Berserk: The Golden Age Arc Overview

Introduction

Berserk: The Golden Age Arc (Japanese: ベルセルク黄金時代篇, Hepburn: Beruseruku Ōgon Jidai-hen) is a Japanese anime film trilogy, which adapts Kentaro Miura’s Berserk manga series’s Golden Age arc.

It was produced by Studio 4°C and distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures Japan. The first two films, The Egg of the King and The Battle for Doldrey, were released in Japan in February and June 2012, and the third film, The Advent, was released in February 2013. In North America, Viz Media has licensed the trilogy for English home video release.

A remastered edited version for television with new scenes, labelled as “Memorial Edition”, was broadcast for 13 episodes from October to December 2022.

Outline

A lone sellsword named Guts gets recruited into a mercenary band and attempts to help the Band’s leader, Griffith, on his rise to power.

Cast

Group	Character	Japanese Voice Actor	English Dub Actor
Band of the Hawk	Guts	Hiroaki Iwanaga	Marc Diraison
	Griffith	Takahiro Sakurai	Kevin T Collins
	Griffith (Young)	Ayako Takeuchi	Barbara Goodson
	Casca	Toa Yukinnari	Carrie Keranen
	Judeau	Yuki Kaji	Christopher Kromer
	Rickert	Minako Kotonuki	Michelle Newman
	Corkus	Yoshiro Matsumoto	Doug Erholtz
	Pippin	Takahiro Fujiwara	Patrick Seitz
	Gaston	Kazuki Yao	Sean Schemmel
Members of the Midland Court	King of Midland	Nobuyuki Katsube	Christopher Corey Smith
	Princess Charlotte	Aki Toyosaki	Rachael Lillis (I), G.K. Bowes (II and III)
	Julius	Rikiya Koyama	Jesse Corti
	Adonis	Maki Mizumi	Colin DePaula
	Anna	Ayako Takeuchi	Lisa Ortiz
	Hassan	Hiroshi Arikawa	Michael Sorich
	Raban	Hochu Otsuka	Marc Thompson
God Hand	Void	Shinji Ogawa	Jon Avner
	Slan	Miyuki Sawashiro	Cindy Robinson
	Ubik	Chafurin	Liam O’Brien
	Conrad	Rikiya Koyama	Sean Schemmel
Other Adversaries and Miscellaneous	Nosferatu Zodd	Kenta Miyake	J David Brimmer
	Skull Knight	Akio Otsuka	Jamieson Prince
	Bazuso	Kendo Kobayashi	David B Mitchell
	General Gien	Shingo Egami	Sean Schemmel
	Gennon	Kazuki Yao	Steve Kramer
	Adon	Rikiya Koyama	Mike Pollock
	Boscogn	Takayuki Sugo	TJ Storm
	Torturer	Chafurin	Liam O’Brien
	Silat	Yuichi Nakamura	JB Blanc
	Erica	Ayana Kaketatsu	Michele O’Medlin
	Old Fortuneteller	Guin-poon-chaw	Barbara Goodson

Production

Music

The soundtracks for the film series are composed and arranged by Shirō Sagisu, with the theme song composed and arranged by Susumu Hirasawa. The insert song of all films, “Aria”, is performed by Hirasawa, a live performance (from Phonon 2555 Vision) is included on the home video releases of the second film, another live version is on the Nomonos and Imium DVD; the ending theme of the first film, “Beautiful Things” (ウツクシキモノ, Utsukushii Mono), is performed by Japanese-American singer-songwriter Ai (in an uncharacteristic epic ballad style) and composed by Rykeyz and Redd Styiez; lastly, the ending theme of the third film, “Breakthrough”, is performed by Kaname Kawabata of CHEMISTRY, written by Kawabata, Hidenori Tanaka and UTA, and arranged by Sagisu, Miho Hazama and CHOKKAKU. A special TV program, narrated by Akio Otsuka (the voice actor for the Skull Knight), that summarised the events of the first two movies, used the Hirasawa song “Horde of Thistledown” (冠毛種子の大群, “Kanmō Shushi no Taigun”) (from The Secret of the Flowers of Phenomenon) as its ending theme.

The television broadcast version of the trilogy, Berserk: The Golden Age Arc – Memorial Edition, features an exclusive ending theme by Mika Nakashima, titled “Wish”. It also features new music composed by Sagisu and Hirasawa.

Release

The project was first announced as a new anime project in September 2010. The films were distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures Japan. Berserk: The Golden Age Arc I – The Egg of the King (ベルセルク黄金時代篇I 覇王の卵, Beruseruku Ōgon Jidai-hen Wan Haō no Tamago) was released on 04 February 2012 in Japan.

Berserk: The Golden Age Arc II – The Battle for Doldrey (ベルセルク黄金時代篇II ドルドレイ攻略, Beruseruku Ōgon Jidai-hen Tsū Dorudorei Koryaku) was released on 23 June 2012 in Japan.

Berserk: The Golden Age Arc III – The Advent (ベルセルク黄金時代篇III 降臨, Beruseruku Ōgon Jidai-hen Surī Kōrin) was released on 01 February 2013 in Japan.

In North America, Viz Media has licensed all three films for a home video release. The Egg of the King was released on 27 November 2012; The Battle for Doldrey was released on 06 August 2013; and The Advent was released on 15 April 2014. The Golden Age Arc has also been available for streaming on Netflix.

Memorial Edition

In June 2022, it was announced that the trilogy would receive a television broadcast version, titled Berserk: The Golden Age Arc – Memorial Edition (ベルセルク黄金時代篇 MEMORIAL EDITION, Beruseruku Ōgon Jidai-hen Memoriaru Edishon). The series was featured at the Aniplex Online Fest 2022, held on 23 September 2022. It was directed by Yuta Sano and broadcast for 13 episodes on Tokyo MX, Tochigi TV, Gunma TV, BS11 and other networks from 02 October to 25 December 2022. The episodes were released on a Blu-ray set on 29 March 2023.

It was streamed outside of Asia by Crunchyroll.