Slayers: The Motion Picture Anime Review

Quick Review

• Reviewer: Marc
• Review Date: 2000-10-10 (updated 2000-10-10)
• 3.5 stars out of 5 (?)

This first film take on the ever-popular Slayers series is more of the same dumb fantasy fun with a liberal sprinkling of actual plot that made the series as popular as it is. Fine art it ain't, but it does amuse, as long as your tastes aren't too refined.

Worth noting is that, since this is a prequel, the story is self-contained enough that you could easily watch it without any prior knowledge of the series and not feel too left out. A few in-jokes will slip by and you won't fully appreciate the characters, but it'll still be enjoyable. It might even be a good way to get a feel for whether Slayers' brand of humor/plot is right for you. If you do go into it from that perspective, you'll get a decent if basic fantasy tale liberally seasoned with a lot of weirdness and quite a few mild breast jokes (though in all it's remarkably tasteful for this sort of thing). It should be hilarious if it's to your taste, but isn't for everybody.

If, on the other hand, you're already a Slayers initiate, you should be pleased with this outing. It's focused solidly on Linna and Naga, so don't expect to see any of your other favorites (although an apparent ancestor of Goury shows up). The plot lies essentially outside the rest of the series continuity, so you also shouldn't expect much in the way of development of any sort. But, as a self-contained story, it serves up the mix of bizarre, somewhat tasteless humor and fairly serious story (toward the end) you've grown to love.

Visually it's a sharp-looking movie, and a definite step up from the TV serieseses... TV shows. The art is clean, sharp, and colorful, the animation fairly expensive-looking and smooth, and some of the backgrounds are very nicely painted. The character designs are essentially what you've come to expect (meaning cute, distinctive, and true to the series), as is the acting in both languages. The music (again, as usual) is quite nice; broad, fantasy-style orchestral themes as background music, with a particularly catchy Slayers-style J-technopop end theme by Megumi Hayashibara.

In all, Slayers: The Motion Picture is a self-contained story built of the same elements as the series. If you're not already familiar with Slayers, this isn't all that bad a place to start, and although the mix of weirdness and relatively serious fantasy isn't for everybody, it's quality entertainment if you're in the right mood. Slayers fans, on the other hand, will find everything they've come to love in a somewhat more attractive package and sans most of the backup characters.