幕府时代末期，外忧内患，山河动荡，百姓生活困苦，且生命时刻受到威胁。少年心太因其善良纯洁之心感动飞天御剑流高手比古清十郎，被其收入门下学习剑法，更名剑心。
在国家危难之际，年轻的剑心怀揣改变时代的梦想下山，加入奇兵队，日后更被桂小五郎纳入麾下，以刽子手的身份为时代的变革尽一份绵薄之力。年仅15岁的剑心接连刺杀多名政府要员，令对手闻风丧胆，直到某一天，一名下级武士在他的脸上留下一道无法愈合的伤疤。
来至京都寻找爱人的雪代巴邂逅了剑心，正是眼前这名瘦弱的男子将爱人从她的生命中带走。巴走入剑心的生活，随之经历了政治斗争的血雨腥风和田园乡下的宁静淡雅。也许她正是剑心那把狂舞之刀的刀鞘，但在大时代的背景之下，两个人的渺小幸福一触即碎……

2007 Japanese animated science fiction film

2008 film by Mamoru Oshii

A mysterious suicide and a series of unmanned robot run-aways sparks off a Police investigation into the suspicious software on-board thousands of industrial robots around Tokyo.

Set in the year 2000, when the level of Labor accidents begin to escalate around Tokyo Bay, police detectives Kusumi and Hata are assigned to investigate. What they discover leads to a series of government cover-ups, conspiracy concerning a new biological weapon entitled WXIII-Wasted Thirteen and a tragic, personal connection to Hata. The only hope to stop this threat is to cooperate with the military and lead WXIII into a showdown with the Labors of Special Vehicle Division 2.

In the year 2029, the barriers of our world have been broken down by the net and by cybernetics, but this brings new vulnerability to humans in the form of brain-hacking. When a highly-wanted hacker known as 'The Puppetmaster' begins involving them in politics, Section 9, a group of cybernetically enhanced cops, are called in to investigate and stop the Puppetmaster.

In 2071, roughly fifty years after an accident with a hyperspace gateway made the Earth almost uninhabitable, humanity has colonized most of the rocky planets and moons of the Solar System. Amid a rising crime rate, the Inter Solar System Police (ISSP) set up a legalized contract system, in which registered bounty hunters, also referred to as "Cowboys", chase criminals and bring them in alive in return for a reward.