Vinland Saga | Reaction & Review 2x1 "Slave"

And it’s also interesting how he got to see Thors treat the slave who fled from Halfdan.

Trevor Johnson

Excited to follow along for Vinland Saga season 2! I’m an anime only, so this is all new content. I’ll be thrilled if this is a more introspective sort of season that I’ve been able to gather from the promo material and some fan chatter. So, as for what’s to come, your guess is as good as mine, and it’ll probably be better lol I’m pretty happy with the production. You can tell it’s made by mostly the same team with a tiny bit more CG, and I have no issues with that. I hope it holds up. This was a very moving first episode. I teared up a bit myself.

Sarah S

yeah if you check the cast credits after the episode you will see ハルドル・エリス・オラフソン credited next to narrator, after some googling you'll find Halldór Elís Ólafsson is the guy

Conroy

I didn’t really notice any irregularities myself, and the credits themselves looked about as ideal as they could with everything being done at Bamboo. Maybe you are mistaking layout work with background art? Those were quite simple. https://i.imgur.com/V2a1j3B.png That being said, when the inevitable episode comes where half of the backgrounds are painted by other studios, no viewer will be able to tell the difference. Not to diminish the work done by the individual background artists in the slightest, but at the end of the day they are there to just do the grunt work. They need to strictly follow the instructions provided in the layouts that are drawn by the animators while using the art boards done by the main art staff as reference. The previous season did not go without outsourcing either. An episode averages around 250 cuts, where cuts having new backgrounds often pass 200. Bamboo has a few dozen employees – they are not big enough to handle that for a two-cour series by themselves. Add on to the fact that their work is some of the most sought after in the industry. They often need to end up relying on the connections that Takeda has made over the decades. He is highly respected and will never run out of friends to ring up when need be. Perhaps studio Bihou? The previous studio he founded who were in charge of Attack on Titan when it was still at Wit. Unfortunately the norm of the industry is to have ~5 episodes ready to go when the first one airs, as unbelievable as it might sound. This season’s production overlaps with Chainsaw Man quite heavily, so it is possible that some of the staff were still preoccupied with that when they started work on this. Though, I don’t believe that would show up in the end result even if it was the case. Also might be worth noting that art boards for a plain-ass field in the middle of the day are not necessarily going to look as visually striking as northern lights in Iceland, or the red/orange dominant autumn scenery in the fifth episode.

Interesting, didn't know that. I read somewhere that it's a va

Sloopgamer

I'm surprised that studio bamboo is back for season 2. I thought the background art looks pretty downgraded compared to season 1 in some places, but maybe they are working under tighter time constraints this time around?

Adding to the fun facts in the comments here - the ED was co-written and produced by legendary producers Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis. They just got inducted into the Rock and Roll HoF in 2022!

Conroy

They actually got a representative from the Icelandic Embassy in Japan to do that opening poem voiceover, sounded great for a guy who ostensibly has never done voiceover work.

Conroy

Hey Im, was just wondering what time you think the doctor who reaction will be out tonight? Just to decide if i want to stay up for it or watch it tomorrow :)

Louis

First some trivia facts about the episode, the whole flashback of Einar is a anime-only thing. We in the manga just had a few pages. The first voice you hear in this episode is indeed icelandic and not japanese. They hired extra a icelandic VA for it. And here is another post about the poem that I found under another yt reaction video. I think it’s interesting to know „HÁVAMÁL Hávamál A poem found within the Poetic Edda, a collection of Old Nordic poems. The title translates to "sayings of the high one," and the contents of the poem are attributed to Odin. The Japanese translation, when not simply titled "Hávamál," is known as "the song of Odin" or "the proverbs of Odin." Hávamál is a gnomic poem, meaning that its verses are meant to serve as lessons or advice on customary topics, such as the laws of hospitality for both guest and host.“ Finally I can hear again my fav composer for anime Yutaka Yamada. He sadly never did many anime projects, that’s why I’m always happy to see his works. He also created my fav soundtrack of all time being the Tokyo Ghoul soundtrack. The only thing is that the anime itself is the most horrendous thing done to a anime adaptation. Together with Berserk 2016, Kingdom S1/2 and Tsukihime probably the most disliked adaptations from the anime community. I say it here, just so you never watch them XD You also talk so much about imagery in your reactions and discussions that I think, you don’t even have a studio Shaft anime on your list. You need to see their animation style either with Madoka Magica, March comes in like a Lion or the Monogatari series. Especially Monogatari and Madoka would blow you away animationwise. Same would be with March, but for a different reason. And if you ever think Madoka Magica isn’t for you……let me say, the anime will prove you wrong. You said, that there aren’t many anime with such a feeling to it like Vinland Saga. The thing that makes the difference there is the demography. Vinland Saga is a Seinen, so for young adults and you’re right, they have different feel to it and there aren’t many Seinen anime out there cause they aren’t profitable enough. And if they make some, they are mostly a terrible adaptation just like with Berserk and Tokyo Ghoul. The two only good Seinen anime that come to my mind would be Monster and Vinland Saga. Cause of the so many bad apples we had, many people feared back in 2018 that Vinland Sagas adaptation would be also not good. But Yabuta proved us wrong even so, I must say, there are very few adaptation decision’s that I quite don’t vibe with. Same with S1 and now with this episode. It’s nothing major, he just changed certain scenes, but most of the time they feel rather important to me or he added scenes that I absolutely don’t like. I’m interested to see, if Yabuta can make this arc as legendary as it is in the manga. One of my personal top 5 arcs of all time! Excited to see your reaction and discussion to it!

