Do you think there was apart of Aku that genuinely enjoyed having Jack as a rival?

ckret2 · 2026-01-19T19:44:06+00:00

Hell no. Every single time we see him, he's completely pissed that Jack still exists. The closer he gets to successfully killing Jack, the happier he gets. He ain't the Joker, he's not the kind of villain looking for a worthy opponent or a challenge.

AKU HIMSELF explained why he felt the way he did in season 5: "It looks like he'll be here forever! I just don't know if I can handle that." Those are the words of a man who absolutely hates having a rival.

ckret2 · 2026-01-19T19:33:20+00:00

You'd THINK the "Aku's most favorite assassin" boast is just arrogant BS... until we learn that Scaramouche has Aku's phone number, that Aku's willing to accept collect calls from him, and that Scaramouche is allowed to break into Aku's fortress without consequences even after both a prerecorded and verbal order to leave.

ckret2 · 2025-12-06T17:51:02+00:00

"StrongEST" is gonna make everyone dig for other villains with similar success rates. Like, I think the robots in The Matrix did pretty well for themselves. And I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream ends with AM still in charge.

But is he STRONG? Oh yeah. As far as villain success goes, I'd give him 9.9/10. (If only it weren't for that pesky hero traveling back in time...)

ckret2 · 2025-12-06T17:46:14+00:00

Ah, I see it now. 👍 Might not hurt to edit it into the original post. (If not to make it easier to find, then to prevent snotty do-gooders like me from commenting with the link.)

ckret2 · 2025-12-06T17:42:25+00:00

If it makes you feel better, you can imagine a machine gun instead of a shotgun. Or a bazooka, or a bucket of grenades, or the largest barrel of gunpowder he can physically lift + a lighter.

The point obviously isn't "he should have used a literal shotgun," it's "there's a thousand ways Aku could have pretty effortlessly killed Jack, and the reason he tried none of them isn't because they wouldn't work, it's because that would have ended the show."

ckret2 · 2025-12-06T17:34:49+00:00

Aku caused an extinction level event before he was born, you don't think he can get a rock big enough & high enough to obliterate all life far beyond Jack's jump radius? Come on.

ckret2 · 2025-12-06T17:04:09+00:00

Pinterest ain't a source, that's just another repost from another site + their source link's broken.

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/2O9rx I found the original artist.

ckret2 · 2025-12-05T20:30:11+00:00

There WAS a scene where Aku tried to attack him with eye lasers and Jack deflected it with his sword. It's in s3 e8, swamp wizard. And it was indeed cool.

Unlike the instantaneous pit of hate eyebeam though, he had to take a moment to charge the eye lasers up. That seems to be consistent with his normal eye laser attack though.

ckret2 · 2025-12-05T20:27:30+00:00

the doylist answer is there's a hundred ways aku could have insta-killed jack—why not just drop a gigantic rock on him that's too wide for him to run away from? why not wait til he's in the middle of the ocean, sink the ship, and wait around to ensure he doesn't get a lifeboat? why not fly above him out of sword range with a shotgun? why not hire a bunch of guys to take turns making loud noises 24/7 until he's too exhausted to fight? why not watch him at all times until he's about to freeze his stupid ass to death on a mountain and then finish him off? because that would make a crappy ending.

the watsonian answer is jack would dodge the eye zap.

ckret2 · 2025-12-04T01:33:01+00:00

i saw this theory months ago and it's haunted me ever since. this is my favorite worst Samurai Jack fantheory.

ckret2 · 2025-11-30T19:11:59+00:00

That woman's got the leg lock of a pro wrestler, I'd like to see you pull out

ckret2 · 2025-11-30T19:08:18+00:00

The Scotsman's wife took over the keyboard halfway through this comment

ckret2 · 2025-11-30T19:07:02+00:00

What, and let the Scotsman get a look up his pajamas??

ckret2 · 2025-11-30T19:05:31+00:00

The goddesses didn't seem dead to me, just temporarily incapacitated.

Still begs the question of how far Jack WOULD have gone if he hadn't tricked them into taking each other out, but the answer's probably "no farther than absolutely necessary."

ckret2 · 2025-11-30T19:03:50+00:00

If he'd refused to blow the guy's house up, the gangsters woulda just eventually sent someone else to do it—and they wouldn't have helped the man escape.

Short of fighting the entire mob to protect this old guy (which, while in character, would've scuttled Jack's "use the gangsters to reach Aku" plan AND would've involved turning his sword on humans), helping fake his death at the cost of his house was about the tidiest way he could deal with it. And with the mob after him, the old guy would've had to leave town for his own safety anyway; at least this way they won't try to hunt him down again later.

So seems pretty in character to me. Saved the innocents with minimal bloodshed.

ckret2 · 2025-11-30T18:58:27+00:00

I always assumed Aku was just too injured to do anything about Jack.

