Shadow Hunters 2: Echo of Destiny (1972)

Japanese screen icon Yujiro Ishihara returns as ninja-killing ronin Jubei Muroto for his final big screen appearance in this immediate sequel to the manga-inspired Shadow Hunters. Like its predecessor, this feature is gushing with grind house blood sprays, ruthless killers on all sides and sexploitation aplenty. But even as it reaches for new heights of gratuitous nudity and fake blood fired from air compressors, the plentiful manga-style action gets sloppy, while increased melodrama becomes a real drag.

In an episodic continuation of the series, shadow hunters Jubei, Sunlight (Ryohei Uchida) and Moonlight (Mikio Narita) continue their vigilant fight against ninja in the service of the corrupt Tokugawa shogunate. Known as shadows, these shinobi spies are charged with exposing regional daimyo, or clan lords of any offense as a pretense to wipe them out. When a clan’s attempt to replace an aged ceremonial cannon with a new, illegally crafted cannon is uncovered, master of the shogunate secret service Mukaku Domoto (Shoki Fukae) is ordered to investigate and take out the shadow hunters should they appear.

Jubei and his friends come to the aid of the clan by agreeing to escort the new cannon back to the clan lord’s castle in an attempt to pass it off as the original. After an initial attack by the shadows leaves the cannon maker dead, Jubei leads the clan’s escort out with the cannon maker’s daughter Miya (Junko Natsu) and young son in tow.

It’s bad enough that Mukaku and his ninja warriors are trailing them, but the hunters now have a new threat to contend with, the kunoichi. These ninja are female assassins trained to use their bodies and wits to beguile, seduce and infiltrate their enemy by any means. It doesn’t prove hard to do, especially with the perpetually horny Sunlight around. He ends up inviting into their midst the leading kunoichi, curiously played by a famous Japanese transvestite named Maki Carousel.

Shadow Hunters was pretty low brow entertainment, but this sequel tries hard to up the ante. One bare-chested woman warrior getting cut down in a shower of blood apparently wasn’t enough. Here we have half a dozen naked ladies getting carved up by the heroes and Ryohei Uchida making phallic jokes about the cannon and fondling female and male transvestite chests alike. But none of this compares with Natsu’s horrific and at the same time, morbidly hilarious fate.

The ninja action is less of a guilty pleasure. The problem isn’t a lack of gruesome death dealing or carnal violence, but rather a lack of skill and creativity in bringing it to life. The filmmakers resort to goofy camera tricks and editing to enhance the ninjas’ leaping and scouring abilities, but as fighters they’re little more than samurai movie extras running blindly into the hunters’ blades. There’s an unintentionally funny moment when several ninja heads pop out from various hiding places in succession like a pack of disturbed prairie dogs. There are also far fewer ninja tricks used this time around. Worse yet, the swordplay gets extremely bad at times. One scene where Ishihara squares off against a mob of ninja is so poorly choreographed and photographed that he might as well have just pointed his sword at the ninja to make them drop dead.

Likewise, much of the actions of the heroes and villains make little sense. The sudden appearance of a bunch of pretty young ladies in the middle of nowhere never registers as a potential threat to our heroes, who have already tangled with numerous kunoichi previously. Then there is a clan chamberlain’s pointless insistence that his men stand around on the opposite side of a river, while they get blown to pieces by cannon shot. I could handle all of this implausibility if not for the horrific melodrama, mostly involving Mikio Narita’s pitiful character, who resents her loss of identity to her family’s heritage, but remains determined to carry on the cannon-making tradition. No one in their right mind could possibly hold empathy for her where in the same movie, three super ronin take on dozens of ninja while casually dodging rifle shot. The seriousness and comic book extremes clash miserably.

If it weren’t for Toho’s production values and Toshio Masuda’s competent direction, Echo of Destiny would make one of those wacky Robert Tai ninja flicks look great. Actually, it seems as though Tai’s notorious Ninja: the Final Duel saga takes cues directly from this movie. For fans of 1980s ninja action, that’s not so bad. But Masuda could have done so much better with a sharper script, tighter action and a little more effort.