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FUNimation Entertainment to Distribute Samurai Champloo 

posted on by Egan Loo
Action comedy, once released by Geneon, from Bebop director Watanabe

The North American distributor FUNimation Entertainment has announced on Wednesday that it will distribute Shinichiro Watanabe and Manglobe's Samurai Champloo television anime series for Geneon Entertainment. Watanabe directed Cowboy Bebop and two segments of The Animatrix before taking on this historical action series with tongue-in-cheek anachronisms. FUNimation will release the entire 26-episode anime series in a box set in 2009.

The story centers on Mugen, a wild, womanizing warrior in historical Japan. He encounters a disciplined, yet master-less, samurai named Jin when a ditzy waitress named Fuu saves both from execution after a swordfight. The reluctant traveling companions agree to help Fuu search for a mysterious samurai "who smells of sunflowers." Their journey only gets stranger going forward — all to a hip-hop soundtrack and a storytelling style that considers no samurai drama cliché sacred.

Geneon Entertainment had released this anime series in North America in 2005 and 2006. Then, Geneon Entertainment ceased in-house distribution of its own titles in September 2007. FUNimation announced at Anime Expo 2008 this past July that it agreed to manufacture, sell, and distribute selected DVD titles from Geneon Entertainment in North America. However, FUNimation had not announced that it will distribute Samurai Champloo until now.

Image © manglobe/Shimoigusa Champloos


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