Customer Reviews

Ninja Scroll - The Series (Vol. 1)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Since the 1996 release of the original "Ninja Scroll" feature, fans have suffered from misleading sub-par efforts such as "Ninja Resurrection" and "Jubei-chan, Ninja Girl." With the 13-episode "Dragon Gem" TV series, "Scroll" fanatics finally have something to latch on to, a series that fearlessly tries to live up to the standard set by one of the most important movies in anime history.

Easygoing, morally sincere, ninja-for-hire Jubei Kibagami is once again the focus of the series, alternately called "The Dragon Stone Treasure" or "The Jade Dragon." Jubei is based in fact on a character of the same name from feudal Japan, the Paul Bunyan or Wong Fei Hong legend for that country. "Dragon Gem" opens with a masked ninja named Rouga fleeing after stealing the precious Dragon Gem of the Hiroku, a ninja clan "destined to live in darkness," and protect the gem. The first fight scenes are a pretty good indicator of what is to come: an overwhelming amount of multi-skilled ninjas, some dispatched with ease, others getting a several-episode lifespan. Rouga is cornered by Hiroku's Migai, a spider-man-type guy, as well as two ninjas from the Kimon clan, who want the gem as well (you'll remember the Kimon as the clan that produced the Eight Devils Jubei fought in the movie). One is a swordsman with a flying bike/lance contraption, the other a woman who can produce ... gremlins. Jubei interferes, simply because they've disturbed his nap, and unleashes a new skill (in addition to his swordsmanship, Wolverine-like recovery ability, and the sturdy string attached to the sword): a sword slash that projects through the air (similar to Raijuta's Izuni in "Rurouni Kenshin"). Rouga offers to team up, but Jubei refuses, arbitrarily because he "doesn't trust people in masks," and because he wants to finish his nap and his dream.

The second part of the setup involves Shigure, a teenager kept from the outside world her whole life, and unknowingly being guarded by an entire village of ninjas. Her world is shattered when the Kimon attack; she also finds out that she is somehow the "Witch of Light" (or Maiden of Light in other translations). Rouga buys her some time to escape at the cost of his life; as he dies, begs Jubei to deliver the gem to Shigure. Jubei agrees, an important fact seeing as the only thing more important than justice and money to Jubei is his word.

So goes the series, with the Kimon and Hiroku clans sending their minions after Jubei and Shigure, who are joined by Dakuan, the Tokugawa government spy from the movie, and Tsubute, an athletic teen thief, and a slightly annoying character. Apparently, the union of the Witch of Light and the Dragon Gem can either lead to the Hiroku treasure, or unleash a hidden horror for the Kimon. The array of characters ranges from uber-cool, to unoriginally [weak]. Two characters borrow heavily from the wasp-hive devil from the movie: one controls a swarm of moths, the other a swarm of bats. There are the cooler characters such as Rengoku, a re-animator who can re-attach body parts to others or herself, and is a sort of twisted Inspector Gadget; or Anden Yamidron, the Kimon's No. 2, who can crystalize and destroy things by touch.

Don't expect 13 episodes with the same quality as the movie. Would you expect a "Ghost In The Shell" TV series to seriously maintain that level of animation for even more than five episodes? Obviously not. That said, the pilot four episodes are of a significantly better level of art than the rest of the series. The TV Jubei is drawn with the movie Jubei in mind--same raggedy brown clothes and split Raiden hat--but has slightly thicker eyebrows, less slanty eyes, and a thicker lower lip: not huge differences, but enough to be noticeable. The art, direction and movement in this volume are by no means comparable to the movie, but far above average for a TV series. The fight sequence between Jubei and Jashi, a ninja with a hollow eye socket that, among other things, can use a dead person's eyeball as a sort of DVD to play back their final moments, is beautifully crafted, with the quick cuts from close-up, to far away, to just the sounds of swords clashing, to images of their shadows battling at the speed of light. The shocking level of gore from the movie is also toned down in this series, as is the [physcial] content, although it doesn't shy from implicit [abuse] scenes. The characters are semi-modern, much like those in "Wild, Wild West" (yes, the Will Smith movie), probably owing to the character designs of Takahiro Yoshimatsu, of "Trigun" fame.

You may have to re-watch Vol. 1 after getting through the second volume just to better understand what's going on, with so many characters being introduced, and with bad guys fighting not only the good guys, but each other (think three-way battle). Thankfully, the series maintains the idea that these demons still exhibit human failings: a female villain embittered by [abuse]; the aptly-named Rengoku, whose desire for revenge many times blinds her to the original mission of [physcial] desire or pride or loneliness.

