Plot
Young Kubo, missing one eye, leads a fairly modest life. He cares for his ailing mother, Sariatsu, a daughter of the Moon King, and works as a storyteller. Using a shamisen, he can create origami figures from pieces of paper and bring them to life. This makes his stories about his father, the samurai Hanzo, seem very vivid. He has many enthusiastic listeners, including the villagers Hosato, Hashi, and Kameyo. At nightfall, however, Kubo must always return home to beware of his grandfather, the evil Moon King, and his mother's two sisters, who stole one of his eyes when he was still a baby.
The overall tone of the film is humorous, with frequent child-friendly jokes. An important theme of the film is the problem of death, which is addressed on the occasion of the Obon festival of the dead. On this holiday, Kubo attempts to contact his deceased father. He is late, and it is already getting dark. Therefore, the Moon King's two evil daughters find him and want to steal his other eye. From now on, he is hunted, and his only hope is to find a magical suit of armor that could protect him. He is accompanied by the snow monkey Monkey. They also have the support of a small origami warrior. While searching for the armor, they meet the beetle-man Beetle, who claims to have once been in Hanzo's entourage. Now he is cursed and suffering from memory loss. Beetle joins the companions. Together, they first find the sword "Unbreakable" in a cave. But Kubo's aunts want to prevent them from finding the remaining two pieces of the armor. On the seabed, Kubo discovers the breastplate "Impenetrable" he is looking for. But he is put into a trance by magical eyes. Beetle saves him, while Monkey fends off an attack from one of the aunts.
In a dream, Kubo recognizes the location where he can find the last piece of the armor: Hanzo's old fortress. However, this turns out to be a trap. There, the companions are attacked by the second aunt. She reveals that Beetle is actually Hanzo, Kubo's father, and immediately kills him. Kubo uses the magic of his shamisen and overpowers his evil aunt. He then flies back to his home village and finds the missing "Invulnerable" helmet. Now complete with his magical armor, he challenges and defeats the Moon King.
The further fate of the Moon King is very surprising and could have been conceived by an aikidoka.
On a new Obon holiday, Kubo contacts his deceased parents, whose spirits actually appear beside him.
The original title, "Kubo and the Two Strings," refers to a hair from his mother and a bowstring from his father, two powerful artifacts of memory that Kubo receives over the course of the film.
