Berserk: Volume 5 (UK) (DVD)

Introduction

The two month drip-feed schedule that most anime releases get does my head in sometimes. It's especially true with Berserk, a show that I have raved about with each successive release. But the fact is that it is an older show, and by the time that next instalment is due, I have forgotten about all the aspects that made me laud it to the heavens, and all I can remember is the creaky animation. So, a show that hovers around the heights of classic anime, turns out to be a show that I dread watching. Not so much this time though, as volume 4 left us on an almighty cliffhanger, and my eagerness for the next volume overwhelmed any issues I might have had with the look of the show.

The European mediaeval period has been the setting for countless films and shows, but I have trouble recalling whether I have seen it done in anime before. If uniqueness is a selling point then Berserk gets off to a good start in that respect. Set in the fictional nation of Midland, it follows the story of a young mercenary named Guts, who wields an unfeasibly large sword, one that would have Cloud Strife of Final Fantasy green with envy. After proving his prowess on the battlefield, he is recruited by a powerful mercenary lord named Griffith into his Band Of The Hawk, in the ongoing war between Midland and the neighbouring Chuder Empire.

The end of volume 4 apparently wrapped up the war between Midland and Chuder, and the all-conquering heroes were being lauded back home, chief among them the Band of the Hawk. The fact that Griffith got promoted to the leadership of Midland's military annoyed the nobility no end, and the machinations and plotting began even before the Band of the Hawk returned home. The plots came to a head at a banquet thrown in the heroes' honour, when Griffith was poisoned. Four more episodes in the story are presented in volume 5 of Berserk: Requited Desires



18. Tombstone Of Flames
Griffith collapses at the banquet, throwing the realm into chaos. Blame is cast on the neighbouring countries, and it looks as if the war may not be as over as people thought. Meanwhile the Queen gathers her loyal nobles to celebrate the removal of a hindrance, a petty upstart with delusions of nobility. Their plans continue to unfold through the havoc with the removal of the assassin, but then smoke starts to rise up through the floorboards.

19. Separation
It's time for Guts to leave, as he's no longer happy following another man's dream. Caska certainly doesn't want him to go, even though she still has feelings for Griffith despite his elevation in society. Guts' departure is further delayed by members of the band, who want to understand just why he has to leave. It's time enough for Griffith to hear of it, and there is a confrontation on a hill outside town that mirrors their first meeting. Originally Griffith defeated Guts in a duel and claimed ownership over him. Now it's time for the rematch.

20. Sparks
Guts makes an appearance at a joust, just to see if he still has the skills, but for the last year he has been living a relatively peaceful life with a sword smith named Godo, and his granddaughter Erica. His days are full of training as he hones his skills and builds up his strength, while he tries to figure out what to do next. A year has passed when he learns of a band of fugitives being hunted down in the area. Led by a woman, Caska, they are the remnants of the Band Of The Hawk, who have been fleeing for their lives since the day that Guts left all those months ago.

21. Confession
Caska's battered army are in a fight for their lives when Guts finds them again, though his formidable sword quickly turns the tide in their favour. He learns of the hard times that have befallen his friends since he left, and while most of the band is happy enough to see him, there's resentment in some quarters that his departure precipitated the mess that they are in now. Most significant is that Griffith is a prisoner in a castle dungeon, and has been suffering torture and torment for the last year. They want to rescue him of course, and with Guts at their side, they have a chance of pulling it off, but first Guts and Caska have to resolve a few issues.

Picture

Berserk gets a 4:3 transfer that takes us back in time to when CGI was an expensive tool for only the biggest budget productions, and when people still animated with paints, pen and ink on little pieces of acetate. Even when compared with its contemporaries like Trigun, Berserk seems to fade into the background, with a dull and understated feel, an uninspiring palette of colours, and animation that only ever does enough, and nothing more. Having said that, there is a consistency and level of detail that never makes you feel as if you are watching something cheap and rushed.

The transfer itself is pretty creaky. There is a slight degree of print damage and grain, but never enough to really stand out. Occasionally obvious are videotape artefacts and an overall softness that simply can't match up to contemporary efforts.

Sound

You have a simple choice between DD 2.0 English and Japanese, with optional translated English subtitles. I opted for the Japanese as always, and found the audio to be suitable. There isn't a great degree of separation, but the dialogue is clear. I wasn't too impressed with the theme tunes, but the incidental music is excellent, suiting the action and the quieter moments well. It's no surprise when you see Susumu Hirasawa's name in the credits, the composer who would later go on to collaborate with Satoshi Kon on his films, as well as the Paranoia Agent series.

