Taisou Zamurai

At the pinnacle of his gymnastics career, Joutarou Aragaki—nicknamed Samurai for his signature hairstyle—suffers a shoulder injury following his wife's death. Five years later, he continues to push the limits of his body as a member of the Japanese gymnastics team. However, Joutarou's strenuous training fails to show any progress. His coach, Noriyuki Amakusa, advises that he retires.

Together with his exuberant and supportive nine-year-old daughter, Rei, Joutarou takes a trip to Ego Wonderland to break the bitter news to her. However, their excursion ends in an odd encounter with a peculiar self-proclaimed ninja named Leonardo. He follows them home and interrupts Joutarou's every attempt at telling his daughter.

Upon learning that Leonardo hopes to witness his gymnastics again, Joutarou astounds Japan with his announcement that he is not retiring. Joutarou dedicates himself to the biggest challenge of his career to prove that the gymnastics world is right where he belongs.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Sturges, Leonardo Main

Ono, Kensho Japanese

Aragaki, Rei Main

Honizumi, Rina Japanese

Aragaki, Joutarou Main

Namikawa, Daisuke Japanese

Aragaki, Bigbird Supporting

Yamaguchi, Kappei Japanese

Minamino, Tetsuo Supporting

Kaji, Yuuki Japanese

Ayu Supporting

Mizuki, Nana Japanese

Nakanomori, Masahiko Supporting

Hirakawa, Daisuke Japanese

Takizawa, Tomoki Supporting

Yoshino, Hiroyuki Japanese

Amakusa, Noriyuki Supporting

Horiuchi, Kenyuu Japanese

Liu, Ryuushou Supporting

Kamiya, Hiroshi Japanese

Cook, Justin Producer

Kananiwa, Kozue Producer

Kimura, Makoto Producer

Odagiri, Narumi Producer

Reviews

Sep 30, 2024

jimfaindel

Recommended

This one had a rough first episode, but its earnest and serious heart far outweighed the unwanted levity of its stumbling start. The way the reveals kept slowly being drip-fed, and the deepening motives of each characters, had me coming for more and checking after the ending every time, hoping for just one more scene. And I am sure glad I stuck around to watch them stick one hell of a landing.

This isn't an in-depth look into the psychology of a professional gymnast, though we do get a window into how their career and passion impact their lives and relationships. The Gymnast Samurai is rather ... a glimpse into the many ways art and sport demand the totality of a person's life, and what such a choice takes not only of an individual, but of everyone surrounding them.

Reviewer’s Rating: 8

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May 29, 2022

Salvatierra21

Mixed Feelings

Taisou_Zamurai is the typical original sports anime that was made to commemorate the Olympics of all the sports anime that were made with this idea. I thought it had a lot of potential and deserved an 8 since its clichéd plot of the typical athlete who was at the bottom and then it sank to the bottom it had a main character that you would support until the end but the final chapters and lack of character development made this anime a waste of time
1- Main characters:
Aragaki, Joutarou: he is a character who feels that all his development to reach the Olympics is in a ... natural way, so you want to support him at all times as his daughter, but not having that final battle in the Olympics means that everything is in vain and a waste of time as watching his training in China

Sturges, Leonardo: he is a nice character that you want to know more about in the story and I dream of him, which happens, but in a very forced way that damaged the way the two protagonists met, making a super cliché

2- Secondary characters: they are all flat, a mixture of eccentric characters, they are only there for conversation, the only characters that have value in the story are the coach and the doctor, it is so much the lack of creativity that they put into
a Gals that does not paint at all in history

3- The rivals: Minamino, Tetsuo seemed to me an excellent rival just like Liu, Ryuushou from the Chinese team, pity that the character was only wasted, he was only there to mention the Olympics, the only revalidation that is seen in the anime is between Aragaki, Joutarou and Minamino, Tetsuo, the young rookie against the Veteran was well built, a fight that should have been the secondary dish because the real fight was against Liu, Ryuushou

4- The horrible music they had no idea what to put just like the animations of the OP and ED a headache

Reviewer’s Rating: 5

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Feb 26, 2022

ccalyyuu

Not Recommended

Preliminary (3/11 eps)

Gave this a try because I'm always on the look out for non-ball game sports anime and gymnastics seems ripe for storytelling— we all know about the drama, the skill and the high that the sport can get, especially after the US Women's team performance at Tokyo.

But this is ridiculous. Dropped it after 2.5 episodes. I've seen other reviews that gush about this, and maybe there's something to it, but I cannot get past the annoying start. They inserted ridiculousness seemingly just for the sake of being wacky, zany, or idk ~original~ but they break immersion instead.

There's the big bird that talks which ... is stupid. Leon, this foreigner that I assume is a fan, pretending to be a ninja and being chased by agents?? The acupuncturist is fem and wears makeup which is good, but he also touched Leo's "leg" (butt really) within 3 seconds so that's just a gag character in my opinion.

I already know there's gonna be stuff about believing in your passion, determination, not giving uo even if you're an older athlete with a busted shoulder, asking for and accepting help, etc. Sports anime can only go so many ways. I'm not looking for originality. But I do want it to come in an earnest way, not some wacky shenanigans which only annoy insteas of intrigue me.

Reviewer’s Rating: 4

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