OK, so – the first episode of Cestvs: The Roman Fighter was pretty good.  But what the hell was the deal with the first three minutes being grisly CGI and the rest of it being, well- normal?  I mean, I’m glad because the CGI was really terrible – and the funny thing is, that’s what they chose for the PV.  But a sudden change to mostly conventional animation after three minutes is odd, to say the least.  It’s not like that was great or anything, though it was acceptable (even the fighting scenes), and I’m sure there will be some CGI action sequences going forward.  But that was pretty damn weird.

Cestvs is based on a 1997-2009 manga (with a 2010 sequel, ongoing) by Wazarai Shizuya, a childhood friend of Berserk mangaka Miura Kentarou.  I haven’t read it but it’s apparently quite well-respected, if not massively popular.  It seems an odd choice for an anime now even with a sequel in serialization, and one wonders how many episodes this series will run with 23-plus years of manga out there.  Boxing, for the record, was indeed a sport in ancient Rome.  The rules were different (as we see in the premiere), but it was more or less boxing as we would call it today.

Cestvs, the protagonist, is a 15 year-old slave boy who appears weak and frail.  However, he’s under the tutelage of a former boxing legend named Zafar, and possessed of both wits and reflexes that are lightning-fast and razor-sharp.  The rules are pretty simple for Cestvs and his kind – fight and win, or die.  Cestvs finds this out when his friend and protector Rocco is immediately killed after their trial match by their cruel owner after he loses to Cestvs. Zafar sees all the talent Cestvs needs to win the 100 fights he must to gain his promised (hmmm) freedom, but it’s the boy’s kind mindset that he’ll need to work on.

Also involved here is Nero, who rose to power at age 16 (not 17 as shown here) and went on to become one of the most infamous of Rome’s emperors.  Nero is an interesting figure – history has not been kind to him, but Roman history was written by wealthy elites, and Nero was something of a populist hero and was known to be beloved by the commoners of the empire.  There’s some doubt about the truth of it now, but here at least Emperor Nero is shown to be a rather timid and kindly boy under the thumb of his mother Agrippina (that part is pretty much universally accepted, as the start of his reign anyway).

This is a premise that has a lot of natural pathos to it.  As he points out to Zafar, Cestvs is basically a murderer is every one of the 100 he must defeat is put to death (that thumb doesn’t work very often),  But if he refuses to fight – or loses – he dies himself.  It’s hard not to think of Kingdom just a bit here, as you have a well-written historical manga which probably only needs barely adequate production values to work as an anime – but you can’t help be dubious that you’ll even get that.  I hope we do, because I’m already pretty interested in this story and I’d like to be able to stick around long enough to see where it goes.