Plot Details: This opinion reveals minor details about the movie's plot.

Having nearly worn out my current collection of Neon Genesis Evangelion and Robotech DVDs, I had been looking for a new anime to get into. I had searched over a few different titles and nothing really piqued my interest until I came across a few sites for Record of Lodoss War. After doing a little research on the story and characters it seemed like something that was right up my alley. Having been a huge closet dork in middle school(playing Magic, D&D, etc.) and being a huge Dungeons and Dragons player when I was a kid, this movie looked like something right out of the D&D universe or Lord of the Rings. You've got magic, dragons, elves, sword fights, ultimate impending doom and a little love story built in, what more could you ask for?

I ended up picking up the Collector's set on Ebay for $12.99 which I considered to be a steal. I've seen this set going for well over $20. The collector's edition contains the original anime, consisting of 13 episodes on 2 DVDs. There was also a television series that was later released and I believe it was a bit longer in length, about 27 episodes or so and some of the episode content is a little different than the original version. I'll try not to spoil too much of the anime for those who haven't seen it yet or who are interested.

The basic story behind Record of Lodoss War is that the island of Lodoss is a war torn area and there have been many battles for outright ownership of the island. There are a few kingdoms remaining who all have their own ambitions. However there is an evil power awakening that has the chance to bring about destruction the likes which no one has ever seen. This is where our story begins.

One of the great things about this series is it has several unique characters on both the good and bad sides. Parn is the main character of the story. He is basically your typical good guy, always saving the day, rescuing the girls, etc. except that at the start of the anime he is sort of headstrong and not very good with a sword. He is always accompanied by his good friend Etoh, who has been training to be a a priest. They meet a young elf princess, Deedlit who is both beautiful and talented on the field of battle. She falls for Parn, but he is pretty oblivious most of the time, however she seems to dig this about him as well as his bravery in battle. Ghim is an old grizzled dwarf who is on a personal quest and he is accompanied by his old friend Slayn a sorceror who uses various types of magic. Rounding out the heroes is a theif named Woodchuck who is intrigued by the friendship Parn shows him, so he decides to tag along with the group. There are two other characters that come along later who have a decent role in the anime, the mercenaries Shiris and Orson.

As for the bad guys, there are plenty of them and they are all pretty cool. Emperor Beld rules the dark land of Marmo(similar to Mordor in LOTR) with the help of his dark knight Ashram and the wizard Wagnard. There is also the dark witch Karla, who seems to have ambitions of her own and is only using the heroes and villains of Lodoss in her own personal game. There is the dark elf Pirotess, she is basically the same character as Deedlit yet she wears a much skimpier outfit and naturally falls for Ashram, who she wants to see conquer Lodoss once and for all.

I'll give a brief episode summary just to get you going, but I'll try not to divulge too much information. Disc 1 contains episodes 1-7 while Disc 2 contains episodes 8-13 and the Making of Lodoss War documentary.

Episodes 1-3: Prologue to the Legend, Blazing Departure and The Black Knight

Basically this is where the story takes off. The first 3 episodes introduce the characters. Parn basically lives by himself in a village, yet manages to nearly get himself kicked out when he kills a goblin in the forest while rescuing a villager. Etoh returns home from training to be a priest while Ghim leaves on his personal journey only to meet up with his old friend Slayn. Deedlit is kind of minding her own business just hanging out in the forest when she notices a group of Goblins up to no good. She warns Parn and Etoh who are nearby and everyone ends up meeting at the village for an epic battle with the goblins. After this the villagers decide that Parn is too much of a hassle to deal with but rather than kick him out, the mayor decides to send him and his new found friends to investigate the strange happenings that are occuring on Lodoss. As they set out they are arrested after a short battle with dark elves in the forest and wind up in the town of Myce where they meet up with Woodchuck. Emperor Beld attacks the city and Ashram lays waste to the castle and the city Captain who Parn had befriended. The heroes have now been drug into something much larger than they had realized.

