I still enjoyed Season 5 no doubt about it from the characters and themes, but there's no denying if felt kinda rush. And it really shows in it's ending

The more time passes the more I feel the first 3 episodes were intended to be an extralong advert for the season as nothing beyond that ever matches the tone and fast pace of that. They could have done this in 10 episodes, they really could have. But its quite clear they hadn't really mapped the episode structures in time. The Scotsman gets killed off and dissapears until the finale, the Aku worshipers got no real attention amd the whole travel back in time without getting to give anyone a proper goodbye was very uncharacteristic of Jack.

A better conclusion to Ashi’s arc would be if she created the portal, but stayed in the Future to take up Jack’s role as protector of the people, so he could kill Aku without worrying about the future’s wellbeing. Ashi would be a testament to Jack’s legacy (like the statues she saw around the world). Jack helped her grow from hateful to respectful of the world around her, and would bridge the gap between Jack and Aku’s reign.

Yeah, you made a good point that I hadn't thought about before. I'd say it's not just about the speed with which it happened, but the fact that all of Jack's psychological issues/internal conflicts just get whisked away by magic feels really cheap and lazy. Instead of him having to adjust to those things and learn to control his anger (thereby growing as a person), he just banishes his rage like it's a demon. And I hadn't thought about Ashi's age before, but that plus the fact that up until she met Jack she'd been brainwashed all her life and that he killed all her friends does make it seem pretty weird that they get together in the end. A lot of female characters wind up being the love interest of the main character, and I think that's part of the problem with her. Ashi feels expendable. She winds up being less of a character in her own right and more just a useful tool to develop _Jack's_ character and offer assistance or total sacrifice when it's needed. Her arc from brainwashed samurai hater to being sympathetic to his cause is pretty good, and interesting, but once she's on his side it seems like everything interesting about her grinds to a halt. Even the episode when it's her on her own is just to show her what a cool guy Samurai Jack is and why she should love him (worst episode in the season btw). I definitely agree that the final few episodes felt rushed. On the other hand, visually the show looked better than it ever had imo, both animation and art-wise, and the fight choreography in the first few episodes is way better than anything in the old series. The 3D camera work really added a lot to those fights and I appreciated how natural and fluid it looked, compared to Jack just flailing his sword around really fast and hearing lots of _clink_ noises.

The show never needed so much dialog and never needed a romance. Season 5 was proof of that.

I think I'm like the one guy who genuinely appreciated season 5 from beginning to end. Just the fact that we got a conclusion to the series was good enough. Yeah, the ending itself could've been fleshed out more but I still believe what we got worked overall.

Me: oh new video 13 hours from now Also me: why must this cruel world exist!

Totally agree with what you said. Just finished the season finale today and man I was riding such a high high for about half or so of the season but then it just kept dipping further and further down. The relationship was rushed. Jack didnt even really fight Aku either wtf?? This whole show's main plotline was jack wanting to fight Aku and in the finale they dont really fight. So disappointing. Not to mention they kill characters off left and right which is fine if you give their deaths a bit more time to settle in but felt like they just dusted all of that. The way his love interest just vanished at the wedding was almost comedic, no lie. Honestly you could have had a stronger bond/relationship with the lone wolf he meets in the first few episodes. But eh I'm just venting at this point. I still loved a lot of things, the fight with the daughters, old characters coming back and S Tier artstyle. But its gonna leave such a sour taste in my mouth how it ended. Anyway, loved the video.

For all this season's flaws, I'm glad it exists. If it's not to have a perfect finale for Samurai Jack, at least to have one adult American cartoon that isn't all about dick and fart jokes.

Well I'm not really sure the ending works

I'm glad I'm not the only one who finds Jack and Ashi's relationship as inappropriate. Ashi is not an emotionally stable/mature woman. She was born and trained to be a emotionless killing machine with the express purpose of killing Jack. All of her emotions have been suppressed for 20+ years. She doesn't know what love, affection, companionship, or kindness. Then Jack shows her mercy and now she has all the freedom in the world to explore her emotions. She's a young woman who's had emotional/physical needs have been suppressed and now she's latching onto the first person who even remotely fills those needs. She doesn't know how to handle these new emotions and is just going with what she feels. After Jack returns to his former self, Ashi now has this handsome young (looking) man who has shown her kindness and a new outlook on life. She starts to fall for him, but it's not true love. It's her hormones driven into overdrive after years of stagnation. She's essentially going through puberty in her 20's. Then we have Jack. A 70 year old man who as far as we know has NEVER had a serious relationship before. And every time he tries he gets betrayed. (Remember when Aku pretended to be a woman and Jack started to fall for her, only to find out the woman he was starting to love was his arch enemy toying with his emotions.) His perception of having a relationship is fucked. He also can assume that Jack has never been intimate with a woman. And with his self imposed exile and his years alone have starved him for companionship. Then comes Ashi, a beautiful young woman who starts falling for him after he returns to his former self. He awkwardly flirts, he sees her naked, they're near intimately close at several points. All this combines into him falling for her. Not because he loves her, but because she's his first emotional connection in decades. TLDR: What we have here is a horny 20 year old and a 70 year old emotionally starved man falling for eachother out of hormones and need rather than a deep emotional bond. Had the season been longer and actually tried to expand upon their relationship and delve into those emotional immaturities maybe this would have been far different. Maybe their relationship would seem genuine. But we don't. Instead we get a rushed romance that drags down the last act of the last season.

