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Some AAW readers from our early days might note that I had posted a less than positive look at the first couple of episodes of the dub, and a look at the reader comments will show that this was not taken well by Bastard!! fans. Well, after finally getting my hands on the DVD, I have carefully watched all six subtitled episodes, and although my opinion has changed, I still have to say that I didn't think the series was anything special. As a fantasy action series with a quirky sense of humor, or perhaps even a subtle send-up of its own genre, it wasn't bad, but there was too much missing for me to say I enjoyed it as much as I could have. If you're interested in my opinion of why, read on.

Something like a much sleazier version of Slayers, Bastard!! starts out like a raunchy fantasy take on the classic Pioneer style: serious plot, but generally humorous atmosphere--almost a parody of more serious fantasy shows (take, for example, a clothing-eating slime as a form of "torture"). For the most part the action and story were serious (good old demon invasion, end of the world fantasy stuff)... except that Dark Schneider (funky name, eh?) kept throwing out really annoying wisecracks and just didn't take the situation seriously. Some jokes were pretty standard, but a few came smack dab in the middle of an otherwise serious scene, and were totally unexpected (in a good way). The best example (I won't give away when) was a character suddenly making an off-handed remark directly at the audience in the middle of a dramatic scene--that caught me totally off guard. There were other similar bits of clever humor, and a few more rather low brow pot-shots which kept the whole show feeling light, and put it into a unique spot in the fantasy genre. On the other hand, it also made the show feel like it couldn't quite make up its mind. Though the humor kept some of the very long serious scenes from getting overwhelming, it also deflated a few others (particularly toward the end), and the whole thing kept threatening to turn into a parody (or hinting that it already was) even though it looked to me like it wasn't really intended to be (and the end was awfully heavy for a parody). It also left me wanting more--if the whole thing had been full of cheesy wisecracks and out-of-nowhere jokes, I'd have been happy (if a little embarassed) but there seemed to be just a little too much drama (and a few too many sleazy moments). Even with a mix, if it had taken longer to work its way from fun to dramatic that would have been ok, too, but the transition happened too quickly and just as things were starting to get going, it was over (and not even in a particularly satisfying way).

Whether there was too much, too little, or just the right amount of humor, the serious parts also turned out differently than I was expecting. To use a food analogy: Bastard!! felt like the main course without any of the additional dishes that make it into a complete meal. That is, there were lots of meaty battles (literally about half the runtime), the battles were filled with lots of character-driven drama, and the series was well seasoned with a lot of jokes. But there wasn't anything else. The initial setup, which made vague references to the collapse of modern civilization and the rise of magic, was railed off in some cheesy narration in the first couple of minutes of the series (and repeated at the beginning of every single episode). The villianous scheming and advancing armies of monsters in the great war between good and evil that series like Record of Lodoss Wars did so well were present, but reduced to a few hurried cutscenes. A whole bunch of hints at subplots--the princess mentioning "my brother's enemy...?", some evil leutenants, and whatever's up with the whole dark god thing--are introduced, then dropped completely. Even downtime and character building between Rushe or Dark Schneider and Yohko was essentially nonexistant. What was left was this: Each episode would start with a short summary of how the armies of darkness were advancing, a little plot, then an excuse for a fight between Dark Schneider and some head villian would crop up, and the remainder would be devoted to a long, dramatic, and sometimes tragic battle between the two. In the case of former friends and lovers turned enemy, they even came complete with lots of flashbacks of their earlier days together.

I'm oversimplifying slightly, but it boils down to the fact that the series had more than enough humor, action, and drama, but there wasn't anything else--it felt like somebody forgot to make the episodes that filled out the series. That's not to say that the drama and set up for the battles wasn't there, but the fact that we didn't have much time to get to know the characters (when they weren't fighting) or establish their past relationships took some potential empathy away. On top of that, the entire large-scale war felt like an afterthought (oh, look, another castle falls to the rampaging army... now on to the dramatic battle) and the foundation for why this whole messy plot was going on never even came close to being explained. True, that last part is almost expected from a Pioneer series, but unlike confusing-backstory-filled gems like El Hazard, this one just felt like they edited it out because there wasn't enough time (or flat out forgot to tell us), rather than to be clever. And in any case, I missed the lighter downtime episodes that Pioneer does so well.

Since a large part of the series was composed of action scenes, I have one last complaint to make--a "lack of scale" in the magical fights. At several points people would point out that Dark Schneider had just used some incredibly powerful spell, and yet every time he seemed ready to wipe out the villian in an unexpected display of his vast power, he'd seem more or less evenly matched. Although I usually prefer it when the hero (if you can call Schneider that) is in the same league as the villian, this seemed like a series that was just begging to have him outclass everyone he came up against. True, some of the "drama" played out to just be toying with his opponent, but he still seemed like he was trying too hard against such mundane opponents as a cursed sword. In most cases this balance of power was necessary for the drama of the battle, but it didn't quite seem to jibe with how powerful they kept setting Schneider and his magic up to be.

