Samurai Jack Is Back!!!

"WATCH OUT!"
-Samurai Jack theme song

So yeah, I caught the season 5 premiere of Samurai Jack a few days ago. It's nice to see this show return! Not only has it come back, but it's not on Adult Swim and is a much more adult show overall. For those of you don't know what Samurai Jack is, it's show about a nameless samurai (who is actually a ronin, not a samurai) who was sent thousands of years into the future by an evil demon. Jack must now vanquish said demon in order to return home and drive the evil away from his timeline as well. In season 5, however, things have gotten rough for Jack. Jack has become ageless after Aku destroyed all of the time portals, and now five decades have passed with Jack still unable to defeat Aku or return home. He's lost his sword, his honor, and most of his allies to the ages.

Now, Jack stands up once more in order to defeat both Aku and his forces. Honestly, this season 5 premiere was amazing! It had good action, good characters, a fun robot assassin for Jack to do battle against, and an interesting setup for future episodes. The animation is somehow even better than it had been previously and the show is more mature, while still keeping the humor and charm of the original show. It feels like a continuation and like a natural evolution for the series. You can watch episode 52 and then go into episode 53 and still get that same feeling of awesomeness. Few continuations (aside from maybe X-Files and Digimon Adventure Tri) have felt as amazing as the source material. I feel like more shows should get continuations like this.

This episode had everything I could want from a Samurai Jack continuation, to the point of being near perfection! Though I enjoyed the show, I did have a few problems with it (Though they are mostly nitpicks) For one thing, I didn't like how those blue alien people in the intro talked by materializing words through their antennae. It felt like an artificial way to put words into one of Samurai Jack's famous silent moments, and it just ended up feeling pointless. I also didn't like how Aku barely showed up, though I guess they are saving him for later episodes which is understandable. And one big problem (and this is down to personal opinion) I feel as though 2-3 episodes should have been aired for this premiere instead of just one. I feel like this should've been a more tremendously large event, and having an extra episode or two would've made the event more momentous. And plus, I don't want to wait until next week.

But yeah, those are just all nitpicks. I'm a monkey, picking nits is what I do! Seriously though, this was a long overdue continuation and I wholeheartedly enjoyed it. It was nice to see Gennedy's work being aimed for older audiences for once, and it was definitely an entertaining experience. Like I said, this episode is near perfection in what it set out to accomplish. I have a feel Sam Jack will bring back the action cartoon and help kickstart a flood of better animated shows for kids. Especially with Rick & Morty going on hiatus, this seems like a good time for Adult Swim to bring in new blood to fill the void. Anyways, that was my two cents on it. Go, watch this show and support the creators! We need more shows like this on television. It's dark, violent, mature, but manages to capture the feeling of the original so well. That's why I give Samurai Jack a SHAPESHIFTING MASTER OF EVIL/10. The highest rating one can give!