There’s no need for explanations. In case you haven’t seen it yet, the fighting is frigging insane, the music is heart-pounding awesome, Norio Wakamoto delivers a TOUR DE FORCE (witness his blood curdingling scream at the 12:00 mark), new characters join the fray, old characters return from the dead (Hondam!), the good guys win and then become enemies once again, setting the table for the second season. Essentially, SG delivered exactly what I was hoping to see. More "hell yeah!"  moments than you can shake a stick at, and schoolgirl-like giggling at the orgy of action. The only downside is that Ichi continued to bleed uselessness to the very end, robbing us of Nouhime joining in the fun with her minigun. Final thoughts to follow.

Whew, it was a long wait for the subs to be released, but I’m not gonna complain, because it was definitely worth the wait, and Sengoku Basara delivers the goods – hyping me (back up) for the announced 2nd season.

While Sanada and Masamune head out to take on the Demon King, a couple different subplots are at play. One is Mitsuhide betrays Nobunaga and plans on killing him at Honnouji (SB needs new people to write their titles, because this subplot was given away before the episode even began). The other subplot is now that Masamune disbanded his old group, Kojuuro starts a new, bigger, better group consisting of everyone in Masamune’s old group and just about everyone in the lands that want to see Nobunaga go down. Kojuuro has proven time and time again that he’s pretty bad-ass for a 2nd banana. Of all the assistant generals, he’s definitely the most capable one (although Sanada may be the best fighter).

Meanwhile, Sanada and Masamune track down Mitsuhide at Honnouji, only to learn that Mitsuhide’s plans to betray Nobunaga has been foiled, and Nobunaga has set them up to be killed or burned alive while fighting each other. It’s not clear why Mitsuhide wants to kill Nobunaga. He makes some references to Nobunaga’s unrelentless bloodthirstiness, but I don’t think he was fighting for the sake of the conquered people. More likely, he’s just a sick bastard.

Back at the real palace, Nouhime’s captured Kasuga during a sloppy assassination attempt. She orders Ichi to kill Kasuga, although Ichi in her completely spineless way refuses to do so. However, before Nouhime can kill Kasuga, Kasuga breaks free and escapes with Ichi (who later decides to just go back. Ichi reminds me of an endangered species that refuses to survive, because it does things like run out into the middle of the highway, or drink acid rain).

Once Kasuga escapes, she finds herself in a spot of trouble and uses the whistle that Sasuke provided for her in a time of need. I assumed it was something like a dog whistle, so I was just as surprised as Kasuga was to see that turn into a jet propelled hang glider. Eventually the prototype runs out of gas and disintegrates sending Kasuga falling not very gracefully, right into Sasuke’s arms. Tsun tsun Kasuga is so cute. But I laughed when Sasuke scoffed at Kasuga thinking that he was going to show up when she blew the whistle. Nobody voices scoffing better than Takehito Koyasu IMO.

Meanwhile, Sanada and Masamue are engaged in a pretty good fight, with neither side getting a clear edge, although Mitsuhide is perversely enjoying the pain he’s enduring from the fight. However, after a while, the little monkey boy Ranmaru jumps into the fray out of pity for Mitsuhide and then quickly gets his ass handed to him by Masamune. Masamue, however, decides to let the boy survive, because well, heroes don’t kill children.

Finally, Kojuuro arrives to take Mitsuhide on and let Sanada and Masamune track down and defeat Nobunaga. I wonder what it says about Sanada and Masamue that they weren’t really making a dent Mitsuhide, but now Kojuuro is tasked with taking him down mano a mano. But I guess Mitsuhide’s tired at this point, so I won’t think too much about it. Meanwhile, Nouhine ostensibly kills a pathetic Ichi (this would be much deserved, considering how useless Ichi has been to this point), but since the gunshot takes place while the camera’s panned away, I suppose Ichi’s not really dead.

Pretty good action this time around, I love the glowing lights, and Mitsuhide’s green’s pretty sweet, but this was merely an appetizer. The main course is what we’ve been waiting all season for.

