Slayers, The: Volume 4

Introduction

A few years ago, it would have been unheard of for a full-length anime series to be released in the short time frame of four months. Usually, it would trickle out at a volume every two months, and take close to a year to complete, as fans waited on tenterhooks. It looks like anime companies are cottoning on to the fact that anime fans are an impatient bunch, and they are altering their release practices to suit. Manga are trying everything from two disc sets, half season boxsets, to complete series releases, and fan response seems to be very favourable indeed. MVM haven't so much altered the release format as they have the frequency. Slayers has been released at a volume a month, and each disc contains between six and seven episodes on average. Now that's a civilised way to do things. It doesn't stop there either, as in May we dive straight into the first volume of the follow up series, Slayers Next.


Lina Inverse is a powerful sorceress in a pint-sized package. She's into wealth redistribution. She takes on the toughest of bandits, the meanest of monsters, with an arsenal of powerful and destructive spells, and then liberates them from their gold, gems and magical artefacts, redistributing it into her own pocket. Having just laid waste to a group of bandits, she's happily traipsing through a forest when the surviving thugs set upon her. Before she can lift a finger, a tall, handsome and brave warrior leaps in to defend her. Gourry Gabriev is the heroic figure, who's frankly disappointed that the damsel in distress turned out to be a flat-chested brat (It's not Lina's fault she's a late developer), but circumstances conspire so that the two wind up travelling together. It's just that among the various items of Lina's latest haul, is a little something that attracts the attention of certain unsavoury characters, and will lead Lina and Gourry on a series of fantastic adventures.

Previously, Lina and Gourry, fleeing persecution, headed to the city of Sairaag with sorceress in training Amelia, to confront whoever it was that had framed them. In Sairaag they encountered Gourry's acquaintance Sylphiel, a shrine maiden, who pointed them to Eris, a powerful woman in the city. When they went to confront her, they were shocked to encounter the resurrected Rezo, and it was only a last minute intervention by the returning Zelgadis that helped them escape. Rezo's outburst of power was devastating for the city though, and with the grieving Sylphiel, the heroes search for a way to defeat the Red Priest… again.


The final six episodes of the first series are presented in volume 4 of Slayers from MVM.

21. Upset! Gourry vs. Zangulus
The adventurers finally arrive at Rezo's Legacy, a vast underground magical laboratory, but before they can search for a means to defeat him, they have to find a way in. They're in a race though, as Eris and Rezo are also looking for this magical weapon. Meanwhile the bounty hunter Zangulus is there too, but he's only looking for revenge against Gourry.

22. Vice! The One Who Was Left Behind
The exploration of the underground complex continues, but the traps and pitfalls serve to hamper their progress. It seems luck is smiling on them though, when they find one of Rezo's minions, Tiiba, who has been trapped for all this time waiting for his master to return. Tiiba is one of the Monster Race, but looks for all intents and purposes like a chicken. He's loyal to his master though, and refuses to help them look for the legacy. It seems hopeless, it's not as if it would just fall out of the sky.


23. Warning! Eris' Wrath!
Rezo's Legacy fell out of the sky, onto Lina's head, but was snatched up by Eris. The adventurers work in concert to retrieve it, but are beaten back by Eris wielding the stone tablet. Eris has set forth her plans for vengeance, using the tablet, the Claire Bible to resurrect the Demon Beast Zanaffar, which Rezo was originally planning to use to defeat Shabranigdo. But as the demon awakens, she isn't expecting to be stabbed in the back, and by none other than the copy of Rezo himself.

24. X-Day! The Demon Beast Reborn!
Rezo joins with Zanaffar, obtaining ultimate power, and his first ambition is to succeed where the original Rezo failed, by killing Lina and her friends. With the fate of the world in the balance, and her friends having no success against the empowered Rezo, Lina crosses her fingers and attempts to use the Giga Slave spell again, but Sylphiel stops her. Sylphiel has noticed something odd about Zanaffar and the magical tree Flagoon that grows outside Sairaag, but before she has a chance to tell Lina, Rezo strikes.


