Hellsing: The Dawn (2011–2012) User Reviews

It should have been a full series

[Rectangular_businessman · 7/10 · 27 May 2023]

This three short miniseries had enough potential to be a full-prequel.

But alas, it basically ends as a mere unfinished preview, without even given a chance to Alucard to do something before the third and final short merely concludes as he (Well, she in this ocassion) enters in scene.

And it is such a shame, because the animation is just as stellar as in the Hellsing Ultimate miniseries; normally I think most prequels are basically cash grabs, but a Hellsing series taken place during the Second World War would have been simply amazing, even more outrageous than Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds.

But alas, this basically is a mere pilot of an awesome series that never was, a mere "supplementary" material as the title states.

So-so abandoned prequel

[Milk_Tray_Guy · 5/10 · 3 June 2022]

Ratings for all 3 episodes,

Ep1 ~ 6/10; Ep2 ~ 6/10; Ep3 ~ 5/10

Three shorts (average runtime about 8 minutes) that were intended to serve as a prequel to the Hellsing Ultimate OVA series. Unfortunately, no further episodes where made, so it ends rather abruptly without completing its tale. Unlike the main HU series (which has a fantastic English dub), this was subtitles only. Artwork is good, and consistent with that of the main series. Nice to see the backgrounds of various characters. Young Walter is a badass, whilst young Alucard is...interesting. Action's okay, although there are a few too many stillshots (maybe a budget thing?). Annoyingly, the final episode includes 'chibi' sequences (hated them in the main HU series; they just don't work for me).

Interesting to see, but too short to make any meaningful contribution to the Hellsing mythos. Overall rating, 5.5/10.

3 in 1, but forgettable

[Horst_In_Translation · 4/10 · 15 January 2016]

"Hellsing: The Dawn" is a Japanese mini-series from 5 years ago that consists of 3 short films. The first runs for 9 minutes, the second runs for 7.5 minutes and the last runs for 10.5 minutes, so the whole thing has a runtime of roughly 27 minutes. It plays during the days of World War II and thus consists many references about Nazis (a bit of an irony given Japan's role), but also many supernatural references about zombies. I found neither the action too interesting nor the characters. The historic references seemed very random in my opinion. And this kind of Japanese animation has never been my favorite anyway. The jumps between super-serious action and goofy Japanese anime style were off-putting I have to say. Very odd. Nothing memorable about this trio of short films. The 3rd is not only the longest, it's probably also the weakest. Not recommended.