The first 50-minute installment was released to Region 2 DVD in Japan on February 10, 2006, and as of December 26, 2012, all ten episodes have been released. North America's release of the OVA was quite slow, as its dub was finished in 2014; 2 years after Hellsing: Ultimate had finished in Japan. The OVA was directed by Tomokazu Tokoro for the first 4 episodes, later replaced by Kenichi Suzuki and Yasuhiro Matsumura respectively, with a screenplay written by Hideyuki Kurata and Yousuke Kuroda, character designs provided by Ryoji Nakamori and music composed by Hayato Matsuo with a production by studio Satelight, then Madhouse, and then Graphinica x Kelmadick.
The series was created after the Hellsing anime had finished, and was intended to be more true to the manga than the anime was. The OVA series can be watched on Hulu, and Netflix in some regions.
Main article: Hellsing: Ultimate/Characters, Cast and Staff
The Hellsing Organisation, a secret branch of the British government, has long been battling supernatural threats to keep the people safe from creatures of the night. Its current leader, Sir Integra Hellsing, controls her own personal army to eliminate the undead beings, but even her highly trained soldiers pale in comparison to her most trusted vampire exterminator, Alucard, who is actually a powerful vampire himself. Along with Integra's mysterious butler and Alucard's new vampire minion, Seras Victoria, the Hellsing Organisation must face not only regular ghouls and vampires, but a rivaling secret branch of the Vatican and a mysterious group of madmen spawned by a certain war over 55 years ago.
Main Characters[]
Alucard: Alucard is a mysterious figure. A supernatural vampire of untold age and power, he acts as the Hellsing Organisation's secret weapon. His reasons for doing so, however, as well as his motivations, remains unknown. His position within the Hellsing Organisation is one of unique status. He is the agency's ace in the hole, answerable only to the Organisation's Chairman.
Sir Integral Fairbrook Wingates Hellsing: A young noblewoman, she is the head and last member of the Hellsing family. She doubles as the leader of the Hellsing Organisation, and Alucard's "Master." She inherited the Hellsing Organization at the age of thirteen upon the death of her father. Although she often seems strict and domineering, she is respected and admired, even among her sworn enemies.
Seras Victoria: Seras was a member of the London Police Department until she was mortally wounded by Alucard in his destruction of a vampire masquerading as a priest. On the verge of death, she chose to allow Alucard to turn her into a vampire. Serving beneath Alucard, she now works for the Hellsing Organisation and deals with the consequences of her decision.
In present-day England, Alucard is called to duty to eradicate a vampire and his ghouls. However, a police girl named Seras Victoria is gravely injured in the process, and upon giving her a choice to live or die, Alucard turns her into his vampire servant. Later, on a mission to hunt down a vampire in the town of Badrick in Northern Ireland, Alucard meets and fights Father Alexander Anderson for the first time.
Alucard has a dream about his defeat at the hands of Abraham Van Helsing, while Sir Integra holds a Round Table conference to report her findings regarding the current wave of vampire attacks, vampire brothers Jan and Luke Valentine launch a covert sneak attack on the Hellsing compound with the help of a ghoul army outfitted with military gear and small arms. Almost all of the Hellsing soldiers are killed in the process and turned into ghouls before Alucard, Seras, and Walter C. Dornez are able to turn the tide.
In a bid to increase manpower following the devastating attack on Hellsing headquarters, Walter recruits the mercenary group known as Wild Geese and integrates them into Hellsing's security forces. Integra receives information from Enrico Maxwell, the fanatical leader of Iscariot, that confirms her suspicions of Millennium's origins. She soon deploys Alucard, Seras and Pip Vernedead, leader of the Wild Geese, to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil to find the whereabouts of Millennium.
As Hellsing and Iscariot hold a meeting with the Queen of the United Kingdom, their conference is interrupted by a message from The Major (via live video transmission brought in by the ubiquitous Schrödinger) citing his intention to wage war on England. Meanwhile, the VTOL aircraft carrier HMS Eagle gets hijacked by Millennium, while the Major and his minions make their way toward London to drive England into another war.
While Alucard remains trapped on HMS Eagle, Millennium starts attacking London. Zorin Blitz is told to head toward Hellsing HQ with a small group of soldiers, while the rest of the vampires attack London. They kill thousands of civilians and attempt to capture Integra. She manages to escape the vampire SS soldiers only after Walter tries to hold them off, ending up getting captured by The Captain. When the vampire soldiers manage to corner her, she is saved by a large group of pistol-wielding Iscariot priests, led by Alexander Anderson, Heinkel Wolfe, and Yumiko Takagi.
