XCIX
Original air date: 5/6/17
Out in space, a rectangular ship travels through the darkness. A meteor shower mostly pings off its surface until one particularly big rock knocks the ship entirely off course and sends it crashing to Earth.
Meanwhile, Samurai Jack and Ashi are traveling together. They stop at a food cart of dubious quality. Jack, after 50 years, has no qualms about sampling anything that looks edible, though Ashi appears to worry. Her worry is justified given that something Jack ate turned his head into a giant Angel Fish.
Before long, they board an enormous camel bus. Jack complains for a moment of not feeling well, but it passes the moment his head turns back to normal. As the bus fills with tiger people and others, Jack and Ashi are pushed closer and closer together due to crowding. They both seem a little reluctant to get closer to each other, and avert their eyes as they must press closer and closer.The bus begins its long trek across the desert, and things take a turn for the worse. The tiger people are not just travelers. They are assassins, intent on killing Jack! He and Ashi fight their way free, and make their escape, then leave the bus, having to travel the desert on foot instead. Jack weaves them both hats out of local plants to keep the sun off, and Ashi is enchanted by the gift and that he thought of her as well.
Their trek soon takes another turn for the worse as a sandstorm whips up. They agree that they must seek immediate shelter from the scouring sands. They find the ship and go inside. Their momentary relief at being out of danger is replaced as little crawling leech worms begin appearing. One bites Ashi. She cries out in pain and goes down. Jack sucks the poison out of her leg and she recovers enough to be able to stand and walk again. Noises in the distance indicate something is coming for them, so they run. The thing pursuing them turns out to be a mass of those same venomous leeches. Jack and Ashi try to find the exit again but the inside of the ship is a confusing mess, leaving them lost and confused with the alien monster still pursuing.
Finally they happen across an armory. Jack triggers a computer hologram that explains this ship is a prison for extremely dangerous creatures. Lazarus 92 is the one that has escaped. The ship helpfully provides a weapon they can use to stop it but before Jack can learn how to trigger it, Ashi distracts him by accidentally discharging another weapon. Jack can't figure out how to turn on the weapon that will defeat the leech monster, so he takes it anyway and hopes for the best.
The monster catches up with them again. This time when it attacks Ashi, its venom dissolves her dress. Ashi, who was clothed only in charcoal until recently thinks nothing of it and continues to fight. Jack is immediately distracted and embarrassed. He throws his gi over her, with a fumbling explanation of why they shouldn't be looking at each other disrobed. The weapon is still not firing. The leeches close in and crawl all over the duo, who have a harder time fighting.
Finally, just as they are about to be engulfed by the leeches, Jack manages by sheer dumb luck to trigger the weapon. It fires out an electric arc that fills the whole corridor. Jack and Ashi are shocked, but the leeches explode, and the electricity neutralizes their venom. The electric arc continues until every last leech comprising Lazarus 92 is burst and dead.
Jack and Ashi are still alive. Stunned. Shaken. Out of breath. They can see each other over the short distance between them as they gasp for air.
Then suddenly their attraction, spurred by their survival, kicks in. They are instantly in each other's arms, locked in The Big Damn Kiss as a Dean Martin song plays in the background.
Tropes:
- Accidental Pervert: In the near end of the episode, Jack unintentionally sees Ashi naked. He blushes, and uses his gi to cover her up so he doesn’t get distracted by her nudity.
- Accidental Truth: Jack claims his gi will help protect Ashi from Lazarus-92's poison, but this is clearly just an excuse to cover her up so he doesn't get distracted by her being completely naked. After the fight, the gi is completely undamaged, possibly meaning the gods made it indestructible—or it could be that Ashi's previous clothing, which was made out of leaves and plants, was a lot more appetizing than the inorganic material that Jack's gi is made of.
- Benevolent A.I.: The prison ship's AI detects Jack and Ashi as non-prisoners, then opens the armory and provides them with everything they need to stop Lazarus-92.
- The Big Damn Kiss: After narrowly escaping with their lives, our heroes pant a little and look at each other, then a hard cut to a kiss.
- Bizarrchitecture: At one point, Jack and Ashi end up in an area of the ship that resembles M.C. Escher's Relativity.
- Breather Episode: While the situation was definitely a matter of life and death, there's a bit of comedic fluff, with some romance before the big showdown with Aku.
- Call-Back: Jack knits a kasa for himself and Ashi out of the deep red leaves of a palm tree. Not only does this point back to a scene in "Jack's Sandals" where he learned from his mother how to weave hats out of straw, it shows he can use multiple building materials, too.