Sloopgamer

Very excited to finally be here! I really love that Yukimura decided to reintroduce us to Thorfinn via Einar. Not seeing him the whole episode and then at the end seeing that he has also become a slave, just like Einar. Him becoming a slave just makes so much sense, especially after his conversation he had with Leif when he was a child, where he was in denial about his ancestors fleeing from Norway. Plus how he looked down on Hordaland for not fighting back against her master. Yukimura knew what he was doing in the Prologue. And finally the OP and ED are so beautiful. They're everything I hoped for and it was nice to finally hear them, after first hearing them in trailers months ago.

RaijinCloud

No problem at all. Thanks goes to you as well - know that I appreciate the hell out of the effort you put into your content. I'd much rather pledge here than pay the same amount for an endless library on some streaming service.

Thanks for these posts! I appreciate it 🤝🏼

FILMBuFF

And as if my text-dump wasn’t long enough already, here are some of the English subbed staff interviews from the first season for those interested. Yabuta-san: https://youtu.be/BSYaUzm7bvo Seko-san: https://youtu.be/dSz46ZgIF44 Abiru-san: https://youtu.be/NnNtpdYfl9Y Takeda-san: https://youtu.be/F149coZ9hNk Hasegawa-san: https://youtu.be/-EWTtu1GaPk

We’re back! Your vocal excitement about this for the past few months has definitely rubbed off on me! The expectations have probably already been set to high heavens by the manga readers, but I seriously can’t wait for your further dissection of this amazing story now that we are, according to one of the voice actors promoting the series; “moving from a physical battle to a more mental one.” Stunning opening! And a two-man job at that, so even more impressive! It’s headed by Sunouchi, which should confirm that he’s back for the season. The premiere itself was also very solid. A Yabuta board brought to fruition by two directors: a new guy and another regular from the first season, Yamamoto. The end credits can give the viewer a general idea about how dire stuff might be behind the scenes, and it seems to be more or less in line with the first season. I would say that it’s realistic to expect a few quite broken episodes and only a handful of ambitious boards – just like before. Not that I was expecting any of this to get any better with a move from one mismanaged studio to another. Yabuta and the team need to be doing a lot of heavy lifting again!　お体に気をつけて頑張ってください！ Also, I’ll share this: https://i.imgur.com/0gqX7ja.png I laid stuff out like so because I was interested – maybe some of you are too. It’s super rare to see the creative team stay this intact while the amusing corporate heads are playing hot potato with an anime amidst the usual stuff they tend to be doing. Takeda and the rest of the team at Bamboo keep staying peerless – let’s hope for some layouts that will let them go as hard as they can. And Kobayashi-cinema is inevitable. Though, I am hoping he had the chance, and opted to direct his own board more than once this time. I’m also looking forward to any new talent who’ll find themselves into this production through Okamura being at the desk this time. Seimei Kidokoro and Kounosuke Uda are among the names whose appearances would not surprise me. Kidokoro was really impressive with Idaten Deities just recently, and Uda is a reliable guy with a lot of experience. Probably most known as the first series director for One Piece (up to ep 278) during which he helmed many classics, including the premiere: https://i.imgur.com/ei96lYD.png Almost none of us like our bosses, and I know that this community can acknowledge the people who pour their heart and soul into these shows instead of just blindly praising the companies barely paying them for it. I also do hope you’ll bear my fanboying for all them in these comments for the next 24 weeks! :) ps. the bike intro is Twin Engine’s.