Just try and act surprised when Ashi gets fridged
I would prefer it if Aku tried to pull a Green Goblin and Jack accidentally stabs Ashi.
Just try and act surprised when Ashi gets fridged
I would prefer it if Aku tried to pull a Green Goblin and Jack accidentally stabs Ashi.
@Count:
Physically, not mentally (he's really in his seventies, and her mind is still as educated as a child). And it's not like you can't have a platonic relationship with a mentor/partner who's around your age and the opposite gender.]quote]
Thing is though what could Jack credibly teach Ashi that she either doesn't already know or can't simply learn herself?
@Count:
I would prefer it if Aku tried to pull a Green Goblin and Jack accidentally stabs Ashi.
Probably would work if Jack hadn't already killed all her sisters but then went out of his way to keep Ashi safe after discovering she wasn't dead and didn't just go through a nasty bit of PTSD brought on in large part by Aku trolling him for the last time.
Thing is though what could Jack credibly teach Ashi that she either doesn't already know or can't simply learn herself?
Social skills and morals. Especially if she doesn't even know how and why deer mate. Actually, that's what is so awkward about the kissing scene. Especially after Ashi thought Jack was weird for being embarrassed about her being naked. But the show seems to have her acting pretty… normal. As if the mindset of a hero is natural to her, I guess. And she can still get advice and lessons on combat despite already being highly skilled (but not as much as Jack). He already taught her about how Aku didn't create the world and stars, which is already a start. These types of lessons could have actually been a good way for Jack to regain hope in his quest by re-realizing what he's fighting for. You know, instead of that weird and random samurai ghost execution shindig that originally seemed to be purely psychological.
Probably would work if Jack hadn't already killed all her sisters but then went out of his way to keep Ashi safe after discovering she wasn't dead and didn't just go through a nasty bit of PTSD brought on in large part by Aku trolling him for the last time.
But Jack killed them on purpose (except for the first one) and was not attached to them. They were deluded, corrupt, had free will, and pushed him to an inescapable corner. Getting over killing an animal or human being by accident is one thing, your own girlfriend another.
I trust that you know I'm completely joking about this though.
@Count:
Social skills
Would be kinda awkward given Jack's dubious at best social skills. But he could probably teach her how to go on long extended walks of silence or cooking and eating rats.
@Count:
You know, instead of that weird and random samurai ghost execution shindig that originally seemed to be purely psychological.
Yeahhhh that was confusing and weird even in a series where magic and the supernatural are recurring elements.
@Count:
But Jack killed them on purpose (except for the first one) and was not attached to them. They were deluded, corrupt, had free will, and pushed him to an inescapable corner. Getting over killing an animal or human being by accident is one thing, your own girlfriend another.
I trust that you know I'm completely joking about this though.
Oh I do.
Would be kinda awkward given Jack's dubious at best social skills. But he could probably teach her how to go on long extended walks of silence or cooking and eating rats.
Not really. It's moreso that plenty of the people he talks to happen to be of a weird and surreal nature. And he's still able to get by in conversations without overreacting by humbly evaluating and questioning the situation.
!
He's obviously weirded out, but still handles adapting his mind to the notion of things like talking dogs, aliens, and being stuck in the future pretty well. Meanwhile, look at how long Ashi was in denial about Aku because of her dogmatic childhood. Or being outraged at seeing two deer nuzzling together instead of the physically superior one oppressing the other weaker one.
Yeahhhh that was confusing and weird even in a series where magic and the supernatural are recurring elements.
This show is no stranger to introducing random supernatural elements whenever it's convenient. But it tends to work in line with our suspension of disbelief because they always accompany completely new concepts. These ghosts were weird because we never learned how they could be associated with a familiar element like the protagonist beforehand. Especially in the middle of a psychological crisis, which has its own hallucination element of having Mad Force Ghost Jack.
Oh I do.
Splendid.
I'm with Count and Rin and support their arguments, though I guess that isn't a surprise. The romance was really cringey to watch unfold, and I don't think it was well developed, seeing as they compressed the entire thing into one ep. I don't feel like the team really thought their personalities and compatibility through beyond penis on vagina, so it's just a boring un-nuanced eruption of sexual tension (consisting of a boner joke, a wardrobe malfunction joke and a bunch of awkward touching). The direction is bland and forced, the couple really doesn't have romantic chemistry, it's not very believable for the characters, and it's still just plain creepy that 70 year old Jack is boning someone that didn't have any concept of love, sex or deer like a few weeks ago at most. If you stare that in the eye, it's borderline exploitative and rapey? It only doesn't come off that way in the moment, since they decided to write Ashi to be just as hot and horny as Jack, even though just a minute ago, she didn't understand that nudity might be sexually provocative.
