‘Samurai Sensei’…A samurai lands up in modern day Japan in a time-slip drama that delivers more laughs than answers.
Spoilers Ahead…
In Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryeo, IU’s character Hae Soo attempts to drown herself when she finds herself debt-ridden and cheated on by both her best friend and her boyfriend. To say that she was saved and continued to live on fairly happy is an oversimplification, based on the simple fact that she, for some inexplicable reason, travels back in time. The same occurs in Samurai Sensei to Hanpeita Takechi, though the direction of travel is reversed, who after commiting seppuku (ritual suicide) finds himself in modern day Japan, 150 years away from his lifetime.
Short history lesson: Hanpeita Takechi was an influential figure of the Bakumatsu period which was the transitional period between the end of the Tokugawa Shogunate and the Meiji Restoration, when many domain factions were spilt in their loyalty towards the Emperor and the Shogunate. Hanpeita Takechi pledged his allegiance to the Emperor but was also for expelling foreigners out of Japan.
Now, the first question is, why 2015 (the year the drama aired) Japan? Why not say…the period of the Meiji Restoration when Japan was westernised and heavily industrialised, or the period of post war recovery, or the bubble economy, where extravagance, excess spending and big, loud parties were the norm (that, right there, is an idea). I obviously am just dreaming up different scenarios but the possibilities are truly endless and Hanpeita Takechi and his friend Sakamoto Ryoma (Kamiki Ryunosuke with a superb comedic timing)— another very famous and influential figure of the Bakumatsu — do ponder why this particular town and this particular year?
The answer is somewhat revealed but the conflict that stems from this isn’t really etched out well. Sakamoto Ryoma talks about how Japan is still rotten, and their purpose is to get rid of this new evil that has plagued this transformed nation, but…what exactly is rotten? We don’t witness any of the issues that Sakamoto Ryoma speaks of except for one incident at the fag end of the series. It makes sense that these are brave, loyal warriors who have stood up for many injustices in the past won’t just enjoy the sights and sounds of new Japan, but will try to make a profound change here as well. I just wished that this change wasn’t relegated to the last two episodes and was instead fleshed out more.
Samurai Sensei is more of a situational comedy with each episode focusing on the Samurai encountering new and fascinating things of the present day, and though I didn’t care for the overall arc of each episode which always almost culminated to a straightforward lying is bad, truth is good lesson (especially the episodes revolving around Akagi Sachiko (Kuroshima Yuina) and her father and Shinohara Rio (Ishida Nicole) and her ex-husband felt redundant), and it was the small moments of the Samurai interacting with the people and the various gadgets and gizmos of the modern day, that I loved and found hilarious. Whether it was Hanpeita Takechi’s truthful introduction to everyone, where he calmly explained that he had travelled from the past, or when he tasted jelly and wine for the first time, or discussed his own life as history with others or tried to understand what a television, internet or manga was, I was in splits! Particularly, the episode set in Tokyo, in a conveyor belt sushi restaurants was hilarious! Akin to Jesus and Buddha enjoying modern day Tokyo, the observations of the Samurai were as amusing as they are insightful, and I just wanted more of that.
