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This Hero was Headlined on May 2018. | ||
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This Hero was proposed and approved by Heroes Wiki's Pure Good Proposals Thread. Any act of removing this hero from the category without a Removal Proposal shall be considered vandalism (or a "villainous" attempt to demonize said character) and the user will have a high chance of being | ||
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| “ | My mission is noble, my heart is pure, I have nothing to fear. | „ |
| ~ Samurai Jack: in Episode 6 "Jack and the Warrior Woman. |
| “ | Fifty years have passed, but I do not age. Time has lost its effect on me, yet the suffering continues. Aku's grasp chokes the past, present and future. Hope is lost. Got to get back. Back to the past. Samurai Jack. | „ |
| ~ Jack, Intro for Samurai Jack (Season 5). |
Samurai Jack, more shortly known as Jack, is the titular main protagonist of the Cartoon Network/Adult Swim animated series of the same name.
He is the son of a Japanese Emperor who once defeated Aku by wielding a magical Katana infused with the power of the gods, making it the only weapon capable of harming the demon, where such duty is later passed down to him. Because of his primary goal throughout the show, he also became Aku's greatest archenemy, who is determined to ensure the death of the samurai.
He is voiced by Phil LaMarr during the series, who also voiced Hermes Conrad in Futurama, Static Shock in his namesake show, Wilt in Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends, Green Lantern (John Stewart) in DC Animated Universe's Justice League, and Kit Fisto in Star Wars: The Clone Wars.
Appearance[]
Early in the series, Jack's face was depicted as long and rectangular; however, later in the show it became more like a square with a distinct eastern look.
As a 25-year-old young man, he is fairly tall and lean but fit in built, and has long jet black hair that he keeps tied in a Japanese chonmage topknot. Jack's clothing consists of a simple white kimono robe (sometimes referred to as a gi) with gray trim on the sleeves and edges, a white obi sash around his waist, and a pair of wooden geta sandals. His geta were once destroyed in Episode XXVI by a group of bikers, then later replaced by a jet repairman called Tengu who crafted the very same geta sandals for himself and his family. Throughout the show, whenever Jack's kimono is severely damaged in battle, he simply tears off the top half to continue fighting unhindered. Because he starts each new episode with his kimono fully intact, it can be assumed that Jack repairs his clothing in-between episodes.
In the image shown by the time portal guarded by The Guardian depicting an older version of himself, Jack is shown to have waist-long beard and hair. He is also shown to be wearing a golden crown and a red cape with scars all over his body.
As of Season 5, Jack has grown a large beard and wears full samurai armor with a mask resembling a Japanese oni demon and a gun holster across his torso. In "Episode XCII" his mask was destroyed by a horde of Beetle Drones, and he discarded his helmet and shoulder pads while fighting Scaramouch. He appeared with his full armor again in "Episode XCIII" only for it to be completely destroyed by the Daughters of Aku, shortening his beard and leaving him wearing only tattered rags. He later regain his original look in "Episode XCVIII".
Personality[]
| “ | I am the lost son of the land you have pillaged. I am here to reclaim it. For my people, for my father, for my birthright. | „ |
| ~ Jack facing Aku for the first time. |
Jack strongly exhibits the characteristics of a stoic hero. He is unfailingly kind and generous, and will always attempt to help those in need, as well as dispatching sage like wisdom to those he believes are in need of guidance. He often ends up sacrificing a chance to return to his own time in order to help someone else. He has had considerable development during his time in the future. Initially, though polite and refined, he was very quick to anger and even more quick to being frustrated or irritated. He rarely spoke more than was necessary, and almost never smiled.
His quest to return to his own time, having been thwarted again and again, even convinced him for a short time that returning to the past was impossible. However, over time, he has become much more patient and calm. He is also clever and rational, often able to come up with a plan or a strategy necessary to defeat the enemy, and knows his limits (such as when he is surrounded by too many enemies to defeat them by pure force). He is also extremely good at thinking on his feet, often improvising his way out of lethal, or impossibly bizarre, situations. He is also a very solitary man, tending not to socialize due to his focus on his quest.
