Its interesting but it has issues. Particularly in story writing. There's too much dialogue and not enough combat. Also not the vast monster variety from the Castlevania series. It also kind of messes up plot crucial elements from Castlevania III. Trevor is viewed as a religious protagonist simply from the beginning cutscreen in Dracula's Curse. Also it really messes up the entire element of priests within the universe. They are seen to be an evil corrupt cabal with no real spiritual power yet have the power to effectively create holy water. This really messed up the narrative and fits the axiom you cant have your cake and eat it too.
Does anyone feel like this is a fair review of the series? I started watching the first episode and lost interest... it just wasn't grabbing me and didn't seem like actual Castlevania. And then James Rolfe reviews it briefly and has that viewpoint about the entire season. I'm not a huge fan of anime, or Castlevania, so I'm wondering if it's really worth my time. The only Castlevania I'm really interested in is NES era... and he says it doesn't reflect that. I remember having to sit and watch Vampire Hunter D stuff in college and hating it, and I got reminded a lot of that while attempting to watch Castlevania on Netflix.
Does anyone feel like this is a fair review of the series? I started watching the first episode and lost interest... it just wasn't grabbing me and didn't seem like actual Castlevania. And then James Rolfe reviews it briefly and has that viewpoint about the entire season. I'm not a huge fan of anime, or Castlevania, so I'm wondering if it's really worth my time. The only Castlevania I'm really interested in is NES era... and he says it doesn't reflect that. I remember having to sit and watch Vampire Hunter D stuff in college and hating it, and I got reminded a lot of that while attempting to watch Castlevania on Netflix.
Damn mang Vampire Hunter D is one of my classic favorites, but I see where your coming from. I've been an anime fan ever since Dragon Ball Z first aired here in the States.
I haven't sat down and watched Castlevania yet but I'm not expecting anything special about it either as most newer anime is hit and miss with me my oldest claimed it was awesome but hes also big into Bleach and Naruto and so far the only thing me an him agreed on was Attack on Titan, but I am a Castlevania fan and I know I'm going to bitch if anything is out of place like I do watching movies after reading the book.
Eh, I couldn't bring myself to finish watching this train wreck. I can see why gore-hounds would enjoy it, however after watching the first 2 episodes I found Trevor super lame, didn't care for the voice acting, the visual style, and the heavy religious overtones didn't sit well with me either .. Shame really, as Castlevania is a fantastic game series .. Oh well, to each their own ..
I actually got around to watching it about a week ago. It was alright.
Honestly, I didn't find it to be as super graphic as I've heard. There was a scene here and there of stuff but I've seen much worse before. Most of the gore was more comical than anything, aside from babies being eaten. Actually, I probably laughed at that. Hhmmm. Was not expecting Trevor to be a drunk that just did not give a shit about anything. Enjoyed that more than the stereotypical stoic hero on a quest to save the world.
I thought the church storyline was heavy-handed to the point of being both tacky and just lazy storytelling.
Once they moved on, it got better, but even then, the scale/scope of the bad guys doesn't really balance out with the protagonists.
They are a full-blown legion of the damned, to where the good guys use everything at their disposal just to kill TWO of them.
And to act like kill TWO of the demons makes any kind of difference in the apparent face of thousands makes suspension of disbelief harder than it already is for that kind of show.
Definitely has some balance issues, if they flesh it out.
Definitely has some serious thematic problems, if they keep beating such a clumsy anti-church drum.
I realized I never gave my thoughts on the series in the thread I started!
I watched the series the day it dropped and I thought overall it was a good starting point but it definitely had some flaws. The animation was decent and I approved of the use of gore/violence. It had a Vampire Hunter D vibe which I liked. The depiction of the church in the show didn't really bother me, its Anime Catholicism. I generally liked the depiction of the main characters and appreciated that the references to the NES games were subtle. My main criticism is of the four episodes, only the first and last episodes really felt like they moved at a good pace. The second and third episodes felt oddly padded, with character motivations kinda drawn out. I really think the first season could've been tighter if it was condensed into three episodes.
In any case, video game adaptations have set a really low bar and this show easily vaulted over it. I give season 1 a solid B+.
It was a slower start than what I imagined. But it was okay, I enjoyed it. I hope they do something good with this because it's got a lot of great potential to be made into something really great.
Comments
Does anyone feel like this is a fair review of the series? I started watching the first episode and lost interest... it just wasn't grabbing me and didn't seem like actual Castlevania. And then James Rolfe reviews it briefly and has that viewpoint about the entire season. I'm not a huge fan of anime, or Castlevania, so I'm wondering if it's really worth my time. The only Castlevania I'm really interested in is NES era... and he says it doesn't reflect that. I remember having to sit and watch Vampire Hunter D stuff in college and hating it, and I got reminded a lot of that while attempting to watch Castlevania on Netflix.
Does anyone feel like this is a fair review of the series? I started watching the first episode and lost interest... it just wasn't grabbing me and didn't seem like actual Castlevania. And then James Rolfe reviews it briefly and has that viewpoint about the entire season. I'm not a huge fan of anime, or Castlevania, so I'm wondering if it's really worth my time. The only Castlevania I'm really interested in is NES era... and he says it doesn't reflect that. I remember having to sit and watch Vampire Hunter D stuff in college and hating it, and I got reminded a lot of that while attempting to watch Castlevania on Netflix.
Damn mang Vampire Hunter D is one of my classic favorites, but I see where your coming from. I've been an anime fan ever since Dragon Ball Z first aired here in the States.
I haven't sat down and watched Castlevania yet but I'm not expecting anything special about it either as most newer anime is hit and miss with me my oldest claimed it was awesome but hes also big into Bleach and Naruto and so far the only thing me an him agreed on was Attack on Titan, but I am a Castlevania fan and I know I'm going to bitch if anything is out of place like I do watching movies after reading the book.
Honestly, I didn't find it to be as super graphic as I've heard. There was a scene here and there of stuff but I've seen much worse before. Most of the gore was more comical than anything, aside from babies being eaten. Actually, I probably laughed at that. Hhmmm. Was not expecting Trevor to be a drunk that just did not give a shit about anything. Enjoyed that more than the stereotypical stoic hero on a quest to save the world.
I thought the church storyline was heavy-handed to the point of being both tacky and just lazy storytelling.
Once they moved on, it got better, but even then, the scale/scope of the bad guys doesn't really balance out with the protagonists.
They are a full-blown legion of the damned, to where the good guys use everything at their disposal just to kill TWO of them.
And to act like kill TWO of the demons makes any kind of difference in the apparent face of thousands makes suspension of disbelief harder than it already is for that kind of show.
Definitely has some balance issues, if they flesh it out.
Definitely has some serious thematic problems, if they keep beating such a clumsy anti-church drum.
I watched the series the day it dropped and I thought overall it was a good starting point but it definitely had some flaws. The animation was decent and I approved of the use of gore/violence. It had a Vampire Hunter D vibe which I liked. The depiction of the church in the show didn't really bother me, its Anime Catholicism. I generally liked the depiction of the main characters and appreciated that the references to the NES games were subtle. My main criticism is of the four episodes, only the first and last episodes really felt like they moved at a good pace. The second and third episodes felt oddly padded, with character motivations kinda drawn out. I really think the first season could've been tighter if it was condensed into three episodes.
In any case, video game adaptations have set a really low bar and this show easily vaulted over it. I give season 1 a solid B+.
It will be absolutely wrong if they leave him out.