Some Tolkien-ish Things in Slayers
Okay so maybe some of you die-hard fans might know the answer to whether or not JRR Tolkien's works influenced The Slayers (That's obvious, I'm sure!), but here's some things worth thinking about!
GEOGRAPHY and HISTORY
* I've noticed also that Slayers was trying to obtain a kinda Tolkien-ish realism. Y'know, they'd always have (bloody useless) maps of their world? Like, Oh, here's a map! Isn't that cool? It's like it really exists! And not to mention the extremely-well-developed (though equally uselessly mapped) Mazoku Heirarchy! They wanted to develop little details like that to make it seem more real, although the only problem is that nobody really pays attention to the details (save the truly obsessed). And somehow the bustling, prosperous city of Sailoon reminds me of the bustling, prosperous city of Minas Tirith.
* And history... they constantly recount wars of old (Monster's Fall, Darkstar's attempt to rule the world or something, Golden Dragon-Ancient Dragon massacre) and tales of the shaping of the world (Cepheid and Shabrinigdo's struggle) . But the stories are for giving background to their world (a la Tolkien), and only have an inkling to current events, rather than personal histories to give background to characters (like the little history of Sailor Moon).
LANGUAGE
* Another likeness. Ahem, first of all, they use runes as a writing system (like in Tolkien's books!) because that whole Ragna Blade instruction book is written in them.
Yeah, and that language Filia's spells are in sound suspiciously like Elvish!
AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST, THE OBVOIUS REFERENCE THAT IS REZO
* Ahem. Rezo the Red Priest is one of the five of the order of very powerful sorceror/priests. Rezo the RED? Then are the other priests of a specific color too? And now take the Istari (wizards) of Middle-earth who are also color-ranked staff-weilding powerful sorcerors. Radagast the Brown, Gandalf the Grey, Saruman the White... (and here we have Rezo the Red of Slayers. See something here?) There are five color-specific preists and five color-ranked Istari. You do the math! Oh yes, and by those standards, I daresay that 'Rezo' does sound like "the name of a villian".
Or possibly an orc. ^-^
Show Stuff
* The beloved Martina Zoana Mel Navritalova is named after a famous tennis player Martina Navritalova. Brass Raquets, anyone?
*Even though this is obvious, Mimi and Nene from Slayers Next are based offa Shampoo from Ranma 1/2. Like I said it's obvious, but I've never heard anyone else say anything about it! (Oh yeah the little doctor girl is supposed to be Rini from Sailor Moon but we all knew that one)
* When Gourry poses as the girl "Lala", and then must fight, he rips off his disguise (a frilly dress) and we see A: His bra, stuffed with a chibi Zelgadis doll besides other objects and B: His girly undies, with a cute little pig on them and the word "Boo". A lot of you probably don't know what that means, so I'll tell you! It is a reference to the anime Tonde Buurin, a cute and ridiculous show about a girl who can transform into a cute and bizarre pig superhero. On the pig's stomach is the hiragana character for "bu", and the character "bu" turns up a lot in the show. I'm pretty sure that's why!
Stupid Coincedences...
*OMD: Just something weird... The 80's group OMD (Orchestral Manouvres in the Dark) always reminds me of Zelgadis. Their lead singer sounds like the singing voice of Zel's Japanese v/a, and their sound is similar to a Zel song I once heard. Their hit "If You Leave" reminds me of Zel because of the lyrics "I touch you once/ I touch you twice/ I won't let go at any price" (because of his wierd thing about Zel touchin' Amelia 0_0). They even did a song called "Tesla Girls" ! Just something to ponder
The Slayers Zodiac: What's Your Sign?
Hopefully I'll get some pictures for this, but here's the one I assembled!
Aries: Martina Zoana Mel Navritolova
Taurus: Valgaav
Gemini: Prince Philionel
Cancer: Rezo
Leo: Lina Inverse (duh!)
Virgo: Filia Ul Copt
Libra: Gourry Gabriev
Scorpio: Hellmaster Phibbrizo
Saggitarius: Amelia Wil Tesla Sailoon
Capricorn: Zelgadis Greywords
Aquarius: Xellos Metallium
Pisces: Sylphiel Rels Nada
The Story Summary, for all you newbies...
The Slayers follows the travels and adventures of Lina Inverse (a sorcoress) and her buddy Gourry Gabriev (a swordsman) and some assorted other characters (Amelia Wil-Telsa Sailoon, a sorcoress and Zelgadis Greywords, a chimera/sorceror/swordsman, etc.) . Even though it sounds like it might be about vampire slayers or dragon slayers or something like that, it's not! I don't know why they chose that name because throughout the whole series, there's only maybe 1 or 2 dragons that are actually slain (and Lina calls herself a dragon-spooker!). Also, Lina is more commonly known for bandit-killing rather than dragon-slaying. (She does it to steal their loot... would that make her a bandit's bandit then?) Anyway, before I saw the show, I was completely clueless as to what it was about. I thought it was about a dragon slayer that runs around slaying dragons or something, but every time I asked someone they'd say it was all to complicated to explain! So for those of you who have never seen it before or have only seen a few eps and still have no idea what it's about, here it is in lamens terms! It's about a group of people running around having adventures. That's it! There is no specific story. The series usually goes like this: They have a few kooky adventures for awhile, and then after a coupla episodes they get tangled up into some kind of evil plot. They fight a main villian, and the climactic part of the entire series is Lina's casting of the Giga Slave spell. Blah. (You'd think after the first two successful castings of it, no one would be scared of it destroying the world anyomore. It looses its dangerousness. I mean, one minute they're saying the Ra Tilt is a really complex and dangerous spell, and then the next minute Amelia is using it every five seconds. It kinda sucks that way)
Oh yeah, one more thing. Who the hell is Lina so insecure? Hasn't she ever heard that Shakira song? Ya know... "Lucky that my breasts are small and humble / So you don't confuse them with mountains" Jeeze, the only un-bimbo girl in the show wants to be a chesty bimbo? What kind of message is that? :p
