A rebooted series, "The New Samurai" was reased in Australia but never captured the imagination of audiences like its predecessor. It's lead character was Shinoske Kage. Bin Amatsu reprised his role as Kongo.
In Shintaro's live performances in Sydney and Melbourne, the show featured a typical Samurai storyline. Done on a central stage, Shintaro had to escort a Princess to Edo (Tokyo) running the gauntlet of the evil Koga Ninjas. They would leap on stage assisted by discreetly placed trampolines offstage which permitted their entrance to emulate the ninja skill of leaping from high vantage points into the fray. As Shintaro despatched them, they'd roll offstage to fight again.
To achieve the effect of both the Samurai, and the Ninja being able to jump up into high places, (ie. tree branches, rooftops, etc), they would merely film the stuntmen jumping down from these places, and then reverse the footage
The members of the famous Australian heavy metal rock band AC/DC were, like many Aussie men of their generation, huge fan of this series. They visited Japan frequently in 1980 on tour and every time Japanese music journalists asked them about their view of Japanese culture, they, especially the guitarist Angus Young, were enthusiastic about how much they, as kids, loved The Samurai/Shintaro's battles with Koga and Iga ninjas. Onmitsu Kenshi was largely forgotten in Japan by then. The Australians not knowing the original Japanese title, and the Japanese not knowing the English title, and the story lines fairly generic, Angus Young could never be able to let the Japanese journalists understand which TV show the band members were talking about.
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