Topic: Animated series reviews.

[JohannGralog]

Haven't watched Spiderman Homecoming yet anyway so my bad.

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The Raimi movies had this though

I watched the second half. The Cyclops scene and Alucard’s introduction were pretty fun.

[Jorge D. Fuentes]

^^ I deleted my post because someone beat me to it.
It's totally in Spider-Man 2.

[Aiddon]

More reviews:

http://www.usgamer.net/articles/castlevania-netflix-review

http://io9.gizmodo.com/netflix-s-castlevania-tv-show-is-a-bloody-great-video-g-1796775317

http://kotaku.com/what-we-loved-and-didnt-love-about-the-castlevania-an-1796775864

http://www.avclub.com/review/religion-just-dangerous-dracula-netflixs-promising-257870

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-b1DSNQZx8

[Sumez]

Castlevania III doesn't have "so little premise" nor it's "pretty much story-less". It actually is the one of the games with the most plot on the NES which, while not hard of a feat to pull off, IS a feat in itself considering how little plot non-RPG NES games had.

Let's just be clear here. Castlevania 3 is one of my favourite games of all time, and I'm familiar with the game's story. I love it for everything it is, and I truly appreciate the way it's told in the game, as a game, basically just depicting Trevor's journey to the castle, and meeting characters along the way that will help him in his battle, never going into details with stuff that it doesn't need to.
After a bunch of Simon games, Konami made the series interesting by introducing ancestors to Simon Belmont in CV3 and the Game Boy games, and the idea that the Belmont clan had an inherent ability to combat monsters that caused the rest of the world to see them as cursed and dangerous was something I found extremely interesting at the time. That's all the premise I needed.

Now, after running for many decades since, Konami has been adding to the story, and I don't think I need to point out how every game doesn't exactly add up, and how a lot of things had to be constantly retconned to make sure things add up (such as games turning non-canon, or the Dracula's 100 year cycle silently being forgotten, etc.). So yeah, games like Curse of Darkness and *shudder* Judgment added new stuff to the canon, but I'm extremely thankful that the show decided to ignore these sporadic attempts at expanding lore that was never intended to be expanded upon. The show is clearly meant as an adaption of Castlevania 3, not of IGA's distraught mind, and I can't imagine anyone believes the show would have been better like that. Instead they took what they needed from SotN, and implemented it really well in the existing story. I think that should be commended.

"Trevor's excommunication"? Not in the game.

I'm sure we have all seen this, but 1:16 in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjdwYlvCDXA

(list of other things that are "Not in the game")

I'm genuinely confused by what you really wanted here. If the show is not allowed to tell anything apart from what's already depicted in the game, why would you even want a show in the first place? Just play the games. Adding new elements to an existing story (which is no different from what Curse of Darkness did) does not make it a loose adaption, rather it's what you would expect from an adaption. It would be a loose adaption if it actually changed the existing story, only taking inspiration from the source, which was something I would have expected. I was really surprised that it actually didn't go this route.
The only thing I can think of that's directly constradictionary to the story we were told in CV3/AD, was the part with Sypha being trained by the church, and honestly I fail to see how that makes any kind of impact on the story. In fact, considering the story being built around a church that burns people at the stake for dealing in what they believe to be magic, it would have been pretty contradictionary to have a member of the church practicing magic...

Sypha being a Speaker flies in the face of her origin story given on the manual

According to the manual, Sypha is a guy.

[Nagumo]

The excommunication thing is based on the wording of the English version of the game. In the Japanese intro it does say people feared the Belmonts because of their powers but then it goes on say the Belmonts suddenly disappeared one day and nobody knew where they went.

Also, the Japanse version never outright refers to Sypha as a man. In Japanese you can leave gender pronouns without it sounding unnatural and that's the case with  Cv3's Japanse manual. Sypha was always intented to be a woman.

[Sumez]

Well obviously.

[TatteredSeraph]

The final shot as well with Sypha and Trevor in Sypha's ending is also telling - it's the long, loose hair down her back, and how close she is to Trevor, with his arm around her.

[Gaawa-chan]

As far as the depiction of the church goes, I really don't see any problem.  You have one power-hungry zealot that's got thugs working for his ambitions in a time of crisis, and ignorant followers.  I guess you could point to the archbishop as well, but he barely shows up and is mostly just used to emphasize the hubris of of the people.  So that's two people and a handful of thugs that one of those two people has in his employ.

was the part with Sypha being trained by the church, and honestly I fail to see how that makes any kind of impact on the story. In fact, considering the story being built around a church that burns people at the stake for dealing in what they believe to be magic, it would have been pretty contradictory to have a member of the church practicing magic...

