Fal 'Chavamee The second Halo Legends short showed on Waypoint takes a different approach of the Human-Covenant war and focuses on Sangheili (Elite) culture in the early days of the Covenant alliance. Here we meet Fal 'Chavamee, a high ranking general and clan leader within the Sangheili ranks who was bestowed upon him the arbiter rank by the high prophet of truth. However once he begins to question about the great journey and even declares it a lie in front of truth, a series of events begins that declares Fal a heretic and ultimately leads to a showdown between him and his fellow clan member Haka, who seeks to kill Fal to and become the new clan leader. The art style for "The Duel" is interesting but it works. The entire short feels like a painting coming to life, and while in some parts it feels out of place, other scenes are just flat out beautiful. We also get see a female Sangheili for the first time, and there is some differences from their male counterparts. They look more human than elite since they don't have a massive split lip jaw, but then again it really wasn't defined in the art style. This is also the first time we get to see the elite homeworld, and once again the art style really brings the world to life with vibrant colors and animations. The animators really went all out on this short and it shows. The voice acting was also pretty good, and Michael Wincott reprises his role as Truth in this short. This was one of the complaints in Halo 3 when Terence Stamp replaced Wincott as the voice of Truth and it was refreshing to actually hear Truth's "true" voice. Fal's voice actor was pretty good and so was the rest of the cast. Since when did Hunters become taller than four story buildings? While a very good story in general, it does have some questionable moments while the ending is pretty sudden and might be unsatisfying to some. Other parts also felt out of place. For example, the Hunters that dwarf everything in size! Were not talking about 13-14 ft hunters from the Halo games, these are taller than four story buildings which could be a definite "WTF" moment for viewers. Another out of place moment is the brief and sudden humor that happens during one of the most serious parts of the entire short. I like funny stuff and all, but I don't think it was needed. Oh yeah, and the blood that shoots out of your body like a geyser is also here. Then again this is anime were talking about and Japanese media in general. They like that kind of stuff. Overall "The Duel" is a pretty good short. It's art style won me over and we get to see a part of the covenant hierarchy rarely mentioned. However the story does have some faults and the ending is a love/hate situation. Still this a solid short and I would recommend watching it before it's gone tonight. 8.5/10
I belive those are a new type of hunters like the H3 scarab: notice the lack of a gun? And yes, the ending was a let-down, but Haka's sword was win on a stick: I want it in Halo Reach.
Haka looked incredibly awesome, too bad the ending sucked. I guess the giant hunters were any early stage, since hunters are multiple eels. Maybe the covenant cut down on their size for more units.