Sometimes it’s hard being a veteran anime fan and a huge Fate Franchise fan. I sit down to watch the latest episode of this series and I want to shut up the cynical critic in the back of my brain pointing out everything that is wrong with this episode. But as events I adored from the visual novel come up and feel lesser than what I recall, a question surfaces in my mind. I like this second half of Fate/stay night, but why don’t I love it? This is an adaption of my favourite route, from one of my very first and favourite visual novels. I should love this. I should be gushing from the heavens about how amazing this is and that none shall reach the heights of its glorious magnificence. But I don’t love it, no matter how many times I try to shut out that critical voice, I can’t help but feel that this isn’t as good as it should be. I know that to others this anime is perfectly fine, great even. I could say that my memories of the visual novel are seen from rose tinted glasses but honestly my issue with this anime isn’t that it’s not a one to one recreation of the visual novel. I don’t want monologues or excess exposition, if I did then I would just read the visual novel again. I didn’t walk into this anime adaption thinking that I couldn’t wait till I saw Archer monologue about counter guardians. I walked into this because I wanted to see those exciting fights I read about in true Ufotable animated glory. For what is the point of a full animated recreation of all spoken exposition scenes in the visual novel? Something like that is no better than a audio book.
A number of times in this episode I noticed a character make a declaration of “The real fight starts here!” only to cut away to another fight where both combatants stop fighting and start talking. What is this, a Shounen battle anime? The real victim of this cut down of action scenes is Assassin. His fight in this route is his main glory to the series, his time in the limelight and the poor guy was taken down in less than two minutes. There was supposed to be a decent fight scene between the two where Saber bends Assassins sword with her blows which in turn creates a gap in Assassin’s Tsubame Gaeshi technique. Saber then exploits that gap to strike the finishing blow, but here Saber just dodges Tsubame Gashi and cuts him down, an anticlimactic end to what should have been a exciting fight. Assassins last words were done well at least, with him sitting down on the steps in his last moments. It’s unbelievable that I say this, but Studio Deen’s 2006 Fate/stay night did this scene better. I shouldn’t be saying that, but I pin the blame on Ufotable placing more emphasis on the dialogue than the conflicts themselves.
For the positives of this episode, what little fighting there was, was good. Gilgamesh pulling out Ea to hit the grail was more or less original content but it makes a good deal more sense than him using Ea on Shirou for no reason and Shirou surviving by means unspecified. The grail growing an arm was a bit weird but at least it shows its desire to use Gilgamesh as a substitute core. Still on the fence about why Gilgamesh would use Ea to destroy the very thing he intends to use to destroy the world but well it’s Gilgamesh. Chances are that he just got annoyed by it. Speaking of his intentions, I was rather surprised when Rin asked Gilgamesh what he intents for the grail when he made it abundantly clear when he encountered them in Illya’s castle. Gilgamesh essentially repeats himself and I wonder as to why we couldn’t cut out his speech from two episodes previous and add that runtime to Archer and Shirou fight. So ladies and gents, this is it. The next episode is the conclusion to the last fight of the series and will ultimately determine my feelings for the series as a whole. So I ask, nay I plea. Ufotable, I know you can give this fight justice, you have shown me before that you have the capability. All I ask is that you display the excellence shown at the berserker fight of the first season once more to give this show the finale it deserves. This is the last adaption this route is going to get and likely the best we can hope for, I just don’t want to walk away from it disappointed.
Are you really that disappointed with it?
Also, it’s really hard to think of the kind of adaptation fans want..
I mean their big disadvantage compared to some Ren’Py program is that they are ultimately limited with time and thus amount of content…
To be faithful, have long action cut-scenes and make special original content might be beyond their limits allow.
You might complain “I never wanted some of the original content and would much prefer long adrenaline filled fight scenes”, but being a second adaptation of something a huge chunk of the target audience are already familiar with and that was adapted or got so many sequels, naturally they wanted to add their own tidbits to keep the story fresh and interesting.
But… Honestly here I think lies the reason you can’t love this.
