Trigun Stampede Distills the Emotional Resonance of the Original

Trigun Stampede is a remake or a reboot, depending on your perspective of the show and its potential second season (we’ll see!). But whatever it is to fans new and old, the recent emotional conclusion has made one thing very clear: Trigun Stampede is a triumph. A rare succession that builds upon the basis of the original with full author intention and sanctity, beautiful in animation, music, and symbolism.

It is an intimate epic worthy of the acclaim afforded its predecessor.

The original series of Trigun released in 1998, at what would come to be nostalgically seen as a watermark decade for anime, for these years saw the release of Cowboy Bebop, Serial Experiments Lain, Hellsing, Ghost in the Shell, Neon Genesis Evangelion, and Samurai Champloo — shows that would go on to influence further cultural and artistic movements within the larger anime diaspora. The mid-late 90s to early aughts are what I dub the “arthouse era” of anime. Not only was this medium relatively new to western mainstream audiences, but the niche, slightly cloistered feel of the decades’ animations, as well as its slotted availability on the slightly forbidden realm of late-night television, gave it peculiarly classic feel — the young teenage audience watching it students of a darker, wilder, international academia.