Hellsing: The Dawn

This is my first review.
hellsing the dawn is a nice addition to the story of Hellsing Ultimate, I think it's rather impresindible, because this explains some holes left unfinished in the anime.
The animation is very good, and interesting story so far, so if you watch Hellsing Ultimate should definitely watch it, and wait until December 2012 to see if with Chapter 10 of the main story its going to be included the rest of this.

If you're watching this expecting plenty of Alucard and young Walter slaughtering Nazis, be warned: there's not much of that here. I gave this a 7 because seeing Walter in action is truly a sight to behold - in fact, any scene with Walter in it is basically pure, unadulterated awesomeness.

Unfortunately, there's not enough of Walter, the rest having been replaced with seemingly pointless humor sequences and some exposition. There's also no resolution to the battle sequence, and Alucard is on screen for a disappointingly short time (in a very interesting form, however!)

Overall, it's fun to watch as a little bonus to the Hellsing OVAs, ... but don't expect much in terms of ghoul-slaying and Alucard's screen time.

Overview:

Well that was over quickly! The whole special is only 27 minutes and really doesn't give us all the extra Hellsing we wanted. Each episode of Hellsing Ultimate was 1 hour long, so with 3 episodes at 9 minutes each, Hellsing the Dawn is like a terrible lover that finishes in 30 seconds and rolls over to go to sleep. We Hellsing fans are the disappointed chick going WTF!!? What was THAT!!!? To make matters worse, half of Dawn episode 3 is a preview for another series, so Hellsing Dawn is in total about 24 god damn minutes!

Story: 6/10

We get to see Alucard as a ... little girl (because why the fuck not I guess) fight Nazis along with young Walter. Little extra back story or insight into the characters is given. We get to witness a 5 second fight between Alucard the Cap, but they even cut out the scene in the manga where Cap kicks Alucard in half. Was there no budget for this project?! After Alucard rescues Walter we are given some exposition by Integra's douchbag uncle with Hellsing's vintage pointless omake jokes. Then the OVA ends. As mentioned previously the last few minutes are a preview for another series, which SHOULD NOT be part of Dawn, but instead be a separate trailer. We came here to watch Hellsing God damn it!

Characters: 7/10

We do get to see more of Walter as a kid, so that was at least fun. We also get a bit more of what the daily friendship is like between The Major and Doc. The most wasted character in all of Hellsing is easily the Captain, but of course he gets no further development here. The captain was interesting not just because he's a fucking awesome werewolf with a cool character design. He is mysterious and has a presence that far surpasses his minimal screen time much like Boba Fett in the first 3 Star Wars films. Why doesn't he ever talk? Was he born a werewolf or did he get his powers at some point in the past? Is he even a German? Why would he carry a med kit around if he can regenerate in Ultimate. Why does he heal and save Hienkel Wolf when all the rest of the Millenium fighters are purely evil. If the Cap is different from the rest of Millenium and is a somewhat noble warrior that just wants a good death from a tough opponent, why doesn't he wipe out Millenium himself and go fight Alucard?! We will never know any of these things. Because Kouta Hirano would rather draw ero doujinshi than give his coolest characters a fucking back story!

Sound: 10/10

More Karl Maria Von Webber! Can't really go wrong there.

Art: 9/10

The excellent art and animation from Ultimate are back here, but we don't really get to see much action unfortunately

Enjoyment: 7/10

I guess it was kind of fun while it lasted?

Overall: 7/10

The tiny bit we saw was fun, but this felt like it was far more of a cocktease by Kouta Hirano than an extra gift for Hellsing fans. Still, the art was excellent and the animation was roughly on par with Ultimate. The soundtrack is great once again for fans of classical music, especially fans of Romantic Period German opera. I just wish that it was longer and actually provided us with more plot and character backstory. Will there ever be any more Hellsing? I have no idea, but I hope so.

Mod Note: This review was initially posted for the animation short, Drifters, and was subsequently merged into Hellsing: The Dawn.

First Impression: For those who are fan animes like Fate-Stay Night, Shingeki no Kyouji or of the so called Hellsing, here is a very good series presented you by Hirano Kouta, that it will stun your senses. Be warned that blood, gore and symbolism are well present in this series.

Overall: The story is quite bad at start, but once you get in to it things change drastically. For those who where fans of great animes and stories that involved a World War Clash of ... Heroes of the past and tales, this one will grasp your attention right away.

