| 16 April 2006
Overview
There are those out there that have been waiting for this since the moment the Hellsing TV series started. Something was always a bit off, after all, even in the very beginning of the show. It seemed as though it was following the manga, but the wary had reason for caution, as came quite clear by the end of the fourth episode. Despite the fact that Hellsing TV was good, it was considered so bad by series creator Kohta Hirano that he refused to have anything further to do with it. Thus was born Hellsing Ultimate, an OVA series in which Hirano took far more personal involvement to ensure that it stayed true to the manga storyline. And y'know what? He did a kickass job of it.
| Fields | USA Info | Japanese Info | Image |
| Title |  |
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| Alternative | |||
| Dates | 2006 | ||
| Company | Satelite, Geneon Entertainment | ||
| Creator | Hirano Kohta | ||
| Director | Tokoro Tomokazu | ||
| Genre | Horror, Action | ||
| Related | Hellsing (Manga), Hellsing (TV) | ||
Review
As I had mentioned, the one real problem for fans of the Hellsing manga is that the TV series really did a poor job of following it, diverging wildly round about the time it hit episode 4 or seven, depending on who you talk to. Partly this is because Hirano didn't take a particularly direct role in its creation. The result was still a great series, but it lacked the feel of the original. For Hellsing Ultimate, Hirano took direct control of the series, and the result is a story that is following the manga storyline almost effortlessly. I'll admit to being mildly concerned for pacing at this early stage - as of this review, only the first episode has been released - but with so much material to cover it's perhaps not surprising to see the series skimming over some of the early stuff. By my best estimation, the first hour long episode covers roughly the first graphic novel and a half's worth of the manga. Usually I'd take the time to give a brief overview of how the series starts, but I'll make an exception with Hellsing.
Always one of its strong points, I have to admit that even with the skim-job they did, the story manages to stay coherent and quite enjoyable. You get a quick, solid feel for Alucard, Integra, Ceres and Walter, as well as the other major players, and for the general form of the world in which they live. I'm not quite willing to call it a modern-day world - Hirano's interpretation of England gives it more of a Victorian feel than it really has these days. That having been said, it's a nicely realistic place, obvious things aside, of course... y'know, like vampires? Heh. Despite the overall good job they did of skimming, I do have to admit to missing the early banter that developed between Alucard, Ceres and Integra. Though they still have a bit of fun at Ceres's expense, the OVA has lost a bit of the early playful nature.
As long as I'm on the topic of the characters, I'll say that they're very true to their manga selves, with one major exception that I'll note below. Ceres is still a little girl that can't quite believe she's not human anymore, Integra is still the single most stubborn, gutsy babe I've seen in quite some time, and Walter's still an old fart - that even Alucard considers the Angel of Death. In truth, the only severe difference - and this was more personal flavor than it impacts the storyline - is that you never get a sense of Alucard's occasional geekiness. Yes folks, that's right... I said that Alucard is a geek, at times. In the manga there was just a tiny flavor of geek to him that added a nice flavor to what might have been a somewhat generic character, but as of yet I haven't seen that same trace in the OVA. It's not a major detraction point - just something that, like the early playful nature of the story, I'll kinda miss.
The animation seen in the OVA series is excellent. In the TV series, especially toward the end of the show, there was a tendency to go for average quality in the face of higher paced action scenes. This isn't true thus far in the OVA - the artwork and animation was consistently of some of the highest quality to be found in recent releases. Character design is crisp and follows in with their manga incarnations. I did have one gripe with what I saw, though - despite the quality seen, some parts of the show seemed as though they'd been compressed a bit, as though the picture had been squished together in the middle, producing slightly elongated features, especially in the case of faces. This effect wasn't always true, which makes me wonder if it was an intentional addition, but still, I have to dock points for it, as it's not particularly good looking, and doesn't seem to serve a real purpose.
The musical score has been changed immensely from its TV counterpart. Where the soundtrack for the TV series was a mixture of rock and what I can only really call new age or funk, the OVA series has a considerably more classical feel to it, with Gothic themes and orchestral arrangements. This isn't a bad thing - in fact, I'd have been disappointed had the OVA stuck with the TV series's style. The more Gothic pieces suit the feel and scope of the manga that the OVA is so closely following, where as another song like A World Without Logos would have been utterly out of place. Kudos to the composers for an excellent soundtrack.
I can't say too much for the voice acting - I know that most of the TV series VA's returned for the OVA, and as best as I could follow on my subbed copy they were quite comfortable in their roles. I never noticed any particular quirks in the spoken dialog, so until I hear the English dub I'll rate the voice track as good.
Overall
I shouldn't need to say that if you like Hellsing, you need to check out the OVA series. It's pretty much a given fact, from what I've seen thus far, that if you enjoy the manga series that you'll enjoy the OVA. Fans of the TV series should feel right at home as well, though you may be wondering what happened to the story you got used to - and why this one is so much more consistent. The effort that Hirano has put into making sure that the storyline stays true is quite evident in the attention that has thus far been paid to detail. Though some of the flavor bits are missing, they're not major points that have any real chance of effecting the main story. In fact, the only real question that I have at the time of this review is how long their skimming is going to continue - I'm thinking that probably about the time they hit the end of the Rio arc they'll slow the storyline down to focus in on the following events. Those that don't like blood and violence should avoid Hellsing. Highly recommended for action fans!