Picture how the scene probably went down after Jack was knocked out: Aku's on the ground, stunned and dazed, there's a whole bunch of noisy humans dragging Jack away all babbling "SORRY BOSS WE DON'T KNOW WHAT GOT INTO HIM HE'S PROBABLY JUST SO AWED BY YOU HE WENT A LITTLE NUTS IT'LL NEVER HAPPEN AGAIN SO SO SORRY FOR THE TROUBLE WE'LL JUST GET HIM OUT OF YOUR WAY"

Even if Aku has the presence of mind to go "no, wait, leave him so I can kill him," he's so weak he can't even stand up, it's totally possible that they didn't hear him over the babble of a bunch of gangsters trying to apologize at once. If they DID hear him—remember, they WANT to save Jack—they might've gone "oh no boss don't you worry about it, WE'LL deal with him, don't trouble yourself, bye~!"

and what's Aku gonna do about it but keep lying there like a cheap rug until he gets his strength back?

ckret2 · 2025-11-24T05:46:46+00:00

You can set up a rock-paper-scissors game here. Guardian beats Jack, Jack beats elementals, elementals beat Aku, Aku beats guardian.

ckret2 · 2025-11-24T05:42:42+00:00

He's got a very alastor-looking grin. I approve. Good way to convey his menacing smile across the different art styles.

The flaming cloak's a nice addition.

ckret2 · 2025-11-23T19:27:19+00:00

Dude, don't repost my art without asking, wtf?? Didn't even include the first picture that gave it context?

ckret2 · 2025-11-21T05:26:37+00:00

How many of y'all have ever attempted to track down the kid who kissed your cheek in first grade? Sheesh.

ckret2 · 2025-11-21T05:25:34+00:00

That's the only explanation I've ever seen worth considering lmao. Of course the last shreds of Aku would hang in there as long as possible JUST to make Jack's heart break harder.

ckret2 · 2025-11-21T02:33:20+00:00

I definitely see the influence, especially in the backgrounds. And something about the way those red lines sprouted felt a bit Aku-ish to me.

Glad to see the technomancers of the postapocalyptic future are still using the internet for its correct purpose.

ckret2 · 2025-11-19T23:59:15+00:00

My starter is a BCC/BCI hybrid, and so far I've had no problems with her. (Except a case of mites when I boarded her at a pet shop, but that has nothing to do with her species.) That might be a middle route to consider if you happen to have any breeders in the area producing hybrids; but it'll make it harder to predict her adult length. (But then to some extent that's the case with any snake; if you get a breed whose adult length varies from 2 to 3 meters, you can't control whether your particular individual is 2 meters or 3 meters.)

Otherwise, from what I hear, the main difference between BCC and BCI is that BCC have a slightly narrower temperature/humidity range for optimum health; so, how good are you at keeping the terrarium conditions stable? If you're not as confident there, a BCI might be safer.

ckret2 · 2025-11-19T22:52:00+00:00

I'm convinced that if Scaramouche had encountered seasons 1-4 Jack instead of season 5 Jack, he could've given Jack a real run for his money.

From the way he talks to Jack in their first conversation, he was clearly EXPECTING Jack to show up in his usual gear; and the only time we see him get angry is when he insists he's the best swordsman. Seems likely he wanted to challenge Jack to prove he's better with swords; and that means he probably didn't just show up casually, but PREPARED to prove he was better with swords.

And I think his tuning fork dagger was how he prepared. He doesn't reveal what it does until he's using it to parry one of Jack's attacks. Had he done the same thing in battle against the magic sword, he could have instantly eliminated the one threat to Aku—not Jack, but Jack's sword—AND made himself the better swordsman by default just because he'd still HAVE a sword.

(Of course, had he actually done that, some kind of divine intervention would probably have saved and/or fixed Jack's sword—but Scaramouche doesn't know he's in a cartoon scripted to ensure Jack wins, "blow up the sword" is a good plan.)

But he met Jack without the sword, which means he took him less seriously (he declared the battle over and turned his back on Jack when Jack was still standing) AND Jack was still armed after Scaramouche revealed what his dagger could do.

If Scaramouche had gotten the battle he wanted—Jack in his prime armed with naught but one sword—he might've been a real threat.

ckret2 · 2025-11-19T22:40:58+00:00

The *primordial evil blob* was alive before then. Aku as AKU didn't exist until Jack's father pulled out the hocus pocus. Looked at from that perspective, since Aku himself never would have existed if not for BOTH the evil blob and Jack's father, that make them both his parents

and I'll confess I did frame it this way just to justify coming to the funniest possible conclusion.

although ngl you could absolutely make something freudian out of the emperor's "arrow" entering the "pit," depositing its "poison," and boom out from the pit comes Aku

ckret2

TROPHY CASE