As the battle commences, back at the Vatican, Enrico Maxwell, the head of Section XIII Iscariot, is given a major promotion, with which he begins to mobilize the Vatican's fighters. Meanwhile, in the heart of London, while Integra is busy convincing the Iscariot members to escort her home, the Hellsing Mansion is under siege by Zorin Blitz and her forces. The only line of defense against this assault are Captain Vernedead, his Wild Geese, and Seras.
While Seras is successfully overcoming Zorin Blitz's soldiers, Vernedead and his forces are being slaughtered. Seras comes to their rescue and destroys most of Zorin's forces. Zorin then delves deep into Seras' memories, forcing her to relive her painful childhood, as she had to watch her parents be murdered by gangsters and her mother's corpse being raped after Seras was shot by one of the robbers.
A dying Alucard envisions his past as Vlad the Impaler, then envisions himself being carried off to execution, but before being beheaded, he drinks the blood on the floor and becomes a vampire. He is then awoken by the pleading of Seras, who is trying to stop Anderson. Alucard awakens and manages to rip Anderson's heart out and crushes it before removing Helena's Nail. The priest says a final "Amen". Suddenly, Walter appears, crushing the remains of Anderson, then prepares to fight Alucard, while Integra and Seras are invited aboard the Major's zeppelin to face him.
Integra and Seras board the zeppelin until The Captain intercepts them, with Seras staying to fight while Integra proceeds onward. Outside, Alucard begins to absorb the rivers of blood from the dead, though The Major had planned on this moment to defeat him. Elsewhere Seras struggles against the Captain, who turns out to be a Werewolf. Will Hellsing win the war? Or... will Millennium prevail?
Music[]
Endings[]
Hellsing: Ultimate I - Step of Life by Hayato Matsuo, performed by the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra
Hellsing: Ultimate II - Funeral Marches by Hayato Matsuo, performed by the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra
Hellsing: Ultimate III - Last Battalion by Hayato Matsuo
Hellsing: Ultimate IV - Das Engellandlied by Hermann Lons
Hellsing: Ultimate V - A Patriot with No Name by Hayato Matsuo
Hellsing: Ultimate X - Step of Life by Hayato Matsuo, performed by the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra
Soundtrack[]
Only one soundtrack album was released. However, the album included two extra CDs other than the main music of the series; the Warsaw Recording Selection, and the Nazi CD. Titled "Black Dog", it was released on February 22, 2008. In addition, an extra CD was released along with the limited edition of the second Blu-ray box set of Hellsing: Ultimate titled "Somehow, Iscariote" in 2015.
Taliesin Jaffe, the director of the Hellsing: Ultimate OVA Series has stated in a panel at Otakon 2008 that Hellsing: The Dawn is going to be animated as part of Ultimate. It was recently revealed on the official features page for Hellsing VIII on the official Japanese Hellsing website that the special Short Gaiden in the extra disc that comes with the limited edition of Hellsing: Ultimate OVA 8 will be The Dawn. The post also stated that the team will be working on a manuscript from Kohta Hirano himself and that the 4 pages of this manuscript will be included with the volume's liner notes booklet. The third installment of Gaiden featured a commercial for Drifters nearing the end.
While talks about adapting Crossfire into an anime happened, they eventually set out to release Crossfire instead as a CD Drama series; releasing alongside Hellsing: Ultimate VI and Hellsing: Ultimate VII. Since Crossfire is mainly an episodic series; with each chapter featuring different main villains, the Crossfire CD Drama features Jin Horikawa as Aphram, Rei Igarashi as Ilyushin, and Susumu Chiba as Abraham Van Rogh as the main villains of Crossfire respectively. The voice actors for Heinkel Wolfe and Yumiko Takagi reprise their roles, alongside Alexander Anderson and Enrico Maxwell.
Luke and Jan Valentine - A Merry Manga[]
A commercial for Hellsing: Ultimate IV features the Afterword segments of the Hellsing manga, however, with some slight changes. Most of these are completely original segments written by the OVA's staff, despite it being directly inspired by the Afterword segments of Hellsing. Essentially, these segments are just the animators having fun and it's completely comedic. There's nothing serious about this at all. Furthermore, since it's a commercial, some of the lines written, especially near the ends are sometimes Luke Valentine directly informing the viewers that the "Blu-ray discs will come out along with the CDs."