Samurai Jack

Plot and characters

Long ago in a distant land, I, Aku, the shape-shifting Master of Darkness, unleashed an unspeakable evil! But a foolish samurai warrior wielding a magic sword stepped forth to oppose me. Before the final blow was struck, I tore open a portal in time and flung him into the future, where my evil is law! Now the fool seeks to return to the past, and undo the future that is Aku!

Samurai Jack tells the story of a young prince (voiced by Phil LaMarr) from feudal Japan, whose father (Sab Shimono/Keone Young) acquired a magical katana that he used to defeat and seal the shape-shifting demonic wizard Aku (Mako Iwamatsu/Greg Baldwin). After the return of Aku, the Emperor tasked his wife to initiate a plan to send his son to travel the world and train his mind and body before returning years later to Japan as an adult. After taking his father's katana, the prince challenges Aku to a duel and defeats him. But Aku creates a time portal before the prince can deal the final blow, sending his opponent into the distant future with anticipation that he would be able to amass sufficient power to deal with the samurai by that time.

The prince arrives in a dystopian, retro-futuristic Earth ruled by Aku and filled with his robot minions and a large number of alien immigrant races of various appearances; fortunately, his world travel and training allow him to adapt to his new environment with relatively little trauma. The first people he encounters in the future call him "Jack" as a form of slang, which he adopts as his name (his true given name is never mentioned in the series). Standard episodes follow Jack's search for a way to travel back to his own time, where he hopes to stop Aku before these events come to pass. The cartoon depicts Jack's quest to find a time portal, while constantly facing obstacles set by Aku in a classic battle of good vs. evil. Typically, each time Jack believes he has reached the end of his quest, something causes him to miss his chance.

In one attempt, Jack locates a stable portal to the past, but the guardian of the portal (Kevin Michael Richardson) defeats him after a long but noticeably mismatched battle. The guardian is about to crush Jack when the portal starts to flicker and glow, seemingly giving the guardian a message: the guardian has a giant pterodactyl take the unconscious Jack away. After Jack leaves, the guardian states that it is not yet time for him to return to the past and an image of what is implied to be an older Jack is seen in the portal, indicating that Jack is predestined to succeed, but it will take years for him to do so.

Season 5, in an apparent allusion to the real-world gap in time between it and season 4, is set 50 years after the events of the original series. In this revival series, Jack has become more despondent and weary, and is now mentally and emotionally unstable as a result of the decades spent trapped in the future, suffering from depression and post-traumatic stress while being haunted by warped visions of himself, his family and an enigmatic warrior on horseback; he is unable to return to his own era due to Aku having destroyed the remaining time portals on Earth, and cannot biologically age as an after-effect of his initial transportation to the future. Jack is also shown in a flashback to have lost his trademark katana in combat, forcing him to rely on acquiring weapons from his opponents until they wear out or lose their usefulness. In a case of dramatic irony, Aku is implied to be unaware of this fact, and has become apathetic towards his conflict with Jack. This season is more continuity-heavy as well, with the first few episodes detailing a series of battles between Jack and the Daughters of Aku, a group of seven siblings trained since childhood to hunt down and kill the samurai.

Episodes range from dark and epic to light-hearted and comical, and often contain little dialogue in the original series. Stories instead rely on the original and revival series' highly detailed, outline-free, masking-based animation, as well as its cinematic style and pacing. Many battle scenes in the original and revival series are reminiscent of samurai films, and since Jack's robot enemies bleed out oil or electricity and his monster and alien foes bleed out slime or goo in the revival series, the action of these films can be exhibited while avoiding censorship for blood and violence in the original series (human blood is shown being spilt on numerous occasions in the revival series, due to its later time slot accommodating for more mature content).

Setting

Samurai Jack takes place in a future Earth where science and technology have developed far beyond what is available in the present day, and in some ways resembles magic on its own. However, despite scientific advances, the future is decidedly dystopian — for example, in one episode, the mafia profits greatly from the sale of simple water. The distribution of technology is also very uneven, with some areas having advanced megacities while others resemble ancient to industrial conditions such as Ancient Greece, medieval Europe, the Middle East, Victorian-era England, 1920s Chicago, and more. Aliens, bounty hunters, and robots as well are plentiful and always ready for a fight. The leader of this society is Aku, who has held the world in a grip of terror for countless years. Aku often confronts Jack in various disguises in efforts to either kill Jack or at the very least prevent him from being able to return to the past. While he fails to kill Jack on these occasions, his attempts to thwart Jack's attempts to return to his original time are successful either through his direct actions or by causing some peril that forces Jack to give up his chance at returning home, thus allowing the series to continue. It is shown that the current generation of children in the world which Aku rules over is slowly losing their fear of the demon due to the exploits of Jack, who has become a symbol of hope to them. On his travels, Jack encounters a wandering Scotsman (voiced by John DiMaggio), who carries a magic sword of his own and has had one leg replaced by a machine gun. The two men form a friendship and develop respect for one another, though Jack's reticence contrasts sharply with the Scotsman's boisterous manner. The Scotsman has considerable skill with his sword; consequently, the two pose a formidable threat to the enemies they face together.

