Pretty cool battle episode. Jack comes across several burnt villages and must find the culprits.
As the other reviewer mentioned, this episode is particularly nice because it raises stakes a fair bit and we find it takes Jack multiple tries to beat his enemies, which makes it more tense than usual.
Loved this episode. Was it just me or were at least a couple scenes throwing off a very 300 vibe?
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2020-02-07T14:59:56Z
[8.7/10] Such a cool, stylized episode. I think my favorite part is the first act. Even though we’re only eighteen episodes in, there’s a kinda sorta problem with Samurai Jack -- Jack seems utterly unstoppable. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. There’s plenty of superheroes who seem undaunted by pretty much anything and you can still tell great stories about them. But it can also feel like the stakes aren’t particularly high when Jack comes across the latest crop of robots whom he slices through like a magic sword through hot butter.
So I like the way this episode builds up its robotic enemies and makes them a legitimate threat. Cross-cutting between the tactile nature of their construction -- the bullets and chains and other weapons being built into them -- with scenes of the devastation they’ve caused is masterful. Showing the audience both the tools at these baddies’ disposal while also showing how they’ve decimated towns, gives us both cause and effect without actually revealing the ultra-bots before Jack has to face them in person. It really sells them as a different sort of challenge for our hero without giving them away.
And yet, when the show does reveal them, it’s really cool. It’s weird to say, but I like how quickly Jack loses to them. He’s frankly lucky to get away with his life. The way they emerge from those baskets, toss explosives and throwing stars at him, until he has no choice but to run and ride also makes them feel like a true risk to Jack’s health and well being that he needs help to be able to defeat.
The middle portion is less availing, but still good. Jack runs into a Nutty Professor type who reveals that he built the Ultra-Robots, watched as they were infused with and powered by Aku’s evil essence, and that he now wants to stop them after Aku used them to destroy his own village. It’s some extra backstory that isn’t particularly necessary, but the character himself is useful to give Jack an upgrade.
It is, admittedly, very cool to see Jack using a giant robot arm. His fight with the Ultra-Robots is beautifully realized as usual, with a nice focus on smaller close-ups of footsteps in the sand or knife plunging into metal, contrasted with wider shots of the red death the Ultra-Robots mean to inflict. But the fight also has more meaning because we’ve seen change over time, as Jack lost to these baddies, found a resource to give him a leg up, and is back to his usual badassery thereafter.
But what elevates this episode is what comes next. When Jack’s cybernetic arm runs out of power, and he has to face the last remaining Ultra-Robot, he pleas to the heavens. From there, in a beautiful impressionistic sequence, forgers from his culture’s past imbue him with the power to defeat these foes, based on his worthiness and the honorableness of his quest. It’s a powerful return to the themes of the series, in which technology falters in the face of faith, or soul, or fighting spirit, or whatever else you want to call it.
Oh, and in all this spiritual glory, it also has a pretty damned amusing running joke about high fives.
Overall, this is a truly great outing for the series, which style out the wazoo, and interesting spiritual message, and a pack of robots who are made more threatening and dangerous than the average goons that Jack usually faces.