You wait a lifetime for Netflix to debut an adult-orientated animated original series about a vengeful samurai, only to end up with two of them releasing in the space of 24 hours. You couldn’t make it up, but there could only be one winner in this highly-specific battle, and it’s Onimusha.
Backed by maverick filmmaker Takeshi Miike, adapted from the long-running video game franchise of the same name, and boasting a theme song from EuroVision Song Contest winners Måneskin, it’s certainly the more eclectic of the two without a doubt. Unfortunately, whereas the acclaimed Blue Eye Samurai got off to a dreadful start on the viewership charts, Onimusha has easily decapitated its contemporary to emerge as the landslide victor.
The former only reached the Top 10 in seven countries following its premiere 24 hours after its unintentional rival, but the latter is faring significantly better having become one of the most-watched TV shows in 42 nations around the globe, per FlixPatrol. That still hasn’t been enough to see it chart as one of the 10-biggest hits globally, but it’s six times better off than Blue Eye Samurai.
Both of them are worth watching, though, having received a rapturous response from critics and the subscribers who actually went out of their way to check them out. Sadly, Onimusha‘s uses of cutting-edge 3D modeling against luscious hand-drawn backgrounds has made the animated adventures of Akio Otsuka’s Miyamoto Musashi a great deal more successful off the bat than those of Maya Erskine’s Mizu.
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