Story(1st till 9th Chapter): The story starts with the protagonist, Shimazu Toyohisa from Sengoku era, a strong man, nephew of Shimazu Yoshihiro. That fought his "last battle" bravely and bloody! At some point he found him self surround by a straight forward Hall, with many doors. And a strange "secretary man" that says nothing more then " Next? "
Toyo yells at the man asking for an explanation of why was he brought here out of the air.
Suddenly a window like Portal, shows-up and swallow’s Toyo inside it and brings him to a "old new era", where humans try to role over other species(ex: elfs, dworfs, hobbits, etc).
Fully wounded, near death, Toyo is rescued by 2 little boys Elfs that found him in the woods almost lifeless. Due to some lost words spelled by Toyo they assumed he was not a native from that world and there for was called a "DRIFTER".
Meanwhile, attempting to take the unknown "Drifter" to the castle they got surprised for another Drifter, who claims to kill them if any other step is taken upon "its" presence. the Elfs explain the situation in a rush and are forced to leave under fear, leaving Toyo in the cares of this person.
Toyo wakes up all bandaged up and the 1st thing he see's in his front is a person who claims to be the famous Nobunaga. (A "king" like in Japan with a story ending in betrayal a few decades before Toyo's time).
Without knowing where he is or what to do, he immediately decides to rush for an attacked village, where the children Elfs who saved him live, and became a carnage assault on a group of humans who started killing Elfs indiscriminately when the rumour spreads saying that Elfs had aid a Drifter.
Now in this unknown world there are two well known groups (or factions if you so prefer) Drifter and Offscouring. Both of those groups hold a variety of heroes from the past of our actual world that will soon clash.

Art: Its Hirano Kouta's Art, there is nothing to say here.
(If you watched Hellsing's OVA's even better.)

Sound: Perfect like always! They got good picks definitely, will catch your attention.

Enjoyment: Guaranteed

Hellsing The Dawn is a series of 3 OVAs that are each about 10 minutes long. They serve as a prequel to Hellsing and show a young (VERY bishonen) Walter kicking Nazi ass in WW2. What's not to love here? I was ready to give this OVA a 9 because of the GORGEOUSLY animated action scenes, but the shenanigans they pulled in episode 3 brought my score down to a 7/10. For some reason I cannot fathom they decided to stack on a full trailer for the anime Drifters to the end of episode 3. Like, if you wanna make a trailer for Drifters, then ... just do that, don't interrupt Hellsing to do so. And I say "interrupt" specifically because the Hellsing portion fades to black just as Alucard enters the fight to back up Walter, who was getting a beating by The Captain. Obviously Alucard and Walter are both alive in Hellsing, so I know they didn't lose the fight, but it still would've been nice to see HOW that fight ended. Instead time and money is spent on the aforementioned trailer, which is why I finished the OVA a little annoyed.

When it comes to the Hellsing saga, noone can argue that Hellsing Ultimate is the best series. After it was finished, Hellsing:The Dawn was announced. I eagerly waited for it, but I can't say that it was as impressive as its predecessor.

Starting off, the story aims to show us events that are only mentioned in the anime and specifically the origins of the artificial nazi vampires. Set in 1944, we see Alucard as young as ever and Walter in his early years. It was obvious that the reason of Dawn's existence is to cover some holes in Hellsing's plot. Therefore, the story is really short ... with few battles and somewhat rapid event rotation. However, it achieves its goal.

The visuals and battles are outstanding as ever, same style with Hellsing Ultimate. Excellent character models, dynamic shadows and realistic blood.

Same goes for the sound. The same cast of voice actors and themes.

What I didn't like that much is that Alucard lost a lot of screen time. With Walter as main character, it was logical Alucard would fall behind. However, Walter's screen time is not that good as well since there are many pointless and unnecessary comical sequences that can tire you and make you bored.

I definitely enjoyed it, but The Dawn is nothing compared to Ultimate. I understand it was created to fill gaps in the plot, but it gives a quickie work feeling. It was wonderful to watch young Walter slaughtering nazis in an elegant way, but I disliked the reduced screen time on Alucard and the strict plot. It could have been better.

Overall, The Dawn is a nice extra to the OVAs of Hellsing. But don't expect to see Alucard slaughtering helpless victims all the time. Watch it after Hellsing Ultimate.

Story: 7
Art: 9
Sound: 9
Character: 7
Enjoyment: 7
Overall: 8