2016 Berserk TV series: Episode 5

What did you think of the fifth episode of the 2016 TV series?

  • It was great.

    Votes: 10 15.9%
  • Some problems, but enjoyable.

    Votes: 34 54.0%
  • It was bad, but had some redeeming features.

    Votes: 14 22.2%
  • I hated it.

    Votes: 5 7.9%

  • Total voters
    63
  • Poll closed .

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
This is the official discussion thread for the fifth episode of the 2016 TV series. Post your thoughts, impressions and reviews as you see fit.
 

jackson_hurley

even the horses are cut in half!
Well I'll say that like last week, this is one of the best episode for that serie. They switch the order of a few episodes but nothing bugged me that much compared to the changes already made. One of my favorite Isidro moment is there.

The animation is a tiny bit less of a mess in this one considering there is not a lot of armour in these scenes. The scene in the tent is horrible though.
 

Kompozinaut

Sylph Sword
Seems this anime has finally found it's footing. I enjoyed this episode about as much as the last one. Mozgus in the torture scene was laughable though. He's much creepier in the manga. I don't know if it's the animation quality (probably) but that scene came off as goofy to me. Surprised they included the Beherit Apostle's eyes at the beginning of the refugee camp, and I was happy to see Silat and the Tapasa.

Since they excluded Conrad in Windham, I wonder if they'll show Slan at the pagan orgy in the next episode?
 

jackson_hurley

even the horses are cut in half!
Salem said:
Must have missed the eyes. My thoughts are about the same as you guys regarding episode 4 and 5. I hope that consistency continues.

At this rate I think it will. I'm still expecting some stuff to be remove or place somewhere but I don't think we're gonna get lots of filler. I hope at the least.
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
Decent episode that basically just follows the manga's storyline, but is as usual weighed down by the production value.

Notes on some of the things that bothered me:

- Crunchyroll writes Isidro's name "Isidoro".
- Isidro is essentially introduced again in this episode, meets Guts and everything. It's therefore completely mind-boggling that they introduced him at the bar in volume 1. It made no sense then, but now it's confirmed that it was pointless too.
- Mozgus' voice actor really feels off to me, not at all appropriate for the character. I'm not a fan of Luka, Nina and Jerome's voice actors either.
- They dwell too long on the scene between Luka and Jerome, like when they pan over him fondling her censored breasts for 10 seconds. Completely unnecessary/useless.
- They cut the short scene with the heretic leader waving his crow around and saying the Falcon is coming.
- Switching from the scene of Casca and Nina at the lake to Guts & Isidro is relatively sensible for the purpose of a TV episode, but I think it could have been pulled off better (the editing sucks in general).
- The clanging sound effects become dowright comedic when Guts grabs the sword off of Isidro.
- Isidro to Guts: "I don't want to serve anyone". Four episodes ago he was literally serving people at a bar. :schierke:
- Guts stops the first possessed wheel that tries to kill Isidro with his arm instead of the DS... Why? It's less good.
- The 3D model they're using for the Skull Knight looks pretty gross in the preview.

Delta Phi said:
Since they excluded Conrad in Windham, I wonder if they'll show Slan at the pagan orgy in the next episode?

Conrad doesn't show up in Wyndham but in a border town that Raban visits. The TV series skipped all of that, as well as the king's dream and Zodd's segment on the battlefield.
 

jackson_hurley

even the horses are cut in half!
Aazealh said:
- The clanging sound effects become downright comedic when Guts grabs the sword off of Isidro.

Yes, this is getting ridiculous. This one in particular was a new kind of clang. My girlfriend asked me what that noise was saying :"Was that suppose to be his sword?"
 
Aazealh said:
- The clanging sound effects become dowright comedic when Guts grabs the sword off of Isidro.

There seemed to be a lot less CLANG when Guts started attacking those wheels, which seemed strange considering the sound effects when he fought those spirits on horseback in Ep. 3. This anime is just weird to me.
 
