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The Genre: Horror

The Format: Manga from Dark Horse

The plot: Seras Victoria was a member of a special police unit sent in to deal with a mass slaughter deep in the English countryside. Before she died, that is. Before she started to work with the man that killed her. That man is Arucard, servant of Sir Integra Hellsing, head of the Hellsing Institute, Protestant Britain’s last defence against all things that go bump in the night. Like vampires chopping peoples heads off.

I should perhaps start by explaining that in the great hard-drive crash of twenty-oh-four one of the many things I lost was my review of the Hellsing anime. Now at some point I may be re-doing this, as well as a few others of the lost reviews, but since my reviews are rather dependent on pictars and the DVDs are in a box somewhere in a distant attic, this won’t be any time soon.

My review, like most of my reviews, could be summed up very quickly, though of course the review itself was the best part of a thousand words. Hey, it’s my website, and I can blather on about crap as much as I want to.

Basically, it appeared to me that the Hellsing anime started strongly, went downhill in the middle, and ended very badly. I surmised that this seemed to be because of budgetary problems. That it had the feel of a 26 episoder having been planed, but the money ran out and they had to dump half of it and finish halfway through. The animation also seemed to lurch wildly from pretty damn fine to appalling arse scrapings within mere moments, and the dub was an affront to the English-speaking world.

This is most surprising, as it’s this that really sets the Hellsing manga apart as something special. It’s genuinely funny in parts, and there’s a wry wit and black humour that pervades the whole work, from the reversal of Dracula to give the main character his name, to the way in which the bad guys are played.

Where the manga is possibly lacking is in character development. Many of the players are a little bit two dimensional (*ahem*), although this is really just a reflection of the slower speed of the manga. So far, the only real development has been of Integra Hellsing and a smidge for Arucard and Seras Victoria. However, I understand the manga is quite a long one, and I’m sure it will get round to the rest in the fullness of time.

I should perhaps explain that really, Hellsing is an ensemble piece. The Hellsing organization of the title is dedicated to fighting vampires in the UK. It is run by the head of the Van Hellsing family, who at this time is Sir Integral Wingates Hellsing (actually a woman), as well as a committee of some sort. They utilise what are essentially Special Forces troops, as well as “shock troops” such as the vampire Arucard.

Arucard appears to be a slave of the Hellsing organisation (although some degree of volition seems to be involved), but that doesn't stop him from being a badass vampire too. Early on in the manga, Arucard rescues a policewoman called Seras Victoria by killing her and resurrecting her as a vampire. She's kinda the hero of the story, but not really.

The other main character is Walter, Integral's butler, who is a retired shock trooper.

The central idea behind Hellsing is that since Henry the Eighth dissolved the monasteries and made himself the head of the Church of England, the Van Hellsing family took over the role that was filled by the Iscariot wing of the Roman Catholic Church. In other words, the Vatican has its own vampire hunter section, and they also have a shock trooper in the form of Alexander Anderson, who is either genetically altered, or in some way mystical.

Naturally, the Iscariot's don’t get on well with the Hellsing organization, and there is an interesting interplay between the two heads of these organisations, as well as some mileage made from the idea of jurisdiction.

Vampire lore is probably the most variable of all of the classical monster lore’s. The things that kill them and the things they need to do are literally as changeable as the weather. Hellsing, however, stays pretty close to the Bram Stoker original and as such, there are some nice moments brought about by these (how, exactly, do you leave an island country if you can’t pass over moving water?).

Another nice touch to Hellsing is the inclusion of a nice thick bonus section at the end. It’s often the case that the bonus bits in manga are rather lacklustre, but here we’re treated to bits of the manga in its original form – focusing as it did on what was to become the Iscariot wing. There are also some slightly deranged ramblings from the author, which also crop up throughout the manga, and all these help to make it seem like a much more personal experience.

As you can probably tell I’m thoroughly impressed with the manga as fas as I have read at the time of writing (up to volume 3).

The Summary: Gory, violent, moody, dark, but also funny, clever and witty - it don’t get much better.

The Score: 5/5

The Pictures:

(click for larger versions)