[2022] Berserk: The Golden Age MEMORIAL EDITION

First off a huge thank you to Leon-Solide for the diligent comparison between the episodes and the movies. The new head models are subtle, but I appreciate the effort to make the character models less clunky and Casca's better hair. It will also be helpful to identify updates to Redux. I also appreciate Aaz's detailed analysis of each episode and his recall to what came before.

I may be the odd man out, but I really appreciated the update to this episode. Extending the love scene to include Guts trauma, and Casca's acceptance of him afterward is a huge win for this update, similar to the bonfire of dreams. They've really put an effort in to target the new scenes to be about character development, especially between Guts and Casca. And the fact that this scene has never been adapted is much appreciated. It's an overall improvement to the trilogy which sorely lacked in character development, among other things.

There are some very rushed bits of animation in the sequence, especially in the wide shots. Not great, but much better than the 2016/2017 anime. There are a couple of very lazy animations. However, the close-ups seem closer to the quality of the original movies.

It's a faithful scene that is probably the best addition after the Bonfire of Dreams. I'm hoping we get at least one more new scene before the series is done.

 
First off a huge thank you to Leon-Solide for the diligent comparison between the episodes and the movies. The new head models are subtle, but I appreciate the effort to make the character models less clunky and Casca's better hair. It will also be helpful to identify updates to Redux. I also appreciate Aaz's detailed analysis of each episode and his recall to what came before.

I may be the odd man out, but I really appreciated the update to this episode. Extending the love scene to include Guts trauma, and Casca's acceptance of him afterward is a huge win for this update, similar to the bonfire of dreams. They've really put an effort in to target the new scenes to be about character development, especially between Guts and Casca. And the fact that this scene has never been adapted is much appreciated. It's an overall improvement to the trilogy which sorely lacked in character development, among other things.

There are some very rushed bits of animation in the sequence, especially in the wide shots. Not great, but much better than the 2016/2017 anime. There are a couple of very lazy animations. However, the close-ups seem closer to the quality of the original movies.

It's a faithful scene that is probably the best addition after the Bonfire of Dreams. I'm hoping we get at least one more new scene before the series is done.

Basing By how they did Bonfire of dreams & Wounds if they can replicate the effort they put on those 2 into the Declaration of War scene then this Memorial edition would have pretty much surpassed what we assumed in the past. When this got announced and we saw the Bonfire of dreams scene it was the only addition we considered that will be added.
 

Aazealh

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Basing By how they did Bonfire of dreams & Wounds if they can replicate the effort they put on those 2 into the Declaration of War scene then this Memorial edition would have pretty much surpassed what we assumed in the past. When this got announced and we saw the Bonfire of dreams scene it was the only addition we considered that will be added.

I'd say it's already surpassed it in that originally, I personally expected nothing beyond cutting up the existing material into 22-minute episodes. Based on the effort, I can actually believe that Berserk is dear to Yūta Sano's heart. However, it doesn't exactly sublimate the movies. At the end of the day it's just a few scenes grafted on to mitigate the original trainwreck.
 
This week's staff interview is to chief animation director / character designer Naoyuki Onda. He shares some details about the approach to the trilogy including some specific requests Miura made at the time about the designs and animation style (he indicated vol.18 of the manga as reference for the trilogy designs and asked the team to avoid the shonen anime approach of animation and stick to realistic motion), as well as the work on the Memorial Edition. He mentioned how he worked from home the entire time never visiting the studio and how it was difficult for him to return to animating Berserk after this time among other things. https://www.animatetimes.com/news/details.php?id=1669363302
 
Interesting. Well, since it appears (based on his responses) that he's returned to work on the Memorial Edition project pretty recently, there doesn't seem to be a possibility that he's worked on anything *else* Berserk-related (like, a sequel Berserk adaptation by Studio 4C). Always thought that getting a continuation by the same Studio 4C staff would be far-fetched, but it sounds even more likely that they don't have anything planned/haven't worked on anything new yet.
 
I don't think it excludes it necessarily, especially since staff members tend to not go too much into details with their works, but even if something would be announced I'd expect nothing soon. One thing I struggle to wrap my head around is the countdown ending 2 episodes before the end of the Memorial Edition. Unironically now I think they could announce something like the BD/DVD (they haven't been mentioned yet), since the best time for a sequel announcement usually is after the release of the last episode. Unless, crazy crazy crazy theory, they've already got in store a couple of episodes of the Black Swordsman arc and they'll air them right after the Golden Age arc. In that case it would make sense an anime-related announcement at that time... or maybe it could even turn out to be completely unrelated.
 
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Unless, crazy crazy crazy theory, they've already got in store a couple of episodes of the Black Swordsman arc and they'll air them right after the Golden Age arc. In that case it would make sense an anime-related announcement at that time... or maybe it could even turn out to be completely unrelated.

It's a little crazy, but not entirely out of left field. You can find bits and pieces of test footage the studio did in later parts of the story: Guts vs. the Holy Iron Chain Knights, Griffith in his Neo Band of the Hawk armor, etc. I can't imagine there's too much more than what's out there on the internet, but they could still use it as a jumping-off point.
 