While the setting is distinctly retro-futuristic and technological, instances of mythology and supernatural events do occur. Mythologies, like Valhalla, as well as even supernatural forces, such as demonic enemies, make regular appearances, yet do not seem to stand out among the technologically-advanced inhabitants. Aku himself is supernatural, as is Jack's sword.

Stories take place in a variety of locations. Ranging from beautiful wilderness to futuristic or even dystopian cities, there is often a stark contrast made between the industrial world and the natural world.

Development

Samurai Jack was created by Genndy Tartakovsky as a follow-up to his successful series Dexter's Laboratory. He intended to develop a series "that is cinematic in scope and that incorporates action, humor, and intricate artistry". Cartoon Network executive Mike Lazzo recalled Tartakovsky pitching him the series: "He said, 'Hey, remember David Carradine in Kung Fu? Wasn't that cool?' and I was like, 'Yeah, that's really cool.' That was literally the pitch."

Influences and design

Tartakovsky has acknowledged taking some of his thematic inspiration from Frank Miller's comic book series Ronin, including the premise of a master-less samurai warrior thrown into a dystopic future in order to battle a shape-shifting demon. Similarly, the episode "Jack and the Spartans" was specifically inspired by Miller's graphic novel 300 that retold the Battle of Thermopylae.

Broadcast

The network announced the series' launch at a press conference on February 21, 2001. Weeks leading up to the series were accompanied by a sweepstakes giveaway sponsored by AOL in which the grand prize was a trip for four to Japan. The promotion also included sneak peeks of Samurai Jack, behind-the-scenes model sheets, as well as exclusive Cartoon Orbit cToons. Samurai Jack officially debuted on Cartoon Network on August 10, 2001, with the three-part special "The Beginning". The premiere received high praise, including four award nominations, as well as was released as a standalone VHS and DVD on March 19, 2002. Cartoon Network ordered 52 episodes of Samurai Jack, which were aired as 4 seasons of 13 episodes each, as a primetime member of the Cartoon Cartoon Fridays programming block. The final episode aired on September 25, 2004.

Reruns had frequently been shown on Cartoon Network's sister channel, Boomerang, from August 3, 2009, until December 3, 2011, and again from June 3, 2012, until June 1, 2014. Later, the series moved to Adult Swim's Toonami block for reruns on February 1, 2014. It was removed on Adult Swim's block on January 25, 2015.

Revival

On December 2, 2015, Adult Swim announced that it would be airing a new season of Samurai Jack on its Toonami programming block, March 11, 2017. The series is once again being produced at Cartoon Network Studios with Tartakovsky as executive producer. The new season has more mature elements and a more cohesive story, concluding the series. The story takes place fifty years after Jack's arrival in the future, though he has not aged as a side-effect of his time-travel. Meanwhile, followers of Aku begin training a group of seven female assassins to finally kill him.

Critical reception

In 2004, British broadcaster Channel 4 ran a poll of the 100 greatest cartoons of all time, in which Samurai Jack achieved the 42nd position. The show was ranked 11th by IGN for its Top 25 Primetime Animated Series of All Time list in 2006. IGN also ranked the show 43rd in its Top 100 Animated Series list in 2009.

Matt Zoller Seitz, a film critic for RogerEbert.com and television critic for Vulture, considers Samurai Jack, along with Tartakovsky's Star Wars: Clone Wars, to be a masterwork and one of the greatest American animated shows on television, mainly for its visual style:

[A]lthough Tartakovsky is a good storyteller, in a silent-movie sort of way—expressing what’s happening moment-to-moment through picture and sound rather than in dialogue—I never watched either of these programs for their plots, and I don’t re-watch them for narrative, either. I re-watch them for the same reason that I visit art museums, attend live concerts, and pause during journeys from point A to point B in New York to watch dancers, acrobats, or street musicians: because I appreciate virtuosity for its own sake. And that’s what Tartakovsky’s Clone Wars and Samurai Jack give you, scene for scene and shot for shot .... [T]he plot was never the point. It was always about the visual music that Tartakovsky, his designers, and his animators created onscreen.

Samurai Jack would later be included in Seitz and Alan Sepinwall's 2016 book TV (The Book) as an honorable mention following the 100 greatest television series of all time.

