Netflix hits it out of the park again with an animated series that replicates the flowing beauty of Japanese anime but is a Western production through and through. It has a bit of a slow start with a somewhat clichéd premise but I was hooked once once I saw the amazing fight choreography. Even better is that it is unabashedly an animated show for adults. It was deaths and amputations galore, full frontal nude shots, sex scenes, the works. I loved the story as well but of course it runs off of Western moral values and not Asian sensibilities. About the only complaint I have is that it ramps the stakes up so high that it’s a little ridiculous how only Mizu, the protagonist, is the only one who can get anything done.

The series starts in media res with Mizu being already a proficient swordswoman armed with her own sword. She interrogates a flesh-trader in a noodle shop when she sees that he is armed with a pistol as her objective is to hunt down and kill the four Westerners who once roamed across Japan. In the shop, the handless cook Ringo witnesses her skill and decides to apprentice himself to her despite her objections. Meanwhile the Princess Akemi is the only daughter of the Daimyo of Kyoto. Her father wants to marry her off to a nobleman of his choice but she wants to marry a young and rising samurai Taigen instead. When Mizu arrives in Kyoto to question the master of a dojo there, she is confronted by Taigen who she recognizes as her childhood bully. Flashback scenes reveal Mizu’s past about how she was warned by her mother to hide her blue eyes which give away her mixed parentage and pretend to be a boy. After her mother is apparently killed in a fire, she swore vengeance against the Westerners but was homeless until she was taken in by a blind swordsmith.

I was less than enthused by this at first because it jumps straight in with almost no setup and a protagonist who is motivated by vengeance is hardly original. The first glimpse I had that this was something special is when Mizu fights Taigen, the first fight in which she has to actually exert herself, and the choreography is simply beautiful to behold. Every fight in the show looks amazing and the art is just consistently good. Mizu is portrayed as being extremely skilled but still far from invincible as she is often injured in nearly every fight. She switches to different styles and uses new tricks over the course of the show so there’s always something new but falls well short of the ridiculous power inflation found in anime. This is also a rare instance of the protagonist being a true anti-hero. As she says, she is no honorable samurai but a bloodthirsty demon out for vengeance and woe to anyone who gets in her way. The show even sees fit to punish her when she has small moments of emotional weakness to harden her heart. The humor is kept to a minimum and the seriousness of the story is underlined by the gory violence and explicit sex. There’s a casualness to murder and death that is shocking to those used to how animated shows are supposed to work.

The supporting characters are well-written too with the Princess Akemi being another woman who achieves personal agency in a different way and Taigen being a brash samurai who is more honorable in his own way than Mizu. As I noted, all this is tuned towards Western values which might be why it’s much more satisfying to us than actual Japanese anime. I do have some quibbles such as Mizu’s skill being implausible. She’s supposed to have picked up a variety of swordsmanship techniques from watching samurai test the swords forged by the swordsmith but that doesn’t explain her ninja-like abilities. Then again, as of the first season, it’s evident that they still haven’t shown her full backstory. I was also disappointed in the very last episode. They build up the military power of the primary antagonist so much that it seems impossible for Mizu to make a dent against his forces. So when the final confrontation dawns, she has a chance only because he suddenly acts so stupidly.

Anyway we definitely will be looking out for the next season as the action on this show is better than even most films. I’m also looking forward to seeing Mizu clash with a foreign culture as well as what happens next with Princess Akemi. As Mizu really cares more about results than honorable duels, perhaps we might even see her learning to use a gun?