Now, there is one thing that I can say in defense of Bastard!!, and that is directed at fans of the comic version. I can only assume that the Bastard!! manga (which is a very long series) has more than enough of everything that the animated version is missing. Were I familiar with the overall plot, the characters' relationships, and had already had my fill of downtime, I would probably love watching a collection of great scenes from the comic condensed into six well animated, action packed episodes. But coming into this one with no experience with the manga (as I'm sure many are, since as of this writing it hasn't been translated into English), Bastard!! seemed like (yet another) much longer series with everything but the meat edited out.

I will give credit to some of the characters. Although a lot of them were almost afterthoughts--Rushe, though almost painfully cute, was only onscreen for a few minutes, and most of the non-magical heroes were shallow at best--the characters who got all the screen time were rather interesting. Dark Schneider, in adition to having a rather odd name, was an interesting mix of self-absorbed player, almost-maniac former villian (with the definite edge of still not being much of a good guy), and, somewhere deep down, kind of a nice guy. Two of the major villians--Ninja Master Gara and the Dark Elf--also had quite a bit more personality than your average evildoer, and were (mostly) believably torn between their former admiration of Dark Schneider and their current aligeance to another cause. Yohko and the Princess were less filled out than I was expecting, but even they at least managed to be rather likable damsels in distress (Yohko being a damsel with attitude). And, actually, I do have to give credit to one minor character--the heroic knight Von Jobina managed to snag a spot in several episodes where he talked big then was promptly whipped by a much more powerful villian--subtle, but pretty darned funny if you think about it.

One last dichotomy before I move on: Bastard!! was stuck between being sleazy fantasy and overly modest. The first couple of episodes are rather raunchy, and although it mellows out later (and was intended, I'm sure, as a send up of this sort of thing in standard fantasy), a few scenes (a clothing-disolving slime, a surprisingly long scene with Yohko chained up topless, and even Dark Schneider strutting around in the buff several times) featured more skin on camera than I would have expected. On the flip side, you've got Yohko making a big deal about having to kiss a boy, when that kiss will save dozens of lives including her own (and possibly the world), and in one case the bad guy's evil torture consists of nothing more than that same slime. Again, the latter was amusing as a parody, but the former just seemed kind of silly.

Now for something more objective, and much easier to analyze: the visuals. Bastard!! was, if nothing else, very good looking. The battles were long, very nicely animated, fairly well choreographed, and featured lots of flashy magic spells and even some sword fighting. The out of battle character animation was also solid if not quite as good, but there wasn't much of it anyway. The art was a slightly darker, rougher take on Pioneer's usual attractive look, featuring plenty of style (a few very nicely laid out moonlit flashbacks). The character designs weren't wildly original (Yohko was rather standard), but in the case of Schneider and the villians were sharp and distinctive (the Dark Elf more than made up for Yohko). A few of the backgrounds were too rough or plain for my taste, but most were detailed and at least sufficiently interesting.

The last thing to look at is the acting. The dub was poorly acted, and not terribly well translated either, a major source of complaints from Bastard!! fans. The original Japanese, on the other hand, was distinctively cast and well acted in the variety of action (they chant a whole lot of magical gibberish and make it sound reasonably convincing) and dramatic scenes, as well as the humorous moments. Dark Schneider in particular had an unusual voice--cocky, slightly annoying, but with a hard edge and he usually sounded like he was enjoying everything in some sort of sadistic way. The Dark Elf, on the flip side, was believable as the torn villian she was. Actually, there was one thing that was better in the dub--the introduction, for some reason, was in English in both versions, but they thankfully re-dubbed the extremely cheesy-sounding narration for the English version. Oh, and by the way, although I've heard a lot of complaints about the accuracy of Pioneer's subtitling, I can verify (based on both my opinion and that of a native Japanese speaker) that at least on the DVD the translation seemed accurate enough. The music was overblown, but as dramatic fantasy scores go, quite good.

All in all, Bastard!! was somewhat unusual and I did enjoy it, but it was a mixed bag. I definitely wouldn't call it bad, but even though it hinted at a story, had lots of drama, fighting, and even comedy, in the end the mood was a little scattered, there wasn't enough establishment of the characters, and it lacked coherency in its world, plot, and feel that would have completed the picture for me. For fans of the comic, this will probably be a real treat--sort of an attractive highlight reel. Fans of magical action or low-brow comedy will probably have a ball too--there's more than enough of both to go around. And if you're a fan of old fantasy role-playing games, you'll probably get a kick out of all the stuff you're familiar with (beholders, effreets, hydrae, although I never remember encountering a slime that only eats clothes, and slowly at that). Left to stand on its own merits, it depends on personal taste--it might be fun as a randy sort-of-parody of the fantasy genre or a reasonably interesting take on it, but it was too uneven overall to be anything particularly memorable.


Pretty raunchy--would probably rate and R. Pioneer appropriately rated it 16+. Violence:
4--Most of it isn't terribly graphic, but there are a couple of pretty gory scenes.

Nudity:
3--A fair amount of exposed flesh in episodes 3 and 4, and Dark Schneider ends up naked several times, too.

Sex/Mature Themes:
2--Not much, but scattered adult humor and mature themes.
Language:
3--Dark Schneider doesn't use the cleanest language.