Samurai Jack has always been a mature cartoon. Sure, the violence wasn’t bloody, but the show always dealt with very adult themes, including slavery, torture and sacrifice.
However, it wasn’t until this season that viewers witnessed blood and implications of suicide. And it wasn’t until Saturday night that Samurai Jack included a near-suicide and “a talking penis.” No, seriously.
Last week’s episode ended on yet another cliffhanger, with Jack leaving Ashi behind to follow the Omen, a mysterious specter.
Ashi’s episode-long search for Jack sees her encounter many of Jack’s former allies and foes. First, she encounters two Woolies, mammoth-like creatures Jack freed from slavery in season one. Then she watches beetle drones being driven off by the three archers Jack freed, also in season one. They take Ashi to their mountain home that teems with life. “None of this would exist if it wasn’t for him,” they tell her. She also happens upon a futuristic Coachella and meets Olivia and the ravers Jack saved in season three.
Later, she arrives at a bar where the bartender is Da Samurai, a funky samurai, now gray and wizened, who met Jack at the same bar in the fourth season. The other patrons turn out to be various robots who Jack has maimed over the years, including one quite literally held together by dozens of Band-Aids. While there, Demongo, another past enemy, makes a quick cameo.
At one point, Ashi reaches a pool of water and flashes back to her childhood. During her training, she was thrown into burning coals that singed her skin black. Apparently, it’s not a ninja suit. In her final act of self-liberation from Aku, she spends the night scraping the ash away. Naked and somehow clean and unscarred, she is reborn the next morning and fashions some leafy clothes that make her look like a blend of Peter Pan and Katy Perry in the video for “Roar.”
Ashi later reaches a haunting graveyard crawling with green mist, where she finds Jack. The samurai is on his knees, a sword lying in front of him. His eyes are closed; his mind appears to be elsewhere. He’s about to commit seppuku, the traditional suicide that samurai would perform to preserve their honor after failure.
The Omen appears and tells Ashi she may “witness” but not interfere. “Witness what?” she asks. “The end,” the spirit replies. Jack picks up the sword, preparing to strike. Ashi runs to stop him but is slapped away by the Omen.
Ashi and the Omen duel as she tells Jack hope is not lost. She tells him of the lives he has changed, of the people who revere him — all of whom she met this episode. She reveals that the blue children are alive, just before The Omen swings his sword, destined for her head.
Jack snaps into action and blocks the blow, and, with one swift slice, bisects the Omen. He has defeated death and tells Ashi he now plans to go get his sword back.
The tension and darkness of this final scene is fantastic. Even though it seemed highly unlikely that the titular hero would go out via suicide, the dark art and creepy music make you believe it might actually happen.
This episode seems to finish the plot of Jack’s existential crisis and now, as he searches for his sword, moves toward the grand finale, a last fight with Aku.
Aside from this main plot, though, is a light-hearted side story. Scaramouche returns as a flamboyant robotic head after having been defeated by Jack in the first episode. He plans to return to Aku to inform him that Jack is without his sword. His goofiness works as a balance to the darkness of the main plot as he bounces along cartoonishly and breaks the fourth wall repeatedly.
Scaramouche tries to board a ship but is only able to do so on a body. He finds an alien with a tiny head, and, once it leaves, Scaramouche utters the episode’s most memorable line: “Whoa, what a freak. Looked like a talking penis.”
This incredible line has already created a stir amongst Samurai Jack fans. Just like the dark almost-suicide scene, the line proves, once again, that Samurai Jack is no longer a show for kids.
Instead, it’s a masterpiece for adults only — a masterpiece with only three episodes left.
Rating: 5/5
Samurai Jack airs Saturdays at 11 p.m. on Cartoon Network.
