Ask John: How Much Slayers Is There?

Question:
Hi, I really like the anime series Slayers. I heard about a series called Slayers Try and Slayers Goergous. (I think its a movie. I’m not sure.) Do you know when they’ll be coming to the U.S., dubbed?

Answer:
The history of the Slayers animation is roughly divided into two different continuities- that of the TV series and that of the movies and OAVs. The Slayers TV series premiered on April 7, 1995 and proceeded through the Slayers Next and Slayers Try seasons, to end in 1997.

The first Slayers motion picture, sometimes referred to as Slayers Perfect, premiered in Japan in August 1995 and was directly followed by three more motion pictures: Slayers Return (1996), Slayers Great (1997) and Slayers Gorgeous (1998). Slayers Special, the first Slayers OAV series, consisted of three 30 minute episodes released in 1996. The second three episode OAV series, Slayers Excellent, premiered in Japan in 1998 and revealed how Lina Inverse and her nemesis Nagha the Serpent first met. All of the Slayers movies and OAVs were self-contained stories set before the events in the TV animation.

After nearly 4 years in limbo, the Slayers animation returned in December 2001 with the 30 minute long fifth theatrical motion picture, Slayers Premium. Unlike all of the previous movies and OAVs, Slayers Premium was the first movie to star the TV series characters.

Finally, while not normally considered part of the Slayers anime cannon, a relatively sizeable amount of original Slayers animation was created for the three different Slayers console role playing games: Slayers Royal, Slayers Royal 2, and Slayers Wonderful. The Slayers Royal games premiered on the Sega Saturn in 1997 & 1998 and were later ported to the Japanese Playstation. Slayers Wonderful, released in 1999, was a Playstation exclusive.

Besides the three Slayers TV series released in America by Central Park Media, AD Vision owns the domestic translation and distribution rights to all of the Slayers animation.