If I wanted to be harsh on the show, I could criticize it for basically taking 2 major battles (the Masamune-Sanada battle in the first 2 episodes and the imminent showdown with the Demon King) and stretching it out with some filler over 12 episodes. But because I like the show, I’m not going to go down that path. Instead, I give it credit for an intense episode 9, in which both Takeda and Shingen met their demise in effects-free and short but intense battles. And for doing a masterful job getting Sanada back on the GAR horse – both figuratively and literally – and amping us up for what promises to be an epically entertaining showdown with the Demon King and his crew.

Episode 9

You know it promises to be an intense episode when it leads off with an ominous choir and Nobunaga brutally slicing his opponent in half, then shooting him in the head. But I can’t help but think that wielding a shotgun brings down his GAR-ness though. It’s not really a fair fight when everyone else is brandishing swords. Then again, why are he and his minions the only ones with access to guns?

While Nobunaga’s carving a path through Kyushuu, his minions are offing the major leaders one by one. Mitsuhide quickly disposes of the useless pip-squeak Tokugawa, who managed to finagle ZERO useful fighting scenes (but plenty of tears) in his various appearances. Meanwhile, Nouhime and her well-concealed mini-gun sneak through Kenshin’s defenses, and she and the mute monkeyboy archer take down Kenshin as he sacrifices himself to save Kasuga from the line of fire. This was the first time we got to see Kenshin get some action, and it’s a shame it ended so quickly. He could’ve been cool. Instead, he just ended up being sort of incomplete.

On a separate note, I didn’t know where to fit in this comment, so I’ll just say it here, but it’s a little weird that Shingen and Sasuke keep referring to two characters we’ve never seen – Motochika and Chosokabe – as if they’re pretty big players in the game. I wonder if they’ll ever make an appearance.

Meanwhile, after killing Tokugawa, Mitsuhide sabotages a dam, forcing Takeda to defend himself and protect the dam at the same time. But once Mitsuhide gets the dam to break (and this should’ve been a foregone conclusion since these guys can shoot beams of light), he uses the split second break in Takeda’s focus to stab him in the shoulder and send him hurdling down with the onrushing water. One episode, three deaths* (*you could’ve pretty much guessed that Takeda and Shingen wouldn’t die). Short battles, but still pretty damn intense.

Episode 10

Your prototypical, rally the troops and get them fired up episode. Except you can swap those two words "rally" and "fired." Because Masamune ends up firing his troops, and instead rallying himself and Sanada for the big showdown.

The episode starts off with Mitsuhide taking both Masamune and Kojuuro’s best shots and riding off into the sunset, swaying like a drunk fiend. Give Mitsuhide some credit, as he’s establishing himself as one of the more unhinged, creepier villains in recent memory. Plus, everytime he talks to Nobunaga, I half expect him to get his head knocked off for being such a crazy bastard. Meanwhile, Sasuke smacks some sense into Kasuga, who’s pitying her inability to do anything besides pump out ninjagasms. I imagine she’ll get a chance to go head to head with Nouhime in the final battle, but I’d be more confident if it was Sasuke fighting that battle.

When Masamune’s talking about partying, I get the sense that he’s not talking about a pity party. And if it wasn’t clear, he makes it so to Sanada, who’s depressed and paralyzed over Takeda’s injury. I mean it was just a stab in the shoulder. I think Takeda’s tougher than Shingen, and if Shingen survived 3 gunshots and an arrow to the leg, I’m pretty confident Takeda will be on his feet in no time. He does look a little freaky without his large headdress on. Much less intimidating.

But by the end of the episode, Sanada is inspired, and Masamune has his list of party of guests and lighting effects to boot. I’ve been waiting 10 episodes for the ball-to-the-walls action Sengoku Basara brought us earlier in the season. So let’s get this party started baby!

Did Sengoku Basara’s fantastic first couple episodes raise our expectations a too high? There hasn’t been a really good fight in this show since episode 2. And it seems like they’re using the b-animation team in recent episodes. While I find the backstory to be entertaining, when the show ends, if I looked back, there’s a very good chance that I’d watch episodes 1 and 2, and skip everything until maybe 9 or so (judging by the title). It seems like one of those shows that likely blasted their budget for the first and last couple episodes, and is trying to cheese their way through the stuff in between. So I kinda want to press the fast forward button to get to the good stuff.