It was just revealed today that Studio 4C has been/is working on a new anime adaptation of "Phoenix" (one of Osamu Tezuka's manga) due out in 2023: https://twitter.com/STUDIO4C/status/1597855437004877824?s=20&t=Ai4piy7UyLbNotuMem0LQw

Considering the studio *typically* works on one project at a time, I'm pretty sure this crosses out the possibility for a sequel Berserk anime by them in the near future (unless, they have been working on new content under wraps for some time -- which I think is unlikely to be honest).
 
I saw that this morning, it honestly looks pretty great! Both the 2D and CG work, which honestly makes me hopeful that a potential new adaptation / sequel could be decent if given the right amount of resources as artistic talent behind it.

As for the studio's business I think they could still do something by next year. I don't know if they have other works listed so far, but consider that for the Memorial Edition the production likely needed an incredible small amount of new footage and they could have been working on more Berserk material for the future, potentially. Also, not knowing the format of this new Phoenix anime (movie / 1 cour anime / 2 cours anime) it's hard to tell how busy they are, or at what state the production is.

It's a little crazy, but not entirely out of left field. You can find bits and pieces of test footage the studio did in later parts of the story: Guts vs. the Holy Iron Chain Knights, Griffith in his Neo Band of the Hawk armor, etc. I can't imagine there's too much more than what's out there on the internet, but they could still use it as a jumping-off point.
If I remember correctly that footage was even a few years older than the Golden Age trilogy, so I don't think it's of much use (especially the CGI, it should be impossible to use, considering that 2022 is the deadline to rework the old trilogy CG footage) and counting how short it was. Also, hasn't some of it been used in the Bonfire of Dreams episode and in the OP visuals?
I'm more thinking about the odd timing of the countdown. It matches the end of the manga arc (and it could be referring to the motion manga they announced a few months ago) and with the Behelit activation in the Memorial Edition activation but assuming it'll be a big announcement for the anime it's really strange to make it weeks before the end. I'm only speculating upon that early date, and that we haven't gotten an official episodes count.

Anyway, we've got screenshots from the new episode in this article. I'm shocked to see that it covers until Requiem of the Wind, having seen the trilogy only once I didn't remember just how fast they went.
Checking the duration of the scenes in the movie it could just naturally end with the moment where the rest of the soldiers under Guts' command unites around him to asking to that them with him, I don't expect anything new this time. The following episode could begin with Casca changing Griffith's bandages.
 
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I think we can use this as confirmation that Wyald and the Bakiraka will not be making an appearance. This is to be expected to some degree, as they were never going to throw out the existing escape from Wyndom to do an elaborate multi-episode escape that results the same. I'm sure there will be additional scenes after the eclipse. Perhaps they'll update some of the Apostle models to look less like 'Beast Wars.'
 

Aazealh

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I think we can use this as confirmation that Wyald and the Bakiraka will not be making an appearance.

I mean, even if they had bolstered episode 10 instead of episode 9, like I had speculated, they couldn't possibly have introduced Wyald or the Bakiraka in such a short time, not to mention the cost of creating new models and so on. But since they pushed the Skull Knight scene to episode 10 so they could fit Guts and Casca's talk, there can't be new footage there. In fact it's going to be a pretty tight fit if they intend to end episode 11 with Griffith's sacrifice. They might have to skip the intro and outro again in either episode 10 or 11.

I'm sure there will be additional scenes after the eclipse.

There's going to be 7-8 minutes to spare for the last episode.
 
I'm a bit late to the party (Uni got my schedule messed up haha), I just watched episode 9 and its really good that they actually addressed character development in their love scene. the close up on their kiss is also pretty faithful to the manga (altough in the manga there are a lot of small gestures that really show their emotiomal state).
The one thing about this chain of events that made me shout at the TV is the fact that they choose to put "blood and guts" over Guts' traumatic flashback with Donovan, why do dirty to this masterpiece of a song.

Also, no SK appearance! I'd never guess they will delay it to the next episode in favor of character development - what a nice suprise!
 
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They revealed today that they'll rebroadcast the Memorial Edition every Friday starting on January 6th 2023. I'm wondering if instead of having a 2 weeks break, they may have an entire new episode after the Guts / Skull Knight sequence which closes the film, in order to fully adapt the post-Eclipse portion of the Golden Age.
 

Aazealh

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They revealed today that they'll rebroadcast the Memorial Edition every Friday starting on January 6th 2023. I'm wondering if instead of having a 2 weeks break, they may have an entire new episode after the Guts / Skull Knight sequence which closes the film, in order to fully adapt the post-Eclipse portion of the Golden Age.

What this says is that the anime will be broadcast on TV Hokkaido to coincide with the next showing of the Great Berserk Exhibition. The regular broadcast on Tokyo MX and other channels is unchanged.
 
I didn't mean like that. It's specified that they will rebroadcast from the beginning, similarly to how Berserk 1997 was rebroadcasted it from ep.1 one week after the last episode was aired for the first time, I wonder if they want to do the same thing. My speculation is that instead of the projected 13 episodes we expect (it would end on December 24th), they may have in store a 14th episode (adapting the rest of the post-Eclipse portion of the Golden Age) so that the rebroadcast will begin one week later the end of the initial broadcast, instead of finishing two weeks earlier.
 
