The Birth of Evil (Part 1)
Episode numeral: XXXVII
Original air date: 8/16/03
Billions of years ago, a gigantic and primordial monster made of pure evil attempted to devour everything in the universe. The gods Odin, Ra, and Rama fought and destroyed most of it, except for a small piece that slowly drifts away through outer space. For a very long time, the piece aimlessly drifts through space before getting caught by Earth's orbit 65 million years ago. Crash-landing on Earth, it causes the extinction of the dinosaurs, and proceeds to feed on the native life for the next few eons.
Now, during the dawn of human civilization, the monster has expanded greatly in size, and may threaten the fate of the whole world. The Emperor of Japan, who is the soon-to-be father of a baby prince (who will become Samurai Jack), sets off to destroy it. But in the process, he instead accidentally causes the cosmic predator to evolve into a giant demon named Aku.
Tropes:
- A Day in the Limelight: An entire two-parter dedicated to the history of Aku, and later Jack's father.
- Been There, Shaped History: It turns out that Aku (or at least the predatory blob of concentrated evil he originated from) killed the dinosaurs with its crash-landing, and then eating the survivors alive.
- Big "NO!": The Emperor lets out a particularly heartbreaking one before Aku begins his attack on his kingdom.
- Bishōnen Line: Aku starts off as a formless and mindless predator that wreaked havoc on the newly born universe before the gods try to kill it, only for a piece of it to survive and land on earth, where it continued to feed after inadvertently causing the extinction of the dinosaurs. Millions of years later, Jack's father tried to destroy the the Lovecratian predator, only to accidentally turn it into a sapient Humanoid Abomination.
- Blob Monster: The formless predator made of evil that Odin, Ra, and Rama battled in the beginning.
- Cosmic Horror Reveal: Downplayed. Anyone familiar with the series already knows Aku is an ancient evil in the story's setting as we know it, but this episode shows that he's ancient from even the viewpoint of the dinosaurs.
- Cosmic Horror Story: Defied. The giant space blob attempted to devour everything in the universe, but the gods (nearly) destroyed it when it was still newborn. The remnant of the monster would later almost destroy Earth, until the Japanese Emperor decided to intervene. Thanks to his efforts, the entity merely enslaved the Earth instead.
- Create Your Own Villain: The Emperor's attempt at destroying the mindless evil with a magic arrow accidentally turned it into a sapient demon named Aku.
- Crucified Hero Shot: The first part ends and the second part begins with the Emperor crucified to a construct of Aku's, forced to watch as he inflicts destruction upon Japan.
- Curbstomp Battle: The Emperor attempts to fight Aku, but fails miserably due to his mortal weapons being unable to hurt the demon.
- Darker and Edgier: Easily one of the darkest episodes in the series.
- Downer Ending: The Emperor's attempt to destroy the mindless evil only brings it to life in the form of Aku. Afterwards, Aku ties the Emperor to a tree and forces him to watch as he destroys his kingdom and slaughters his people.
- Eldritch Abomination: The entity that Aku was spawned from; a gigantic, primordial, mindless Blob Monster from outer space.
- Establishing Character Moment: The first thing Aku does once he is born is destroy the Emperor's kingdom, killing hundreds.
- Extreme Omnivore: The black mass hunted and ate any people, animals, and plants that got too close to it, allowing it to expand in size and strength.
- Forced to Watch: Aku decides to tie Jack's father to a tree and watch him burn down the Emperor's kingdom as punishment for trying to attack him.
- Generic Doomsday Villain: The original black mass that the three gods fought is shown to be a mindless force of destruction with no real intelligence, just an otherworldly predator with the intent to consume everything in its path. Ironically, the Emperor's attempt to destroy said cosmic predator is what gave it sapience and a name.
- Holy Burns Evil: Odin and the gods use their divine weapons to harm and almost entirely destroy the Black Mass.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Implied to be the fate of the men who were riding into the forest with the Emperor.
- Killed Offscreen: Quite a fair amount of the primordial evil's victims are killed this way, with the rising spikes used to confirm the deaths shortly after they occur.
- Load-Bearing Boss: Subverted. When the Emperor fired a poisoned arrow at the Black Mass, the trees growing from it began to collapse. At first, it seemed like the cosmic predatory forest was dying, but something was wrong. Two hellish flames light into existence as the forest began to undergo evolution at an alarming rate as a huge black mass tree shoots out and begins to mutate...
- Monster Munch: When the Black Mass that will one day become Aku crash-landed on Earth, the first ones to fall victim to the then-animal instinct-driven Shogun of Sorrow were the Dinosaurs.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
- Odin, Ra, and Rama were able to destroy most of the blob... except for one smaller fragment that got cut off and fell out of their sight, slowly drifting towards Earth...
- After being born, Aku wastes no time rubbing it in the Emperor's face that his attempts to destroy the mindless evil instead gave said evil a new face and personality.note
- Origins Episode: The episode explains the origins of Aku, while Part 2 gives a more detailed account of Jack's father battling Aku, and also shows Jack's birth. From a chronological standpoint, it's the very beginning of the series.
- Phlebotinum Killed the Dinosaurs: The black mass causes the extinction of the dinosaurs when it crashes down on Earth.
- Red Shirt Army: The Emperor takes a whole regiment of his men to battle against the black mass. They don't last long.
- Royals Who Actually Do Something: The Emperor charges into battle once the mindless evil begins invading his kingdom, and later goes on to fight Aku after he gains a magic sword.
- Say My Name: An unlucky peasant farmer discovers his dog's leash sticking out of a puddle of black goo, so he cries out his lost pet's name (Shinichi) in both fear and sorrow.
- Silence Is Golden: The episode's dialogue is minimal as is, but there's none whatsoever for the first eleven minutes. And if you count the cavemen's speech, there's still no human voices for eight minutes.
- Unholy Holy Sword: A likely unintentional example on part of the Emperor's advisors. The elixir was supposed to destroy the black mass, instead it only created Aku as we know him now.
- The Unintelligible: The cavemen that the mindless evil devours speak gibberish, though the creators have stated they made up a language just for the scene.
- Villain Ball: Aku would have flat-out won in the end if he chose to kill the Emperor after he failed to kill Aku with his mundane sword.note Instead he decides to force the Emperor to watch as he destroys his beloved kingdom.
- Villain Episode: The plot of the episode focuses mostly on the story of where the primordial evil that would eventually become Aku came from, and the events which lead to Aku's birth.
- Wham Episode: This episodes shows that Aku is far more ancient than what was to be believed up until this point and also sets in motion the entire series afterwards.
