When I was a kid and Ronin Warriors first popped up on TV, it was one of the most incredible things I’d ever seen. The cool armor, the awesome villains, it just stood out against standard cartoon fare of the time. I even tried to make my own Ronin Warriors card game using a standard 52-card deck! No, the rules didn’t make any sense.

But while Ronin Warriors was something I look back on fondly, I’d never really experienced the Japanese version, Legendary Armor Samurai Troopers. The closest I got was the fact that I’ve often listened to the second opening, “Samurai Heart,” by the amazing Moriguchi Hiroko of Zeta Gundam and Gundam F91 fame. The original was always something I wanted to check out eventually, but I had it forever in the backlog.

What finally got me off my ass to watch it was the surprise announcement that Samurai Troopers is getting a sequel. While I’m sure Yoroi Shin Den Samurai Troopers won’t require viewers to remember everything about the first series, I figured it was as good a time as any to check this one off the list. And with a few decades between my first experience with Ronin Warriors and now, I wondered how I’d feel about this anime without the nostalgia goggles.

It’s Boys in Armor, All Right 

The plot of Samurai Troopers focuses on five young warriors who can each summon a special armor with a unique elemental power. Together, they fight the evil forces of the Netherworld and their leader, the disembodied demon spirit Arago.

With its cadre of fiery yet angsty heroes clad in armor, the series is pretty much built in the image of Saint Seiya. I was completely unaware of that influence as a kid, but now, the fingerprints of Kurumada’s title (particularly its anime TV series) are all over Samurai Troopers. The series swings between its characters yelling as they launch attacks and give passionate speeches, and then having them yelling and moaning while being hit by enemy attacks—especially when it comes to protagonist Sanada Ryo of Wildfire. It’s a familiar combination of cool action stuff and dudes suffering handsomely, trying to appeal to both the kids eager to live vicariously through them and the older fans gushing over the characters and their popular voice actors, much like the whole multimedia experience we still see today.

A Focus on Style

I find Samurai Troopers to be good and fun, but not particularly great. The series is very spectacle-forward and reminiscent of soap operas in its dramatic moments: Plot twists, lore reveals, and even fight scenes are often more about vibes than trying to create a coherent narrative. Part of this definitely has to do with the fact that the series changed directors halfway through (over disagreements related to shilling of toys, apparently), but even without that, Samurai Troopers often seems to fly by the seat of its pants. 

Some developments feel like they were probably planned to a degree, while others feel like course changes in the interest of playing to the audience and/or throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks. The reveal about the true origins of the armors and the lead-up to the Inferno Armor that defines the first half are fairly coherent and overall entertaining, but the second half of the series comes across as stopping and starting every few episodes as if it’s in search of the right storyline to continue.

For example, after the midway point, they devote a handful of episodes to focusing individually on each Trooper. This is a welcome thing, but it’s strange to do this so late into the series. Also, for whatever reason, the episode focused on Shu of Stone is unusually well animated compared to the rest of the series. Elsewhere, Shu leans slightly more towards a comedic role, but here, he’s the biggest badass. And then, he and two other Troopers are kidnapped and basically out of sight for like six episodes as Samurai Troopers pushes Toma of Heaven into the spotlight with Ryo. 

That said, the series has an undeniable cool factor that it keeps up well overall. When everything lines up, it does make for some really satisfying storytelling. The villainous warlord Shutendoji (known as Anubis in Ronin Warriors, where he was also the best) is probably the most compelling character in the entire anime because of his story arc and role as an honorable villain, and it often feels like later antagonists are attempts to replicate his success with mixed results. Incidentally, there’s a different character named Anubis in Ronin Warriors, which isn’t confusing at all.

Other Things

Speaking of Ronin Warriors, I was thinking about the localization choices, and while the changes are fairly substantial, they really are perfect for a 90s show for American kids. Arago’s Youja forces are subtitled in Samurai Troopers using phrases involving “Doom” or “Nether,” but it’s basically a combination of you (spirit, supernatural) and ja (demonic, malicious). However, in Ronin Warriors they’re Talpa’s Dynasty, which sounds awesome and menacing in English, even if the show definitely likes to conflate Japanese and Chinese culture. The fact that Samurai Troopers is basically Saint Seiya but hyper Japanese makes this funnier.

There are a couple recurring noncombatant characters whose main purpose is just to be the kid sidekick (Yamano Shu) and the female companion (Yagyu Nasté). Aside from some later plot relevance, they feel like audience inserts for their respective demographics. But Nasté is interesting to me because she’s kind of a prototype of Relena from Gundam Wing, which the first director Ikeda would go on to direct (and also leave). She’s not as forceful as Relena for most of the series, but in the sequel OVAs of Samurai Troopers, Nasté does get portrayed as a more strong-willed character.

Regarding the OVAs, they are much more fully out of the realm of toy commercial. The first two OVA series really pretty up the boys, double the angst, and give them lots of fashionable outfits to wear. The third, titled The Message, seems to interrogate the nature of trying to use evil objects to do good, but in a way that involves 50% existing footage and an overwhelming amount of narration by individual Troopers. While arguably being the most interesting in terms of ideas it presents, the format is a complete slog to get through. 

Final Thoughts 

Samurai Troopers occupies a kind of transitional space between different standard approaches to anime: It’s not primarily episodic, but it also isn’t committed to serialized long-form storytelling. The show wants to sell the toys to the boys and the guys to the ladies, but the ratio of its appeal shifts all over the place until the OVAs. All this is not so unusual; Samurai Troopers is hardly the first case of a work trying to find itself as it’s going, and even the Saint Seiya manga apparently went this way. However, I think this incongruity is more noticeable because the series doesn’t always follow through with its choices. 

This might seem like I’m down on Samurai Troopers, but I’m really not. The way it clearly tries to navigate different audiences is fascinating to watch, and the excitement the title brings is undeniable. I think if I were a kid watching week to week, the way it swings between episodic and serial would make the latter parts feel that much more special.

So now I’m ready for the new show. It’ll be interesting to see how much the series leans into more recent tropes and how much it’ll try to match the feel of the original.