Random Ramblings About Kage No Gundan: Hattori Hanzo

[Guest kungfusamurai]

I finally finished watching the whole series. It still was enjoyable sitting through again, after having it on DVDR (I re-buy the official versions of the films I like).

Things I noticed about the series:

The ninja doctor, Kinnosuke(?), is hardly in the series. He was in the first few episodes, disappeared, then came back for one or two episodes in the middle, then never returned. Was this because the actor was busy doing other projects? Or was he one of the JAC people, and he was injured?

I noticed the Daihachi character disappeared for a number of episodes towards the end, but returned for the very last episode. But while he did a lot of fighting, empty handed combat, throughout the series, he didn't do any fighting in the last episode. I wonder if the actor may have gotten injured and was out because of that?

The Koga rivalry didn't seem to be as significant after watching it this second time. Initially it was, but then when Okou left the group, the series kind of meandered with the Iga fighting ninjas with magical powers and other weird stuff. But it was all good. It would probably have gotten tedious if they had only fought the Koga in every single episode.

With regards to the DVDs, I really liked the subs, especially for the written texts. The only complaint I have is the translation of the titles of the characters. For instance, Hoshina was called Mr Hoshina. If his japanese title was 'Tona' (I think that's how it was pronounced), shouldn't the english translation of his name be 'Lord Hoshina'? He was a high ranking politician in the shogunate.

Still worth every penny. Can't wait for Series 2.

KFS