Nothing like a little "Champloo" to clean out your head.

Okay, so after a week of studiously avoiding any of the Noir OSTs, and putting the DVDs away, I managed to actually get through an evening of watching anime without being all irritable because it wasn't anything like Noir.

And you know what? It wasn't just because "Samurai Champloo" is pretty good. I actually watched disc 2 of "Chrno Crusade" first. And I survived it!

It's actually been quite a while since I saw the first disc (and the stupid search engine isn't helping me find what I wrote about it at all, so no link), so I sort of forgot most of the details behind the characters upon starting the 2nd. No big deal, though, because it's not a particularly complicated show. Anyway, it was fun enough popcorn escapism that I didn't mind continuing it. I kind of like the premise (early 1900's New York City convent fighting supernatural evil -- in other words, "nuns with guns"). But over all, it's just more fluff. I'll keep renting.

Then I moved on to "Champloo". Disc 2 had finally, finally arrived about a month after it was released (so much for pre-ordering!). So to re-cap, I started with disc 1 and watched them both in a row. It's continuing to be immensely enjoyable and entertaining. An early description of the series was that it's more about the journey than the destination, and it does a totally excellent job living up to that.

And it's just dripping with "cool". A very worthy successor to "Cowboy Bebop", I'd say.