Blade of the Immortal - Recommendations

• TV (24 eps)
• 2005

Oboro, a naive, love-struck girl, is pledged to Gennosuke, an idealist. Both are successors to opposing ninja clans with a long history of hatred kept barely in check by a covenant of peace. Just as the two vow to reconcile the clans with their marriage, the shogun orders the feud to resume in order to resolve an internal struggle that threatens to tear the Tokugawa shogunate apart. Even worse, Oboro and Gennosuke themselves are forced to lead their clans in battle. Can the star-crossed lovers resist the brutal circumstances and remain true to their love as the death toll rises?

• TV (5 eps)
• 2007

In a futuristic and wild west-inspired Japan, there are only two rules: the Number 1 rules the world and only the Number 2 can challenge him; these ranks are worn with pride in the manner of headbands. In these harsh times, Afro is a samurai who is on a mission for revenge – an evil gunman killed his father to become the Number 1, and it’s up to Afro to take him down in a shower of blood and entrails. He has mastered the art of the sword and become Number 2, but many others want to hold his title and the title of Number 1 for themselves. With competition and sword fights at every turn, can Afro finally exact his revenge?

• TV (26 eps)
• 2004 - 2005

Samurai Champloo is all about style, from the dj-style scratching scene changes to the hip-hop-inspired soundtrack to the eclectic character design. Mugen's fighting style is a funky meld of capoeira and limb-cutting, and Jin is the dramatic foil; he is all steel and old-school samurai style. What binds them together is the desire to test each other's abilities, and a promise to a girl named Fuu: to find the samurai that smells of sunflowers, who plays a pivotal role in her past. Together they travel through edo-era Japan, finding battle and comedy wherever they stop.

• TV (13 eps)
• 2003

A half-man, half-beast is chased by foes wielding power of an unpleasant nature. He would certainly be slaughtered, his mission failed, if not for the intervention of a wandering mercenary -- Kibagami Jubei. With the last of his strength, he gives Jubei a mysterious jewel, thereby transferring his mission: deliver the jewel at all costs to the Priestess of Light. The mystery of the jewel's powers, and the identities of those fiends who quest for it... these are questions whose answers will only be found through blood and battle.

• TV (26 eps)
• 2009

Princess Rinda and her brother Remus are the foretold Twin Pearls of Parros – one will be a shining prophet and the other a great ruler. However, when their homeland is lost to the invading Mongaul army and their parents slain during the siege, Rinda and Remus are transported into Rood Forest, a dangerous hideout for ghouls. Lost and vulnerable, the two barely escape death thanks to the help of a powerful man with the head of a leopard called Guin who cannot remember who is or how he became that way. Together they journey across the land, evading monsters, fighting the power-hungry Mongaul army, and gathering trusted companions such as Istavan Spellsword and Suni of the monkey-like Sem – all in the hope of fulfilling their destinies and finally bringing peace to Parros.

• TV (12 eps)
• 2010

In the bloody Warring States period of feudal Japan, many generals fought in an endless struggle for power, but one man proved to be too big a threat - The dark lord Oda Nobunaga. Sanada Yukimura and Date Masamune, two young warriors from different regions who become heated rivals, begin to form an unlikely alliance with the rest of the generals to take down the Devil King.

• Movie (1 ep x 92 min)
• 1993

Jubei Kibagami is just a wandering swordsman minding his own business... until fate lands him in the middle of a battle with the terrifying Devils of Kimon! Now the fate of all of Japan lies in the hands of a vagabond samurai, a deadly female ninja and a perverted old monk as they take on an enemy who is, literally, immortal.

• TV (12 eps)
• 2007

In the 6th year of the Kan'ei era, people enjoy a time of peace; skilled swordsmen are revered and respected, and their lives are their own. Amidst the tranquility, Lord Tokugawa Tadanaka decides, for his own amusement, to hold a fighting tournament in which real swords are used - though laws forbid their use. In a match to the death two highly-skilled swordsmen face off: the one-armed Fujiki Gennosuke, and the blind Iraki Seigen. As they take their respective stances, flashbacks paint a picture of the duo’s past and battle wounds; and thus, the real story begins...

• Movie (1 ep x 98 min)
• 2007

Kotarou is a brash young orphan in war-torn Japan, on the run from mysterious pursuers with Tobimaru, his faithful canine companion. Clueless as to why anyone would want him, much less imperial warriors from mainland China, a chance encounter with a strange wandering swordsman could not be more unwelcome in Kotarou's skeptical eyes – especially when the stranger has a secret past that has caused him to seal his blade. Forced by circumstance to work together for survival, the unlikely duo forge a tenuous friendship that is threatened all too soon when Kotarou's pursuers thrust the two into a dizzying whorl of clashing ambitions between men both big and small. Will the stranger manage to overcome his past and save them both from peril with his blade?

• Movie (1 ep)
• 2011

The fuse is lit! Prepare to have your mind blown by a multi-megaton explosion of battlefield action in the feature-length climax of the Sengoku Basara saga! Toyotomi Hideyoshi is defeated, but feudal Japan isn't safe yet. The fallen villain's most loyal and lethal minion Ishida Mitsunari is obsessed with carrying on Toyotomi's legacy of violence in the name of vengeance. Ishida brutally cuts a bloody path across the countryside, even as the nation's other warlords rally toward an era of harmony. Unfortunately, for peace to finally be achieved, the fires of war must be unleashed once more.