It should've been a five-star series; the major, but not horrendous, drop-off in quality from the first four episodes to the rest of the series is a little bit of a turn-off, as is the over-emphasis on fights, which affects the plot development, and the story behind the gem. It's a good series that benefits from having a great movie to work off of, but may suffer from the extremely high expectations fans may put on it.

You must remember this series is just that a series, Not a movie which means smaller budget. The animation in this movie is "different" and not in a bad way, but if you were to compare it with most series it diserves 4 stars. But it does take some getting used to, it's nothing like the old ninja scroll animation. Which is not a bad thing, it's fresh something new that will take getting used to. The dubbing: Do not expect the old favorites that you are used to Jubei does have a different voice, but i think you will get over it after episode 2.
Jubei is still the main focus of the series thus far, but he is the star of a 2 sided story-line.

I'm not a hardcore anime fan, i watch only animes that are worthy of my attention. Ninja Scroll: the series has done that so far, so i will not rate this, while comparing it to the other animes i've seen in my life time. If you compare everything in the series to the movie, you will make yourself hate this series while still being entertained by it.

PRO's: - It has a new style to it and is a welcomed change.
- Jubei is still the loveable character as in the past.
- Combat in this series so far is very well done
- A lot more charcters (see con's section)
- Jubei is back & he is still bad.
- Dakuwan (the oldman) is back too, and he has some tricks up his sleeve

CON's: - Technology (this is ancient japan and technology doesn't fit in to well, probably my biggest gripe.)

- more charcters (this series so far brings about 2 or 3 new charcters in every episode, you'll not have to remeber too many of them though)

- different voice actors (for previous charcters)
- Jubei as always seems more like a smaurai than a ninja

OVERALL: This is a good series so far and i have been able to
look past the cons, the new technology does bother me, but i can look past it. This series is easily worth getting as long as you are not to stuck up on the movie (and are able to look past the fact they are not related in anyway other than two charcters thus far.) This is a very enjoyable show, and from what i've seen it is better than most series out there, and you do not have to be a "hardcore fan to notice it".
So i advise you if you are a fan of the movie, PICK UP A COPY OF THE SERIES. if you can look past the subtle differences you will enjoy it.

I'm not quite sure what I expected when I picked this up. It's been long enough since I saw the original film that inspired by this series that all my mushy brain cells can really remember is that I enjoyed it a great deal. Given the success of the release of 'X' as a series developed from a film, I decided to dive in. What I found was both more... and less.

The series, like the film documents the adventures of Jubei Kibagami, a legendary Japanese samurai. In the film he is a sleepy character who keeps getting dragged into a conflict between two ninja clans - the Hiruko and the Kimon. Not ordinary ninja either, but half-human creatures with gruesome habits. They are fighting over a dragon stone and the light maiden, whose fate is somehow tangled up with the stone.

When the village that guarded Shigure (the light maiden) is attacked by the Kimon clan she barely escapes with her life, and the dragon stone falls into Jubei's hands. He sets out to return it to her and the adventure begins. Eventually the travelers will include Dakuan, a wizened old 'monk,' and Tsubute, a thief, as they try to stay alive and solve the mysteries of the stone.

Expect a good deal of wild ninja style goings on and the requisite amount of gore and you won't be disappointed. Dialog is adequate, but only Jubei has the spark of wit and charm. I found the art a bit weak as well, colorful, but lacking in the detail that we have come to expect in modern anime. Consider this Ninja Scroll lite. In addition, the series is only slated for thirteen episodes.

On the other hand the music features primary themes by Kitaro, with Peter McEvilley doing the shorter work. An exceptional team for any anime project, and they do a wonderful job on the DVD. On the whole I think this will be a good series to watch, but so far it lacks the intensity of the original. If that is what you were expecting, this will be a disappointment.

So far I've only seen the subtitled version but I have seen the whole series.OK. Its a little differnt than the movie. The style is more cartoony, (it IS a series) not much nudity or hardcore violence. BUT, every episode is still loaded with action (fair bit of blood), plenty of sword fights, cool and unusual characters (and alot of them), with a simple plot (all you want to see is Jubei hackin up demons anyway). I think the series is unreal but dont compare it too much to the movie. As a series its very successfull! The last episode is great. I wont spoil it.

