Yet another samurai anime! Haven’t we seen enough of these? But wait! Onimusha stands out. No, it’s not the story. It’s. . . . I’ll get to that.

Aging samurai Musashi joins with a team of fellow samurai to hunt down the traitor Iemon. In the way lay a series of demons raised from the dead by Iemon. But Musashi has a secret weapon. It is the Oni Gauntlet which lends him the powers of a demon as he fights. Unfortunately, it also takes a bit of his human soul.

So the band sets out on a bloody adventure. Characters get killed off, and they are joined by a young girl named Sayo, whose parents themselves are now part of the living dead serving Iemon. Everything leads to a final one-on-one with Musashi’s humanity hanging in the balance.

But it is not the story which attracted my attention. It is the animation. The animation is a good deal better than what you get from most TV series. The characters movements flow in a realistic manner. Also, keeping the backgrounds occasionally a touch out of focus gives us a 3D effect.

What also caught my attention are the movements of Musashi. His mannerisms remind me of the legendary Japanese actor Toshiro Mifume. Out of curiosity, I switched to the original Japanese dub, and sure enough Musashi’s original voice did sound like Mifume’s. You don’t get that effect from the English dub, though. All this was confirmed as intentional when I checked imdb.com.

Ominusha is co-directed by Shin’ya Sugai, who also directed Dragon’s Dogma. It is dedicated to the memory of Kim Jung Gi, a South Korean artist who was one of the character designers, and who tragically died at age 47 from a heart attack.

If you enjoy anime for the artwork, then the eight episodes of Onimusha is a must-see. It does get a bit bloody, but it is a samurai anime. It should be expected.