Rurouni Kenshin: Kyoto Inferno

Makoto Shishio, it is the name of a former manslayer who is dead set on bringing the Meiji Government crumbling to the ground.  Desperate to stop him, the government turns to the one man who can match his skill: Shishio’s Manslayer predecessor Kenshin Himura.  However, this is no simple fight Kenshin is walking into.  Shishio and his men are beyond ruthless and are not above slaughtering civilians to realize their dream of conquest.  The city of Kyoto is where the battle for the fate of the nation will begin.  Even with a slew of new allies and trusted friends at his side, can Kenshin win this battle without returning to his Manslayer ways?

It’s been a long time since I was this pumped to see a movie.  Though I had plenty of reason for this one.  Seeing Rurouni Kenshin at Otakon 2013 was one of the best movie going experiences of my life and, each year following, I hoped I could see the sequels at a convention.  Well it only took four years but I finally managed to feast my eyes on this heavily anticipated continuation.  And while I don’t think it’s as good as it’s predecessor, Rurouni Kenshin: Kyoto Inferno is still an incredibly strong continuation of one of the greatest live action Anime adaptations ever made.

As the title implies, Kyoto Inferno covers the first half of the Kyoto Arc of the Rurouni Kenshin Manga and Anime.  This is the arc that everyone associates the most with Kenshin for it’s action, story and villains.  At the head of this is the latest baddy, one of the greatest Anime baddies of all time, Makoto Shishio.  Cudos to the make up department for being able to bring this madman to life.  All the burns and bandages could not have been an easy feat to accomplish but they pulled it off.  Shishio looks as ferocious as he ever did.  Plus, he’s got the acting talent to match.  Frequent live action Anime star Tatsuya Fujiwara (Death Note, Battle Royale) looks like he’s having an absolute blast playing the villain.  His pretty boy looks of Light Yagami may be absent, save for one flashback, but that’s still Fujiwara bringing has A game to the project and he doesn’t disappoint.

There’s a definite air of added darkness to Kyoto Inferno, it is a rule of the sequels after all.  Viewers can sense the hoplessness and despair that Shishio will being with every single scene of intense fire or it’s ashy aftermath.  Even the humor is dialed down quite a bit, more so than the last film, to give the film an added sense of seriousness.  “This is war”, Saito says at one point. It’s hard to argue that when you see all the chaos going on.  Naturally, this tests Kenshin’s Rurouni code to the limit.  Will he need to become Battosai once again to take Shishio down?  With villains as deadly as Shishio, Hoji, Sojiro and Sword Hunter Cho, it would be hard to blame him for doing so.

Not only is the film darker but it’s more action packed than the first film.  Even harder to believe is that they manage to match, if not surpass, many of the fights we’ve seen already.  Rurouni Kenshin has been hailed as having some of the best action scenes in Japanese Cinema and I have to agree wholeheartedly.  Watching Kenshin effortlessly beat down thirty men in under two minutes left my jaw on the ground, there was no playtime here folks.  And then there’s my favorite fight of the film.  Much like it’s Anime/Manga counterparts, Kenshin’s duel with Swordhunter Cho is a desperate, fast and furious rush and the fight choreography matches it blow for blow.  You can feel yourself getting pumped watching the swords fly so fast and you can hear your heart pounding by the time Kenshin stops to prepare one of his Hiten Mitsurigi quick draw attacks.  This is the stuff action legends are made of.  There are numerous other action scenes, including an all out war scene at the films climax in the streets of Kyoto.  The action keeps getting better and better and I love these films all the more for them.

The film does have a couple of drawbacks and, in this case, they fall mostly upon something that was absent from the first film that I was really looking forward to in this film: Aoshi Shinamori.  The young, deadly and confident head of the Oniwanbashu finally debuts and he’s a bit of a mixed bag.  Not sure how to explain or sound mean in the process.  His actor looks a bit older than I imagined, and his costume and look are a lot grimier than I would normally associate with Aoshi.  Also, his backstory and motivations are changed slightly to match his only appearing now but I don’t see how he couldn’t have been added into the previous film (since he was originally part of that arc in the Anime/Manga and gave Kenshin one of his best fights).  I feel like this all could have been handled differently.  Like Aoshi could have been one of Shishio’s men going into the film, much like he was briefly in the original story, using Shishio to get to Kenshin to kill him by himself.  The actor definitely has the action part of Aoshi down, his fight with Okina is brutal.  As far as misteps go, I think a lot were taken with Aoshi.  They don’t hamper the film too much but I wish they had done better in this regard as Aoshi is one of my favorite characters from the story.

As you may know, Kyoto Inferno is the first of two parts covering the Kyoto Arc, so the film ends on a pretty big cliffhanger.  However, unlike the similarly released Matrix sequels, Kyoto Inferno hits it out of the park with added quality in characters, design and action that the first one perfected and this film runs with in bold, new directions.  When the film ended, I was ready to jump into Rurouni Kenshin: The Legend Ends, without fear of it sucking.  The people behind this production know what theyre doing with Kenshin and his world.  They know what the fans want to see but also what to bring in an average movie goer and keep them engaged.  Rurouni Kenshin: Kyoto Inferno isn’t without some flaws.  But at the end of it all, it’s still a solid second entry in one of the greatest Live Action Anime adaptations of all time…yes just as good as Death Note (who would’ve thought that would come to pass?).

8.5/10

Check back tomorrow as I leave you with one parting gift before I head for Katsucon…my review of the dramatic conclusion: Rurouni Kenshin: The Legend Ends.