Berserk

I was introduced to Berserk by a friend of mine. He had seen it over at a friend's house and thought I would enjoy it.

Until Berserk my favorite anime had been Tri-gun. Upon seeing this anime I had been blown away by the sheer magnitude of story, characters, etc. I loved it.

This anime is one of the best ones I have seen. The story and Characters were developed over time all 25 episodes not just the first 3 or 4 as is typically found. The story raised the same emotions of excitment that FF7 did when I first played it.

I really wish the ending would have been different, but it only meant that more is to come. I am really hoping that they decide to do a 2nd season of Berserk, if they don't I'll just have to get my hands on the manga that everyone has been talking about.

Overall the series is very good. there are minor flaws in the animation at times but for the most part its smooth sailing.

Almost everything that could be said, already has been. I just wanted to say thank you Kentaro Muira for all that you brought to this world. Never before has a piece of fiction ever made me feel so many emotion at one time before. Thank you also for taking your time with the series and not rushing to finish. Even though it's possible Berserk might never have a true ending, you still managed to create one of the most amazing stories to ever exist.

Some of my favorite things to watch are stories that take you on more than a 2 hour simple journey and instead lead you on an epic tale. This is great in that aspect. The first episode left me thinking it would be only similar to all other anime I have watched - good, but nothing exstatic. However, from the second episode forward it only got better and better until an unbelievable climatic ending. I love the midievil aspect rather than the usual sci-fi, or goth (vampire) themes. The three main characters, Guts, Griffith, and Caska - are excellent, and by the time the series nears the end you really know each of these characters individually, meaning you can feel their pain and hopes. All around, this is a superb film, and I can only pray every day that they make a second series since this one ends making you crave for more - ends on a cliffhanger so to speak. I'd love to see Guts' further adventures and what would happen with his relationship with Griffith/Femmto.

To the one who panned this series after watching an hour and a half of it: That's like watching the first 15 minutes of >insert title of any complicated, intelligent movie here< and dismissing it.

As for the music, it's not standard anime j-pop crap. It's not movie-score like music either. It's definitely not for everyone, as far as just listening to it goes (but I must say I've developed a liking for Susumu Hirasawa's work), but most of it fits quite well (although with the rampant re-use it's bound to not work sometimes), and some of it is great regardless what it's presented with. "Behelit," and "Forces" being the real stand-outs, both in terms of being listenable, AND in terms of reuse with varying degrees of appropriateness. The opening theme does suck though. No question. (In stark contrast to the end credits song, which, while also being an abomination of Engrish, sounds perfect.)

I used to be really into anime. I fell out of it a few years ago, and stopped giving a crap about almost all the anime I'd ever seen or heard of. But as all the chaff blew away, this was one of the few grains to remain. It's unforgettable, especially if you watch the whole series in order. It's unspeakably grim when viewed as a whole, but contains a growing optimism throughout most of the series.

There are only a tiny handful of animes which can stand beside Berserk in the quality of their storytelling. Hell, only a small portion of ANY fiction can be compared favorably to it. Berserk is not just good anime, it's good drama. If you like the fantasy genre in any format, you must see this show. If you like stories about people growing through hardship, you must see this show. If you like stories about unrelenting badasses, you must see this show. If you don't care about anything but eye candy, or you're an anime dork looking for wank-fuel, look elsewhere. Berserk may not have something for EVERYONE, but it has something for MOST people.

This is a good anime if you want to get introduced to the Berserk franchise and I know for sure it was my introduction because while I prefer the manga, I still love the anime quite a bit.

Both subbed and dubbed versions are pretty good though I am neutral on the subbed/dubbed debate personally. But the English dub did pick good voice actors and what captured me on the dubbed version was Marc Diraison voice performance as Guts.

This is a great anime of the one of the longest and still good manga out there written and drawn by the great Kentaro Miura! The anime did his manga a decent amount of justice at least.