Overview:
Berserk [2016] continues near immediately after the 1997 berserk anime. Something that the 97 anime does not cover is how Casca and Guts escape where they were at the ending. To cover that piece. In the movie remake of original Berserk it goes over this in the last couple minutes of the film. A character called Skull Knight, who does appear in this season, breaks in, takes them and leaves to put it simply.
The movies are basically the same as the anime but more condensed due to being a film instead of 25 episode anime. There are some details skipped over and some added that the anime didn’t have. Watching both the anime and the films will give the most information but not necessary.
With this season of Berserk, the animation shifted from being 2d to 3d modeling. This isn’t a bad choice but is starkly different from before. The arc covered is The Tower of Conviction. Inside and around the tower is considered a holy ground… perfect for what is shown inside the tower and around it. Enraptures exactly what one would imagine a holy place to be in every aspect from the torture, famine and abuse and general rodding people are getting sometimes quite literal kek.
Visuals/Music:
With the visuals shifting over to 3d, backgrounds and scenery look very good while the character models on the other hand are pretty bad and feel quite out of place. Its not to say everything looks bad since that isn’t the case. If a person solely watched the original TV airing version, then yes it will have looked bad. However, on the BD release there was quite an overhaul that had been made to improve the quality of character models and portions that looked bad. Still left a large room for improvement though, would have been better if more time was sunk in to make BD’s look better. Most notably lip syncing/movement is worse than regular 2d, feels completely unnatural. [unnatural given this is an anime]
Music was very well done with an intense soundtrack that matched the tone of the show. Sadly, its pretty much the opposite of original Berserk, where there isn’t a calming and more soothing soundtrack to complement those moments. Other than that, no real complaints.
The sound effects I found were not the best. This is from the time that a lot of shows love to use mic rupture esque effects, but I don’t find that to be an excuse. A lot of the time the sound effects felt out of place or didn’t match what was happening, so it didn’t really help with immersion. Lot of room for improvement on them but the OST itself is up there, especially My Brother since you know when that plays its about to get real.
Final Thoughts:
Having 3d I do not think was a bad choice, but due to using 3d and having the character models look bad, it takes away from the intenseness of the show, at least for me. Not everybody will feel this way more than likely but thought it was something to point out. 3D can be very good… it just takes a lot of time and effort to achieve a high level of quality from it.
With the use of 3d, I found that it helps quite a bit for the size of Gut’s sword since in the original the size seemed to vary every couple minute. One second being same size as him and the next over double his height lol. Was never an issue but more of something that was funny to see. That problem is solved with the use of 3d models.
For those that enjoyed the first season of Berserk, I would recommend watching its sequel. Those who have not seen the first one and try to jump in, it will be very confusing. If only watching for the action, you’ll get what you came for.
Moments of rape, gore and violence is very prominent and more prominent in this season than the first, for those that cant handle these types of scenes I would avoid since there are a lot of them throughout the season.
Characters (main) – 3.5/5
Characters (sub) – 3/5
Enjoyment – 4/5
Visuals – 3.5/5
Music – 3.5/5
Story – 3/5
`<code>Overall Ratings - Rec: 3/5 Raw: 68%</code>`
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