When HAYASHIBARA Megumi (Lina Inverse) first began mentioning wanting to do another Slayers TV series followed by word that a new Slayers TV series would be produced, I have to say that I was pretty excited. Slayers made me a fan of “Megu-chan” (as the manga about her addresses her) because her portrayal of the powerful sorceress Lina Inverse was just so freaking awesome to me. So how did this do? I thought it was pretty enjoyable.

Things got off to a great start with Lina going after pirates rather than bandits. I have to say that I laughed and laughed at that. Inspector Wiser going after Lina for being Lina Inverse is funny but starts wearing thin after a few episodes. Fortunately the writers drop him for a time and allow Lina to have her pursuit of Pokota before bringing Wiser back. I never really cared for Pokota as a character, but he wasn’t as bad as I feared he would be considering he looks like he came over from Digimon.

So, the gang all returns (Gourry, Amelia, Lina, and Zelgadiss) which is cool. The powerful mazoku Xellos is also back but he pretty much takes a back seat to things. I think the writers actually use him as he should be used. He gave Marquis Gioconda a warning about showing him disrespect (crossing a line that Lina often touches but won’t cross). Xellos simply wanted to keep an eye on things, realizing that a single Zanaffar beast being created could serve mazoku purposes but multiple creatures would not. Also, I liked how the writers had Lina acknowledge that if push came to shove, she and the others would have no chance in a fight against Xellos. So even though Xellos may not have been used as much as some might have liked, I thought he was used and portrayed correctly.

Also returning this time around are Prince Phil and Sylphiel. One positive about seeing Sylphiel is knowing that she served a useful purpose with the armies of Saillune. I felt the writers gave Sylphiel more respect in this series while still retaining some of the aspects that she had in Slayers (addressing Gourry as “Gourry-sama,” her carrot-shaped Flare Arrow spells, etc.). Prince Phil is still Prince Phil, but I guess he has a new seiyuu. It didn’t bother me, but I know some fans were disappointed and I can understand that.

As to the story itself, I hated the faux Sword of Light that Pokota created. That smacked of cheapness and a way to bring back that weapon which had been returned to Dark Star’s universe in Slayers Try. However, since the writers decided to bring back Zanaffar and this time keep him true to how he is described in the novels, I guess they had to do something to get the Sword of Light back, even if a faux one. Also, by this point, Gourry having the Sword of Light is pretty much a trademark I guess. I would have preferred Gourry get a new sword as he did in the novels.

Bringing back Zanaffar in a correct form (unlike how Zanaffar was brought up in Slayers) was a cool thing for me. The aspect to the Zanaffar story this time is how the writers basically tried to ignore what was done in Slayers rather than maybe giving an explanation. So everyone acts dumb as if they’d never dealt with Zanaffar when in fact they’d dealt with Copy Rezo who had a form of Zanaffar when Lina’s party battled him in Slayers. It seems like it wouldn’t have been too hard to bridge the two series and come up with an explanation but I guess not.

Speaking of Rezo, he’s back — sorta. I’m not so sure I like that. After all, Lina (and company) took down Rezo, then Copy Rezo, and now there’s the apparent soul of Rezo in a pot. Unfortunately, that aspect of the story remains unresolved (as well as its ties with the unresolved Taforashia story with Pokota) until Slayers GLORY (or whatever its called).

While the series was a lot of fun to watch, there was one episode that wasn’t — episode 6‘s side-track where Lina and company try to get a giant ball up a mountain in a competition. Ugh. That episode was just awful and clearly the low-point of the series. Fortunately, that was the only bad episode that I remember.

I noticed something about fan reaction to this series. While my blogging efforts of Macross Frontier would generate significant hits, even if I were the last person to blog about an episode, that was not the case with Slayers REVOLUTION. Indeed, as time went on, the number of hits dropped off, indicating anecdotally that people didn’t care much for Slayers any more. However, my article on Slayers GLORY then generated a ton of hits, suggesting there’s still interest in Slayers, but not Slayers REVOLUTION. Go figure.

For me, I rather enjoyed this latest outing of Slayers though. I felt that it returned to the fun of the first and second series while retaining an interesting adventure with Zanaffar, the assassin Zuuma and introducing a mystery regarding Rezo. Since it is already licensed, I suppose it is just a matter of time until Enoki finds a distributor (odds on favorite is FUNimation). When that happens, I’ll be sure to buy it.