(THIS REVIEW IS FOR ALL 3 VOLUMES OF THIS SERIES) --- Ninja Scroll TV Series was actually pretty good, regardless of some bad initial reviews I've read online. It's still not as good as the OVA, probably the best anime ever for those into violent swordplay dramas, because that was more serious, had better animation and a great overall "style". Granted TV series do not have the same animation budget as the OVAs and movies. I thoroughly liked the subtle humor in this series, it's not overdone or overexaggerated with funny faces, magical teardrops or the running in place B.S., especially the one-liners from Jubei when he laid the smackdown. The other thing I liked was how creative each ninja bad guy was designed. They seemed to have used the Dragonball Z'd template as every episode introduces 1-3 new ninja enemies that each have a certain look and power that talk a lot of garbage and then get their @sses handed to them. The 2nd Volume is kind of lame as they stretch out too little plot (with a couple of stand alone "one off" episodes), it all could have been wrapped up in 2 episodes instead of 4. Plus they changed the world a bit where there's technology present, at least in regards to some of the ninjas and their powers (i.e. guns, tires, electrical currents, butane flame, etc.)
I read somewhere that the creators wanted to distance themselves from the OVA even though they keep the characters of Jubei and the tiny old man with the hat and staff (can't remember his name). Some of the musical score was created by Kitaro, his first for an anime series. They replayed the same 5 themes over and over again, they are all pretty cool except for one of them which is like aggro 80's rock guitar, I don't know if he wrote that piece as it doesn't sound like his usual new age/traditional "Japanese" style work. Overall this series is definitely worth watching at least once, it's different when compared to the OVA, but still good on it's own merits. Maybe rent it first before buying if you are still on the fence. Good stuff !!!

I have never seen Ninja Scroll the movie but i will eventually buy it. This series is a good samurai show. I thought is was going to be Rurouni Kenshin with more blood and gore. But I was partly right. The fighting scenes are really well done and and character creations are interesting and original. The good thing about this series so far is it get straight to the story with no wasteless episodes. But thats the reason why I didn't give it 5 stars is because the story development is weak, and so far two of the episodes are almost identical because they all end of with a big fight scene at the end and all the bad guys want the same thing. But this series so far is really well crafted and fight scenes are excelent, if you like samuari shows or samurai anime this is a must buy for you.

If you expecting the adept writing, design and pacing of the original movie, look no farther! - It isn't here. None of it. But if you just want some cut'm up samurai super hero action adventure...this MIGHT be your bag.

Taking the main characters and basic idea of the movie 'Ninja Scroll', MADHOUSE animation creates a series with very middle of the road effort in hopes of finding a gullible audience. 'Ninja Scroll' the movie succeeds in several ways this series doesnt. 1) The writing set up situations sequence by sequence culminating in a great multifaceted climax/dilemma. There was almost NO flab writing in the movie; each scene had something to say on atleast two levels. 2) The movie established a 'normal' world and then branched into an encroaching, weird, darkness that threatened to take over the 'world'. 3) Characters were caught in moral dilemma and weaving through a tretcherous, thread of a path to save themselves and their world from chaos and destruction. The series has none of that, and is piling up characters with weak reasons and personalities. Freakish villains abound, and die quickly, for no real reason. Is everyone in this world a samurai, super freak or ninja?? Where is feudal Japan??? This probably plays well to the younger crowd who want to see nice drawings and fight scenes. Anyone else, beware. The title doesn't transfer quality from movie to series.

Great stuff here.... Anime and soundtrack is kicking. A must have for an anime collection. Great fight scenes, killer bosses and one hot babe.

I have bought Ninja Scroll the movie, I think it's great. Then I bought Ninja Resurrection thinking it was the sequel to Ninja Scroll, but now I know it's not. My question is, would there be, or maybe there already is a sequel to Ninja Scroll the movie (by movie I mean the anime movie, not the series)?
I like Ninja Scroll, I think it's by far better than Resurrection, it seems to me that Resurrection has no ending, kind of leaves you hanging in mid-air.

i would say four is a little generous its more like a 3 1/2 but i cant do anything about that. I (like everyone eles) have some issues with this: first the sword thing; whats the point of watching if he kills everyone with that sonic sword thing.In the movie ( i counted) he does it 3 times but in the series its all he does. Then theres the new characters every episode; this is annoying because you really cant get into thier personality. There were things i did like however; Jubei is still a badass, there seems to be a plot(which beats to plot), and they kept the old guy who always had some funny trick.

overview:
~too many characters and they die too quickly
~uses sword thing way to much
~the characters that are used are just rip offs from the movie: the glass guy with the moths is almost exactly like the wasp guy, then theres the lady who can spawn the creatures from her skin is a rip off of that snake lady( i could go on with more rip offs)

goods:
~jubei is still the same old character

~ a plot is begining to unwind
~ old guy still kicks ass

overall id say its ok, not the best. But its worth renting (not nessecaily buying worthy), id give it another shot...