Slayers The Motion Picture, also known as Slayers Perfect, is a 1995 adventure fantasy comedy anime OVA directed by Hiroshi Watanabe, who would be in charge of directing all of the Slayers OVA specials and movies from this point on. It was written by Kazuo Yamazaki (who is known for directing several episodes of Urusei Yatsura), this would be his first and only writing credit in the Slayers franchise. The cast features the great Megumi Hayashibara, Maria Kawamura, Osamu Saka, Tessho Genda, Yuri Shiratori and Mahito Tsujimura. Perfect was one of the very first animated entries in the Slayers franchise created by Hajime Kanzaka, as it was released on July 29, 1995, three months after the TV series started airing.
Strange nightmares haunt sorceress Lina Inverse who, along with her companion and adversary, Naga the Serpent, travels to the hot springs of Mipross. When the magical waters turn out to be fake, the girls realize a bunch of bandits own them, under the command of the Great Master, who is involved with the elves seen in Lina's visions.
These early Slayer stories in the timeline are among my favorites, that's mostly because of the inclusion of fan-favorite sexy sorceress Naga the serpent, whose chemistry and constant clashes with Lina create some of the funniest moments in the franchise because of the very evident contrast (physical, moral, personality-wise) between the two girls. This first OVA really takes advantage of that by pretty much establishing how much Lina can't stand her but has to team up with her in cleverly conceptualized situations to face a bigger enemy.
The storyline I felt was well handled, what's initially just a mystery eventually is explained to the audience in small doses with very good pace and rhythm. Having Lina and Naga encounter several quirky secondary characters as their journey is either interrupted or disrupted by imaginative enemies and fun obstacles was a good way to structure the film. It's not really as streamlined as one might think, and there's a tendency towards a more fragmentary type of narrative, making some of the events feel slightly disjointed but the script is decent enough to tie everything together even if it's to a small degree in order for the plot to make sense feel cohesive, it never feels like it's just random scenarios strung together.
There are also some differences with the anime series that are established in this first movie, things that will become recurrent in the OVA franchise. First up is Lina being more hardcore with her magic, she's slightly less joyful than in her introductory scene in the show and she also doesn't mind killing or hurting bandits and doesn't think twice about things like that. Another thing is that the sexual jokes and raunchy jokes based on Lina's body are also more prominent and emphasized in these OVA's overall. Some more graphic bits of imagery are also present here.
By now you can tell that since the market is for direct-to-video consumers the sensibility is a bit more edgy and daring. Not to a weird degree but enough to realize the tone isn't exactly the same as the series, a divergence that helps to make these OVA's stand out.
If you wanna start with the OVA movies instead of the shows this is a good place to begin, you don't need any real knowledge of the lore and most of the important things you need to know are introduced here anyway. If you are a Slayers fan but somehow you haven't seen it, then I would recommend you to give it a go!
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