The Miyoshi Triumvirate looked much cooler than they actually were. If I ever cosplayed – which I don’t think I ever would – I think I would dress up in samurai gear with full face mask. The one art direction piece I didn’t like was being able to see their faces around the eyes. I think it would’ve looked much cooler if the eye holes were smaller, or if there were maybe a black border around them to make them look less human. But anyway, Kojuuro squares off against the triumvirate, and even with poison wafting around, and no flaming ball transformations, he easily disposes of the three and heads forward to confront Matsunaga.

Meanwhile Sanada and Sasuke arrive, prepped like it’s the first day of school, to give Kojuuro a helping hand. While all of them are off doing their thing Takeda and Masamune have a heart to heart. We learn an interesting thing tidbit about Matsunaga during their conversation though. Apparently, he was the only one that Nobunaga failed or chose not to kill in a previous battle. I’m sure there was interesting thought here, but it doesn’t really go anywhere.

Sanada catches up to Kojuuro and offers Matsunaga the Takeda clan’s family jewels – debunking Matsunaga’s claims that the Takeda clan is merely using the Nobunaga clan for gain. And while Takeda does throw down a high stakes duel with Masamune after the battle with Nobunaga, that was more keeping with the competitive spirit between GAR men, than wussy backstabbing which Matsunaga seems to be fond of. Speaking of which, rather than take on Kojuuro’s challenge, Matsunaga tries to ambush them with a blast of explosives, trying to kill the hostages and then tossing some literal cannon fodder at Sanada and Kojuuro.

Of course, all of that is no match for either Sanada and Kojuuro, who gets his health revived by Sasuke’s antidote bomb. I know Sengoku Basara isn’t an RPG, but that part just felt very RPG-ish. Kojuuro then proceeds to (disappointingly) destroy Matsunaga with one fireball charge. Again, another weak fight. For someone who survived an attack against the Demon King, I would’ve expected him to put up a much better fight than to just have some randomly placed explosives go off, and then getting one-hit killed. In the end, Kojuuro gets his men back (having survived the bomb blasts like true gangsters), and everyone is happy.

Next week, it looks like there’s a showdown between Nouhime and Kenshin (and Kasuga the busty ninja), as well as Mitsuhide and Takeda. On paper, it should be really good stuff. But I’ll withhold judgment until I see it. I haven’t played this game, so I have no idea what comes next, but either next week’s title: The Tiger of Kai dies at Midaigawa is blatantly spoiling, or one big red herring. It’s a plausible turn of events, what with all the leadership lessons Takeda’s been pounding into Sanada, but I’d be sort of shocked to see it actually happen. I can’t imagine them fighting Nobunaga without the whole gang.

Remarkably little happened during this episode. Both action-wise and story-wise, but for some reason it amped me up for the next episode moreso than the last few episodes have. Maybe it’s because I get the sense that Matsunaga and his shinigami triumvirate could be the first worthy enemies for Kojuuro and Sanada to go all out on (I never really thought Hondam or Azai would bring out the best in Sanada and Masamune). Or maybe it’s because I’m just getting antsy for some balls to the wall action.

The episode starts off with Kenshin rallying his healthy troops back to protect his homeland and Kasuga fawning over Kenshin’s praise. She leaves his side to investigate some suspicious activity and finds the always hilarious Sasuke, fielding his standard set of fantastic one-liners and sarcastic comebacks. Sasuke comes with a message for Kasuga to not leave Kenshin’s side no matter, even if it means disobeying orders, in order to prepare for a possible Nobunaga counterattack. While all the other big players have good right hand men, Kenshin’s the only one without backup and left exposed.

Meanwhile, a new character, Matsunaga comes into play, as he takes advantage of Masamune and Shingen’s weakened state and takes a few of Masamune’s troops hostage, using a hilarious feudal Japan-era Bob-omb, demanding Masamune’s swords and Takeda’s special armor for ransom.