25. Yes! A Final Hope: The Bless Blade
All hope seems lost when Lina is stabbed, and Gourry and the others look hopeless in the face of an ever-vengeful Rezo. But they fight a valiant last stand long enough for Sylphiel to escape with Lina, and attempt to heal her. She takes her to a secret hiding place that she knows of, where years ago she secreted the Bless Blade, a part of the Tree of Flagoon, and what may be their only chance against Rezo.

26. Zap! Victory is Always Mine
The conclusion.

Picture

Slayers is an anime from the mid-nineties, so pixel perfect CGI perfection is just an animator's dream. This is traditional, hand painted, cel acetate animation with all the inconsistencies and flaws that implies. It looks pretty good for all that, with a decent transfer of a good clean source. There's no sign of age or print damage here, and the animation may be comparatively rough and ready, but it still has all the vibrancy and imagination that I have come to expect from anime. It isn't all that flash or high budget, but the character designs are memorable and the world design does what it needs to, to get the story across.

Sound

You have a choice between DD 2.0 English and Japanese, along with optional English subtitles (except for the credit reels, where the subs are burnt in). My instinct as always was to go for the Japanese language option, and I wasn't disappointed. I was dreading the English track though, the mid-nineties wasn't a period known for its excellence in dubs, but I was pleasantly surprised by the English audio in Slayers. For one thing it's quieter than the Japanese track, and not just in terms of audio levels. For once, a dub cast plays comedy for the jokes, rather than the misapprehension that by screaming a line they make it funnier. Also, there are some occasional choice diversions from the Japanese script, responding to the onscreen action, that are actually funnier than the original dialogue. It may be sacrilege to some purists, but I think in this case it works. The sad thing is that this dub is from the old days, where technology wasn't as good as today, and the English dub feels layered on top of the anime, rather than an integral part of it. There are also a couple of nice themes to get the toes tapping, from Japanese voice of Lina, Megumi Hayashibara.

Conclusion

The first season of Slayers concludes in a suitably pyrotechnic manner, and if you have been following the show up to this point you won't be disappointed. It did however manage to fail my personal test for entertainment value. Twice watching this disc, I had to skip back to re-watch half an episode, simply because I had fallen asleep. I think that reconfirms my earlier opinion that Slayers works best when it drops all pretence of seriousness, and goes straight for the comedy jugular. I thoroughly enjoyed the first half of volume three for that very reason. Here, as we come to the season finale, and the big showdown between Lina and Rezo-reborn, comedy has to compete with action and drama for screen time, and my interest begins to wane.


It's because comedy can on occasion be timeless, and jokes can make you laugh no matter how old they are. A pratfall sixty years ago is little removed from a pratfall today, and Slayers with tongue in cheek is just as fresh and entertaining, as it was when it was first made. It's just when things get serious that the show begins to smell… musty. Slayers is from an era where anime had to be broad entertainment, appeal to a wider audience, and so it is that the action and drama is straightforward and even tiresome. Good and evil is drawn in strict shades of black and white, while characterisations are simplistic and stereotyped. Everything slots into a neat pigeonhole, and the story proceeds in a very predictable way. It's that which has me nodding off, whereas the sparky asides and sarcastic comments are more likely to have me laughing. I also find it hard to take character drama seriously when those very same characters have been playing it strictly for laughs for the previous seven or eight episodes. There's also a last minute character redemption that seems utterly out of place given what the main characters had been through up to that point.


While I may not be Slayers' most vocal proponent, I can see how it will immediately appeal to those nostalgic for the creaky VHS viewings of yesteryear. But it also has a lot to offer to fans that are approaching it for the first time. If you can get past the aged look and sound of it, and the rather generic and worn storytelling devices, then it's a great show to switch your brain off at and just revel in the madcap sense of humour. It won't take the UK by storm, it's about a decade and a half too late for that, but it deserves to do well. I'm already looking forward to Slayers Next.