Castlevania

LulzSect said:

My first instinct after watching the first two EPs was it feels like anime made by white people. I'm glad it's voiced in Japanese at least. They tried.

The pinnacle of Castlevania was SoTN. Would have preferred this instead tbh:

*i finished it, oh so it is going to be the SoTN story (lel)

it has potential

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Nah, not going to be SOTN. It's got three of the four characters from Castlevania 3: Dracula's Curse for the NES; they're re-doing that story instead. SOTN was about Alucard returning to the Castle like 95 years early because it started showing life, and it turned out to be Richter Belmont pulling the strings because he was under control of the dark wizard Shaft. This is still directly Dracula being legit angry with a bit of overcompensation in his rage.

However, I think there was an interview with Warren Ellis where he talks about wanting to do the story about the different generations of Belmonts, so SOTN-stuff might show up at some point. There's a boatload of Belmonts to work through though.

Rezz said:

Nah, not going to be SOTN. It's got three of the four characters from Castlevania 3: Dracula's Curse for the NES; they're re-doing that story instead. SOTN was about Alucard returning to the Castle like 95 years early because it started showing life, and it turned out to be Richter Belmont pulling the strings because he was under control of the dark wizard Shaft. This is still directly Dracula being legit angry with a bit of overcompensation in his rage.

However, I think there was an interview with Warren Ellis where he talks about wanting to do the story about the different generations of Belmonts, so SOTN-stuff might show up at some point. There's a boatload of Belmonts to work through though.

Click to expand...

SOTN comes directly (a few years) after Dracula X - where I think it was a natural every 100 year resurrection of drac, he does his standard fuck with the belmonts - Richter goes in, saves the girls and maria - beats the shit outta drac, this stops the eternal night in the area (established in LOI) and then opens the window to let the sun come in and finish off a weakened dracula.

Few years later Shaft summons a replica of Castlevania, Richter is like WTFBBQ and goes to investigate, gets mind controlled - and is being used as the agent to revive dracula and the real castle. Because there is no belmont, no other person entrusted with the whip, nor no other being or organization powerful enough to confront and kill drac (established in COM, OOE, POR, Bloodlines) - this lead to Alucard being awoken as he is the only one left to confront his father.

The story element of Lisa and her death being a re-fuling of Draculas rage was initially told in SOTN- so they have taken that tie in element into CV3's story - and thats the basis of the anime. I do like they kept the boss you had to fight to get the girl etc. Now if they wonder onto a pirate ship lol

It was good at humanizing Dracula and protagonist. Loved how they made characters seem like they had a right to be in the universe. Can't wait for next season. Hopefully it's longer.

4.5/5

4 fucking amazing eps on netflix but fuck you for ending the awesomeness so early. -.5

Everyone who liked this should check out Hellsing (2006) - Anime - AniDB. Blueray rips are available in both japanese and english.

Awesome

Hellsing is okay, the castlevania anime is actually darn good.

I watched this while driving out to Colorado when it came out. Was pissed it was only four episodes. So happy it is coming back with eight more.

I had heard they only did four because they weren't sure if it would be well received/get more funding for more episodes. I can understand due to the actors being involved. Just happy we are getting more.

I think some of its success actually came from how much they cared - I think there was a lot of typical "indi anime series start up idea" that had a good foundation and then went out to get teh moniez and actually did not accept creative compromise - so the suits (netflix in this case) was like - do 4 and let the fates decide. No advertising effort form netflix was done for the first run, and obviously the 2nd lol - it was all done by the creator/director and VA's as well as castlevania fans themselves.

What is actually good- is most of the reactions have been very positive from the very split CV fandom - you can essentially break it down into "I hate 2" and "I love 2" clubs - there are many splinters thereof such as "RONDO 4 LYFE" people, but those again, typically are 2 h8rs.

So, the fact that almost every CV fan of any point in the series likes it - that's a great thing... but this cannot "live" on CV fans alone. Every comment and review from "I don't know what CV is, but this show is awesome" helps a lot and gets word of mouth. You obviously get anime fans of the art style and director and the VAs- all of this is actually doing what "in theory, but never in practice of $$" should happen - so hopefully the decision $ makers take note.

The anime is CV3 in story, time and setting - so as all the CV3 superfans (again, are the hate 2 crowd) are very happy even if the story/plot is not a hit by hit narrative of the game, the others, that do not really like 3 all that much (me) enjoy it and like the retelling and added depth and not being stuck to the game play of 3, that I did not care for. I wont go into why I am not a super fan of 3, but love 2...that's another time.

I guess I'm in the minority here in loving both C2 and C3. C2 genuinely creeped me out a bit as a kid, and C3 was awesome thanks to introducing Alucard. SotN is still my most favorite Castlevania game. I regret not having it anymore, cuz I never got it to 200% completion.

I was very young when CV2 came out, but I loved it - however those dudes hanging at the start of the mansions gave me night terrors lol

As for 200% in SOTN, you have to get really really lucky with that one square in the "basement-cave thing" that in non-inverted you had to walk on the floor in the water exactly in this perfect spot that barely dipped enough to get the square in- its even more annoying to get it with inverted.

Season 2 trailer