I pretty much agree with Nagumo, Laina, Sindra, Foffly, Aensland, and Reinhart77.
I liked it most when I suspended my disbelief as a Castlevania fan.
But if I have to do that to enjoy this, then it is a fail as a version of the Castlevania III story.
So this is once again the writers putting their creativity before the canon and the producers mindlessly grabbing at a franchise license with no actual confidence that it can stand on it's own for what it is.
It felt very much like Akumajou Densetsu as seen through the the stained glass window of Vampire Hunter D.
I didn't mind Sypha's accent because at least it wasn't cockney.
As much as the average viewer might find it cliche, I would have preferred eastern European accents for the villagers.
And a better Spanish accent for Sypha FERNANDEZ would have been better.
Could they just correct that horrible mistranslation, please?
Would it kill them to acknowledge this finally?
And the biggest problem is with demonizing the church in general then having to make up a cockamamie group of spell casters for Sypha to be a part of.
There was nothing wrong with the original story's premise.
If they needed to make a distinction between "the church" which burned Lisa as a witch, and "the church" that sends mages and to fight Dracula and search out an exiled Belmont they could have blamed the Inquisition which was relevant in the time frame of the setting.
This would have left more time for character development instead of wasting it explaining what this new group they pulled out of their collective asses was.
The lack of monster variety was unforgivable. I'm no insider, but I think the studio could have been able to throw in a few skeletons and zombies here and there.
Hell, I thought when Trevor first went down into the catacombs that suit of armor was going to be an Axe Lord. Missed opportunity or cut content?
I guess I would give this a 7/10 because it was entertaining in a very least common denominator sort of way.
As a retelling of CVIII, I give it a 4/10. And I have no confidence that the rest will be any different.
PS- I get the feeling that all of the violence and heavy metal talk from Ari was reigned back by the rest of the producers. Just a thought.