Kazemakase Tsukikage Ran

—by John Yung

Daichi Akitaro is probably better known for his directorial work on anime comedy series such as JUBEI-CHAN, ELF PRINCESS REN and KODOMO NO OMOCHA. With IMA, SOKO NI IRU BOKU, Daichi took a break and presented us with a powerful drama that left no one laughing. Working with Madhouse again, he returns to lighter-hearted stories with his latest series: KAZEMAKASE TSUKIKAGE RAN.
TSUKIKAGE RAN harkens back to the live action jidaigeki shows such as ABARENBO SHOGUN. These shows featured a samurai hero who wandered around performing good deeds with a partner who often acted as a humorous foil to our noble hero. Each episode featured some swordfighting action for added excitement to the stories. It's a familiar formula that has seen countless variations over the years.
Daichi's spin on this formula is making the protagonists of his series female. Possbily named after Tsukikage Ken, well-known author of samurai manga, Tsukikage Ran is a female ronin whose skill with her katana is only matched by her fondness for sake. Her counterpart is a Chinese martial artist named Myao who practices the art of Nekotekken. As amusing as Ran's weakness for sake is, Myao's hyperkinetic country bumpkin antics are even funnier, but you wouldn't want to get either one of them mad at you...
There is no grand plot that takes course over the run of the show. Instead, TSUKIKAGE RAN is more like a collection of folk tales about Ran and Myao as they wander the Japanese countryside, stumbling into situations where people need help from thievery, deceit and mistaken identities. Even though the basic situations are clichéd, the brand of justice that Ran and Myao dispense is usually not as straightforward, and that keeps the stories entertaining.
The episodic nature of the series is a faithful homage to the jidaigeki genre, but it's also a source of frustration. Characters as interesting as Ran and Myao just beg for more development, and with little continuity between the episodes, they just don't get the full treatment they deserve. Unfortunately, the series is only 13 episodes long, so there doesn't seem to be much room for exploration of Ran and Myao's characters given the pacing established by the first three-quarters of the series.
The animation quality for TSUKIKAGE RAN lives up to the high standards of Madhouse, which comes as no surprise. What's breathtaking however, is the quality of the fight scenes, which are excellently choreographed. Ran's swordfights are graceful, mixing lulls of measured movement with staccato of swift swings and blows. Myao's acrobatic displays of Keotekken techniques are equally impressive. In ABARENBO SHOGUN, the hero Tokugawa Yoshimune was such a swordman that he could kill a man with a single slice of his katana without drawing blood (since it was a TV production, the show's producers probably didn't budget for special effects). Daichi stages Ran's fights in similar fashion, but he emphasizes that she doesn't resort to using her blade until she has no other resort.
Character designer Watanabe Hajime does a nice job of making both Ran and Myao attractive, but the other characters sometimes aren't as lucky. Watanabe worked with Daichi before in the same role on NURSE RIRIKA SOS, but none of the characters in TSUKIKAGE RAN look overly cute enough to appear on a magical girl show. In fact, the guest characters vary widely in looks, from very simple and generic to unique and stylized. This difference in design quality between the recurring and guest characters exists on other shows, but not as pronounced as in TSUKIKAGE RAN.
The series features some nice musical touches. Continuing with the jidaigeki homage, the opening song "Kazemakase" is an old fashioned enka song. It's a change of pace if you're accustomed to hearing jpop music. The ending song "Kazemakase 2" is more contemporary and very catchy. The background music is mostly period pieces performed on traditional instruments, but there are a couple of jazz tunes which seem out of place on a show that tries to capture the nostalgia of the old samurai dramas.
KAZEMAKASE TSUKIKAGE RAN could have been filmed in live action like the other shows in this genre, but then the series would be different. The exaggerated expressions of the characters (especially Myao) make the humor funnier. The choreography of the fights are breathtaking. It's doubtful that there are many skilled swordswomen and martial artists who can perform such stunts and also act as convincingly as this series demands. Even though the series doesn't have the same emotional impact as IMA, SOKO NI IRU BOKU (mainly due to the fact that the episodic nature of TSUKIKAGE RAN doesn't allow for much plot buildup over the course of the show), the exploits of Ran and Myao are still very entertaining. This seems to be Daichi's intent, and on that account, he succeeds with flying fists and slicing swords.

Bandai Visual Co., Ltd.
VHS / DVD, 25 mins.
Vol. 1 (of 5) - VHS: BES-2531 / DVD: BCBA-0468
¥3800
Available now in Japan
Where to buy