Berserk: The Golden Age Arc I - The Egg of the King

Berserk: The Golden Age Arc I - The Egg of the King (2012) is a Japanese fantasy anime you can watch online on iFILM, directed by Toshiyuki Kubooka. It opens the three-film cycle that adapts the Golden Age saga from Kentaro Miura's manga.

Guts is a sword-for-hire with no aim beyond the next fight, and no trust to give anyone. That cracks the day Griffith defeats him — a beautiful, magnetic young commander who leads the undefeated Band of the Hawk. Guts joins up, an uneasy bond grows between the two men, and Casca, the company's lone swordswoman, can't stomach the outsider or the pull he has on Griffith. As Griffith climbs toward power, his ambition hides a goal whose price no one has guessed yet.

The animation blends hand-drawn leads with 3D crowds in the battle scenes — a divisive choice that gives the carnage a grimy, medieval weight. Expect blood, severed limbs and a creeping sense of doom; this is not the kid stuff some assume anime to be. Manga readers will clock every beat, and newcomers get a clean way into one of fantasy's darkest worlds. Stream Berserk: The Golden Age Arc I (2012) online on iFILM.