Samurai Champloo, Volume 1 by Masaru Gotsubo

It's okay to live a life other than the one you may have planned for yourself. But when I was at my lowest point, Mama picked me up and I've been here ever since. I should have been chasing him because I liked him, but I realized that if I found him, I probably would've killed him. You see, in my case, I was traveling alone, so when I got depressed there was no one to cheer me up. I told you earlier that I traveled.in search of someone, but.the truth is that I was chasing a guy who left me.

I'll end this review with some quotes from Haru, an older girl Fuu befriends when the three work at an inn: I think the themes of why we travel and self-discovery are touched upon enough in this manga to make you think, but unfortunately isn't so heavy-handed or developed with it that it would bore people just looking for mindless action lol. Those made me think more and I appreciated some of the thoughts they provoked in me. The stories don't really have grand themes or messages to tell, but there were some nice bits of character development that aren't as touched on or fleshed out in the show (e.x.: Fuu missing her mother, and the reason why she travels Jin being a samurai without a purpose, aimlessly making his way through life without knowing why, but starting to develop his own moral compass and compassion to live by). It's not bad, but just not that remarkable, either. I gave 4* because while enjoyable enough to get through, I don't think I'd come back to this manga to read again and again except for some passages I liked.

There were some female characters I really liked and wanted to see more of, but everyone else is pretty filler and not quite remarkable ('episode of the day' types).

Jin gets less of a spotlight here and rarely gets to have his own solo fights, only sharing with Mugen.

a lot of fighting and action scenes and Mugen being an idiot and Fuu getting kidnapped. The stories are mostly light-hearted and fairly enjoyable, typical of what you'd see in the show, a.k.a. It deviates from the show slightly in the beginning, and then goes on to have its own spin-off adventures separate from the show's. My best friend somehow miraculously found a copy of this extremely rare manga in her rural, small town library and lent it to me to read.

Samurai Champloo, Volume 1 by Masaru Gotsubo