Hokkaido may be Japan’s largest prefecture, but I’m not sure even it’s big enough to hold this many badasses.

Pound for pound, Golden Kamuy may be one of the most complete series I’ve had the pleasure to read and/or watch.  There’s something in here for just about every taste – brutality, humor, kawaii, historical context, social commentary, great action – maybe even romance.  It’s easy to see why the manga has won just about every award in the medium and sold a ton of volumes to boot – it just doesn’t have any weaknesses.  That makes it all the more a shame that the anime is only going to be 12 episodes, but that’s the financial reality we live in as anime fans these days.

So many characters in this cast are so vibrant and distinct that it almost feels like overload at times.  The escape artist Shiraishi has barely been a presence before now, but he’s a great addition – snarky and recklessly bold.  He agrees to help Asirpa rescue Sugimoto (if he’s actually still alive) because he says he likes to bet, and Asirpa is someone he feels like betting on.  A cut of the gold for him is fine with her, as she’s not actually interested in the gold itself.  So she oils him up in bear fat and Shiraishi slips through the bars into Sugimoto’s cell, only to find him rather the worse for wear.

In a cast full of GAR bastards Sugimoto himself takes a backseat to no one, and he’s managed to survive a brutal attack by the Sugita Tomokazu twins despite being cuffed.  Though Retar’s presence has spooked the horses and put the 7th on alert, Shiraishi manages to get the cuffs off before they open the door – and once he’s done that Youhei has no chance.  But the really juicy part of this is that Sugimoto uses Youhei’s intestines to make it look like he’s been gutted and talk his way out of the cell, fooling even the devious Lt. Tsurumi.

Tsurumi is a great badass too, with being a nut-job the special accent he brings to the role.  He doesn’t manage to catch up with Sugimoto once he figures out Sherlock Holmes-style what’s really happened. but he performs a supremely GAR move in hitting the ground rolling after Asirpa shoots his horse and not missing a beat.  He doesn’t shoot Sugimoto, because really – what would be the point?  He reasons that it would be better to let Sugimoto’s team hunt down the tattoos because they’re better at it than the 7th – and then reveals that he’s been wearing the ones they’d already collected as a jacket, keeping them safe after Sugimoto and Shiraishi set fire to the compound as they flee.

Meanwhile, there’s Hijikata – one of history’s great bad hombres.  And he’s teamed up with Nagakura Shinpachi (Sugou Takayuki), the captain of the Shinsengumi 2nd Division who historically speaking was actually still around at the end of the Russo-Japanese war (unlike Hijikata).  Hijikata is in this for more than money – he’s got it in his mind to use it to re-form the Shinsengumi and make Hokkiado an independent nation under their control.  Maybe Shinpaichi is right and Hijikata just wants a chance for the battle death he feels he’s been cheated out of, but there’s something Shishio Makoto-like about all this.  The scene where the two old Shinsengumi warhorses and their ally Ushiyama Tatsuma (Nomura Kenji) take out the nest of a local kingpin who refuses to ally with them is pretty remarkable – Hijikata slashing with his katana with one hand, and blowing heads off with a rifle with the other.

As for Sugimoto, he gets a just reward from Asirpa for running out on her – and I can’t say he shouldn’t have expected it.  The fact that Sugimoto is as ashamed as he is reveals the truth of his feelings about Asirpa – maybe he doesn’t love her in that sense, but he’s come to respect her as a warrior and a survivor.  The two of them and Shiraishi seem more or less to have teamed up, and he and Asirpa overrule Sugimoto’s plea to spare the horse they stole – soon enough it’s uma sukiyaki (but not before the funniest scene of the episode), and Sugimoto actually gets Asirpa to try some meat despite it having been cooked in miso.  Of course she finds it delicious – it is delicious.

As if all that weren’t enough, there’s one more magnificent bastard to add to the mix.  NIhei Tetsuzou (Ootsuka Akio – if this show is overrun with anything as much as badasses, it’s badass seiyuu) is a legendary bear hunter, possibly of the Matagi people – and he’s teamed up with Tanigaki, which means Retar remains solidly in the firing line.  Hokkaido at the turn of the 20th Century was a pretty perilous land to begin with, but with this group roaming about a war between superpowers might just have a safer time to be there.