Episodes 4-5: The Grey Witch, The Desert King

Parn and the group decide they have to warn the remaining kingdoms of Lodoss about Beld's advances. They head for the kingdom of Valis. Karla attempts to kidnap Princess Fiana, who has been sent from Valis to Alania to form an allaince to stand against Beld. Parn and his friends thwart the attack on Fiana, even though Karla could have easily defeated them. However she admires the courage of the young warrior and leaves them to their fate. The King of Valis welcomes Parn and company as heroes and there is a grand ceremony. Parn meets the mercenary king Kashue who will prove to a powerful ally. Deedlit trys to put some moves on Parn but gets frustrated when he just stares into space. Finally she drags him onto the dance floor and manages to get some QT with him. Meanwhile Emperor Beld is heading for the kingdom of Valis.

Episodes 6-7: The Sword of the Dark Emperor, The War of Heroes

Parn and the group discover that Karla is the descendant of an ancient group of sorcerors who appear in times of struggle to basically play God and decide the outcome. Emperor Beld arrives at Valis and quickly advances towards the castle of King Fahn. The King decides to meet Emperor Beld in battle, the two being old friends. Ghim leaves the group on a personal quest and the remaining heroes are left to assist King Fahn in his battle against Emperor Beld. However, the outcome of the battle is not what anyone expected and the two sides are left to pick up the pieces of war.

Episodes 8-9: Requiem for Warriors, The Scepter of Domination

The war is over and Lodoss stands at a tipping point. With Fahn and Beld now dead, King Kashue and Ashram are the major players for both sides. As Parn and his friends race to catch up with Ghim, they are intercepted by the mercenaries Shiris and Orson who are defending a village. A short battle ensues where it is revealed Orson is a berserker. After realizing Parn is not her enemy, Shiris gets control over her friend. Parn and his friends leave to find Ghim as Shiris comforts Orson. Ghim faces off against Karla in a battle that will reveal many things, both about who Karla is and why Ghim is so hell bent on defeating her. Meanwhile Ashram has taken the demon sword from the fallen Beld and gathers the forces of Marmo together. After hearing of the Scepter of Domination, he sets off to fire dragon mountain to claim the powerful artifact. Wagnard has plans of his own though and sends the dark elf Pirotess to kidnap Deedlit. Ambushed in the forest, Deedlit is in dire trouble, but Parn and his new allies Sheris and Orson quickly come to her aid.

Episodes 10-11: The Demon Dragon of Fire Dragon Mountain, The Wizard's Ambition

After being rescued, Deedlit reveals to Parn that Ashram is heading to Fire Dragon mountain to get the scepter of domination. King Kashue is also headed in that direction to stop the dragon Shooting Star, who is terrorizing the land surrounding his lair. Deedlit and Parn share a few quality moments and their love begins to get a little bit clearer for the viewer. Parn and company head out to help Kashue defeat the Dragon and in the end they meet up with Ashram and Pirotess. A battle ensues with Ashram claiming the Scepter of Domination, only to have it stolen! Shooting Star is slain with the help of Parn, Orson and Kashue and the mountain begins to come down around everyone. Parn and his friends escape as Parn watches Ashram and Pirotess get swallowed up by the collapsing rocks. Meanwhile it is revealed that Wagnard is behind the plot to get the Scepter of Domination. He wants it so he can resurrect Kardis the Destroy, an evil power that has laid dormant below Lodoss. Deedlit and Parn part ways with Orson and Shiris and share a touching moment as Deedlit reveals to parn that the Marmo will need her eternal life to complete their plan. They are interupted by Wagnard, who now with the powers of Kardis, easily defeats Parn and kidnaps Deedlit.

