Welcome to the inaugural post of Otaku Eye - as well as the Vintage Anime Review series. This series of posts will look at vintage anime - generally defined here as series from before the 21st century - but with a twist: I'll be writing each review from memory! That most likely means it's been years since I've last seen the series in question, so the assessments I make here will likely exhibit an interesting, rose-colored patina of retrospection. I'll eventually re-watch the series and write an updated review that reconsiders this one in a forthcoming series called Vintage Anime Redux.
Hopefully, this series should prove interesting to those who would like to discover great anime series of yesteryear, or, at the very least, those interested in a case-in-point of the mutability (and likely fallibility) of human memory. Enjoy!
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If there is one series from the 1990s that epitomizes the esprit of excitement, action, and humor unique to the anime genre, it is Slayers (スレイヤーズ ). Slayers offer colorful characters, a milieu with a deep mythology that is inextricably linked with its complex (if somewhat boundless) magic system, all without losing a pervasive sense of charm that never takes itself too seriously. Its a perfect example of the kind of serial that is imminently re-watchable over and over again, precisely because it does not delve too deeply into depths that even angels may fear to tread.
Slayers is an action/adventure series where nothing - whether characters, magic system, or even the plot - takes itself too seriously. The characters are defined more by their eccentricities than all but the most rudimentary and potentially cliched characterizations, and yet each one - whether main or ancillary, hero or villain - somehow exceeds the sum of his or her parts to become genuinely entertaining. The show remains imminently watchable upon repeated viewing precisely because character development is mostly static and the plot, though perilous at times, never casts any serious doubt that the good guys will win in the end. Perhaps its appeal in this respect parallels that of the best Saturday morning cartoons, or even the longest-running prime-time serials: Slayers offers a consistent and endearing cast of characters whose adventures are both interesting and, above all, safe, in a way that implicitly ensures that nothing too bad will happen to its recurring mains. After all, if something truly paradigm shifting were to occur, the carefully concocted ensemble and its familiar episodic formula would be shattered, and there would be little left for viewers to continue to tune in for.
Its stories are fun rather than cathartic, entertaining rather than exhilarating, which positions it as a panacea for those who need a break from heavier-hitting, angst-ridden contemporaries like Neon Genesis Evangelion or more dramatic and plot-driven series like Fullmetal Alchemist. Even if it isn't high art, it is still indisputably an art, insofar as art entails something evocative of the human experience. Better than any other anime, Slayers seems to encapsulate the kind of wacky, ebullient adventures without which life would be far less worth living.
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