December 01, 2003:

A rogue group thankfully subbed Kaze no Yojimbo Episode 23. They mistakenly cropped off the tops and bottoms of the frame (the opening and closing credits are letterboxed, but the show itself is 4:3), but at least it got subbed. Two more episodes to go.

May 07, 2004:

I got the first Kaze no Yojimbo DVD today. I've only given it a quick look thus far, but from what I've seen, it's pretty damn nice. First of all, M-Lock case. FUCKING AWESOME. Second, five episodes on the disc. Nice. Third, good looking cover art and a Stratos 4 insert. Yes.

Kodama George

For those of you unfamiliar with the show itself, Kaze no Yojimbo is a fairly serious tale about a drifter, Kodama George, who comes to the small town of Kimujuku in search of answers to mysteries from his past. In the course of events, he gets caught up in the local feud between the Ginzame and Tanokura groups, and ends up playing both factions against each other. As you probably guessed, it's based on Yojimbo, the classic Akira Kurosawa movie.

Tanokura Miyuki

Caught in the struggle is Tanokura Miyuki, the daughter of the head of the Tanokura group. She features prominently in the opening credits, but there's actually much less whimsical interaction between Miyuki and George than the opening montage would lead one to believe.

August 15, 2004:

Bandai has released its third region one Kaze no Yojimbo DVD. As with disc two, the third DVD contains four episodes, suggesting that Kaze no Yojimbo will be a six-disc series. I think they should have gone with a five-disc release, putting five episodes on each DVD like they did with the first disc.

Bandai may have hurt the potential sales of the later discs by dropping to four-episode discs, since the four episodes on the second DVD are arguably the weakest in the whole series. (For example, the casino episode, and the "treasure" episode.) I know many people lost patience with the series during that span and gave up on the show.

I imagine many casual DVD buyers might also lose interest with the series after disc two, and not buy the remaining DVDs, not knowing that the show really picks up around episode 13 or so. I think these consumers would be more likely to continue buying the DVDs if these early discs were better values.

The Kaze no Yojimbo trailer Bandai is putting on their other DVDs (currently available on the official website) is pretty good, though. However, the trailer downplays some of the show's real strengths (the plot and the intrigue) and overstates the action sequences (which really aren't particularly good).

August 02, 2005: On Sabbatical. Be back later.

Travelling. Itinerary not conducive to watching anime.

So long.

P.S. Y'all should watch Kaze no Yojimbo, eh.

November 07, 2005: Still on Sabbatical.

So, this sabattical is going on a little longer than I planned. Everything is copacetic unless I run out of money, though.

In any case, I've started a little bit of anime-type catching up, but I've been avoiding anime blogs, message boards, and the IRC to avoid spoilers. Hey, what can I say, sometimes I don't give a damn about spoilers, sometimes I'm neurotically fastidious about avoiding them. Right now it's the latter.

[Update: I understand that this has nothing to do with Kaze no Yojimbo, but I don't care to fix it at this time.]