I suspect that this is one of the main reasons why they changed Sypha's backstory.  I suppose they could have gone the route of having multiple groups within the church that were antithetical to one another, but eh.

[Chernabogue]

All those reviews are good, the main criticism is just the season being short. Let's hope it gets CV more popular!

[theplottwist]

Let's just be clear here. Castlevania 3 is one of my favourite games of all time, and I'm familiar with the game's story.

(click to show/hide)

Are you? Because seeing as you cite the English intro of CVIII (that does NOT say what you think it does), it looks like otherwise, to be frank with you. The game's plot is FAR from being just its intro.

This is not a problem, mind you. One doesn't need to know every single comma from the game's plot to be a fan. What I'm noticing, however, is a trend of people saying the game "has no plot" while at the same time showing they have no clue what it is.

Also, Castlevania is beloved by many people. Doesn't mean they fully understand the medium. Most still think Dracula is ~le scary vampire man~ only.

Now, after running for many decades since, Konami has been adding to the story, and I don't think I need to point out how every game doesn't exactly add up, and how a lot of things had to be constantly retconned to make sure things add up (such as games turning non-canon, or the Dracula's 100 year cycle silently being forgotten, etc.)

Do you know the reason why specific games are not canon? Do you know why the 100-year revival cycle is not true (yes it is NOT TRUE, did you know that?)? How much of it "doesn't add up"? Because, the way you say it makes it sound like EVERY game contradicts the previous one. Does it "not add up" because you don't get it, or because you don't like it?

See why I keep saying that you're criticising something you don't know? These points have very clear reasons, and you're using them as "negatives".

So yeah, games like Curse of Darkness and *shudder* Judgment added new stuff to the canon, but I'm extremely thankful that the show decided to ignore these sporadic attempts at expanding lore that was never intended to be expanded upon. The show is clearly meant as an adaption of Castlevania 3, not of IGA's distraught mind, and I can't imagine anyone believes the show would have been better like that. Instead they took what they needed from SotN, and implemented it really well in the existing story. I think that should be commended.

>I can't imagine it therefore it'd be impossible

Two things:
1. This show has IGA's hand in it. It has MUUUUCH more of Ellis, but still of IGA. Whatever way you think IGA's "distraught mind"  works, this show only exists like what it does because of him. You didn't know that, did you?
2. IGA did barely no change to CVIII, did you know that? Did you know IGA created everything around CVIII without messing with the original plot beyond adding Lisa? So, the show not only used as little as possible from the original CVIII plot to concoct its own story, but the greatest actual plot point came from IGA.

Consider these two things.

I'm sure we have all seen this, but 1:16 in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjdwYlvCDXA

Where on this scene is saying "the Church excommunicated Trevor"? If I'm reading clearly, it says "towspeople". As far as I'm aware, "towspeople" do not hold power to excommunicate someone.

Despite the crap US translations, this point holds true even in English (on its own strange, schizophrenic way). The theme is: The people is ignorant, not the Church.

I'm genuinely confused by what you really wanted here.

I will not express what I really wanted for this series. But I will tell you that you didn't understand the point. Repeating myself for the sake of clarity, not out of condescension:

"And here I'm talking only of stuff that is directly stated to not be the case on the original plot itself, or that changing something would change the original plot's essence."

You need to know the original plot. If your only knowledge of the CVIII plot comes from the official US translations and "playing the game", you'll certainly not understand what I meant. Also, you can think only of Sypha, but I could think of all those points. Why is that?

If the show is not allowed to tell anything apart from what's already depicted in the game, why would you even want a show in the first place?

"If the show wants to do whatever the hell it wants respecting nothing, why make a show out of a video game? Why not make an original show? Why go the trouble of touting it as the greatest, most perfect, most true video game adaptation to date if it really isn't?"

See the problem? I never said it is not allowed to take freedoms, Sumez. I was specifically pointing why your argument of "no plot" doesn't work: CVIII has so much plot that the series contradicts it at every 5 minutes. Hence why it IS accurate to call it a loose adaptation. It IS loose. I never said it "can't be loose", I said it IS loose.

