Okay, now I don't run into many anime series/movies that leave me with a sense they were left incomplete and disappointment. However, I have found one that fits both categories and it was a sad day in my otakudom. I picked this up from Amazon.com and I thought it was sure to be a great set of films. Oh, how wrong I was.
Legend of Crystania picks up a frew months after Record of Lodoss War and Record of Lodoss War: Tales of the Heroic Knight. Ashram and Pirotess are leading the people of Marmo away from their homeland since Kardis is awake and their land is destroyed. They reach the land of Crystania, by ship convoy, but it is closed off from the rest of the world by a wall constructed formt he skin of an epically mammoth serpent. The whole island is basically made form it. Ashram is desperate to help his people and calls to the gods who rule Crystania to let them pass. The dark godking Barbas answers him, promising that they may enter Crystania, but, Ashram must give up his body to Barbas and his soul will be trapped in the Realm of Chaos. The deal goes through, the people of Marmo construct a castle, a town, and place Ashram's sleeping body on the throne. For 300 years, Pirotess waits for her lord/lover to awaken.
Skip forward 300 years and we meet a band of new adventurers who are descendants of the Marmo refugees. Lord Haven, Prince Redon's father, has declared that he will be neutral in the conflicts between several other factions. However, Obier, a companion with a small girl in tow who knows sprite magic (remember Deedlit?!), is sent by the most powerful of the factions to assassinate Haven. He fails, but is caught up in an attack by that faction and finds out that he was being used and would be blamed soely for Haven's death. He escapes with the other companions. The main part of Crystania is shut off by a huge wall that extends into the clouds called the God Wall. When Redon wishes for power to destroy the faction that killed his father, Barbas answers him in the form of Ashram. The God Wall splits and the companions run through, beginning their adventure in the Lands of Crystania where the beastmen rule.
Now, that is where I got confused. The band of adventurers are directly descended from the Marmese(that's what I call them), but Ashram's castle is in the Beastmen's Territory. So what happend? did they have to escape to the other side of Crystania? I want to know! There are plot holes from the beginning...great.
The first thing any Record of Lodoss War fan will notice is that even though the films are produced by Kodokawa, it's whole new animation and art team. The character detail/appearance is what killed me when I saw them. Their level of detail from the original 1990 release is, quite frankly, horrible. The animation is choppier than I would like, even for anime. However, I did notice that the characters have a higher degree of "natural" movement instead of flying all over the place and striking poses, they move more like you and me.
Character development was non-existant. Redon is this story's Parn, but without Kashue to beat him into shape. He, like most of the cast, is uninteresting and you end up feeling nothing for them. This had to be my second biggest complaint as I was expecting something great (with Kodokawa doing it, what fan wouldn't?), however, they remained as you met them. Lady Aderashia is a perfect example of a character they could have done A LOT with, but cut her out of 90% of the film. WHY?!
Ashram had the baddest mullet in all of anime in this film. But he didn't have it in the original series. He had this gothic, dark knight look that was on par with Darth Vader, though he never wore a helmet. In Legend of Crystania, he has a mullet, can anyone tell me why? I didn't think Ashram was into NASCAR and Smokey and the Bandit films. However, if you take off his now very uncool armor and put him in overalls, you can see it wouldn't take much. His voice is still deep and sounds good. That and he still carries the demon sword.
Pirotess is the main character although the story revolves more around Redon, which I never understood since he's a punk and she's featured on ALL the cover art and the discs in the set. She's fallen a long ways from her badassitude from Record of Lodoss War and is now easily taken down by even minor badguys. WHY?! I ask again. That's one reason I fell in love with the character (not in that way, she's just that good(bad). She's on a quest to reawaken Ashram with the use of an artifact called the Chaos Ring (kind of a Lord of the Rings where you WANT her to get the ring to her lord). She still uses people to her advantage, but isn't as bloodthirsty as she once was, like when she uses Yoof to help her get to the Realm of Chaos, but when Yoof becomes injured and ill, she's angry, but allows Yoof to rest at the behest of a Shrine priest. However, I still wanted to see some of that old Pirotess I met in the first series. Another complaint is that she goes from being her old dark-skinned complexion, to almost Nordic White in the film, some coloring issues they could have addressed before release.
Kodokawa released this film in their "Essential Anime Collection", but is has next to no extras and it just comes off as half-assed. I could have done better, and I'm not kidding. In the original Record of Lodoss War and Tales of the Heroic Knight, you got a bunch of extras if you bought the special edition versions. If this is a special edition, where are all the extras something like this was supposed to have? What's so "Essential?" However, my biggest complaint comes at the very end when Barbas is dead, Ashram freed, and the beast gods are almost all dead. Pirotess has fought so hard for so long, waiting 300 years for her beloved to reawaken and rule his land finally, and she gets absolutely no payoff whatsoever. Watchout, this is a spoiler, so if you want this movie or to at least want to watch it, don't read any further.
Pirotess frees Ashram's soul from the Realm of Chaos with the help of Yoof and the Chaos Ring, and Redon. The God-killing dragon is dead and all is well. Then we see our lovely dark elf standing at the throne of Ashram...he's still asleep. She goes before him, kneels on one knee and puts her head down. At this point, I was waiting for the big surprise where she would get what she so richly wanted for 300 years, for Ashram to wake up and take her in his arms and you get that really good feeling in your being. But NO! He still freakin' asleep! WHY?! Why should she have to fight for so dang long, nearly die on several occasions, and not see her man come back to her? Kodokawa, you really left me feeling like crap after that. GGGRRR!