I didn't mean like that. It's specified that they will rebroadcast from the beginning, similarly to how Berserk 1997 was rebroadcasted it from ep.1 one week after the last episode was aired for the first time,
I didn't knew they did that, it sounds so cool! Imagine being a kid in the 90s and seeing episode 1 after the eclipse - hell of a time :puck:

I've had my hopes of a new adaptaion after the memorial edition finish its broadcast, but seeing that studio 4C is working on that Phoenix anime pretty much killed that possibility IMO.
 

Aazealh

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About episode 10. They cut a good ten seconds of footage during the transition to the SK scene. Notably, the intro cuts abruptly through the scene as SK approaches Guts. It's a bit jarring, and it would have been much better to insert it between that scene and the rescue mission. Otherwise, the scene is unchanged. The transition to Casca opening up the tomb is shortened a bit. There are small changes to Judo and Casca's face, the usual stuff. Guts & Pippin too as they descend.

There are some other minor face fixes in the escape scene as well. Nothing special. A bunch more weren't touched up. One nameless guard captain model (reused throughout the movies) gets the biggest upgrade during a little close-up. Things are mostly unmodified after that. The episode ends after the raiders come to see Guts and tell him to take them with him, with the transition slightly shortened before the end credits. After the credits, there's 35 seconds of a teaser for episode 11 that shows the Eclipse.

Overall no remarkable changes.

I didn't mean like that. It's specified that they will rebroadcast from the beginning, similarly to how Berserk 1997 was rebroadcasted it from ep.1 one week after the last episode was aired for the first time, I wonder if they want to do the same thing.

The link you posted only specifically talks about the anime being broadcast on a regional TV channel to coincide with the exhibition.
 
Thanks for the breakdown. It ended right where I imagined.

The link you posted only specifically talks about the anime being broadcast on a regional TV channel to coincide with the exhibition.
I mean, that's not at all the point / speculation I'm making though. I've already explained it twice, I don't feel the need to repeat it a third time. Have it your way then. It doesn't matter much since we'll find very soon anyway.
 

Aazealh

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I mean, that's not at all the point / speculation I'm making though. I've already explained it twice, I don't feel the need to repeat it a third time. Have it your way then. It doesn't matter much since we'll find very soon anyway.

Repeating yourself doesn't change the fact you're misconstruing the nature of that announcement. But I agree: who cares.:shrug:
 
Repeating yourself doesn't change the fact you're misconstruing the nature of that announcement. But I agree: who cares.:shrug:
I don't understand this repeated effort of proving me being wrong on something by bring up observations that have nothing to do with the point I'm making. Whether it is a regional broadcast or national, whether it is done specifically for the local Exbition announcement or not (which is where my limited understanding of this announcement lies), it doesn't affect the fact that there is a specific gap in between the two broadcasts that made me think of a speculation about the total episode count. I don't think there's anything wrong is wondering or speculating upon that. I wonder if you really don't care about this since you really do want to prove me wrong on something.
 

Aazealh

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I don't understand this repeated effort of proving me being wrong on something by bring up observations that have nothing to do with the point I'm making. Whether it is a regional broadcast or national, whether it is done specifically for the local Exbition announcement or not (which is where my limited understanding of this announcement lies), it doesn't affect the fact that there is a specific gap in between the two broadcasts that made me think of a speculation about the total episode count. I don't think there's anything wrong is wondering or speculating upon that. I wonder if you really don't care about this since you really do want to prove me wrong on something.

They're starting that specific broadcast on TV Hokkaido to coincide with when the exhibition will begin in Sapporo. That is why it starts on that date. And it's not exceptional. When the exhibition was first held in Tokyo, they aired the movie trilogy on WOWOW. It's a form of advertisement for the series.

Because it will be broadcast on a channel where the show hasn't aired yet, and because they haven't announced that it would air again on the channels it's currently on, it's not a "rebroadcast" as far as we know. It won't affect the people who have been watching on Tokyo MX, BS11 or wherever else. So, in short, that announcement isn't mysterious and doesn't particularly lend itself to theorizing. That's all.

With that being said, rest assured that you can speculate about whatever you want, like that it'll relate to Netflix licensing the rights for the 1997 series in Lithuania. I really don't care, and I hope you've gotten my point because I don't want to talk about it anymore.
 
They released a new PV for episode 11 (and the following ones?), basically it's the teaser at the end of the second film with different footage. I hope the scenes in this PV won't be exclusively about ep.11, since it even shows Skull Knight when he breaks in... They can't possibly compress the entire Eclipse in one episode.
 
They released a new PV for episode 11 (and the following ones?), basically it's the teaser at the end of the second film with different footage. I hope the scenes in this PV won't be exclusively about ep.11, since it even shows Skull Knight when he breaks in... They can't possibly compress the entire Eclipse in one episode.
This is the same teaser that's at the end of Movie 2. I wouldn't read too much into it.
 
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