauntlet in a very purposeful way because just like any other supernatural object, it has its side-effects and other characters including Kaizen need to vouch for that to avoid any mishappenings.
Overall take on Ominusha
Plot pacing :
It reveals lots of details very earlier but still it’s pacing feels kinda slow so requires a lil bit of patience by the viewers to get the overall feel of anime.
Episodes & Story :
With the amount of episodes it has, it is perfectly wrapped up, at least for me, without adding any unnecessary plot twists. It sets a strong tone ( up to 3 episodes) in the beginning but kinda seems rushed at the end. Still, the fighting scenes are its strong aspects and hold the series from beginning to end.
Animation :
3D stuff in anime is not my thing but after Blue Eye Samurai, I’m trying to get into this style of animation. To me, CGI was also pretty good, The 3D style does stand out a bit but it complements the action sequence very well and held the plot pretty well.
Characters :
The characters are the one that holding the plot for me and I really loved the blend of traditional-style samurai guys dealing with a bit modern supernatural concept. Each character’s development was shown nicely despite being limited episodes.
Nevertheless Onimusha is brilliant with its characters, action but it’s not for everyone. Throughout the series, I had to experience some slow and clunky moments with some awkward dialogues. There are some loopholes in the plot and it becomes lazy with some effects.
Overall, it’s a one-time watch, and if I have to compare style of animation & CGI, Blue Eye Samurai has set the bar very high for such types of animation & CGI.
Blue Eye Samurai and Onimusha both are delivered by Netflix and I must say, it really getting its game ahead of its time. Thanks to them, I’m exploring more anime genres out of my comfort zone. Kudos!!!
Have a look at the trailer :
Animexon 