- Cat Folk: A crowd of this sort of folk with green fur and stripes are on the giant camel bus, posing as commuters.
- Cats Are Mean: The cats are actually out for Jack's blood.
- Clothing Damage: Lazarus-92's worms dissolve Ashi's Garden Garment—Jack gives her his gi to keep her decent.
- Cool Sword: Ashi manages to salvage one from the armory room, with two blades that she can spin at high speed.
- Covered in Gunge: Jack and Ashi wind up covered with leech guts when Lazarus-92 explodes.
- Department of Redundancy Department: When Jack is embarrassed by Ashi's nudity, this is what he says when trying to explain his reason of embarrassment to Ashi:Jack: Well, ah-uh, you know, men and women... are different and d-d-private things are personal.
- Distracted by the Sexy: Jack freaks after Ashi's clothes are destroyed, and even takes the time to put his gi on her so she doesn't have to fight while completely naked.
- The Dreaded: Lazarus-92 was apparently feared/dangerous enough that a weapon was created specifically for it.
- Dual Wielding: Briefly done by Jack in one scene, where he uses the sheath of his sword in his off-hand while he uses the sword in his right one. (Another case of Shown Their Work, as a katana's sheath often could be used in such ways.)
- Easter Egg: Only Genndy Tartakovsky's most diehard fans would notice it, but it's there.
- Ending Theme: Instead of the usual, this episode ends with "Everybody Loves Somebody" by Dean Martin.
- Fanservice: The entire scene with Ashi's Clothing Damage and her briefly fighting while totally naked.
- Freeze-Frame Bonus: If one looks closely at the walls of the prison armory, a stylized design of the number 92 can be seen on the wall, indicating that 92 is likely the designation of this ship. As for Lazarus-92, it probably means there's more than one of these mofos imprisoned across 91 other prison ships. Let's hope they never grace the Earth like this one did.
- Full-Frontal Assault: Ashi's plant dress is dissolved by the worms, forcing her to fight in the buff until Jack gives her his gi.
- Genre Throwback: This episode has the feel of what a typical day for what Jack's earlier adventures were like in previous seasons.
- Glad-to-Be-Alive Sex: "Kiss" in lieu of "Sex," but the episode ends with Jack and Ashi making out after surviving a life-threatening situation.
- Held Gaze: Occurs several times between Jack and Ashi as their bond with each other slowly blossoms into love.
- Improvised Weapon User: Ashi is able to pick up shards of broken glass and use them efficiently like shuriken.
- Innocent Fanservice Girl: After being attacked by a swarm of leech-like monsters, Ashi's plant dress is dissolved by their poisonous slime, leaving her naked. Jack does his best to avert his gaze and tries explaining to her that men and women shouldn't see each other that way. Ashi (having quite possibly gone through her entire life basically naked and raised by an all-female cult) doesn't understand why Jack's acting so weird all of sudden and just continues fighting the swarm while naked until Jack drapes his gi over her.
- Insistent Terminology: A brief one—Ashi calls Jack's gi a robe after he drapes it over her and she questions if it's really going to protect her, to which he corrects her by claiming that it's "gi" and not a "robe."
- Lone Wolf Boss: The Lazarus-92 inhabits a crashed alien ship (possibly having caused whatever made it crash) and seems to have no relation to Aku. If anything, it's another Monster of the Week.
- Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Ashi finds a riot shield in the armory that works... to a point.
- Me's a Crowd: Lazarus-92 is able to separate into multiple beings to fight Jack and Ashi. Given their heterogeneous appearance, they might be copies of the missing prisoners.
- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Lazarus-92, naturally. The typical name for an "attempt to play God gone haywire", now given to an alien abomination.
- Never Trust a Trailer: The preview for the episode gives precious little information away about the plot of the story, featuring almost nothing to work with but Jack and Ashi running through corridors and finding themselves turned around several times while being pursued by something. It also hides the entirety of the Unresolved Sexual Tension and Ship Tease rampant throughout the episode.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Ashi's inopportune misfire of the alien gun causes Jack to miss the activation sequence for the X-49 device, and he can't get the computer to repeat it.
- Ninja: While Ashi and her sisters have always had elements of this trope this episode really drives home that Ashi is the Ninja to Jack's samurai. At one point she even uses glass like shurikens and shows a level of agility that might even surpass Jack.
- Nothing Is Scarier:
- The preview deliberately keeps any hints of just what is chasing Jack and Ashi hidden.
