Rurouni Kenshin : the Legend Ends: less than perfect ending

Less than a week after I reviewed Kyoto Inferno, it's time for the second movie, Rurouni Kenshin: the Legend Ends. I would prefer this method rather than waiting for a year or two for the second part (and another year to the ending in most trilogy). By the time I waited a year or two, I would have forgotten most of the earlier movie.

For those who have read my review on Kyoto Inferno, my main opinion stays. The actor has embodied the character well. I have come to accept most of them to portray the swordsmen. All except Sanosuke, since I still think the hair should be more spiky than that. Kudos to Tatsuya Fujiwara who played Makoto Shishio to near perfection. He may be slimmer and taller in the manga but the viciousness is played to perfection. By the third movie, I could not imagine anyone but Takeru Sato to play Kenshin.


The action is fast paced. Watching the sword fights will make one's hand itchy to swing a blade. Fast and exciting is how to describe the fights. However, compare to the first movie, Kyoto Inferno, relatively there are less depiction on the individual style of swords fights. Rather, we have more of generic swords-swing-and-fight. Do not get me wrong, I totally enjoyed the action sequence, but I wish so much to see more of Kenshin's hitten mitsurugi, or Saito's thrust or Aoshi play with 2 swords. Even the depiction of Kenshin's ultimate technique is a bit of letdown.

Which come to the biggest flaw of the movie. The writer tried to stay as close as possible to the original material. Although there are some creative deviation, but I do agree that this adaptation is one of the better adaptation that stick fairly close to the manga. But because of that, they have to cram too many things into 2 movies. Shishio's arc is a HUGE arc in Kenshin's storyline. By the time I finished the first movie, I still doubt how much could they depict in the ending. At the end, Aoshi's appearance seems rushed and not important. Even his conversion to fight by Kenshin side appeared bit forced. I was really disappointed as there is only 2 fight with the Juppon Gatana that was featured. All this after Juppon Gatana was introduced with style in the first movie. And the fight between Saito and Usui was ended in a flash. Yup. Less than 5 second. One of the few highlights of Shishio's arc in the manga are the fights of Juppon Gatana. Even the way how the Shishio allowed the good guys to invade his warship is rather puzzling. Someone who is as manipulative and smart as Shishio (who always resort to assassination) would not see the government ploy to play for time to build cannons? Holes, holes, and more holes. If they have taken the time to stretch to 3 movies, or at least omit the Aoshi's story, they would have more time to make more sense of the story. The whole story is about struggling to find one's meaning of existence in a new era, and the message is reminded in every single opportunity. Up to the point of feeling of being nag to.



Despite my long rantings on the movie, it is still one of the best manga adaptation ever. It is an epic film (based on an epic manga). However, given a completely perfect build-up by the first movie Kyoto Inferno, I felt bit short changed at the ending.

ratings: 3 poink!
comments; go read the manga.