Berserk: The Golden Age Arc II - The Battle for Doldrey

The only real problem here is the CGI, which is on the same level as your average ps2 game. This is made even worse by the fact that there are moments where it swaps from the bad CGI to the honestly great looking traditional animation, which makes me wonder why they didn't just keep it all traditional. Aside from that, it's an entertaining watch that held my interest.

This review is written as a berserk fan so I can't help it if im biased against this second film installment.

Anyways firstly as a berserk fan I first saw the anime sometime in 2001 and then proceeded to move onto the manga which I've since read many times over and let it be known that berserk is probably one of the great works of art and dark fantasy out there. So when i first saw the movie remake I won't deny that I was excited. However after the first installment I was rather skeptical considering the super condensed story line and clunky 3d animation. However, I gave it the benefit of the doubt that being a first attempt, perhaps the second attempt would get it right...sadly I was very wrong.

Lets start with the one good point, the animation is great making the sword swinging, blood spilling and gratuitous boob grabbing all that more satisfying to watch. Seeing guts in smooth fluid animation is absolutely great, something that the original anime couldn't capture due to the low budget and superbly clunky animation. However, I couldn't help but feel that the original anime did a much better job of capturing the art style of the manga. Perhaps the ICONIC battle of the golden age arc (fans will know which one im talking about) was absolutely ruined by this film despite the fluid animation, so many of the scenes depicted in the manga were just outright skipped. Sure its nice to see guts swinging his sword around with the assistance of a bigger animation budget, but so much of the awesome stuff he does in the manga (not to mention the low budget anime) is just ignored and replaced by fluid and nice looking but ultimately empty animation.

This same 'glossing over' effect also goes for the story, no character development is allowed and many smaller but hugely valuable interactions and events are just skipped for the sake of cramming what is essentially hours of BERSERK into a condensed but ultimately tasteless 80 minutes. I also found it weird that so much time was spent on a particular sex scene which although important as a plot device didn't really warrant the amount of time and emphasis it did on screen.

But perhaps I'm blinded by my previous experiences and memories and perhaps the movie isn't really that bad. But I GUARANTEE that if you enjoy what you've seen in this movie but haven't been acquainted with the original manga...then do yourself a favor and go read it cause its a world of difference.

*Word of warning, if you do take my advice don't expect a conclusion to the berserk saga cause for all its beauty and genius, the series has definitely taken a dive and is unlikely to ever be concluded at the rate the author is going

I really liked the animation style of the OG berserk series but the 3d animation style on this movie especially on action sequences made me feel abit uneasy. Not a fan of the animation approach but i do enjoy the gores, and it was far more gruesome than it was on the series. Totally not for younger audiences. Tremendous improvement in the sounding department - Great scores and good intro song that was very reminiscene of the series.

Apart from the quality improvement and changes in style as well designs, nothing much of differences in the storyline (similar to the series, just few changes in the flow/pace). They even get rid of few important back stories that are supposed to be crucial for the whole franchise especially on guts, casca and griffith characters' development. Liking the feature changes on nosferatu and other demons.

Recommended.

Berserk one of best genera in dark fantasy at ancient times. Now taking place after events of part 1. This time the actions, fights, battles are bloody, Gruesome, and shockingly gory. Fiercely it creates edgy experience. Suspense, twist and turns properly executed. But story was lazy simple and straight lower runtime removes some impactful, heartfelt dynamics. Also visual was too blunt & flat to see 2D/3D effects could have been well polished & detailed. Consider ing on 2010-13 made significance in making many popular franchise. Some elements felt boring & slow paced. Which puts lightness on details. However, love between Griffith & princess was beautiful. But, scene was brief & vague to see clearly. It could've been longer and more intense.

Ending shifts its way to go right in full speed. Bit of Advice don't try watching 3rd part if you can't handle this.

Took me longer to watch the whole thing than expected. Kept stopping after about :40 to do something else.

"Was it interesting?" I was expecting a darker story. The character motivations felt a little hollow.

1.5 out of 3 "Was it memorable?" The worst flaw is the movie trying too hard to be pretty. The attempted mesh between different animation styles was so distracting that it almost ruined some of the action scenes. Luckily there were enough action scenes to make up for this.

1.5 out of 3 "Was it entertaining?" It just felt long and badly paced, like 3 or 4 episodes spliced together. It progressed the story just enough to be adequate.

1.5 out of 3 Starting with 1 (because), 1 + 1.5 + 1.5 + 1.5 = 5.5 I'm rounding down to 5 because I feel that a :40 special with more traditional animation would have been find. They tried too hard.