- The prison ship itself is this until the monster actually appears, as it's clear something dangerous is on it.
- The Nudifier: Ashi ends up getting her clothes destroyed by Lazarus-92, leaving her naked until Jack makes her wear his gi.
- Oblivious Transformation: Eating some strange alien food temporarily turns Jack's head into a fish, which he fails to notice (and Ashi avoids telling him about) for the duration of its effect.
- Oh, Crap!: After he's done being distracted by Ashi on the bus, Jack's face drops when he quickly comes to realize the letter sweaters of tiger people surrounding them spell out "DIE SAMURAI JACK".
- Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping: Phil LaMarr's American accent comes out a bit when Jack has to shout, particularly when he yells "Ashi! You're naked!!" It works to the joke's advantage, though: Jack's Japanese nobleman's eloquence is so disturbed by how genuinely and intensely flustered he is from seeing Ashi naked that he can't even speak properly.
- Or Are You Just Happy to See Me?: As the cat people cram themselves into the camel bus and Ashi and Jack are forced together, she notes something is poking her. Pan down to the hilt of Jack's sword.
- Poisonous Person: Lazarus-92's worms can excrete a neon-green poison which spreads quickly. Jack manages to suck the poison out when one grabs Ashi's leg. Her plant dress isn't so lucky later on and is dissolved by the poison.
- Prison Ship: The giant cube is a prison for dangerous alien beings. It gets hit by an asteroid and crashes on Earth, causing a breakout.
- Raging Stiffie: Subverted—while crammed together on the camel bus, Ashi feels something poking her, but it's turn out to be the hilt of Jack's sword.
- Relationship Upgrade: The episode ends with Jack and Ashi in a passionate make-out session, signifying their status as a couple.
- Rule of Drama: The X-49 device is designed to be used against an incredibly dangerous lifeform, possibly in an emergency. So, naturally, the only instruction is an easily-missed briefing tape that only plays once. No instructions on the device itself. Jack and Ashi basically end up brute-forcing it until the weapon finally works.
- Running Gag: Jack still can't manage to keep his clothes on, though it's at least intentional this time.
- Scenery Censor: Ashi's nudity is blocked by her weapons, her shield, and Jack's (conveniently placed) sword.
- Ship Tease: The episode is overflowing with this, as Jack and Ashi share several awkward moments like accidentally touching each other or holding hands, Jack sucking out the poison from Ashi's wound and him acting flustered by seeing her naked. It culminates with becoming a Official Couple at the end of the episode.
- Shock and Awe: The X-49 device releases an electric shock which causes all of Lazarus-92's component worms to burst.
- Shout-Out: A very subtle one. In one scene where Jack and Ashi were cautiously sneaking around, Jack is pushing buttons on the X-49 in the exact same way as Dexter during the intro to that other show Genndy Tartakovsky created.
- The walrus fish vendor is an Expy of Wally Walrus from Woody Woodpecker. Right down to having Billy West voice him like in the 1999 cartoon.
- Suck Out the Poison: Jack does this to save Ashi after one of the worms grabs her leg.
- Try Everything: Jack misses the activation sequence, so he has to simply punch in random combinations in an attempt to activate it; he succeeds right before he and Ashi are nearly Devoured by the Horde.
- Uncomfortable Elevator Moment: More like a giant camel bus ride in the African desert, but it still applies. The Cat Folk cram Jack and Ashi together, and it's clearly awkward for Jack, and he tries to avoid eye contact and tries to direct his eyes towards blank space, but it's so hard for him to do. For more added flavor, music plays throughout the entire scene, just like in an elevator. The tension is ultimately broken when the cat people realize who he is.
- Unresolved Sexual Tension: So much throughout the entire episode, with Jack and Ashi clearly trying to hide what they feel for each other. Then they get their Big Damn Kiss at the end.
- Vile Villain, Saccharine Show: Lazarus-92 lives up to to the threat of being one of the most dangerous monsters in the galaxy, even in spite of "XCIX" being a Breather Episode.
- Wham Shot: The very final scene of the episode is Jack and Ashi kissing each other after defeating Lazarus-92.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: Lazarus-92 is the only prisoner that ever appears, even though Jack and Ashi pass by numerous broken cells. It's possible Lazarus-92 killed/ate the other prisoners, but this is never made clear.
- The Worm That Walks: The prisoner Lazarus-92 is a being made up of thousands of leech-like creatures and is able to change shape and form. It regenerates lost members quickly and can propel the individual ones like living projectiles.
