Berserk: The Golden Age Arc

Berserk: The Golden Age Arc (ベルセルク 黄金時代篇) is a Japanese anime film trilogy, which adapts Kentarō Miura's Berserk manga series, specifically its Golden Age arc, and was produced by Studio 4°C. The first two films, The Egg of the King and The Battle for Doldrey, were released in Japan in February and June 2012, and the third film, The Advent, was released in February 2013. In North America, Viz Media has licensed the trilogy for English home video release.

The Egg of the King
A mercenary named Guts attracts the attention of the Band of the Hawk when he killed Bazuso during a siege, forced into joining the group after being defeated by its leader Griffith twice. The Hawks were later employed by the Kingdom of Midland for its Hundred Year War against the Tudor Empire, with Griffith raising up the kingdom's hierarchy after his group decimated the Black Ram Iron Lance Cavalry. During one siege, Guts and Griffith encounter the demon Nosferatu Zodd, who notices the Behelit around Griffith's neck and warns Guts that Griffith will be his doom. In time, Griffith's gradual rise in status is ill-received by the noblemen, and a failed assassination attempt by the king's brother Julius results in his murder by Guts, who was also forced to kill the noble's son Adonis to leave no witnesses. Guts, emotionally scarred by his actions, would later hear Griffith discussing his idea of friendship with the Midland Princess Charlotte and is further unsettled to learn he and the other Hawks are a means to their leader's end.

The Battle for Doldrey
Following an incident where he and his fellow Hawk member Casca bonded while being separated from the others and fending off attacks by the Tudor's misogynist commander Adon, defeating a 100 of his men single-handed while covering Casca's escape, Guts decides to leave the Band of the Hawk so he can become an equal to Griffith. He would participate in the bloody battle to exploit a civil dispute in Tudor to capture the impenetrable Fortress of Doldrey, Guts defeats the Purple Rhinos' commander Boscogn while Casca dispatches Adon. A month after the war's end from after capturing the fortress and winning the war, Guts parts ways with Griffith after defeating him in a duel. Griffith does not take his former ally's departure well, and in a lapse of judgment he is caught sleeping with the king's daughter, Charlotte. Charged with treason for his actions, Griffith is imprisoned in the Tower of Rebirth while the members of the Band of the Hawk are branded criminals.

The Advent
It has now been a year after Guts' duel with Griffith and his departure from the Band of the Hawk. Upon learning the Hawks have been labeled outlaws in Midland, Guts returns to aid them in freeing Griffith from the Tower of Rebirth. However, they find out that Griffith is a broken man barely alive and rendered a mute cripple after months of physical and mental torture. When Griffith is reunited with his Behelit while attempting suicide upon realizing what he has been reduced to, a solar eclipse occurs that draws him, Guts, Casca and their comrades into another dimension where they encounter the archdemons known as the God Hand. Told that his tribulations have been leading to this moment, Griffith accepts becoming the final member of the God Hand to achieve his dream while knowing his transition requires his allies being offered as branded sacrifices. In this hopeless battle with the God Hand's monstrous horde of Apostles - former humans like Nosferatu Zodd - Guts's attempt to rescue Griffith fails as with Guts and Casca remaining as Griffith is reborn as Femto. Guts and Casca are spirited back to their world by the mysterious Skull Knight, but not without repercussions: Casca loses her sanity from the nightmarish ordeal she endured of watching her comrades' slaughter and then raped by Femto; and Guts losing his left forearm and right eye in his attempt to force their former leader off her. After leaving Casca under Rickert's care, learning his brand will subject him to nightly attacks by various fell creatures that will seek his life, Guts embarks on his journey to hunt down the Apostles and the God Hand so he can kill Griffith.