For a 100 episode series it is really depressing to get 1 less episode on the second disc than the first, but that is the usual MO of Anime companies and this is Media Blasters after all, but at 100 episodes we will have 24 or 25 DVD’s to get this whole series, and that is some serious money! Still it doesn’t stop this from being 4 more episodes of Zatoichi goodness. Katsu-shin rocks, and that is all there is too it.

And a cool side note, this is my 500th entry in this blog! Nice! I started this is in 2004 and it is now 2006, so 500 movies in 2006. I can’t believe that is all the movies I have seen, but that doesn’t include all the television I have watched (admitedly not that much television, but I still watch it, especially Sunday Night HBO).

Katsu Shintaro returns as the sword wielding blind masseuse Zatoichi, and much chaos and bloodshed ensues. It is always a pleasure to watch Katsu-Shin weilding his sword to right wrongs and fight injustice.

The highlights of this set include in A Bird Lands on Ichi, Zatoichi meeting a samurai who is kind and gentle and tends a track of land of animals for the lord to hunt, but an evil official wants to sell the animals to make a profit. The samurai even has birds that come to him and land on him, but won’t come to Zatoichi because of his aura of death, though the 2 become friends and fight the bad guys, and eventually a bird comes to Zatoichi.

In An Unforgettable Flower Ichi saves a girl from suicide, and then helps her be freed from prostitution but her past follows her. The evil man who seduced her and sold her into prostitution finds her and sells her out to her former owners, and they come after Ichi and her. Ichi and her were happy and were acting as husband and wife, but when a spear is headed towards Ichi she jumps in the way and takes it, dyeing in the process, and leaving Ichi more saddened, and alone again.

In The Two Zatoichis, Ichi arrives in a town to heart that Zatoichi is there, and he finds that his old friend another Zato or masseuse is working with a woman who is using him to pretend he is Zatoichi though he is really a bumbling fool. She pretends they will get married, but in fact she won’t even sleep with him, and eventually having a prostitute do it. Ichi tries to get his friend to separate with her, but he won’t, even when the woman tries to get Ichi to pose as Zatoichi. Of course eventually Ichi must reveal he is the true Zatoichi and take out the baddies, though leaving the woman alive to live her miserable and lying life, using her beauty to seduce men.

Sure the image is a little dirty, but this is zatoichi goodness, I just wish they gave more episodes per disc! Oh well, I still recommend this for all Zatoichi fans.