Review by Ian Keogh
In Japan there was a gap of almost a year between the publication of this volume and the previous one, which is almost unheard of given manga production schedules. As the English translations were three years behind, it didn’t affect them this time, but Kohta Hirano took further breaks, and later volumes were delayed throughout the world.
It’s understandable. His incredibly detailed style is work intensive, and even with the Japanese system of uncredited assistants there’d be some keeping up with the way he switches between approaches as per the sample art. On other pages Hirano comes across as an infinitely talented 20th century schoolboy scribbling away on his exercise book, doodling ever more detail into battle scenes as a teacher drones about about the formation of an isthmus.
When Hellsing 4 ended a warship full of Nazis and vampires was heading toward Britain, which is as good an indication as any of Hellsing’s growing lunacy. Having started off with an almost straightforward action strip, the progression and the procedure has become ever wilder, and whereas earlier in the series Hirano might have curtailed his whimsical impulses, here he positively revels in them. An example is old men turned into vampires mourning that they’ll never again feed the pigeons in the park in sunlight despite the trade-off of immortality, yet a dozen pages later Hirano’s back to destruction on an epic scale.
It’s understood that Alucard can deal with the vampires, but his doing so is five chapters of excess. Even so, it’s only the prologue. More awaits, some Nazis survive, and that takes us on to Hellsing 6.