Masamune awakes in time to over hear the conversation and plans to head off to face Matsunaga in order to get his men back. Kojuuru, showing that he’s no yes man, faces off against Masamune, not allowing him to go ahead with his reckless rescue plan in his weakened state. They engaged in a short, uremarkable battle, but despite the lack of over-the-top action, I thought it was one of the more intense fights in recent memory. I think this is the first time we’ve seen Kojuuro really fight. And while taking out an injured Masamune doesn’t show much for his fighting skills, going through with the fight and not taking it easy on his master, was an impressive display of character. After defeating Masamune, Kojuuro takes off for Matsunaga on his own, taking Masamune’s swords with him (likely for fighting, not for ransom).

This leads to a hilarious scene in which Sanada struggles to explain everything that had happened and why he allowed Kojuuro to go off on his own, to Takeda, who’s seen everything. Let’s just say while Sanada’s reasons weren’t bad, Shingen wasn’t thrilled with Sanada’s lack of initiative and general pussyfooting. Evidence?

An f-ing epic uppercut that even Manny Pacquiao would be proud of. It seems Takeda’s wise words to Sanada have been falling on deaf ears, and he implores Sanada to take the lead and go help Kojuuro bring back his comrades. Act as a true hero would.

Like I mentioned earlier, we get a glimpse of Matsunaga’s shinigami warriors, and I think we’re in for a damn good battle in the next episode. Masks always raise the likelihood of epic battles.

Rule #2: if you’re a regular soldier without a gun or superpowers, you might as well stay home, lest you get swept up in one of the inevitable maelstroms.

Not only did Nagamasa die ingloriously, he finds out that it was all a setup – the relationship, the marriage with Nobunaga’s sister Ichi – all fiendishly plotted to weaken his clan’s military might. Admittedly, Ichi did fall in love with Nagamasa, and while things may not have gone exactly to plan because of that, let it be known that she didn’t do anything to save Nagamasa in the end. Of course a lot of that has to do with the guro-loving Mitsuhide. Who we finally got to see in action, albeit briefly, in a weak, halfhearted fight with an injured Masamune.

Elsewhere, Hondam has been won over by Sanada’s fighting skills (Sanada’s quite a popular guy) and challenges him to a duel. Why Tokugawa let him do that in the middle of a major battle that they were losing – I don’t know. Again, the fight between Sanada and Hondam was short and half-hearted. No new tricks, nothing too over the top. It felt as though Production IG realized they needed to include some action, but wanted to pull punches on all the battles. At least we got a couple nice insert songs.

We do finally get to see Kouhime in her dazzlingly killer glory. Again, a short battle in which she eliminates a few of Tokugawa’s soldiers and then kills off Hondam, but this was the over the top action I’ve come to expect from Sengoku Basara. When she tossed away her pistols, I was thinking why would she do that just to pull out a sword? But lo and behold there was no sword. And instead, out from the realms of her dress, she pulls out a freaking minigun and starts gunning down everyone. Die quickly? Damn straight. Then she kills Hondam with a land nuke or something. Craziness. Although, considering all the major fighters can fly, explode in balls of flames and toss hundreds of soldiers at a time, I’m sort of disappointed to see them get gunned down so easily. Are you telling me Masamune couldn’t have blew those rifleman away in a tornado of swords?

With Azai gone and Tokugawa heavily weakened, not to mention losses to Kenshin, Masamune and Takeda’s troops, Nobunaga pulls the reigns and leaves the field, I guess to plan his next move. Ultimately setting up the final alliances between Kenshin, Takeda, Tokugawa (why would anyone want his help, he hasn’t done a thing?) and Masamune. It also looks like the next episode or two will be spent rounding up the final 2 players of the game, Mouri and Chousokabe.

Back at the skull cave, Mitsuhide gets censured and threatened for deviating from the plan and acting out on his own. It was great to see Nobunaga drinking sake from one of the many skulls around him. I wouldn’t have expected any less. Too bad all the blood was cleaned off of it thoguh. Everytime I start taking SB a little too seriously, they’re able to go over the top with something to make stop doing so. Mitsuhide proves that he’s sick in the head to the very end, getting some sort of strange pleasure from Nobunaga’s threat. I do hope he does get off’d by Nobunaga. I’d like to see him do something really evil, something really violent.