In Season 5, his lack of social skills is highlighted in his interactions with Ashi, first when he tries to convince her of Aku's evil and later when he tries to bond with her. He once jokes in XCV about the raining needles stuck in their bodies, claiming people pay for it and that it is called acupuncture, then later shyly compliments her new dress and hair in XCVII. Though not expanded upon, his lack of socializing makes him more shy and awkward around women, exemplified through his interactions with Ikra, Josephine, and in particular Ashi, whom he becomes infatuated with. While he is fine working with and befriending several people (regardless of gender) throughout his journey both during his training in the past and current quest in the future, he becomes shy during more intimate moments.
However, a running gag in the show (During Seasons 1-4) is his inability or reluctance to understand the technology of the future, such as in one episode where Jack had attempted to escape Aku's fortress after rescuing two fairy like creatures by driving a hovercar, but he fails to operate it competently, claiming he prefers to walk. He is also quite good at keeping his wits about him when confronted with the outlandishly strange circumstances that he often finds himself in, simply rolling with the proverbial punches rather than becoming upset or baffled.
After 50 years in the future, between losing his father's sword (the only means of killing Aku) and all known means of return to the past being destroyed, Jack has become disillusioned with the idea of ever completing his quest. He is emotionally vulnerable, showing signs of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder as he is often haunted by hallucinations of his family and the people of the past, constantly asking him why he didn't return to save them. Also, in Episode XCIII, his mind manifests a hallucination of Mad Jack, demanding that Jack give up and end his constant suffering, means that Jack is contemplating seppuku (traditional Japanese suicide) in this episode. Despite his weariness and seeming lack of hope, Jack refuses to surrender, continuing his quest to save people from Aku's tyranny wherever possible.
At the same time, he also becomes open-minded with technology in which he begins to utilize high-tech weaponry, explosive, and riding a motorbike. Despite his decades of training and fighting as the ultimate warrior, and his seemingly endless journey hardening his overall outlook, Jack's general nature is still rather inexperienced, having never directly taken the life of a human-being or sentient alien.
He is able to distance himself from the knowledge of all the robots and androids he has destroyed by noting that they are just "nuts and bolts". However, upon actually killing such a being, one Daughter of Aku, he was left horrified at the sight. However he later comes to term with his first kill after a memory of remembering his father's word of wisdom and is able to handle killing the remaining Daughters of Aku. Despite this, he still dislikes the notion of having to kill unless absolutely necessary, and will never harm an innocent.
For a certain period, Jack became more easily influenced by Mad Jack due to Aku destroying the last time portal. This causes him to become easily more annoyed, aggressive and angered. However, he eventually let go of his anger in order to be worthy of using his sword again.
Biography[]
Early Life[]
Long ago in ancient Japan, the young boy who would grow up to become known as Samurai Jack was the son of a Japanese Emperor moments after he had defeated an evil demon king known as Aku, by wielding a magical katana infused with the power of the gods, making it the only weapon capable of harming the demon, and sealing him away in a dead black tree. Right after Aku was long defeated, young Jack began to live a young & peaceful life with his family but his father would still remain very protective of the things around him, as he greatly feared that his nemesis would return once again & reek havoc, but while Jack didn't have such doubts, he would not know in one fateful day his life & the world he knew would change forever.
8 years later, after being told the story of Aku's defeat by his dad, Jack was warned by him that he must always be prepared for when evil comes, but Jack brushed it off as just a warning, but during his story time a solar eclipse had occurred and while he & everyone else brushed it off, little did they know was that the eclipse was just the thing needed for Aku to escape from his prison after his initial defeat. Just as a young Jack was still playing around, he was the first to witness Aku's attack on his home & despite trying their best, the army was unable to stop the demon and they were immediately defeated before his father was captured just before he could get the sword, fortunately Jack was rescued by his mother and the two managed to escape Aku's grasp as he continued to lay waste to their kingdom with his father now at his mercy.
Training across the world[]
With his entire home in ruins, a heartbroken Jack vows to honor his parents wish as his mother sends him off on a ship away from Japan to prepare to take down Aku for good. To start his training to take down Aku, he first takes the captain's lesson in astrology where he learns all about what the stars in the constellations mean to the stories they hold before they arrive at there first destination in Arabia.
