Monday, April 6, 2020

Record of Lodoss War: Chronicles of the Heroic Knight Part 1 Episodes 1-4


Five years have passed since the War of Heroes.  Lodoss, the accursed island, has enjoyed a relative peace with Knights free to roam the land while Dragons soar the skies.  However, one mans evil quest threatens that peace.  Ashram, the Black Knight, has returned to finish what his Emperor, Belge, started five years ago and bring all of Lodoss under his rule.  Parn, the Free Knight, and his beautiful Elven companion, Deedlit, are called upon once more to intercept Ashram and stop him from claiming the Scepter of Domination.  It will be a difficult task…but only the opening chapter for a new dark age for Lodoss.

The original Record of Lodoss War OVA was the second title I reviewed for this blog and still remains one of my all time favorite fantasy Anime.  I remember seeing adds for Chronicles of the Heroic Knight as part of Toonami Reactor, the short lived Toonami website that featured streaming Anime that included Lodoss, Patlabor and Star Blazers.  And though I was never able to catch the TV Series there, hearing the title led me to the OVA and Id hoped to see the Chronicles of the Heroic Knight series eventually.  Well that day has come…but honestly it could be off to a far better start.

There are a slew of problems with the opening episodes of Chronicles of the Heroic Knight.  The first is setting and chain of events.  Based on info I gathered before going in and what is explained in the show (amongst a great many other things), the series picks up five years after the mid point of the OVA, which saw the demise of Ghim and Karla the Grey Witch possessing Woodchuck.  Those events are acknowledged and Woodchuck Karla is greatly hinted to still be around.  But the series doesn’t give us any backstory to begin with and just throws us right into things with hardly anything to go on.  If you’re not familiar with Lodoss or if you haven’t seen the OVA before this, youre going to be lost.  And even if you have seen the OVA, you’ll still be wondering why the stumbling start here.  Could we have at least had like an Episode Zero that explained how Parn met Deedlit, Slayn and King Kashue and covered the climactic War of Heroes? 

The second biggest problem is that, while Chronicles of the Heroic Knight refuses to show us everything that’s come before, it’s quite content to talk about everything else under the sun.  From Lodoss lore to mapping out every single aspect of a coming quest or developing plan, the show loves to hear its characters just talk…and talk…and talk…and…wait, shouldn’t there be some action in a story about Knights, demons and the threat of ancient Gods?  There is one very brief battle between Parn and Berseker Orson in the first episode but other than that, the rest of the premiere episodes move at a snails pace and things are hardly exciting.  It’s all build up and I can only hope that the payoff in the next couple sets of episodes is worth it.  I cant believe I almost fell asleep trying to watch a show ive been wanting to view for a very long time.

There were some scant aspects of this debut set of episodes I did like.  The opening and ending themes are gorgeous to listen too, very mystical and inviting to balance the swashbuckling tunes of the main OST.  After a long time away from this world, it’s great to see the cast again, particularly the beautiful Queen of the Anime Elves, Deedlit, who also seems to be in a kind of relationship with Parn after five years traveling together.  Ashram looks as bad ass as ever and I cant wait to see him tearing things up on the battlefield in that fearsome way he did in the OVA again.  I can also give credit where credit is due and compliment the fact that Chronicles of the Heroic Knight attempts to give a decent development arc to Orson, who was the Berserker who came into the OVA around the halfway point, along with his companion Shiris, who was just there to try and form a love triangle between herself, Parn and Deedlit…and failed miserably.  Well while Shiris’ role is just as pointless overall, Orson getting a backstory and his own quest to rid himself of the spirit that gives him his rage abilities is notable and is probably the most interesting subplot of the tale so far.

And then…there’s Welcome to Lodoss Island, which I did not expect at all and was kind of thrown for a loop for.  Welcome to Lodoss Island is a series of comedic shorts, taking up the last couple minutes of each episode, featuring chibi-fied versions of the cast poking fun at themselves and the world they live in.  When this appeared in the first episode I was kind of mad that the normally serious Lodoss was getting this kind of treatment.  I mean, couldn’t these just be their own separate special feature somewhere else?  But, the more I got bored with the main series itself, the more I began to appreciate the humor of Welcome to Lodoss Island and, do I dare say, I’ve some to look forward to those skits at the end.  Everyone, especially the English Voice Cast, seems to be having a lot of fun lightening things up for their characters.  This goes double for Lisa Ortiz, who reprises the role of Deedlit, one of her earliest roles of her voice acting career.  As much as I could listen to her soft, soothing tones as normal Deedlit, it’s always fun to hear her bring a sort of Lina Inverse spunk to Chibi Deedlit.

I’d say it’s kind of a bad sign when the comedy sketches at the end of an episode is the most memorable part of a series following in the footsteps of one of the greatest Fantasy Anime of all time.  I don’t want to say Record of Lodoss War: Chronicles of the Heroic Knight, is already in trouble…but it needs a good recovery next week.  At least don’t let us skimp on the potential awesome action with Parn, Deedlit and Kashue taking on a freaking Dragon.  If they somehow manage to make that boring…oh man, we are in trouble.  See ya next week.

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