Ninja Resurrection is one of ADV's "Landmark" titles. You can always tell by the beautiful box art and the offer for a free poster. (An example of a past landmark OAV is Ki*Me*Ra.) I usually have no idea why they choose these titles... they're usually not much better than the usual releases. Ninja Resurrection is another one of these titles.

Hailed as a pseudo-sequel to Ninja Scroll of sorts, the story is more or less the history of the Christian holocaust during the Tokugawa Shogunate. Young Christian leader Shirō Amakusa is believed by the scattered surviving believers to be a child from heaven, sent to deliver them from the evil intolerance of the government. However, according to the legend, if things go wrong, he'll make matters worse by being reborn as Satan. (So of course, there has to be some traitor among the Christian ranks...)

This OAV has nothing to do with Ninja Scroll at all. It's not by the same director, it's not by the same production house, the characters look different, the time period is different... in fact, the only connection between the two is that there's a character named Jubei. Jubei isn't even a main character! He's just one guy fighting. I couldn't even tell what side he was on! While I can understand ADV Films wanting to milk the market that got into Ninja Scroll, it's not the only marketing inaccuracy: It's less than 40 minutes long, while the box says it's 50.

The dubbing is fairly well-done. While there are a few moments that could have used a little more work, for the most part, the dubbing is exceptional. It's amazing how far ADV's dubbing studio has come from the wretched crap dubbing of Golden Boy.

While Ninja Scroll may have been a masterpiece, Ninja Resurrection just sits there. The animation is flat, and while there is a lot of action, the story is simply not told well enough, giving the feeling that the plot resolves itself in an anti-crisis.

In truth, the story doesn't resolve itself at all. Something REALLY bad happens, and that's it. The OAV calls itself part one and ends with "To Be Continued" but there's nothing to suggest that the series ever was or ever will be. I can understand why.