Raijuta, a truly savage samurai, entered a dojo last week and challenged the concept of using wooden swords to train. His brute strength and ruthless ambition to make swordsmanship deadly once more put him into conflict with Kenshin, setting the stage for a new battle. We’ll see just how low his dishonorable samurai will go in this week’s episode of Rurouni Kenshin.
Episode 16 — The Ideal Man
Rurouni Kenshin: Past and Present — Yutaro Tsukayama, Yahiko’s Eternal Rival
Like many other characters in this iteration of Rurouni Kenshin, Yutaro has seen a change in appearance between 1996 and 2023. His hair and eye color now match his manga counterpart. He has a lighter hair color, and his eyes change from blue to light-colored brown.
Rurouni Kenshin: Past and Present — Dueling Ideologies
The episode begins with more of a bang than it did before. Following Kenshin’s refusal to join him, Raijuta unleashes a sneak attack that is quickly evaded. It did destroy an otherwise really nice bridge, though. Raijuta continues to perform otherwise devastating strikes and succeeds only in cutting a part of Kenshin’s sleeve. The duel ends when Kenshin breaks Raijuta’s sword with his own attack. None of this happened in the previous adaptation. Kenshin was still demolishing Raijuta’s men, a continuation of an earlier episode. He then dove into the ocean to save Yutaro from drowning. The kid just would not let go of a sword too heavy for him.
Where things can be compared is when Yahiko and Yutaro begin their duel. As before, the locations and times of day are different. In the 1996 adaptation, Yahiko challenges Yutaro to a duel to settle their arguments. In the past, they dueled at sunset, and Yutaro used a real sword against Yahiko. The contest was relatively short as Yutaro stumbled while holding a sword too big and heavy for him to properly wield. Yahiko leaped into the air and slammed his wooden sword down on Yutaro, reminiscent of Kenshin himself.
The 2023 duel happened quite differently because it was night as everyone slept when Yutaro showed up at the Kamiya dojo to accept Yahiko’s challenge. It’s shown that he doesn’t even know how to properly hold a sword. And Yahiko dismissed the entire affair, so they never actually dueled. Kaoru then invites Yutaro to train at her dojo.
Rurouni Kenshin: Past and Present — Yutaro’s Training
Yutaro got a pretty good training montage back in 1996. He swung his wooden sword at different locations like a ‘90s montage. Rocky would have been proud. The new training arc has much more exposition. Yutaro expresses his desire to become a proud samurai and put his father (a former samurai who became a merchant) to shame. He also intends to spy on Kenshin to report back to Raijuta, but Kenshin merely helps with the chores and little else. His arguments with Yahiko are maintained. Yutaro’s potential as a swordsman is highlighted more in the 2023 adaptation. As an aside, Ayame and Suzume were present for Yutaro’s training. We miss you, girls.
Kaoru invites Yutaro to become her student in the 2023 iteration, which he declines. The Yutaro of 1996 already makes his admiration of Raijuta clear, making such an invite pointless, even after getting tossed off a cliff into rapids.
Rurouni Kenshin: Past and Present — Kenshin vs. Raijuta, Round 2
In the past, Kenshin chased after Raijuta after he saw the terrible scene at the manor. In both instances, Kenshin and Raijuta have their next duel, where the faked bandit attack happened before. Raijuta’s attacks continue to miss, so he resorts to using a projectile attack, Tobi-Izuna. It sliced Kenshin and Yutaro’s arm because the boy was right behind Kenshin. In the prior version, this attack was intentional since Yutaro didn’t want to see Kenshin and Raijuta fight.
Kenshin postponed the duel to take Yutaro to a doctor. This is good because we see Megumi and Best Doctor Oguni Gensai. In the 1996 version, Kenshin just told his friends to take Yutaro away so he could continue to duel Raijuta.
Rurouni Kenshin Ep. 17: Settling the Score
Raijuta took things too far, and Yutaro got hurt. Kenshin will face him again and put an end to things next week.
What did you think of this week’s episode? Raijuta obviously can’t even touch Kenshin, but do you think he’d have a better chance against Sanosuke? Will Yutaro see through Raijuta’s true nature before it’s too late? Let us know in the comments below.
Let’s keep going by pitting Kenshin against isekai‘s favorite edgelord. The Kirito POP UP PARADE Figure Aria of a Starless Night Ver. from Sword Art Online is now available for pre-order. He has his own berserker nature that Kenshin should have fun dealing with.