There he is brought before the first ruler he officially meets in the form of a kind and generous Sheik to teach him his second lesson: horseback riding. After first learning how to get close to a horse, Jack was soon able to go from an amateur to a skilled rider in just the right amount of time.
A few years later, an little older Jack travels to the country of Africa to where he meets a tribe of proud warriors, from their the tribe's Chief gives him his first lesson in combat in the form of stick fighting. Which he puts to good use when he learns that Aku overheard that someone was training to destroy him & had a bunch of bounty hunters take him out, using his training experience Jack successfully defeats them all & the chief declares his training complete.
His next destination leads him to the desert country of Egypt where the best scholars of the land go on and teach him how to read hieroglyphics. During which he learns a story about how a band of beings who worship the Egypt god of evil Set were sealed away, but before he could learn how they were beaten his teacher had him go back to his studies 'cause he got distracted.
After being very fluent in what hieroglyphics mean, Jack then sails towards the land of Greece where he meets a wrestler there to learn how to do so, while also learning about the tale of the thunder god Zeus & his ruthless dad Cronus. After that, Jack would then head to Europe where he would not only meet the noble & generous outlaw Robin Hood, but he would also become his student in archery due to him being known as the greatest archer the country had known, all while also helping him out in his noble endeavors.
When his training in archery is complete, Jack would then continue his training around the world to prepare for his next battle, continuing with traveling on a Viking longboat & learning how to sail, then to Russia where he trained in the art of ax-throwing, and then to Mongolia where he learned how to fight on horseback. Once he finished with that Jack then traveled to China and went to a Shaolin temple where the monks who lived there taught him martial arts, where he even made a good friend in the form of his Master's son Tan Zang.
17 years later Jack, now at the age of 25 and his training made him a powerful samurai warrior strong enough to take down anyone that comes at him, finally returns to Japan to reunite with his mother. Meeting her outside of a snowy temple where no one could find them, Jack's mom gives him a white Gi and the magical katana and with one last training session, he feels himself that he is finally ready to face Aku.
First battle with Aku[]
After gearing up, Jack mounts up on a horse and rides off to a mine where a bunch of slaves, his father Chief among them, are being forced into manual labor. Taking down all the guards and freeing the prisoners, Jack is told by his father that while the sword was capable of harming Aku, it's true power lies in it's wielder, and following this Jack once again mounts on his horse and rides off to the location of Aku's tower to take him down.
Arriving in the dark castle Aku now lives in, Jack hops past all the evil forces guarding it and slips into Aku's throne room where he calls out the demon king and challenges him, and upon remembering the sword he now wields, Aku wastes no time in trying to destroy the son of the one who imprisoned him, after a hard-fought battle, the young prince is able reduce him to nothing more than a shriveled sentient shadow. But right before the Samurai was about to kill Aku, the evil demon reveals he has powers over time itself and quickly opens up a portal right underneath him & he falls right down under it.
Arrival in the Future[]
When he finally escaped the portal, the Samurai found himself sent far into the future where Aku reigns supreme to the point where he now has power all over the universe and extraterrestrials everywhere. After learning everything that has happened during his time skip the samurai, now trapped in a dystopian future, adopted the name "Jack" (which was given to him by a bunch of alien teens) and made it his goal to return to the past and undo the horrible future Aku created.
Freeing Archaeologists[]
During his first rescue mission, Jack comes along with a sentient dog archeologist and his fellow canines to liberate their colleagues who are being forced to mine crystals for Aku. Upon arriving at the excavation site, Jack swiftly manages to free all the workers, they soon learn that Aku has become aware of Jack's arrival in the future and knowing full-well on what he's capable of, he sends a battalion of robots to destroy him.
Deciding to prepare themselves for their inevitable arrival, Jack and his canine companions arm themselves and set up traps and weapons all over the worksite, even using the very crystals they were mining for against the robots. But when they all soon run out of weapons, Jack steps into the battlefield himself and wipes all the robots out, afterwards he bids farewell to the archaeologists before vowing to find a way back to his time, all the while fighting against Aku's tyranny.