All in all, this was sort of a weird episode. I don’t think it was directed well. It was all over the place. From the battlefield fights, to awkwardly-timed duel challenges, to Hondam’s demise, Masamune’s retreat and Tokugawa’s non-stop crying – there were too many random things happening. In many ways they’re still setting up for the final battle. But it seems like they’re tossing in just enough action to whet the appetite. I imagine we have about 3 more episodes of exposition and halfhearted battles, which isn’t ideal, but something I can forgive if they go absolutely over the top and pull out all sorts of new tricks for the last couple episodes and battles.

Back to the action in this episode. Unfortunately, there’s no new tricks this time around – unless you count Honda the samurai Gundam – but there’s plenty of old favorites to enjoy. And the wait continues for both Kenshin and Nobunaga to get in the action.

Takeda’s last ditch effort to get Tokugawa to renounce his alliance with Nobunaga fails, and thus after a couple episodes of exposition, the battle begins. On one side is Takeda and Kenshin. On the other is Tokugawa, who (falsely) believes Nobunaga will support him with some literal firepower. And somewhere in between is Masamune, who’s “alliance” with Takeda and Kenshin only exists in that they’re all trying to kill Nobunaga, and Azai, the sad sack husband of the wet blanket, who’s clearly going to get screwed over by Nobunaga regardless of what he ends up dong.

I lol’d at Hondam’s Gundam launch sequence, and then Kenshin’s “first squadron” leader immediately getting Patrick Corlasaur’d. Where’s Kati? These little comedic bits really make Segoku Basara that much more amusing.

The battles aren’t as nicely animated as some of the battles in the first couple episodes, but they’re still very well done. Lots of movement, lots of style and a real good sense of brutality and epic-ness. Whether it’s Sanada becoming a red fiery ball, or Takeda creating tornados, even when it feels a little familiar, it’s still a blast to watch. I guess they’ll never get to the point of tossing whole galaxies at each other, but I at least want to see Nobunaga eventually blast a mountain in half and destroy an enemy battalion by tossing it onto the battlefield. They’ve whetted my appetite for destruction, now I want more, more, MOAR!

While Takeda, Sanada and Kenshin’s troops (unfortunately no in-battle Kasuga ninjagasm) take on Tokugawa’s forces, Masamune finds himself in a showdown with Azai, who actually when not getting bitched around by Nobunaga or put in crap situations by his dojikko wife, turns out to be a pretty good fighter. However, their fight takes a turn for the dour when Nobunaga shows up with his own personal vanguard of evil music, thunder, lightning and dark, foreboding clouds. His right hand man, Mitsuhide has redirected the riflemen from supporting Tokugawa to taking out Masamune. However, that requires them to shoot past or through Azai. Interestingly, Nobunaga is not pleased with Mitsuhide’s independent streak. Whether it’s because Nobunaga has some honor and isn’t keen to the idea of double-crossing Azai, or whether he just doesn’t like subordinates not following his orders, is up for debate. The episode ends with Azai getting shot in the head and a cut away before we can see what happened to Masamune (definitely alive) or Kojuurou (possible death?).

Couple quick thoughts on a couple scenes I thought felt off.

First scene: Sanada sees the face of the enemy – and the humanity behind it – and freezes. They’ve been pointing towards Sanada becoming a more thoughtful character vs. the hothead he is right now – what with him having the talks beatings from Takeda. But I find it hard to believe that a battle-tested warrior like Sanada would freeze at a moment like that. There’s a time for reflection. It’s not on the battlefield. Freezing was a rookie move. And definitely not what I’d expect from Sanada. Score one for misplaced drama.

Second scene: the final scene. It seemed too heavy handed, what with the slow motion blood splatter, etc. We know Nobunaga’s not a good guy. And Azai seemed destined to become Nobunaga mincemeat, so Azai getting shot in the head was no surprise. No need to over-dramatize it. The show’s better when it’s not taking itself too seriously.

There were zero battles in this episode, unless you count Takeda’s punching of Sanada or Nobunaga’s quick humiliation of Azai, but I still enjoyed this episode quite a bit, because of the buildup. Not every episode can break new barriers of GAR, but that’s ok, as long as the story’s moving to a conflict or resolution. And compared to the last episode, I thought the writers did a better job of ratcheting up the pressure and drawing the lines of battle we’ll expect to see in the coming episodes.

