Hellsing Ultimate Review

Hellsing Ultimate is the OVA (Original Video Animation) of the manga Hellsing. The series revolves around the titular organization; Hellsing, as they follow their mission to protect Queen and country from the forces of the undead. But when a long thought dead enemy rises from the ashes to wreak havoc upon Great Britain, will Hellsing be able to stop the oncoming forces of evil? Or will Britain perish in fire and brimstone?

(P.S. This review WILL contain spoilers.)

So to begin with I might as well go ahead and say that this show is completely over the top! Like it’s one of the most over the top, out there shows that I have ever seen and that is because of three things. 1. Nazi Vampires, 2. Hellsing and 3. The amount of totally absurd violence that is in this OVA. This show is a bloodbath. Literally!

The main characters in Hellsing Ultimate are Alucard, the vampire that’s forever chained to do whatever Integra Hellsing commands him to do, the leader of the Hellsing establishment and governed to protect and serve. Finally from the Hellsing Foundation is Seras Victoria, otherwise known as police girl. An officer caught in the fire between Alucard and a priest turned vampire in the first episode and turned into a vampire by Alucard to save her life, now as a newly turned vampire she is forced to work for Hellsing. And that is where my first problem with this show is, in Seras’ character, at least at the beginning anyway. My first problem with her is just that when she becomes a vampire and is drafted into the Hellsing foundation, there’s no ifs and no buts from her. She just blindly accepts that she has to work for Hellsing and fight against other Vampires, annnd that’s kinda it. I would have preferred it at least if Seras questioned the fact that she is now being forced to work for Hellsing, instead of just being ok with having to become a vampire. The second problem I have with Seres is her backstory. So Seres has a perky, upbeat attitude towards everything, from almost dying to becoming a vampire, and then nearly dying again. To then fighting Nazi Vampires. She seems quite fine with it all, which is fair enough. My problem with her character is that for someone with an upbeat attitude to everything, her backstory REALLY doesn’t match up with her personality, like at all.

So right here, I’m going to have to just put up a warning, as Seres’ backstory does contain some quite serious topics, such as rape, death and sexual assualt. So if you don’t like those topics, I’m just putting up a warning now, so you can skip it, and I will stop talking about it by the end of the paragraph. So in one of the episodes, Seres is forced to go back into her past and we see what happened to her as a child. So one night, two crooks out for revenge on Seres’ father (who was a police officer) break in their house and shoot Seres’ parents right in front of her, shoot Seres, and then proceed to rape her mother’s corpse right in front of her after she’s been shot. In the first episode she’s almost raped and she is sexually assaulted by a vampire priest, and in later episodes, she is sexually harassed and assaulted by Hellsing’s mercenary soldiers.

Now tell me how does that correlate with Sere’s upbeat fun personality? It just kinda doesn’t and it also makes you think of the Mercenaries advances in a WHOLE new light… Aside from those two problems I had with the Seras’ character, I actually did quite enjoy her. I thought that she was funny in places and towards the later episodes in the series. SHE IS KICK FUCKIN ASS! Her fight scene between her and the Captain was pretty cool if a little short.

Now back on to the other characters, I pretty much like every other character this show has to offer, through the Iscariot, Hellsing’s rivals throughout the series and the Vatican’s lap dogs, with my personal favourite being Alexander Anderson, Alucard’s human match up, and biggest rival within the series. And finally, you have The Major and his horde of Nazi Vampires. Threatening to not only create a World War Three, but to create a war that never ends. (Not sure how that’s even possible, when all he talks about is completely obliterating his enemies, but whatever, just go with it.) So the Major is a very cool villain, up to a certain point. For a genocidal war monger who just wants to kill everyone, he never stops talking about war. Literally at the end of Episode 4 right before he’s about to blow London to kingdom come, he goes on a 10-minute rant, (ok more like 5, but it feels a hella of a lot longer than that) about how much he loves war. Point is, his speech goes on for way too long, it had me screaming! “SHOW DON’T TELL,” but it doesn’t stop there, throughout the rest of the series The Major just keeps going on about how much he just loves war… Man does that guy have a massive love boner over watching London get destroyed. He’s like one of those people that keeps going on and on about vaping, that it’s a “cleaner and healthier” version to smoking. Like yeah! We get it, dude! YOU VAPE! I felt like The Major still had his cool as fuck moments, taking 50 years to plan out Alucard’s demise and getting all his resources ready for the war, but ultimately his character is let down by his monologues.

The animation is pretty top quality stuff, It’s just beautiful to look at at times, and as it is a OVA it is to be expected. The CGI in the later episodes though isn't the best, and it looks quite shoddy. I wouldn’t say that a whole lot of you if you watch it, would think that it’s the worst CGI out there, but it’s not great.

So that about wraps up my review for Hellsing Ultimate, it’s bloody good fun (yes the pun was intended,) if you like mindless violence, vampires, and some pretty badass characters and set pieces. Some of the characters I had a problem with, but that's about the biggest concern with the anime that I have.