Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #29733 in DVD
• Released on: 2005-07-26
• Rating: Unrated
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Format: NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 4
• Running time: 600 minutes

Video Details
Let the forces of evil tremble in fear (along with wealthy merchants and inno cent bystanders)... THE SLAYERS ARE BACK! Join the not-so-heroic adventures of Lina Invers e--the super-cute sorceress who steals from the rich and keeps it for herself! Along with her sword-swinging (but dumber than dirt) sidekick, Gourry, her hyper-enthusiastic protégé , Amelia, and the tormented and overly-serious golem, Zelgadis, there's nothing Lina can't do! BONUS FEATURES INCLUDE: Video Interview with U.S. Actors, Character Sketches, Meet th e Characters, Comics, Sneak Peeks, Interactive Menus, Chapter Stops, Spoken language: Japa nese & English, English subtitles. DVD-ROM FEATURES INCLUDE: Art gallery (includes Japanes e packaging), Cast info, Scripts, Graphic Novel pages, Character Sketches, Reviews.

DVD Menu

• Disc A --
  • Languages
  • Play Program
  • Special Features
    • Meet the Characters
      • Gourry - Eric Stuart/Yasunori Matsumoto
      • Zelgadis - Crispin Freeman/Hikaru Midorikawa
      • Lina - Lisa Ortiz/Megumi Hayashibara
      • Amelia - Veronica Taylor/Mesami Suzuki
      • Xellos - David Moo/Akira Ishida
      • Martina - Rachel Lillis/Mifuyu Hiiragi
    • Comics
    • Meet the Actors
    • Character Sketches
  • Dvd Rom
  • Sneak Peeks
    • Play Them All
    • The Slayers Try
    • Revolutionary Girl Utena
    • Wrath of the Ninja (The Yotoden Movie)
    • Darkside Blues
    • Photon
• Disc B --
  • Languages
  • Play Program
  • Sneak Peeks
    • Play Them All
    • The Slayers Try
    • Revolutionary Girl Utena
    • Wrath of the Ninja (The Yotoden Movie)
    • Darkside Blues
    • Photon
• Disc C --
  • Languages
  • Play Program
  • Sneak Peeks
    • Play Them All
    • The Slayers Try
    • Revolutionary Girl Utena
    • Wrath of the Ninja (The Yotoden Movie)
    • Darkside Blues
    • Photon
• Disc D --
  • Languages
  • Play Program
  • Dvd Rom
  • Sneak Peeks
    • Play Them All
    • The Slayers Try
    • Revolutionary Girl Utena
    • Wrath of the Ninja (The Yotoden Movie)
    • Darkside Blues
    • Photon

DVD Chapters
Disc A --
0. Select Episode
1. The Terror! of the Monster Zoamelgustar [23:30]
2. The Roguish Priest! His Name is Xellos [23:30]
3. A Wonderful Business! Being a Bodyguard Isn't Easy [23:30]
4. An Ancient Pledge! One Who Seeks Immortality [23:49]
5. Staying Behind! For the Sake of Love [23:50]
6. The Return! of the Obsessive Martina [23:49]
Disc B --
0. Select Episode
1. Follow! the Phantom Dragon [23:31]
2. Be Eternal! The Day Prince Phil Died [23:32]
3. Hidden Ambitions! The Shocking Confession [23:32]
4. Take Back! That Magic Power [23:52]
5. Slash 'em to Bits! Ragna Blade [23:52]
6. The Unexpected End! The Shocking Truth [23:52]
7. The Moment! of Ambition's Defeat [23:52]
Disc C --
0. Select Episode
1. Where! is the Strongest Spell [23:50]
2. A Big Crash! The Battle at Artemay Tower [23:51]
3. Bitter Curve Balls! Gusty Fast Balls [23:52]
4. They're Talking! About a Girl Named Zelgadis [23:51]
5. The Temple of Sand! The Secret of the Giga Slave [23:51]
6. Disclosure At Last! Xellos's True Form [23:52]
7. Set Course! for Dragon Valley [23:51]
Disc D --
0. Select Episode
1. The Traitorous! Demon Dragon King [23:51]
2. The End! of the Demon Dragon King [23:52]
3. Menacing Swordsman! A Journey of Reunion [23:50]
4. Sinister Trap! The Mysterious City of Ghosts [23:50]
5. The Soul's of the Dead! Lina's Final Decision [23:50]
6. Go To Next! And Then Again... [23:50]

Customer Reviews

This is great but the sound is kinda bad.
I love Slayers!!! The story is great, the fighting is great, but i have one problem and that's the sound. For example their's a guy walking down a hall right while the foot steps sounds get their before the guy's feet touch the ground!!!! That's a bad thing people!!! And another thing is when Lina is talking her mouth this moving and she isn't talking!!!! But other than a few sound problems this's a fun box set.

