This 3-volume series is the comic remake of the first Lodoss novel. This story was also shown in the famous (though now a bit old) 13 OAV Lodoss series, which is what made Lodoss world famous outside Japan. A very good quality anime series, whose main flaw is the very plot, even if in the OAV series they tried to make it a bit less straightforward, pulling away a bit from the original novel.

This comic series however does not pull away very much from the novel, so the plot remains a bit different from the anime series: which allows it to avoid direct confrontation with the OAV series, and that's good, since "famous big brothers" ever make for uneasy confrontations.

Art quality is rather good. Drawings are detailed, backgrounds made with care. From this point of view anyway, characterization and clothes are just those of the OAV series, which must be a real "standard" by now for all Lodoss series in Japan. But Yoshihiko Ochi's style, though very personal, comes out very well from the "uneasy confrontation", in my opinion: if character faces sound "childish", the painstaking drawn details make it stand as high as the OAV series character design. In the Japanese volumes there were a few beautiful pages with color artwork, which, of course, Planet Manga did not include in italian version - actually, being it flipped, as many manga issues by this publisher you get ada on the back cover... which I hate - I'd rather they put it in the inside of the cover - anyway this isn't the author's fault.

the script is very straightforward and doesn't have any particular good or bad point. Scenes are built giving to characters the right description, but, being the plot not so bright, there's pretty no sense of wonder. Anyway scenes are well built, timing is right and the comic flows easily in the reading, a good rendering of what the original novel is (on the contrary, especially in italian, if you look at the awful translation by Kappa Edizioni, the comic version is _much_ better).

Finally, a fair fantasy comic, but I'd recommend it just to "classic fantasy", "a la D&D fantasy" fan, as Lodoss is nothing more than this. In its group it does stand out, but it's not enough if you want something more than prick ears and easy adventure.

Young warrior Parn is the only son of former knight Tesius. Together with his friend the cleric Eto, he fights a pack of goblins settled near his small village; but he is hit and poisoned and saved thanks to dwarf warrior Gim's arrival and his friend mage Slain's cures. Thus he decides to go on a travel to train, and asks his friends to go with him. Later on they will meet Deedlit the elf and Woodchuck the thief. This party of six will face many adventures ending up being involved in the great war that is coming on Lodoss cursed island moved by Beld, king of the infernal Marmo island...

There are (at least) seven novels about Lodoss island stories. They are being published in Italian by Kappa edizioni and up to now we have the first four or five (Cronaca della guerra di Lodoss: La Strega Grigia; Cronaca della guerra di Lodoss: Il demone delle fiamme; Cronaca della guerra di Lodoss: La montagna del drago di fuoco: il principio; [?]; Cronaca della guerra di Lodoss, vol. 5: Guerra santa dei re). I bought just the first one and found it rather bad in style and especially poorly translated (not just style but also some heavy grammatical mistakes!). It is possible that later on they get better, but I wouldn't recommend them.
From the first two novels was first made the OAV series (anime series made to be sold directly in the home video market and not for TV). Good quality, excellent soundtrack, beautiful art and animation; it pulls away a bit from the original version of the story so that there is more suspence effect. It has a false "in medias res" beginning, in fact it's just that an episode was moved to the beginning, but it ends up being just quite puzzling because you don't get any character introduction. It's a very poor try to get an immersion effect and that episode would be better placed in its logical linear place. Apart from this flaw the series is more than enjoyable.
Later, other video series were made (but I have never seen any, I've come across just a few titles: one of them is Legend of Crystania), but I heard they're not as good as that first.
At last, manga series. There are many. In Italy, Dynamic Italia published the first volume of Record of Lodoss War: the lady of Pharis. A two-volume series, really enjoyable both in art (wonderful) and in script timing. Perhaps more or later I'll make a more detailed review of this one. Anyway, in Japan volume two has been out for quite a while, but here in Italy Dynamic Italia still says it had only one volume. I wonder if we will ever see it finished.
Recently, Planet Manga published two more Lodoss series: La leggenda del'eroico cavaliere (the legend of the heroic knight), set after the grey sorceress, and La storia di Deedlit (Deedlit's story). The first one is a pretty usual fantasy story, like the grey sorceress story reviewed above. Old characters turn up, after a time. The second one is a rather introspective story, in two volumes, which evolves around Deedlit (and a bit around Parn too). It disappointed many readers exspecting the usual fantasy story like the first one, but I enjoyed it though it has a rythm, obviously, slower and more poetic.