I had forgotten what older dubs sounded like. I always opt for the original language track, and while I can nitpick modern dubs, they are a world away from what dubs used to be like ten or so years ago. Berserk's dub sounds as if it overlays the action, instead of being part of it. It's of the type where voices are chosen for the look of the character. And none of it is really all that good.

Extras

There's none of the usual anime fripperies on this disc, instead it just gets down to the meat of the extras.

The first is the Interview with Producer Tushio Nakatami. This last for 18 minutes and he discusses how much Berserk was a revelation in an industry that at that time was geared more to broad audiences and family entertainment. Berserk was a new anime for a new audience, and was quite experimental. There's talk of the difficulty of adapting such a gory anime, as well as why the story ends where it does.

There are more outtakes on this disc, 9 minutes of them, with the English cast having fun making up lines for their characters, or just flubbing the scripted dialogue. It's actually laugh-out-loud funny, which is more than I can usually say for this type of feature.

Conclusion

I knew full well this was coming, as I had read around Berserk before starting with the series, but the fact that the story doesn't conclude in the anime never really bothered me until now. From what I can tell, only the first arc of the story made it on screen, and that tantalising opening episode that flashed back to this arc never gets any sort of resolution in the show. For that, you'll have to seek out the manga to complete the story in print form. But with this penultimate volume, it strikes home that all the plot threads that have been laid, all the character arcs that have developed, and all the twists and turns that have brought us up to this point, may not get a satisfactory resolution at all. I found the episodes in this volume to be tinged somewhat with regret, and I suspect the feeling will only intensify for the final volume when it eventually arrives.

On the other hand, the Berserk anime does show every sign of heading towards a narrative conclusion, as this volume follows the well trodden path of throwing in a big reversal, a bit of calm before the storm, as well a resolving a couple of character arcs in preparation for a big finish. The cliffhanger is resolved pretty promptly, and let's face it the likelihood of Griffith meeting a sticky end was non-existent. How he reacts to the situation is pretty brutal though, and once again he uses Guts to accomplish his wetwork. It's an indication of how much he has come to rely on the beefy warrior, and presages what happens in the next episodes when Guts decides to leave. It's a development that has long been coming, ever since Griffith first asked him to act in an underhand manner. There have been many instances where Griffith's purity of vision has been tainted by his methods, and for someone like Guts, who has a straightforward approach to life, such moral shading must have grated. We've seen him wrestle with this issue over the past couple of volumes, and his departure was inevitable. What wasn't predictable was Griffith's reaction to it. I don't think even he realised how much he relied on and needed Guts. Guts needs to improve himself, to see himself as an equal of Griffith, but here it becomes apparent that Griffith already sees him that way. Certainly there is no one else who Griffith confides in, or trusts. When Guts walks away, it must feel like a betrayal, which goes someway to explaining what happens next. Griffith has always had a clarity of purpose, a sense of destiny. But his subsequent actions are irrational and dangerous.



It's why when we next hear of the Band Of The Hawk, they are hunted fugitives, and Griffith languishes in the castle dungeon. Guts' leaving may have felt like a betrayal, but Caska has deeper issues to work out, dealing with the betrayal she feels after Griffith's actions that led to their flight. For a year she has tirelessly led the Band Of The Hawk, and kept them from capture. For a year she has nursed the realisation that for all her devotion to Griffith, there was never a chance that he would reciprocate, and there is also the realisation that when Guts walked away from the band, she felt more for him than she did for Griffith, meaning that her own devotion was a lie. Being reunited with Guts brings all of that into focus, leading to a bloody confrontation between the two.

The volume ends on something of a positive note, the Band Of The Hawk reunited and re-enthused, Caska and Guts finding the possibility of a future together, and the group determined to rescue Griffith. But with Griffith having been tortured for the last year, I doubt that we will be heading for a happy ending for this anime. Just as long as there is an ending worth the name. The plot holds its metaphorical breath in the penultimate volume, in anticipation of the conclusion. Similarly I find that there is less reward than expectation here, which nudges the mark down just a tad in my estimation. It's still an essential volume of anime, which I urge upon you. Just one more disc to go…