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Vampires are usually a tough sell for me, but Hellsing Ultimate broaches the trope in an intense, unique, and majestic way that's unlike anything I've seen.

Never mind the beautiful animation, the delightfully superfluous gore, and the spot-on character development; for me, the story is perfect. It's a graceful meld of history, mythology, and action that makes no sacrifices and turns everything up to 11. War, politics, religion... it's all there and then some.

This more than makes up for the original anime. I'd say it boosts the Hellsing name into a whole other realm of excellence, because there are very few pieces of media ... - including non-anime works - that can even begin to compete with this series.

My two cents includes nothing that hasn't been said already, at least to my knowledge.

Crystal was super hyped but failed to live up to it. While I enjoy the faster pace of the series and the fact that they generally abandoned the Youma of the Day model, the animation is increasingly hard to ignore. The magic-oriented sequences make the Senshi look as if they're made of rubber, and the overt CGI in the transformations make me think of early Pixar rather than something we'd use in 2015.

My lukewarm reception to this series is truly a heartbreak for me, as Sailor Moon was my gateway to ... the anime world (my first hunted-down sub, no less). Part of me wants them to drop the project completely, but the upcoming Infinity arc - known as Sailor Moon S in the original anime - is my favorite, and I'm a tad intrigued to see what they do with the Death Busters.

However, I should note the writers for Crystal seem slightly more - for lack of a better term - ballsy than those who participated in the original anime. Killing off Pluto in the second season was a big deal, and I think it was handled gracefully in terms of dialogue and timing. Of course, she will return in the Infinity arc unless they divert completely from the original plot, but actually acknowledging death in a major way is a good change, as the 1990s anime often glossed over it.