It being loose is no detriment to the series. The problem is trying to correct people on their rightful assertion (that it IS REALLY loose) because you don't like the Castlevania canon.

The only thing I can think of that's directly constradictionary to the story we were told in CV3/AD, was the part with Sypha being trained by the church, and honestly I fail to see how that makes any kind of impact on the story. In fact, considering the story being built around a church that burns people at the stake for dealing in what they believe to be magic, it would have been pretty contradictionary to have a member of the church practicing magic...

So, what should you draw from that? The game and manual makes no mention of "the Church punishing people", and Sypha works for the Church. The people is constantly said to be ignorant, while the Church is an organization aware of the nuances of evil magic and good magic.

Put 1+1. Don't you realize this entire plot of the Church was built for the series, and never once stated or implied on the games? It is contradictory for you because you don't understand the plot.

[Shinobi]

To be fair though, the above mentioned series aren't as notorious for excellent music in the way CV is, especially in terms of sheer number of excellent tracks overall.  The Batman 60's show would probably be the most iconic of the series you mentioned.

While I agree to your firsts sentence, that doesn't mean Castlevania will be an exception not to use any of it's iconic music in animated adaptation. We could say the same thing with Street Fighter II which has an excellent yet iconic music for each fighters but none of their themes was used in the animated movie version both in Japanese and American version(Same thing as the animated movie version of Street Fighter Zero). Fatal Fury OVAs and Motion Picture is another example, although one track has a hint of Tung Fu Rue's theme in the first OVA, the rest are original tracks. Samurai Shodown too which none of the character's themes was used in the Motion Picture and the two part OVA.

[Sumez]

@theplottwist

I think you're severely misunderstanding my post if you think I'm criticizing anything.
Look, I never claimed there's no story to CV3, just that the game itself doesn't actually tell a story the way that a movie or TV series would. I definitely believe that you are reading way too much into a bunch of games that were thought up one at a time based on what kind of story the developers in question thought would be cool to add. This is a series of video games, not a grand complex and epic mythos that was all mapped out ahead of time. And thank god this show doesn't think it was either.

I don't believe the show changes anything besides minor details in the storytelling that you'd see in any adaptions of any material, while you believe it's constantly contradicting everything that's going on in the canon you have assembled. I guess we will just leave it at that...

Yeah, I have read the Japanese manual, and I have followed the series closely since the 80s, taking in both the Western and Japanese versions of the games' promotion material, reading interviews, and hell even radio dramas and all kinds of other ridiculous nerdy things. I'm not sure what it is you think that I don't get, but the fact that I'm not taking everything literally and super seriously does not mean I "don't understand it". If you're gonna keep up this rude tone I'm not really seeing this going anywhere anyway.

[Dracula9]

And there it is.

"You're just reading too much into it, god what's wrong with you? How dare you read into between-the-lines themes that I either didn't notice or don't care about! The canon was never as big as you say it was because I think so!"

And you people wonder why he gets annoyed.

"God, why can't you just let me have my opinion, I know just as much as you because I think so! You're so rude for arguing a different opinion, just let it be what I think it should be!"

And then you people wonder why he gets pissed about being told to shove it or being called rude or whatever else because he has the audacity to share and defend his opinion the same as everyone else is.

Especially when it's been well established that the man has leaps and bounds more connections and insights into the lore than the average fan that were earned by years of digging and work.

The conversation's not going anywhere because some folks can't handle dissent or have their opinions challenged without feeling personally attacked, not because one guy is arguing his opinion against others.

Hell, I'm in the camp that's (mostly) in favor of the show, and you don't see me calling names or arguing a pissing match of who knows more about the series, do you?

[Sumez]

I honestly don't care that he has a different opinion about how the Castlevania "lore" should be represented in a cartoon show, I think everyone is free to think what they do. But there's really no reason to take up such a patronizing tone in his way of addressing me directly just because I dared calling Castlevania 3 light on storytelling.

[TatteredSeraph]

Now it's been stated by D9, possibly walking away and having a bit of a calm down might be a good idea.  Things are getting a bit heated.  We're all entitled to having our own likes and dislikes, our own opinions on matters.  Just because a view is different to one's own doesn't mean that their view is any less valid, and it doesn't have any relevance on who might have more, or less, knowledge on a series, as that's how it's certainly come across.  Now though, it's posisbly time to walk away fro the keyvboard for a bit, like I said earlier.