Im glad they finally decided to use Hirasawa susumu's "Hai yo" for the music instead of the train wreck of a soundtrack they've been using. However the music was in the background and was hardly audible over the stupid clangs and their voice :rickert: slap to the face right there.
Other than that i was quite satisfied with the episode. We finally see :casca: and the whole deal with that womans' baby was done pretty well "except for mozgus face when he takes her to the torture room. He looked happy and not menacing at all. Wait hold up, there were 4 Bakirakas with the kushan dude, weren't there only 2 at that point in the manga? Episodes keep getting better and better, but i finally see why people complain about the animation and facial expressions. the wheel dudes all had the same face and expression with no differences. ugh.
 
One of my favorite moments in the manga fell completely flat in this episode. That moment was when Guts said "Let's go, Puck."

It was awesome in the manga to see Guts acknowledging Puck and finally calling him by his name. :puck:

In the anime, it wasn't as good given that they didn't spend as much time together and we didn't see their relationship develop.

Other than that, Isidro's scenes made his appearance in episode 1 utterly pointless and redundant, as Aaz mentioned above.

Was great to hear Susumu Hirasawa's song again, and I'm still waiting eagerly for the full version to release (any ideas when?).
 
my favorite episode yet, i thought the bakiraka had pretty good models, the guts vs bakiraka scene was the best part of the episode for me. i wonder if i'd feel the same way if Hai Yo wasn't playing, that track always gets me pumped. the tapasa look bad, silat looked good in that close up shot, casca has a pretty good model. this ep also emphasizes who pointless isidro's bar scene is. overall enjoyed it much more than previous episodes but they'll still cutting shit and changing or adapting things poorly, and of course its not really pretty to look at.

Was great to hear Susumu Hirasawa's song again, and I'm still waiting eagerly for the full version to release (any ideas when?).

you're probably gonna have to wait for the soundtrack cd to come out for the full version.
 
Kaladin said:
you're probably gonna have to wait for the soundtrack cd to come out for the full version.
Oh god now that you say it. Well, we can only hope they play it during another scene and actually balance the audio so we can hear the song.
 

DANGERDOOOOM

Rest In Peace, Kentaro Miura. We will miss you.
I thought this episode was well done and well adapted from the manga. Enjoying seeing all the characters I thought they'd ultimately cancel out from the show. I see every episode as an improvement :guts:

Aazealh said:
- Isidro to Guts: "I don't want to serve anyone". Four episodes ago he was literally serving people at a bar. :schierke:

:ganishka: Feel like they just put him in the first episode just to give people some hope amd excitement for later episodes. Kinda shot themselves in the foot with that idea.
 

Mammon

Mangoku army
I liked it better than previous episodes, I just watched it and didn't take notes, so I didn't have time to analyze everything, but...
(My speakers got damaged so I may have missed some stuff audio wise)

- The Bakiraka scouts vs Guts scene was pretty good/faithful to the manga, but Guts announcing his presence by stomping/slamming his boot on the ground just behind them (sorry English is not my native language, I'm not sure how to translate that) felt a little off to me;
in the manga you really get the impression that Guts was legit just passing by and that led to an awkward situation;
here it kinda felt to me like he announces his presence, and just when Isidro was about to get killed to boot;

For new viewers it will look like a "ah, he is obviously trying to save that kid from episode 1 again and plays dumb, what a cool guy" moment. Well, maybe.

But it's a minor thing. And the anime people who have only watched the movie trilogy can recognize Silat and the Bakiraka scouts (in the 3rd movie he has a couple of them with him when he leads the attack on the Hawks; they are absent in the manga of course).

- Nice, Jérôme, my favorite "normal badass" makes his appearance.
I've always liked this character, he has normal fighting abilities for a simple noble knight but he still plays a big role in the story; seems a bit like a jerk at first, but after a while we find out that is a nice dude (conversation with Serpico, offers to take Casca with Luka to get treatments [when for all he knows she is just her ill and disfigured sister; and I don't know about the "pillow talk" thing Luka thinks about, he proved to be a reliable guy]
smuggles the group in the tower, doesn't lose his mind when confronted with Mozgus and the other pseudo-apostles, fends off the "twin torturers" with Isidro, and is a big help for Guts side in general.