What’s the old saying? You can tell the quality of the man by the woman at his side? In that case, Azai is destined to be a big chump, because his wife – Nobunaga’s sister, is a powerless, self-pitying crybaby… who conveniently goes out to battles to… I don’t know… what’s her purpose? Besides to eventually become a hostage? But before that, Azai receives a visit from my second favorite ninja, Sasuke, who brings an offer for an alliance. Azai refuses, since Nobunaga’s his brother-in-law, but is perturbed when Sasuke reveals that Nobunaga is planning to attack a mutual ally.

Meanwhile, Kasuga’s doing the same for Kenshin, bringing olive branches and offerings of semi-nudity. I’m sure she’s a great ninja, but seeing her become flustered when Sanada lets her in on what Sasuke’s been saying about their “relationship,” and seeing her expression of shock when Takeda & Sanada are engaged in their punching game, was pretty endearing. She’s such a cute voluptuous ninja. I know that’s an oxymoron, but it’s true.

Sanada and Sasuke later share a heart-to-heart. While Sasuke enlightens Sanada on the wiles of women, Sanada reveals that he’s become GAR for Masamune. In the subsequent scene we learn that Masamune feels the same. Awww. GAR flags have been triggered.

Meanwhile, out in the battlefield, Azai intercepts Mitsuhide, who was leading the attack on their ally, the Asakura clan (not to be confused with the ASAHAKURA or ACHAKURA clans, n~yoron), and demands an explanation. Mitsuhide takes both Azai and his useless wife back to Nobunaga, so that Norio Wakamoto can finally get some lines to speak. I don’t know what sort of relationship Azai thought he had with Nobunaga, but apparently he was gravely mistaken about how close they were. Actually, he was mistaken about how close Nobunaga was with his sister, because he doesn’t hesitate to put a shotgun to her head, forcing Azai to lead the attack on their former allies. Hell, what do you expect from a guy who sits on a throne of skulls and blood, with evil villain music playing in the background? It’s actually a pretty comical scene. Nobuaga’s evil reaches levels of high hilarity. I can’t wait to see him fight.

Other than that, we see Kenshin and Takeda join arms, and glimpses of a teenaged-Tokugawa and his feudal era, Gundam negative-zero model, who’ll likely be the first major battle on the way to the showdown with Nobunaga. On a completely separate note, I like that there’s these huge armies out on the battlefields, really, with the only purpose of being mowed down by the major characters. GAR has an exponential correlation with the number of enemies you take out. Seems like Production I.G. is well aware of this adage.

Next week should be good. It’s time to get back to the action.

After a rousing battle or two, I like to lean back, kick my feet up and enjoy some delicious Sengoku BASARA Anime Label Beer. No other beer has the flavorful mix of hops, barley and GAR. It tastes great, is less filling and increases the likelihood of bar brawls by 50%! Mmm, mmm good.

In other news, we get a break from a lot of the mind-blowing, adrenaline-racing action that so entertained us in the first two episodes. In its place is a lot of exposition with many proper nouns that I didn’t quite catch. But basically, Keiji, the dude with the monkey is visiting the various generals and apparently trying to build alliances to take down Nobunaga. He’s a fairly bland, but likeable character. Although his monkey is much more of a hoot. I feel like it should know Kung Fu though (yeah, I realize it’s a Japanese monkey, but regardless).

His first visit with Kenshin goes pretty well, and there’s a pretty amusing scene where Keiji comments on Kasuga’s weird habit of ninjagasming, but otherwise, it was mostly Kenshin talking. We know what Sanada, Masamune and Takeda can do, but I’m still waiting to see this Kenshin guy fight. Does he actually harm people, or just have them submit amidst moans of ecstasy?

Keiji then visits Masamune, who’s either brooding or gaining the courage to face Nobunaga. Whether he’s irked by his fear, or more likely, just a prickly person, Masamune’s much less keen to Keiji’s advances, and instead fights him. Keichi holds his own for a while, but is eventually defeated pretty handily. The force pull sword grab was pretty cool, but otherwise it was a very tame battle. Nothing like we’ve seen before. Clearly, Production I.G. is saving their money for animating some of the more bombastic fight scenes to follow.

