Adult Swim’s Ninja Kamui has been one of the most talked about series in 2024 with fans looking up some of the best anime just like it.
What sets the show apart is the incredible fight choreography. While the story follows the simple tale of a man seeking revenge, it’s the blood-soaked battles and the emotional tension that hook the audience in.
The narrative follows a retired ninja, Joe Higan. He had broken the code and escaped the clan with his wife Mari to start a family under new identities.
However, years later he was tracked down, and his family was killed. Fuelled with vengeance, Higan leaves a staggering body count in his wake as he perseveres to destroy the ninja order.
The best anime like Ninja Kamui on our list today have some of the most incredible fight scenes. They often boast a narrative pacing that is emotionally and philosophically charged.
5 best animes to binge if you are a fan of Ninja Kamui
5) Samurai Champloo
Shinichiro Watanabe’s Samurai Champloo is one of the best samurai anime you can be binging right now. Its stylistic representation is very similar to his other works in sci-fi and cyberpunk anime like Cowboy Bebop and Space Dandy. However, Samurai Champloo is set in feudal Japan and is Watanabe’s own take on the period.
Many consider it an ode to the samurai, and you can actually see that with how the narrative plays out. The story follows Fuu, a tea waitress who goes on a journey after meeting and befriending Mugen and Jin.
Fuu’s mission is to search for a samurai who smells like sunflowers. However, during their journey, they meet a lot of enemies who are after Mugen and Jin as one of them is an outlaw and the other is a ronin.
As trouble follows these wanted men, Samurai Champloo often showcases well-choreographed sword fights similar to Ninja Kamui. However, in this samurai adventure, there is a blend of modern hip-hop with combat.
While there is a lot of death and destruction in the series, the anime never fails to display solemn undertones and reflective insights. The protagonists are often seen to contemplate the inevitable end of life and their place in it.
4) Afro Samurai
Much like Ninja Kamui, Afro Samurai too has revenge as one of its operating themes. The series begins with Afro witnessing his father being defeated and cut down by a man who goes by the name of Justice.
Justice takes the number one headband for himself while casting away number two. This series of events propels Afro to seek revenge against the man who killed his father. However, to do it he will need to climb up to the rank of number two.
He leaves a trail of bodies in this path of destruction> Not a single episode goes by where Afro is not cutting someone down. But what sets the series apart from the rest of the ninja and samurai anime is the unique fights styles that it represents.
Afro Samurai comes with its own blend of combat and sword fighting which you won’t find in most anime of its type. This is another area where it’s very similar to how Ninja Kamui deals with its combat.
However, one point of difference between the two anime lies in its setting. Afro Samurai is much more historical and a take on feudal Japan just like Samurai Champloo.
3) Rurouni Kenshin
Rurouni Kenshin is a classic in the action anime genre. It’s one of the earliest shows based on the Meiji Era that laid the groundwork for other samurai anime.
Rurouni Kenshin follows the journey of Kenshin Himura who is traveling in search of redemption. He wants to forget his past as “Battousai the Slasher” when he mercilessly cut people down as an assassin for the Bakumatsu.
However, the slasher’s past caught up with him during his journey. This is why Kenshin is often forced into fights during his journey. As he wants to help people along the way, Kenshin has completely abandoned the notion of killing others.
He has developed a style of taking down people without killing them. However, that is a double-edged sword. His reverse sword style nerfs a lot of his capabilities often leading to Kenshin getting seriously injured.
While Rurouni Kenshin sticks to tradition when it comes to representing sword fights. But there are still some over-the-top action and fight choreography to look forward to. It boasts a very satisfying hack-and-slash visual experience and much like Ninja Kamui it champions human will and determination.
2) Ninja Scroll
Ninja Scroll is one of the best anime that champions the violence that is inherent in feudal Japanese anime. The show takes this very common theme and dials it up to a hundred in terms of both story and combat representation.
The narrative follows the swordsman mercenary, Kibagami Jubei, who takes a systematic approach to all of his encounters. Jubei is on a mission to take out the Eight Devils of Kimon. They are an elite team of ninjas who are best with supernatural abilities and the skill to be incredibly precise with their swords.
In terms of temperament, Jubei is very similar to Ninja Kamui’s Higan. They are both very level-headed when in combat, and come up with the most practical ways of dealing with their enemies.
Additionally, both series contain supernatural abilities in the form of ninjutsu. However, there are no sci-fi tech elements in Ninja Scroll. Like some of the other entries on our list, this too is based on a historical period.
1) Hell’s Paradise
Similar to Ninja Kamui, Hell’s Paradise too is set around the motives of love and revenge. The protagonist Gabimaru the Hollow, is betrayed by his own clan and is sentenced to death. However, all attempts to execute him failed because of just how hard and resistant his body is.
This is why Gabimaru along with other deadly prisoners who are on death row were sent to the island of Shinsekyo. Thair goal is to obtain an elixir of life for the shogun. Whoever succeeds will receive a pardon from the shogunate in return.
This is where the supernatural elements of the show start popping up as the prisoners and their detainees slowly start to encounter fantastical beings. The island turns out to be incredibly dangerous for them, and each episode is fleshed out with some impressive fight choreography.
Special secret techniques are very common in the anime’s world design. Gabimaru is often seen to be conjuring flames from his mouth and tanking hits from enemies that can slice most men in half.
Hell’s Paradise has a very unique story telling and the plot is often revealed bit by bit. Instead of having full-blown expositions, the audience’s expectations are often kept on a knife’s edge. Hence, it’s not too surprising why it’s considered one of the best anime like Ninja Kamui.