Refreshing to see that Azan and Serpico aren't the only 2 hicks worth a damn in dire situations. Hopefully his role won't be cut too much...

Also
- Despite knowing what would happen, Puck messing with Isidro and trapping him under the DS got a chuckle out of me.
- Damn they didn't hold back with the torture chamber. Mozgus was a bit much, didn't really care for the animation of his "fervor face".
- The editing is still pretty bad, and some CGI moments were particularly cringe-worthy; but it looks like it's here to stay if the preview for next ep is any indication...

That's it for now, I'll rewatch it later and edit my post to add or remove stuff.
Well, it's the first episode that actually makes me want to watch it again, good sign :carcus:
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
Gamehowitzer said:
Wait hold up, there were 4 Bakirakas with the kushan dude, weren't there only 2 at that point in the manga?

The scene is the same in the manga There are four Tapasa assembled around Silat, leader of their clan, the Bakiraka.

Mammon said:
since the 2016 anime is supposed to follow the "movie trilogy canon"

Actually it's not, this series doesn't follow the movies' version of the story. It's a standalone product.
 

Mammon

Mangoku army
Aazealh said:
Actually it's not, this series doesn't follow the movies' version of the story. It's a standalone product.
Oops, that will teach me to trust wikipedia, I googled it just before posting since I didn't follow the project very closely but...

"Berserk (Japanese: ベルセルク Hepburn: Beruseruku?) is a 2016 anime television series based on Kentaro Miura's Berserk manga and a sequel to the Golden Age Arc film trilogy."

... and I didn't look further.
My bad, I'll edit it.
 
Am I the only one who thinks the animation was worse than last episode? Thats excluding the Bakiraka battle of course, which they - despite the usual very limited movement - manage to be somewhat smart about for once and came out almost "decent" regarding style, I'd say. But man, that scene in the tent, lingering WAAYYY too long and just totally unnecessary, like Aaz already said. And that particular shot with both the 2D and CG just glaringly weird. And OMG those wheels at the end....did they REALLY have to include them at all if it was gonna be THAT poorly done??? The torture chamber was initially more or less only as much of a disappointment as the rest of the significant scenes we've gotten and didnt really stand out, but of course that Mozgus face and little speech really put an exclamation point on it.

This is pretty irritating cause I thought the last episode would be kind of indicative that it'd keep that (albeit still low) standard. On the other hand, that episode barely had any "fighting" scenes, so that might explain that.

The only other scene that looked decent to me would be the one with Casca and Nina, which of course barely had any movement (surprise surprise!)

Perhaps this is just needlessly stating the obvious at this point, but no matter how much they seemingly try to follow the manga in their own little way here and there, and the sheer fact its done a lot less significantly, everything just comes off as either pretentious or cheesy when taken out of the manga's more serious and ominous context. This is a pretty good example

Mammon said:
...here it kinda felt to me like he announces his presence, and just when Isidro was about to get killed to boot;

For new viewers it will look like a "ah, he is obviously trying to save that kid from episode 1 again and plays dumb, what a cool guy" moment. Well, maybe.

Im sorry Im still venting quite a lot about this show, I'll try to keep a more positive spirit from now on.
 
The wheel zombies were indeed very poorly done. Looked like they were unfinished, untextured models that had a purple haze added to them to hide it (which failed).

I agree with the general consensus here: show is actually getting kinda decent thanks to sticking to the manga content, but generally cheap and/or inept production values keep me from enjoying it very much.

On the bright side, I like Isidro's VA in this so at least I'll enjoy hte Isidro/Puck moments. But yeah, this episode makes the whole bar scene into pointless because Isidro does not once mention seeing him at any earlier time

Hanma_Baki said:
Am I the only one who thinks the animation was worse than last episode? Thats excluding the Bakiraka battle of course, which they - despite the usual very limited movement - manage to be somewhat smart about for once and came out almost "decent" regarding style, I'd say. But man, that scene in the tent, lingering WAAYYY too long and just totally unnecessary, like Aaz already said. And that particular shot with both the 2D and CG just glaringly weird. And OMG those wheels at the end....did they REALLY have to include them at all if it was gonna be THAT poorly done??? The torture chamber was initially more or less only as much of a disappointment as the rest of the significant scenes we've gotten and didnt really stand out, but of course that Mozgus face and little speech really put an exclamation point on it.