Meanwhile, we see very little of Takeda and Sanada in this episode. Although I always get a chuckle of their Oyakata-sama! *PUNCH* routine. I also got a kick of Sarutobi catching up with Kasuga and giving her grief over Kenshin and Keichi’s friendliness. I gotta say, I’ve enjoyed just about every role that Takehito Koyasu has done, ever since I heard him as Shark Fujishiro, one of the coolest tertiary characters ever. He’s got a knack and playing that “I know I’m better than you” role, and sounding perfect in it. Actually, now that I think about it, I think he would’ve been the perfect Roy Mustang 2009. His voice has just the right mix of GARness and arrogance.

If the last couple episodes took your breath away, this was a breather. Not a great episode, but necessary to set up the story – even though it’s not much of a story. You need the quiet moments to truly appreciate the loud moments. But I’m looking forward to this show getting back to doing what it does best: getting serious about kicking some ass!

This show is too damn GAR to not write about. So consider this my second pickup for the season.

Is it ironic that the only samurai who gets the girl is the one voiced by a woman?

I love deredere ninjas. I didn’t know this before, but now I do. Especially when they’re so easy to please. Ninjagasms mmm.

I’m not familiar with the game, nor with the history of the Sengoku period so forgive any ignorance you may read (although I got a kick in learning that most of these samurais were real samurais, and checking their Wikipedia pages to learn about them. Who says you can’t learn something from anime?).

Masamune (or Washizu as I like to think of him) is after some guy who looks like one of the eunuchs from Code Geass and storms the field where they’re traveling in true GAR fashion – by knocking hundreds on soldiers into the air as he barrels through, riding on his trust steed. Just as he’s preparing to kill the eunuch-like coward, Sanabe (or Keiichi as I like to think of him) shows up to stop him and to challenge him to another duel. Hearts and emotions have been stirred by their last honorable battle.

The lack of a backstory made it hard for me to figure out exactly what was going on. Who the eunuch was, why Masamune was out to kill him and why the Takeba clan apparently didn’t want that to happen. But I’m willing to forgive it, because the action was so over the top. I loved the zoom shot through the enemy crowds to show Masamune riding towards them with his typical cocky grin on his face. And the way he dispatched those petty soldiers, just tossing them into the air like little muppets, is the way I expect to see all fighters fight. The unique art they used during the Masamue/Sanabe battle was probably a shortcut to save some animation costs, but it still worked. It mixed up the visual style and gave the action a nice, stylistic flair.

Of course, not to be outdone, Takeda amps up the GAR level even further by scaling a castle, while riding two horses in standing position. And then to show the next trick up his sleeve, when he confronts Hojo, and Hojo unleashes a super-powered ninja assassin, Takeda stands there waiting until the assassin is a millimeter from stabbing him in the eye, before reacting and defending him off. I used to do Karate and they taught us to wait until the last possible second before blocking or countering, so that the other side didn’t have time to counter the counter, but this was just another fricking level man! Just unbelievable. Then Takeda proceeds to punch the assassin a 100 feet into the air, and take down Hojo and his ancestral powers in a fireball of passion. The action is so over the top it cracks me up and pumps me up all at the same time.

I love deredere ninjas, but dark haired ninjas with butterfly tattoos on their thigh, and skills with a pistol are pretty damn sexy too.

Not content to merely allow Masamune, Sanabe and Takeba their GAR glory, the villain, Nobunaga shows up and displays his level of GAR merely by standing on top of a ledge, with a foreboding soundtrack in the background and hellish swirls of clouds above him. He does not speak. And he only moves to shoot the eunuch dead with a shotgun. This merely sets up for the next time we see him, in which having Norio Wakamoto simply speak, could lead to whole new levels of GAR unseen.

This show is so stylish and so unapologetically over the top, it’s difficult not to love. You don’t even realize whether there’s a story or not, because there’s so much happening.  I also like that the show isn’t too serious and can toss in some funnier moments. And finally, I love how they’re producing and animating this show. For a show that’s probably been like 75% action, I’m very impressed at the level of detail they’ve been putting into it. Hell, even the DVD promos are GAR!