Thing is though what could Jack credibly teach Ashi that she either doesn't already know or can't simply learn herself?
Besides literally everything (ie that deer are not minions of Aku just because they have weird horns), my hope was that he'd be training her to take his place, should he fall, or succeed in going back, but fail in taking down Aku (or at least changing this particular timeline).
When you think about it, this is basically the equivalent of a Vietnam veteran with severe, nearly incapacitating PTSD dating a home-schooled teenager that has never been allowed out of her home by her psycho parents before this year.
It's not like Aang and Katara or any relationship Captain America has been in because those people didn't experience the intervening time and have a mental state that matches their physical one; Jack did live those years even if he wasn't aged by them.
Has Jack even interacted with a woman that wasn't Scotsman's wife or Aku?
@Cyan:
Has Jack even interacted with a woman that wasn't Scotsman's wife or Aku?
There was the not-Darth Vader princess bounty hunter (but that was only for a quick first encounter fight) and the female bounty hunter named Josephine in The Good, The Bad, and The Beautiful.
@Cyan:
Has Jack even interacted with a woman that wasn't Scotsman's wife or Aku?
There was that fairy.
my hope was that he'd be training her to take his place, should he fall, or succeed in going back, but fail in taking down Aku (or at least changing this particular timeline).
To be honest, that was my desire as well.
I personally don't hate this relationship, but part of me would've enjoyed mentor-student all the more.
More reflection on this, but isn't it a little weird that we have Samurai Jack as vulnerable, lustful and passionate just a single episode after the one dedicated to him restoring his mental and emotional balance?
More reflection on this, but isn't it a little weird that we have Samurai Jack as vulnerable, lustful and passionate just a single episode after the one dedicated to him restoring his mental and emotional balance?
Oh, that was actually explained in detail. Remember how Mad Jack was a manifestation of Jack's pent up anger and frustration?
It turns out that it was pent up sexual frustration. :ninja:
Certainly puts a whole new meaning to the term Slash Fic.
So I guess that just happened lol
! go Jack x Ashi I fucking love the song they played during the kiss hahahaha
Jack defeats Aku and is standing before a portal back to the past.
He gives Ashi one last longing look before reluctantly returning to the past.
Past-Aku then flings him back into the future like last time.
THE FUTURE REFUSES TO CHANGE
Final shot is Jack screaming to the heavens as this plays:
One hell of a penultimate episode.
! Well that makes the whole "actually covered in ashes" thing make slightly more sense
I like how they didn't show any scenes from the final episode for the preview.
d-dat ending
Has Aku top Gendo for world "best" dad?
! Every girl Jack falls for is really Aku, it's awesome.
! "YOU HAVE EXCELLENT TASTE, SAMURAI JACK"
One episode left, and all they have to do is resolve Ashi's storyline, resolve the Guardian storyline, have Jack reunite with the Scotsman's ghost, kill Aku, and get Jack back to the past.
Easy peasy
! Aku made this episode, between the drive thru and him chatting up with the robot.
resolve the Guardian storyline,
! Pretty sure that was functionally resolved with the Guardian's shattered glasses and the time obelisk being gone.
@Cyan:
! Pretty sure that was functionally resolved with the Guardian's shattered glasses and the time obelisk being gone.
! So I guess the future with Jack becoming a king or something before using the portal was all BS
That cliff-hanger.
THAT CLIFF-HANGER.
Having to wait a whole week is going to be agonizing.
! So I guess the future with Jack becoming a king or something before using the portal was all BS
To be fair we're all aware of the adage of the future not being something that's set in stone.
Yeah, no idea how they're going to wrap this all up in 22 minutes. This is really the point we should have been at five episodes ago.
If only this season was thirteen episodes long like the other seasons.
!
And to think. We'd have the finale right now if not for April Fools.
97 Years Samurai Jack. 9 seasons. 9 more seasons until we get back to the past.
Yeah, no idea how they're going to wrap this all up in 22 minutes. This is really the point we should have been at five episodes ago.
Well, this is Adult Swim so maybe we'll find out in Season Six in, oh, say that they hurry production, 2019.
! I just realized that if Jack marries Ashi, Aku technically becomes his father-in-law.
!
!
@Count:
If only this season was thirteen episodes long like the other seasons.