This is pretty irritating cause I thought the last episode would be kind of indicative that it'd keep that (albeit still low) standard. On the other hand, that episode barely had any "fighting" scenes, so that might explain that.

The only other scene that looked decent to me would be the one with Casca and Nina, which of course barely had any movement (surprise surprise!)

Perhaps this is just needlessly stating the obvious at this point, but no matter how much they seemingly try to follow the manga in their own little way here and there, and the sheer fact its done a lot less significantly, everything just comes off as either pretentious or cheesy when taken out of the manga's more serious and ominous context.

Took the words right out of my mouth. This material isn't as easy to adapt as one might think. Without the right overall tone and direction, it can easily come across as campy.
 
As Delta said, it feels like its finally starting to find its footing, because this was the most enjoyable episode so far for me, even if it wasn't the best on a technical level. Its established the goal, its attempted to establish the important characters, its attempted to catch people up as to the world and such. All it has to do now is follow Miura's story. If they can just do the rest of the arc the way they did this episode, I
think ill be able to forget/ignore the horrible opening few.

The big thing that's stopping from just enjoying the episodes however, is the jarring switch between 2D and 3D animation. If they just committed to one or the other, 100% 2D or 100% 3D, I think it would really have helped it. Or at the very least cut down on one or the other. Don't mix 2D characters with 3D characters and what not. We would actually be able to get used to the characters and their jankyiness. Instead we are left with constant switching between 2 different art style so we can never get comfortable with how everything looks.
 
I've found that if I just totally pretend that the first episode did not exist that I'm happy with how this is turning out for the most part. I think that kick in the dick that was the opener kind of put a bad taste in a lot of people's mouths, mine included, to look for the bad instead of the good and aside from the fist one this has been pretty good.
 
Another pretty solid episode. I still have some issues with some of the production value from time to time, but I'm seeing some major improvement. Same with the music and sound effects. It all seems more polished, almost as if they were working on the early episodes right up until delivery time, but had a little time cushion to continue to refine these last couple. No more CLANG, less power metal sound track. Less bad CGI. And for the most part a very faithful adaptation, with minor omissions of side characters or a line or two. The type of thing that should be expected from an adaptation. Most of the shots are even direct compositions from the manga. It's a little fast paced, but I'd take that over cutting content.

I don't quite get the criticisms I've been hearing that this anime is 'merely' recreating the manga panel for panel with the same dialogue. Isn't this a good thing? It feels much stronger, I remember criticisms of the movies prior to this for diverting from the manga by quite a bit in composition and content. So which is it that we want? A faithful adaptation , or a director who makes it his own.

So far I vastly prefer the last two episodes and the second one. The ham fisted attempt to squash the black swordsman into two episodes feels like a massive failure without any emotion or connection to the Golden age. Guts was just going through the motions. This latest stuff actually feels like Berserk.

I really hope that when this comes out on Blu Ray to release an uncensored version, they retool the sound track and effects of the earlier episodes to feel more polished like the latest ones. We'll see though.
 
This episode was my favorite so far, Guts vs Bakiraka was definitely the best action sequence yet. Also it seems that "Hai Yo" has been getting some more developments? I don't recall Hai Yo being chanted in the intro during Episode 2.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
ApostleBob said:
I don't quite get the criticisms I've been hearing that this anime is 'merely' recreating the manga panel for panel with the same dialogue. Isn't this a good thing? It feels much stronger, I remember criticisms of the movies prior to this for diverting from the manga by quite a bit in composition and content. So which is it that we want? A faithful adaptation , or a director who makes it his own.

The manga was drawn in such a way that took advantage of the medium. The animation should do the same. Instead they're relying on the exact same framing for most of the shots, and even then, they're doing it badly. So the end result is something that resembles the manga, only looks shittier.
 
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