Episodes 12-13: Final Battle! Marmo the Dark Island, Lodoss - The Burning Continent

Wagnard now has everything he needs to resurrect Kardis and begins a ceremony to sacrifice Deedlit's eternal life in order to do so. Parn and his friends set out for Marmo to rescue Deedlit and they arrive just as King Kashue and his army get there. As they attempt to lay seige to Wagnard's fortress, the dark dragon Narse shows up to deter them. Ashram has mastered the powers of the Demon Sword and survived the collapsing volcano due to a valiant sacrifice by Pirotess. He sets off to battle Wagnard for ultimate control of Lodoss. A massive battle ensues between the two, but it appears Wagnard is too powerful for anyone. With help from his friends, Parn eventually is able to break away to find Deedlit. After crossing swords with Ashram, Parn must overcome his greatest foe yet if he is too stop Wagnard and rescue his true love.

The Good and the Bad:

Overall I was pretty pleased with this anime. I honestly watched it non-stop when I finally received it in the mail. The voice acting was well done for the dubbed version. The characters were all very interesting and unique. Deedlit was my favorite character overall because of her uniqueness and the way she also provided some comic relief for the anime with her classic facial expressions and frustration over Parn's ignorance to her advances. She is also one of the most delicate characters yet she is also very powerful. The characters were all well drawn and had awesome costumes, whether it was Deedlit's graceful armor, Pirotess' somewhat stripperish outift or Ashram's dark armor, each character had a unique look that fit right into the whole fantasy realm.

There are a few areas I think the anime could of improved upon though. For one, I don't think there was enough action in the whole Parn and Deedlit love story. I mean you could tell enough from the anime that yes they were interested in eachother, but there were never really any great moments between the two during the anime. The most romantic scene is about a 10 second scene where Parn gives her a flower and then is totally speechless and staring out a window as she beams at him. There is a fairly powerful scene where Wagnard finally kidnaps Deedlit and Parn nearly dies trying to save her while saying heroic lines like "you can't take her from me, I won't let you." Other than that though, you don't get a whole lot of love story action. I'm not asking for a make out or sex scene, but at least let them get a kiss in somewhere and have a couple minutes where they finally let go and realize how much they are in love.

Also, for having such great characters, I think they could have spent a little more time on character development. Shiris and Orson are excellent characters that come in to the story kind of late and you don't really find out a whole lot about them. We kind of get that Shiris likes Parn, but that was totally left alone for the most part. It would have been neat to see her try to get between him and Deedlit. Besides Parn, Deedlit, Ashram and Wagnard, there is not a lot of the anime dedicated to many of the other characters. Ghim has an episode for himself, but other than that, we do not get much background on the rest of the gang. For example, Deedlit is referred to as an elf princess when Pirotess attempts to kidnap her and says she has a repuation and all this, yet we never see anything regarding the origin of either of these unique characters. The only characters that we seem to get a lot of background info on are Karla and Parn.

The anime was also kind of short and left me wanting more. This is one of the reasons I'm checking into the other series that was released. I believe it is 27 episodes and delves into the story a little bit deeper, however it is a bit more pricey than the collector's edition so it may be a while before I can get my hands on it. 13 episodes was too short for me and I think that may have something to do with why they didn't delve into the development of the characters so much and left out some juicy romance between Parn and Deedlit.

Other than that I don't really have any other complaints. The story was great and it had all of the fantasy elements I love, wizads, dragons, elves, knights, swords, etc. The anime is fairly dark since the theme is basically world destruction and domination and there are a lot of scenes that show death and blood. Keep this one away from your kids! The love story between characters adds a nice angle to keep the plot from centering solely on world domination and is a nice touch. It's kind of a staple of any fantasy tale such as this that the hero gets his girl in the end.

I hope you have enjoyed reading this review. If you are a fan of anime or fantasy type movies/shows I highly suggest checking out Record of Lodoss War.

Recommended: Yes

Viewing Format: DVD
Video Occasion: Fit for Friday Evening
Suitability For Children: Not suitable for Children of any age