Legacy and influence

The distinctive style of Samurai Jack is what drew Lucasfilm to recruit Tartakovsky for the Star Wars: Clone Wars animated series. Much of the signature cinematic style of Samurai Jack is present in Clone Wars, such as lightning-fast combat, extended sequences without dialogue, explosions, epic vistas, etc. Samurai Jack also remains a popular subject with Cartoon Network animators and was referenced and parodied in the series Duck Dodgers and Dexter's Laboratory.

Reviewers of the 3D animated feature film Kung Fu Panda (DreamWorks Animation) have noted that the stylized 2D opening sequence is either inspired by or an homage to Samurai Jack.

Jack later made a cameo on the Uncle Grandpa episode "Pizza Eve".

Home video releases

Like other previous Cartoon Network shows, Samurai Jack DVDs were released by Warner Home Video between 2002 and 2007. The DVDs include episode numbers in Roman numerals as they appear at the end of each episode but remain untitled. Season 1 was released on Netflix streaming service in 2013.

Video games

The Samurai Jack world has been seen in the video games Samurai Jack: The Amulet of Time for the Game Boy Advance in 2003 and Samurai Jack: The Shadow of Aku for the Nintendo GameCube and PlayStation 2 in 2004.

Several elements of the Samurai Jack concept were reused in several video games: the MMORPG Cartoon Network Universe: FusionFall features Jack, the Scotsman, and Demongo as non-playable characters, while Aku is a Nano. The online game Project Exonaut, features Jack only as a playable character for the Banzai Squadron. The brawler game Cartoon Network: Punch Time Explosion for Nintendo 3DS, Wii, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360 features Jack and the Scotsman as playable characters while Aku is an assist character, a boss and a playable character.

Samurai Jack is voiced by Phil LaMarr once more for most games, and by Keith Ferguson for Cartoon Network: Punch Time Explosion. In Cartoon Network Universe: FusionFall, the Scotsman is voiced by John DiMaggio and Demongo is voiced by Kevin Michael Richardson. Due to Mako Iwamatsu's death in 2006, Aku is voiced by Greg Baldwin in Cartoon Network Universe: FusionFall and Fred Tatasciore in Cartoon Network: Punch Time Explosion.

Comics

In February 2013, IDW Publishing announced a partnership with Cartoon Network to produce comics based on its properties. Samurai Jack was one of the titles announced to be published. It was further announced at WonderCon 2013 that the first issue of Samurai Jack would debut in October 2013. The first comic in the series was released October 23, 2013. The final issue came out on May 2015. On October 25, 2016, IDW re-released all of the issues in a compilation entitled "Tales of a Wandering Warrior".

He also appeared in multiple issues of DC Comics' anthology comic series Cartoon Network Action Pack, which ran from July 2006 to April 2012.

Planned film

There had been plans for a Samurai Jack feature film in 2002, but the project was cancelled after the lackluster performance of The Powerpuff Girls Movie. In a 2006 interview, Tartakovsky confirmed that "Jack will come back" and that "we will finish the story, and there will be an animated film." In 2007, Fred Seibert of Frederator Studios called Jim Samples, then-general manager of Cartoon Network, and was granted the rights to a Samurai Jack movie, as long as Tartakovsky had creative control. The then-newly formed production company Frederator Films announced in Variety that one of their first projects will be a feature film adaptation of Samurai Jack, written and directed by Genndy Tartakovsky. As of September 2009, the film was said to be in the writing stage of pre-production, co-produced by Cartoon Network Movies and J. J. Abrams' Bad Robot Productions alongside Fred Seibert of Frederator Films and distributed by Warner Bros.

The movie was still being planned as late as 2012. In September, Genndy Tartakovsky announced in an interview with IGN that a Samurai Jack movie is in pre-production. He said: "I've been trying so hard every year, and the one amazing thing about Jack is that I did it in 2001, you know, and it still survived. There's something about it that's connected with people. And I want it, it's number 1 on my list, and now Bob Osher, the President (of Digital Production at Sony Pictures Entertainment), is like 'Hey, let's talk about Jack. Let's see what we can do.' And I go, 'You're going to do a 2D feature animated movie?' and he's like, 'Yeah. Maybe. Let's do some research and let's see.' So it's not dead for sure by any means, and it's still on the top of my list, and I'm trying as hard as I can." It is going to be the conclusion for the series. The film, which is budgeted at $20 million, will combine traditional 2D animation with stereoscopic 3D. Tartakovsky said the loss of Mako Iwamatsu (Aku's voice actor) would also need to be addressed. As of October 2015, there have been no new updates on the production of the film, but from October 2013 to May 2015, the continuation of Samurai Jack had been reprised as Samurai Jack comics, although now with the Season 5 revival of Samurai Jack, the comics have since been considered non-canon. Later, Tartakovsky confirmed that the movie never went through.