50 years later[]
Time traveling caused Jack to stop aging, after 50 years of fighting Aku in vain Jack lost all hope and the magical Katana, becoming a merciless killer. Jack faced and killed a group of assassins known as "The Daughters of Aku" but spared the only survivor among them, a girl named Ashi. In return, Ashi helped Jack recover his honor as a Samurai and regain the Katana, in the process the two became lovers. Ashi eventually discovered she had the same powers as Aku and opened a time portal for her and Jack to return to the past at the exact moment when Jack had initially been sent to the future, allowing him to finish that initial battle and kill Aku once and for all.
With Aku dead, the horrible future was averted, saving trillions of lives across many generations and preventing centuries of suffering, but that came at the cost of Ashi being erased from existence since she was part of that future.
Samurai Jack: Battle Through Time[]
In the video game that picks up during the finale of season 5, as an alternate scenario, Jack managed to break Ashi free from Aku’s control and opened a time portal with her. However, Aku transported Jack into a time pocket Aku Created, a rift of time and space in his control, with no future or past, leaving Jack to relive on many challenges he had faced throughout the series. Throughout the entire game, Jack faced robots, demons, bounty hunters and the Daughters of Aku once again, overcame Aku’s final scheme, and faced Aku in the final showdown, with the help of The Scotsman, his daughters, Da Samurai and Sir Rothchild facing Aku's army. After finally defeating Aku, Jack told Aku that the time pocket that he created is starting to collapse and a disbelief Aku refused to admit defeat and then Jack slice him down with his katana , then Jack reunited with Ashi and goes through the portal to the past with her, finally destroying Aku, during Episode CI, once and for all.
In the canon ending, as the series ended, Jack finally married Ashi in his liberated homeland and, rather than Ashi fading away from existence thanks to the time pocket Aku created and Jack being all alone. Jack was finally content and happy with Ashi, the woman who restored his hope.
Quotes[]
| “ | What trickery is this? Aku- | „ |
| ~ Jack’s last words before being sent to the 21th century |
| “ | No, MORE!!! | „ |
| ~ Jack before expelling Aku’s essence to be destroyed. |
| “ | Even I forgotten that the sword is forged in purity and strength, it can only be used for good, in the hand of evil it can never harm an innocent, and so Aku it can never harm me, but it can harm You! | „ |
| ~ Jack explaining the true nature of his Sword to Aku |
Powers and Abilities[]
- Immortality: Due to the side-effects of Aku sending into the future, it affected the aging process of his body, making him ageless. He has been in the future for over 50 years and is still in his prime, but gained a beard.
Jack proves to be a highly skilled martial artist, as demonstrated in his battle with Aku in his human form.
- Master Combatant: Jack has shown impressive mastery in many styles of martial arts some of which include the Shaolin Praying Mantis, Tiger, and Eagle styles, Ninjutsu techniques, Greek wrestling and African stick fighting. He is well versed in a number of weapons that range from spears and staffs to nunchakus and shurikens, as shown in his fights at the Dome of Doom. In his youth, Jack also learned how to use unfamiliar weapons by observing others, and adapting their style into his own skills to use them more effectively as necessary.
- Master Archer: Jack has shown to have excellent skills in archery since he was trained by Robin Hood. His marksmanship skill was put to the test in Episode 3 when Jack used his archery skills to set off traps against the beetle drones and later used his last arrows on the beetle drones which they hit dead on.
Jack displays his superb swordsmanship while destroying Aku's beetle drone army.
- Master Swordsman: Aside from Jack's ability to proficiently wield a vast number of weaponry, he showed the greatest amount of skill with his sword. This was most likely due to the fact that the only weapon capable of destroying Aku was Jack's blade, allowing him to defeat a large number of enemies easily as shown in his battles with the beetle drones as well as the countless bounty hunters that Aku sends to capture Jack. Jack is shown to rely primarily on swiftness and precision in his strikes in a balanced blend of attack and defense, able to land dozens of blows in seconds, as well as being able to parry machine gun fire from multiple directions. Coupled with the sword's extreme cutting power, Jack can also slice through structures, enemies, and machines much larger than he is while also able to parry most strikes with ease. He is shown to be an equal match to the Scotsman's brute strength.
