Slayers Return 2001 CPM Press   Buy It Now

The Slayers are back once again. Of course I'm talking here about none other than the underdeveloped Lina Inverse and her rival (and occasional rival) Naga the White Serpent, the one who really is easy on the eye, and well built I might add. However, this isn't your typical Slayers adventure. Okay, it is, but this one takes place earlier in the continuity of the series, so in some ways I suppose that Slayer Return is a bit misleading, but that's really not a big issue.

This story is much earlier, and Lina has only just set out on her adventures with Naga. As usual, the two are looking for ways to make money, places to have fantastic food, and of course, treasure. The pair has the fortune to bump into Salina, a young villager whose home has recently been overran and the inhabitants forced to work for the bandits that have come there. This looks like the perfect job for the two spell casters, but when these two come into contact with anything, it is never easy, and they find themselves squaring off against a madman who is determined to recover and buried Elvish treasure in order to rule the world.

Like most of the Slayers manga, this one starts out with quick action and some sarcastic wit and just keeps on moving. The manga might be set early on, but that doesn't mean that it needs to portray itself any differently. The action is fast and the battles are faster as Lina and Naga go from trying to just save villagers to dealing with the threat of a meteor that is going to destroy the village, to battling the Elves buried treasure which turns out to be a creature of potentially destructive force and unstoppable. Although the story is short, like most of the Slayers have been, there are brief bits before and after the "main attraction", including one story that follows the adventures of Naga and Lina's nemesis here, Galef.

Slayers is wonderfully drawn of course, but the one thing that I really have never cared much for in the manga are the spell casting sequences, at least the results. Often times, they seem to be a bit bland and not nearly as eye catching as what some of the other artwork is. Usually, this wouldn't be that big of an issue, but when it comes to Slayers, casting spells is what the series is all about.

Still though, this does end up being yet another classic piece of Slayers manga, chock full of entertainment and the usual banter and bickering between Lina and Naga that you would expect. It is on the shorter end, and it seemed that I flew through this one much more quickly than some of the previous Slayers manga. However, that's not really something that is a negative thing, and there are times when shorter manga really are the better ones instead of they are just a bit too long and tend to drag on and on. For a quick read, Slayers is the ideal thing, and for the real fans of the series,  it's yet another must have to keep that collection growing.

- mike -