Dororo (2019) is MAPPA's anime series adaptation of the dark historical action fantasy manga of the same name written by Osamu Tezuka in the 1960s. It follows an orphaned thief named Dororo and a disabled ronin, who was more wood than flesh, named Hyakkimaru, as they hunt demons across Sengoku period Japan (15th–16th century).
Having been sacrificed to the demons by his father, Hyakkimaru had been born without any limbs, eyes, ears, a nose, or even skin. His father immediately ordered to dispose of him, cuz wut are they gonna do with a worm baby. But through a miracle, he lived long enough to be taken in by a doctor named Jukai who gave Hyakkimaru some sick ass doll prosthetics!!!!
If there's one thing that Hyakkimaru was born with, it was a uber strong affinity to live. He lacked a sense of hearing, smell, feeling, and sight (somewhat), as well as a sense of fear or limit. Since Hyakkimaru seemed to attract monsters and demons, Jukai taught him how to fight so he could defend himself, which he does really well despite his state.
And when Hyakkimaru reached 16 years of age, Jukai did the funniest thing ever and released him to the forest where he can roam around and eat raw fish and fight monsters and stare at people.
Eventually he crosses paths with Dororo, an orphan thief kid who wanted to capitalize on Hyakkimaru's monster fighting abilities ala PT Barnum
I first watched this anime in 2019, around its release. I was a fan of utaite singer E ve at that time. I loved his music so I was super proud upon hearing that he produced his first ending song for an anime! That anime was Dororo. I don't watch a lot of anime, but since Dororo had a really cool premise, cool fanart, a lot of good stuff being said about it, and an ending by E ve, I decided to watch it :3
After watching, well! I actually disliked it ^__^ but that was because I was 13. I came in wanting a gray story, got a gray story, then was disappointed because it was a gray story. I simply did not understand. And I never really gave it another chance for many years, up until recently when I watched it again along with some friends. And I am soooo glad that I did, because Dororo is literally a 10/10 (update 10 Dec 2023: after some months and more thinking, I'm knocking my rating down to a 9/10 :P). I definitely take back all those times I said Dororo was disappointing and got bad in the latter half, because boy it is a full horse (episode 19 reference)
And lo and behold! I'm making a shrine! :D I'm going to dump whatever stuff that I want to say about Dororo ^__^ I luv it so much and I greatly wish that it had at least a semi-active fandom. But eh, it's a complete anime that doesn't have any fanservice or crazy anime gimmicks whatsoever, so...
I'll only cover the 2019 anime adaptation though. Dororo is a pretty old franchise so it has quite a few adaptations. Personally I recommend just going with the 2019 adaptation because it's just so good; it doesn't matter if the original manga is better, the 2019 adaptation can stand alone as its own piece of media. No prior familiarity with the series is needed to enjoy it.
Content warnings for this anime: Dororo tackles themes of war and death. There's a lot of blood and violence in this anime. It's not detailed gore, but the animators did not hold back from showing corpses, severed limbs, people getting dismembered and mutilated, and lots and lots of blood.
Furthermore, HUUUGE SPOILER WARNING!!! I highly highly recommend that you watch Dororo before reading any of the articles I've written here. Please!
... I'm still writing! Please go watch it while you wait! (you can find the whole season on YouTube!)