- Superhuman Strength: Jack is shown to have immense physical strength despite his lean frame, able to cleanly cut through most machines with no effort and can easily throw opponents much larger than himself (although this may be due to skill more so than raw strength).
Jack demonstrates his speed to evade gunfire from the Mantoids.
- Superhuman Speed: Jack is shown to be extremely swift on his feet and has performed incredible feats of speed and agility, able to avoid gunfire, carve through entire armies within seconds and in one instance, defeat a team composed entirely of highly infamous and skilled bounty hunters from all directions in the time it takes for a drop of water to hit the ground.
- Incredible Jumping Capability: Since coming to the future, Jack has learned the ability to leap many times his own height to the point of looking as if he could fly while also being able to fall from great distances with no injury from a jungle man and his adopted tribe of white-furred gorilla's. This is due to the training method of having incredibly heavy boulders tied to his arms, legs and back and being forced to perform strenuous activities such as climbing up a tree via a vine, tight-rope running across a clearing until his body has adjusted to the weight. This has vastly increased his strength granting him new levels of speed and agility.
- High Durability: Jack has shown many times throughout the series that he has a very high durability and has survived blows from powerful opponents and still been able to stand and fight, he also has a very high tolerance for great physical pain.
- Survival Skills: Living among Aku's Orwellian regime greatly limits the places Jack can visit for a meal even when he has money; thus he frequents living in the wild and foraging and hunting his own food. As such he trained long ago the means to secure his own food in the wild, capable of setting traps or outright killing the animal himself. Thus he has a subset of skills such as Stalking and Concealment to aid in his obtaining food. He also knows how to cook. He is aware of basic medicine.
- Willpower: Jack seems to possess an indomitable force of will. He climbed one of the highest mountains in the world without the aid of provisions or cold weather clothing. Fight against countless drones despite pain. His ambition to defeat Aku remains above all despite his near hopeless situation.
- Heightened Senses: Jack's senses are higher than an average human, as he can hear someone take a breath and a drop of sweat falling onto a leaf.
- Indomitable Will: Jack has strong determination in himself to keep going. He always willing to help those in need and willingly to go off into finding his way back to his time while tolerating the events he encounters on his adventure.
- Apathy: Through intense training, Jack suppresses his emotions to avoid emotional distraction and think properly. Despite this, he sometimes tends to lose his anger and express some emotion when dealing with certain events.
- Pure Heart: Despite his apathetic attitude, Jack has a pure heart and he's the only one who can use his sword. Because the sword was forged to be used for good, but in the hands of evil, it can never harm an innocent.
- High Intelligence: Jack was able to prove to be cunning when using his wits towards his opponents during combat, notably Aku whom he decieved into giving Kronos eye,
Trivia[]
- Jack's real name has not been revealed. The name he uses was inspired by a group of punks he met when first arriving in the future, who called him "Jack" as an nickname (like one would be called "Dude" or "Pal"). However, given his background and origin, it is likely that his real name is Japanese.
- He fought against Afro Samurai in Death Battle and won.
- He bears a resemblance to Professor Utonium in The Powerpuff Girls, a fellow Cartoon Network series.
- Jack is biologically 25-years-old, but because he spent 50 years in the future, despite still being a young man and the same age in physical appearance, he was technically 75-years-old by the time of the fifth and final season.
- Jack is one of the nine main characters of the IDW comic Super Secret Crisis War.
- He has PTSD.
- Jack has made an appearance at the end of Team Red Pro’s short film Afro Samurai Champloo, where he encounters Mugen and Fuu after he and Afro Samurai slaughter the Bandits in Black. He is portrayed by Kevin Le.
- As many fans have pointed out, Jack better fits the definition of a ronin than a true samurai, being a wanderer who had no liege or master who was separated from his family and people.
External Links[]
- Samurai Jack on the Pure Good Wiki
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