I may not remember all of this in the proper order. But in the beginning, early 1998 or so, Slayers was one of the first series I watched, on rental VHS, with Iria, Dirty Pair Flash, and other now forgotten minor titles (and Pokemon). I knew about Iria and DPF, indirectly, from cover and promotional art online (Amber Anime Archive, for certain, the other sources lost to time; probably Geocities shrines) and I recognized those first. Slayers I did not know, but it looked good to me at the time, when most everything colorful, sexy, and big-eyed looked good. Slayers: The Motion Picture, just coming out that year from ADV, came tumbling after.
The reason any of this was important, or worth remembering at all, is that the rentals that happened to be available to me were the English dubbed versions.
Like most young new fans at that time and for years to come, I did not appreciate then that the Slayers TV series and its movie were dubbed by different studios, half a country apart, with different casts. That first year I may not have made too big a deal at all with how Lisa Ortiz’s Lina Inverse (TV; CPM; New York) sounded compared to Cynthia Martinez’s (movies/OVAs; ADV; Houston), if I realized it was two different people to begin with. But no matter what I did hear, I enjoyed it. In large part because I was excited to begin with by this new and vibrant medium, but these happened to be also vibrant and energetic dubs with new talent also excited to explore things as much as I was, regardless of how well their efforts held up at the time (they did) or today (still do, mostly, but I’m biased).
From that very beginning (I could include Voltron from childhood, to be annoying) being a dub fan was what being an anime fan was, for me. While I listened to both English and Japanese when I began buying and renting DVDs by the end of that year, I can’t say what Japanese track was my first. It doesn’t matter to the fan I was then and what it lead me into, and what I was for at least ten years following. Today, Japanese is most of what I listen to, and is the current talent base that I better know; not out of choice, though I love it just the same, but because the wide-ranging domestic industry that spawned my early dub fandom is no more.
How does all of this lead to Slayers NEXT, that second season of Slayers? Why, the dub. Aired in Japan in 1996, The VHS release from Central Park Media for NEXT was in 1999. I had a lot more dubs under my belt by then, from Houston, LA, Vancouver, and other places, but I still had a lot of my interest centered around New York, primarily old TAJ Studios, which produced Slayers but also the Pokemon juggernaut. Though I only watched that first season of Pokemon, it was my formal introduction to Rachael Lillis, the originator of Misty, and on the other side of her range, Team Rocket’s Jessie. Slayers NEXT, for several reasons the heart of the Slayers TV franchise, came right on Pokemon’s heels. And Rachael Lillis’ bumbling wannabe sorceress with boy problems and green hair from NEXT, Martina Xoana Mel Navratilova, was the first performance in anime, in any language, that became my “favorite one.” Martina steals the show.
So this is a little bit a tale of first love, with Lillis as my first and therefore always favorite anime voice actor. There was much to come (Yuriko Star; Mizuki Takase) but Martina remains my comedic touchstone in her credits and (obviously) how I most remember Slayers NEXT. It feels unfair, in fact, because there’s a lot in NEXT besides Martina, the vengeful former princess of a kingdom Lina Inverse destroys in the beginning of the story and who, through the power of a monster she made up, pesters the heroes off and on all series long, eventually, as these things go, allying with them to save the world. This is also the part of Slayers where Lina and Gourry admit their feelings. Sort of. And where the franchise’s great trickster, Xellos, appears. And where the arcane pantheon of gods and monsters of the Slayers world is revealed.
It’s also the season where Lina and Amelia sing in magical girl costumes.
The 26 episode NEXT, based on volumes 4 through 8 of the original light novel series, is for my money the best part of the TV series, superior in its pacing and gags, its dramatic arc well melodramatic but in fun and meaningful ways. There are, as usual, several ridiculous episodes about ancillary things, but it’s all set off, as good stories are, with a simple quest: locate the Claire Bible—the Philosopher’s Stone of Slayers mythology that crops up in every menacing turn in the franchise. First as a means for Zelgadis, carrying over from the first season, to cure his chimera curse, but soon enough drawing the rest of the gang into a double-veiled fight between the gods, in a race for the fate of the world.
Martina, aquamarine springy hair, mismatched wardrobe of bikini, thigh boots, shoulder guards and cape, was created for the anime adaptation. And she exists for most of the time as comedic foil to the galloping drama and peril of the story. This is what, outside of Lillis’ performance, most endears me to her character: she stubbornly keeps the comedy-drama mix that underpins Slayers alive and kicking. She’s the best manifestation of the absurd that is always there to undercut the severe routine of swords and sorcery. The best on the TV side of things, at least—she is closest there to Naga the Serpent, Lina’s sole partner in the (smidgen less serious) prequel movies and OVAs.
Twenty—or seventeen—years on, the defining memory of a show like this is also my big takeaway for it: there is no story or theme that reconnects me to my younger self, no lesson on what used to be and what’s left now, there’s instead a more basic connection to a single character, and voice, that gave me a reason for being a fan. For a character that specialized in them, it could have been a curse. But I’ll live with it.
Thank you, Martina. Thank you, Rachael Lillis.
