Last week, news hit the Internet that Sword Art Online (or SAO for short) will receive a live-action adaptation on Netflix. This story came several weeks after the announcement that the Full Metal Alchemist live-action movie would also be available through Netflix, and if I’m being honest, plenty of other anime deserve live-action adaptations more than SAO. The first season doesn’t live up to the promise of its premise, and the second season features backpedaling character development, tentacles, and borderline incest. I can list seven anime off the top of my head that deserve a live-action Netflix original adaptation, and that’s what I’m about to do.
Samurai Champloo
Anime That Deserve a Live-Action Netflix Adaptation
Anime fans admire Shinichiro Watanabe, the creator of the legendary Cowboy Bebop. He also created Samurai Champloo, and while the show is nowhere as widely recognized as Bebop (nothing is), it still deserves to be admired. Samurai Champloo features Watanabe’s uncanny ability to combine any music genre with any setting; in this case, Edo-period Japan and hip hop. In lesser hands, this combination would be a disaster, but Watanabe turns it into the lovechild of Akira Kurosawa samurai epics and Aaron McGruder’s The Boondocks.
While the live-action Cowboy Bebop Hollywood movie anime fans have desired (and dreaded) has finally started production, Samurai Champloo has been left by the wayside, even though it is on par with Cowboy Bebop. While not necessarily fit for an epic movie, Samurai Champloo would make for an excellent live-action comedy, as the show is at its best when it features bonkers stories. Imagine: Japanese Samurai vs. American Naval Officers. In a game of baseball. Complete and utter lunacy.