! [qimg]https://d2kmm3vx031a1h.cloudfront.net/srV4Qr8gQzGmot9bFiXd_C_wnsRhWsAAtWCu.jpg[/qimg]
I want a painting of this on my wall
At this point we're clearly not getting the giant army of past characters united in a final stand like we started hoping for when we were shown the Scotsman and the bunch of old characters a couple episodes back.
i mean, I imagine the Scotsman's ghost at least will pop up again, and those guys may all cameo… so even if we DO get them, there's just zero run time left to do anything really potent or interesting or pay-offey. Just two second cameos at best. And that's a shame.
! @Robby
We start the episode with the army mounting a brave assault upon Aku only to have them steamrolled with the Samurai they have yet to save.
This distracts Aku long enough to have Jack talk some sense into Akushi who retrieves the sword? (assuming Aku doesn't crush it immediately after his final frame pose)
! I'm hoping we'll get something longer than 30 minutes, but know it's unlikely.
Wondering if Aishi with Aku's essence would be able to make a gateway back to the past and be able to 'rig' it so they could travel back together.
Expecting a bloody confrontation with heavy losses that might 'ruin' the future for Jack should the army show up at all, but he could end up being stuck in it if there's truly no way back.
Yes, they can do that, but at this point there's no time to showcase anything rewarding or satisfying with any real payoff. They will at best be glorified cameos.
Which really does reduce the episode from earlier to just fanservice rather than finally bringing the whole plot together.
I suppose they were doomed to be references unless they had decided to go another direction with these 10 episodes.
But the series itself was rather simple when it came to having arcs, connections, and continuity before getting to this season that we didn't even get much of Aku until the very end.
Seems kind of true to form, but I suppose I've been enjoying the series for what it is that the plethora of 'one-shot' characters not getting a big time budget for the final episode wasn't a big detractor to me.
I'd be delighted if they did something substantial in the finale and subvert my expectation of being used as another emotional crux for Jack (be it dark or really cheesy).
The next episode will be the Scotsman reuniting with Jack. The episode will focus on the Scotsman helping Jack to get his groove back (again) after which he reveals an enormous army of past characters ready to take on Aku. After the episode ends, they announce a Samurai Jack movie coming next year to conclude the series.
Only in my wildest dreams.
This ep basically confirms what I've been thinking for a while now about Jack's fate:
! I was wondering if Jack going back would potentially affect the future in a sort of butterfly effect, but with the sad possibility of people like Ashi never being born. Now that it's spelled out in a more literal sense, that Aku literally begot Ashi and her sisters, I'm certain that Jack won't be able to go back and erase Aku's influence if he wants Ashi to still exist. It's crazy to consider that staying in the future means letting generations of people's suffering stand, but then, that's the kind of pull love can have on a person. It's hard to think about the greater good when there's one person you really want to save.
! What I'm imagining is that Jack is reunited with the Scotman's ghost and all the rest, he manages to destroy Aku and free Ashi, then gets presented with a time portal home, but decides to stay, maybe with a push from his ghost parents. Maybe he becomes a king too, I dunno.
Yes, they can do that, but at this point there's no time to showcase anything rewarding or satisfying with any real payoff. They will at best be glorified cameos.
Which really does reduce the episode from earlier to just fanservice rather than finally bringing the whole plot together.
This entire run has primarily been about Jack, Ashi and Aku so all the characters from the previous four seasons were gonna be cameos at best.
This entire run has primarily been about Jack, Ashi and Aku so all the characters from the previous four seasons were gonna be cameos at best.
Up until this point there was still absolutely room to have a big ol giant war finale full of every character ever, and that they threw in Scotsman so early and then those others at the halfway point seemed to indicate they would.. They coulda gone that route easily. And just aren't.
Since we are in the realm of should and could. As much as I love Aku, he needs to become a dead father-in-law/needs to vanish completely from existence.
Ashi stays alive of course. Don't know how they will pull that of, but they need to.
! It just dawned on me that Aku might die next week, after all these years with the series being left unfinished. What a nice ride this mini-series has been.
The "ending we never knew we wanted!" will be Aku reforming because of his daughter's love and everyone getting along happily.
ANd just ignoring the centuries of death and horrors.
The "ending we never knew we wanted!" will be Aku reforming because of his daughter's love and everyone getting along happily.
ANd just ignoring the centuries of death and horrors.
Kishimoto is writing this?
A friend of mine works on… a project that Genndy is working on currently. I'm not at liberty to say due to NDA's and such. But we did have a 3am talk about Samurai Jack and Genndy's reactions ot the Tumblr backlash. Ultimately, this has been the endgame for years. Like if the show had went on before the long hiatus this is still how it would've ended. It probably would've been slightly different with the adult references and liberties but the overall arc was something he had been wanting to do even back then.
I'm gonna have faith.