Slayers

I'm just new to SLAYERS, so I decided that The Motion Picture would be my first animated encounter with Lina and Naga. Boy, did I enjoy it. I got lost on the plot once, but I just ignored it and picked up from there on. Out of the two mages, Lina has to be my favourite. There's something about her... I think it's probably her short temper. My favourite scene is just after when Naga literally bounces onto the screen and admonishes Lina for her diminuative stature. Lina cooly points at Naga and uses a fireball to roast her. I also liked the Midnight Blue song at the end. Oh, Naga! I forgot her. Um, well, just looking at her says it all. The best scene with Naga has to be the jellyfish/sea cucumber battle. That was just an odd spell, as was the one with the dragon made of rock (a massive head and tiny body). One problem, though: I think there wasn't enough of Lina's Dragon Slave.

But on the whole, an excellent piece of viewing for newcomers.

The English dubbed version of the Japanese 'Slayers - Gorgeous'. Although some of the dubbing was really badly done (ex. Dill Brand = Explosion Array, Dragon Slave spell was mixed up), and Lina's Seiyuu (voice actress) got kinda annoying after a while, it was overall a solid effort and was another great success in a great series... Slayers!

Lisa Ortz (Lina's regular Seiyuu) was off recording Record Of Lodoss War - Chronicles of the Heroic Knight when this was being dubbed, so they had to get someone else. Naga's Seiyuu was, however, a true tribute to her Japanese voice!

If your looking for a good time with a couple of smart-ass gals who like to blow stuff up, welcome to Slayers!

Slayers is one of those things that's been on the list of "something I should probably watch one day" given it was one of those cornerstone 90's anime that all my friends love. The opportunity presented itself for me to watch this today, and I took it, making it the first piece of Slayers media I've ever seen.

And it's fun! But also kind of weird, in the way movies based on series tend to be, where the first half of this movie is basically just all these little vignettes where villains queue up one by one to get destroyed by Lina and Naga in a single hit. It's breezy and it's funny, don't get me wrong, but it does feel like it goes on a little too long for a bunch of dudes that are ultimately inconsequential.

When the movie finally starts moving on its central plot, it almost feels begrudgingly so. But at least it's well-established that Lina and Naga are basically unstoppable, so that when a credible threat emerges, it's that much more impressive.

The glue that holds all of this together is the animation, which is A+ prime 90's anime gold. The monsters, the spell effects, all of it is gorgeous, and there's something about the hand-painted cels on real film stock that makes it feel that much sharper and more colorful than a lot of modern digitally-produced anime. This era of anime at its peak in terms of look and style.

Also, count me among the many who are amazed that Naga, a pretty iconic Slayers character, only ever appears in these movies and is not from the actual Slayers series at all. Weird!

Nahga the Serpent is a great addition to Slayers in that she brings another level of comedy with her. But what separates this film from the rest of the movies and the Specials is that Lina's and Nahga's adventure intertwine with the story of a human whos memories and quest are perhaps more important to the audience than that of the two sorceresses. Slayers the Motion Picture had everything I wanted from a Slayers film and more: love, heroism, wit, adventure, and comedy.

My son introduced me to anime not that long ago. Like most things, there's a lot of junk, but "Slayers, the Motion Picture" is definitely NOT junk! I was unaware that it was originally a tv series in Japan, but this movie can stand entirely on its own: Heroines, villains, good writing and characterization, great animation, and, finally, an evil foe with great power and no conscience whatsoever. I do have to agree with my son, though, that it's best to watch this movie with subtitles rather than dubbing. Dubbing cannot capture the same character qualities as the original- and often very witty- Japanese dialogue does.