In the future,could you talk more about Generator Rex ? I think this show deserves more digging in and talking about it :)

Great video as always!

I just hope they remake season 5

Yeah, I'm feel like they could have added more in to let jack and ashi develop over time, make their love more understanding and open jack to a future to were he stays in the future with ashi and finds peace within the world he was force in to. Ashi love for jack stops her from ending jack life and hold her self back for a small amount of time for jack to end it all, with aku death, ashi falls to the ground slowly dying, jack takes ashi to the ancient temple of the monks to heal ashi.

I loved season 5 I really just wish the ending would have finished differently. It felt way too rushed and didn’t give jack or ashi the justice they deserved. Jack I see as this man who is at his lowest and even with the transformation I believe his destiny was not to return back home but to rebuild the home he has made in the future. It doesn’t do justice to all he has fought for in the future to just let that all go. Idk I love samurai jack and I still see it’s beginning as some of the best anime moments and some of the best compelling emotions for jack

Ashi’s death was handled terribly. They built suspense when she begged Jack to kill her, killed that tension with a happy ending, then made her disappear FAR later than would make sense if the problem was her birth being undone. It seemed like they wanted a bittersweet ending, but didn’t want to predictably kill Ashi. It came off as retconned and unnecessarily brutal to Jack and Ashi alike.

My biggest problem with Season 5 is how many of the characters are killed off and never mentioned again, mainly The Guardian and the High Priestess (Who I really would have loved to know who she truly was behind her mask and robe).

Anyone remember Jack fighting the guardian of a portal, being spared because it “wasn’t his time yet”, and seeing vision of an older, bearded Jack in the portal? They easily could’ve used that portal, had the same battle with the allies and Ashi’s powers, WHILE using a previously established solution and showing off Jack’s character development for why he’s worthy and won’t underestimate or spare Aku this time.

Hey anyone remember when Jack got Scaramouche's cool sound fork dagger that used sound vibrations to cause objects to combust after a short time? Or the fact he adapted with cool gadgets and a pretty nifty samurai armor with usefull utility? And how he Had an arsenal of weapons hyping up to a new struggle for Jack? Remember how all these elements that was presented to us through trailers and leaks was also thrown away very fast just so they could introduce Ashi as a love interest? I hated this season for the dissapointing turn. We got one cool new Villain and the rest was just pushing Ashi into the spotlight from there.

I wish Jack had gotten a sword made from his own inherent goodness. Instead of using his father's blade still, he manages to forge his own legend after 50 years of suffering and endurance. Instead, he just gets told "Oh, you got rid of the evil voice in your head you didn't really listen to. I'll set you back to your Season 4 self now."

Jacks mind and body don't age, if only his mind was aging, then he would talk and act like an 80 year old dude, but no he is literally not aging mentally or physically

I believe that Jack wasn't aging at all because of the time travel. He was basically still his age the moment he entered the future so there was no way for him to get older because of some sort of "time law" or whatever. Since time is an illusion and time travel can never happen we can totally use all sorts of theories making them look like "science".

I really wish Samurai Jack got 2 seasons to finish off the story. Season could be the beard arc, ending with him getting iconic look back and the redemption of Ashi. And season 6 being a war with Aku. Hell, why couldn't we get a final battle on par or greater than the one Aku had with Jack's dad, God forged armor and nimbus cloud and all?!

I had an idea for a video floating around in my head about how I didn't like how the characters were handled in season 5.

I actually loved the inner demon scene cause he realizes that he must be at peace with his dark side and anger. He still has trauma but he’s on his way to healing.

Just finished watching the season. Overall I am satisfied. A full-on happy ending wouldn't fit, IMO. The only thing I would have done differently, is have Jack realize, before he strikes Aku down completely, that by doing so, he will not only erase Ashi from existence, but also all of the people from the future that he helped. It would have been interesting to make Jack have to choose between present and future, and see what choice he makes and why. The future of Aku was terrible to be sure, but there was beauty there, as well. Of course, logic follows that the ending is a total paradox: Jack himself cannot return to strike Aku down, if the future is undone. Interested to see what the video game did.