Model middlebrow anime series w/ great cast. Amelia rules.
Slayers is a proven crowd-pleaser with a worldwide fan base. The franchise has extended to three full seasons of TV plus several films and OVA releases. By popular consensus, this second season is Slayers at its best. The show wins because of its enjoyable group of four central characters: Lina the mercurial and mercenary teenaged sorceress, Gourry her good-natured but thick-headed protector, Zelgadis the reserved and melancholic stone-skinned "chimera", and little Amelia the hyper-earnest and idealistic magic-using princess, who is my favorite character.

Some interesting relationships criss-cross the group. There's an awkward but acknowledged romantic attraction between Lina and Gourry (he's too good for her, in my view), and a quieter, but not entirely one-sided thing between Amelia and Zelgadis (cute couple; he'll come around sooner or later). To this mix, add Xelloss the enigmatic "priest" who follows the group around. A great character: amusing, yet the writers never let you forget his dangerous side. And Martina, the addled former princess who has a vendetta against Lina for blowing up her kingdom.

This is one tightly written season. Not everything the writers do is great (I'm not a fan of anime slapstick) but they always keep things moving, even in the comic "filler" episodes. The dramatic arc of the last seven episodes leading to the final showdown is compelling.

The voice cast is awesome! I mean the original Japanese cast; the English dub here is weak and not worth your time. What a difference good actors make. If you really squint and just pay attention to the character of Lina as scripted, she isn't all that likeable, though I admit she can be counted on to do the right thing in a crisis. The real reason so many fans love Lina, I think, is because of the exuberant portrayal given by Megumi Hayashibara, the most famous anime voice actress in Japan. (Hayashibara-san is the bomb. If you ever doubt just how versatile her talent is, reflect on this: Rei Ayanami from _Evangelion_ and Lina Inverse are the same person! And she sings. Just the other day I was enjoying her clever, limber-tongued single "Koibumi" from a recent anime series. If you hate Hollywood as I do, it's a comfort to be reminded that there are full-fledged stars out there in the world like M.H. who owe nothing to the U.S. media cabal.)

Speaking of singing, the Slayers Next opening song, "Give a Reason," ranks among the most rousing anime themes ever. I almost gave the series five stars purely based on the lift you get from hearing it before each episode. Hayashibara-san sings it and wrote the lyrics.

This series has some faults. The animation isn't any better than it needs to be, except for the last two episodes. It's very consistent, though, and the big-eyed "romantic comedy" style fits the series well. I already mentioned I'm no fan of the slapstick: maybe it's a cultural thing, but I don't think it's funny to watch people smack around their friends. But there's plenty of fun visual and verbal wackiness to make up for it, like the exaggerated "action sequences" that Amelia runs through when declaiming her latest imprecations against the enemies of righteousness! Some of the dialogue and reactions are also a little broad for my tastes; this is a middlebrow anime pitched at a wide audience.

Lina, finally, is just not quite as cool as the series and the Slayers fan base make her out to be, and occasionally gets on my nerves. But she's still pretty cool. And her three companions are great.

Well worth buying.

Top of the Line Swords & Sorcery
The whole of the Slayers series is built to be more fun and funny than any other anime series that actually involves a plot. Slayers Next (season 2) is the fulfillment of that goal, with infinitely more character development than the original series (season 1) and a far more even storytelling keel than Slayers Try (season 3). The end of the Next storyline is powerful and beautiful without disrupting the flow of the world-building. Their silly "we need to take a break from the drama" episodes in the middle of the series are, as mentioned, fairly even-keeled and continue to flesh out the characters (unlike those in Slayers Try, which were fun and silly, but little else).

This isn't to say that the rest of the Slayers stock is bad -- it's not, they're a whole lot of fun -- it's just that Slayers Next is the best what the Slayers universe has to offer.

Of course, I'm also of the opinion that Slayers Next is the overall single best season of anime available on DVD, perfectly blending character consistency, Camus-style existentialism (which is quite intense in Slayers Try), comedy and action -- even beating out the also-fantastic but not-quite-as-satisfying Trigun. (I also enjoyed Cowboy Bebop and Love Hina; Lain defies comparisons to any type of comprehensible anime, but it's still quite respectable.)