The first 3 episodes of s5 are defintley the best samurai jack has ever been

His character development was really good! I wish we had more of gritty and edgy Jack

I know I’m late to this but I’m glad I’m not the only one That felt this way and I think I know the reason why season five is so off two words Cartoon Network it seems to me that the only reason we’ve got this season is the Cartoon Network told genndy that if he wants to finish his show they have to have these type of themes in it like samurai Jack‘s love interest and how she is the key to everything and jake is on the bench to his own show and it’s all about Oshie I don’t know if this is true or not but the way he talks about it behind the scenes and how the show ends I can see it maybe I’m just overthinking it or seeing something that’s not there but that’s how it seems to me a least

The cartoon by itself is really good. Keeps the old stuff going mature to some degree. The story, however, only begins well. I'd say the 1st 4 episodes are incredible. But then it crashes. I could see the love interest and the time paradox from a mile away.

I find it funny how after all of the arguing on whether or not Jack is too old for Ashi, there's a moment where the Scotsman offers one of his daughters' hand in marriage to Jack.

12 years I watched season 1-5 in one week

2:51 I don’t they got rid of his anxiety. He’s still imagining things after he kissed Ashi. But I do wish they kept there beard and mane and still keep the samurai suit

i wish he would've stayed in the future, i mean didnt he basically change the future by going back? i mean what happened to the scotsman and all those other characters now than the future has been changed? it's kinda sad to think about because those characters wont ever even know jack existed now that he altered the future. he should've taken out aku in the future

Further reading: Pop Culture Detective's "Born Sexy Yesterday" Video reminds me a lot of Ashi's character in Season 5. Watch it here: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/ZtqYo6iqqt3NaGQ.html

I regret watching this

I get what you are saying dude the ending felt rush oh and it felt wrong to push through all his struggles/inner self in one episode and finds his inner peace etc it could've been done better. Well what would've you done man the ending is perfectly done even if it was done so cliche about romance and how he got back with Ashi it was basically a Gurren Lagann ending. It ended on a good note and Jack achieved what he was set to do all along. Imo it worked out good despite fans wishing there was more.

Let's not forget that ashi is jack's niece lmao

Jack went John Wick

in my own head cannon, I took ashi's disappearance as a dark foreshadow of Jack's future. if ashi literally dematerialized then what happens to Jack's memories of all his adventures? if everything related to aku from then on dissappears, then he would lose everything he ever experienced in the future. all the experience and memories.. every single episode he would forget. best case he ends up as an idiot child in his adult body... worst case scenario he ends up as a vegetable, drooling at the mouth like an Alzheimer's patient because the time stream slowly erased 95% of all his brain synapse connections due to it never actually happening in that reality. either way, even with the vanilla ending... it dosent end well for our hero.

Once I saw Jack go back to the past and not realize he was effectively killing everyone he ever helped throughout his 50 years made me think, why didn't he make the hard decision to stay in the future defeat Aku there, and give the people he's been fighting to protect for 2/3 of his life a chance to thrive. Maybe even have Jack lead some sort of force to work on fixing the world and stabilize it after Aku and make a callback to the image of King Jack when he lost to the Guardian. It would have been a difficult decision for him to let go off the past and move forward that would have at least provided a bit more tension. Maybe even at the end of it all we could find out Jack's real name, but that's just me spit balling

I heard that in the game there is a different ending

aang was technically 113 yrs old when he and katara got together

Man. Your voice and presentation are great but I feel like your arguments are very poor. It seems to me like you think this season should be called samurai Ashi. Why are you so caught up on her arc which had her go from troubled child to murderous villian to lovely warrior capable of good? That is a pretty good arc to me, and as for the love cliche, isn't this about a warrior with a holy weapon that vanquished an unholy beast? I appreciate your work but the arguments are anecdotal at best.

the last statement you made really irks me man. I know it shouldnt but idk. it's hard to hear samurai jack just passed off as something that can be beat or something that isnt a part of animation's best. samurai jack's peaks far outshine other series imo. that's what i got from what ya said idk if im correct or wrong. I dont mean this to bash you or anything but idk why it was just sad for me to hear. good editing for the vid tho

2:40 Why not? After all, the series went from "For everyone" to a "Mature content" ;y 4:50 Die? More like she disappeared alongside the future timeline, since the present was set back right or something >.

Season 5 was my least favourite as I thought Ashi was a lazily written character that fell for Jack being the daughter of Aku sending Jack back to the past. With all the portals destroyed after Season 4, I would've settled for Jack killing Aku in the future and shaped the society that was destroyed for the villain not this cheesy romantic nonsense with Ashi.

If u can make a better cartoon than jack why haven't you U really ended this shot crazy asl U a goofy

Sounds like Stalin propaganda to me

This is the dumbest take away I’ve ever seen. Of Samurai Jack isn’t the be all end all of western animation, it never was.