It’s not that anything in particular is missing so much as the fact that it is no longer as exciting as it used to be..
After all, how many times can you hear about the same stories of the same red-headed moron trying to save the world by fighting a bunch of historical figures?
You already know what happens, you’ve already experienced the tensions and highs, and frankly you’re just reliving a memory now except it’s the whole route and not just the parts you wanted.
And frankly the story isn’t flawless either.
You can’t love this, because it’s nearly the same.
You may have a point. And I know the story itself is flawed.
But I think I would be singing it’s praises if the fight scenes were longer because in the visual novel the fights basically consisted of CLASH, BANG, CLANG, SWIPE, and some discriptive text. Your imagination had to visualise what they clashes were but at least there were clashes. They may be faithful as far as dialogue goes but as I metioned above, they are cutting out the fights present in the orignal materail. The orignal contect is more or less padding because they blazed too fast though the story and don’t really have enough content to fill a second season.
Honestly I don’t think anyone would be happy if the last fights of this series ended after a twenty minute dialogue scene and a two second fight.
Well you have a good point!!!
That said, how disappointing of an end it is, is a matter of taste.
I agree with your view but I think many people might be satisfied even with an ending with less fight scenes.
That said I think the atmosphere and fight scenes of 2006 anime was one of it’s best parts!!
Some techniques and aspects may have been explained more poorly, but boy was there tenacity in the air!!!
I think I remember the stuff about Excalibur and Avalon being poorly detailed but that moment Saber cut Gil down and Shirou punch-knifed Kotomine was just awesome!!!
So I agree it sucks when all saber does to fight assassin is a gimmicky “two man slash, one gets cut dead”, then move to the next thing like nothing ever happened.
“I agree with your view but I think many people might be satisfied even with an ending with less fight scenes.”
I would like to be one of those people. Unfortunatly I cannot.
“I think I remember the stuff about Excalibur and Avalon being poorly detailed but that moment Saber cut Gil down and Shirou punch-knifed Kotomine was just awesome!!!”
(Nods) That was indeed awesome. Oh and the Knife Shirou used to kill Kotomine is the same one Kotomine used to kill Rin’s Father and was given to Rin by him. Delicious, Delicious poetic justice.
Hi, I’ve been watching this unlimited blade works version of F/SN on Crunchyroll. I am new to the series, have never done the VN, etc.
What’s the best order to experience this stuff in? Is there one more episode to FSN and then it’s on to Fate Zero? Another season to go first? I’ve never done a visual novel – do I need to do that to get the experience?
Please advise 🙂
Hmmm…that’s difficult. If you can, try the visual novel. Heres a link with setup instructions
http://www.reddit.com/r/fatestaynight/comments/2r1qvl/fatestay_night_vn_installation_guide
As visual novels go it’s essentailly Babies first VN. If you do plan on playing the visual novel then make sure to get the Realta Nua version. It’s the same game but with large improvements in presentation and extra scenes. That link should point you in the direction to download the Realta nua version.
However Visual novels are not for everyone. They are very slow moving and require a lot of patience. It could be possible that it’s not your thing. But from my perspective it’s the best place to start with this series.
From an anime only perspective that’s become a bit unsure. VN fans say start with this anime I am reviewing, Fate/Unlimited Bladeworks while other say it’s better to start with Fate/Zero. In my opinion you can start with either as it’s pretty subjective to the way you can “properly” experence it.
There are four animes in total of the “main” series. Studio Deen made the original 2006 Fate/stay Night anime and a film adaption of this Route called unlimited bladeworks. And the other two where made by Ufotable, that being this anime and Fate/Zero. The Studio Deen animes are generally looked down upon. I don’t think they are that bad(I actually think they are decent) but it’s important to note that they are a big step down from the Ufotable versions.
So short version. If you are already halfway through this then finish it. After that try either the visual novel or move to Fate/Zero.
Sorry for the wall of text but hopefully this has helped you out.
Thanks for the info. But aren’t there lots of things in the Fate/Stay universe? Where do those fit in? I really like seeing Tohsaka Rin and Shirou together… if Zero takes place 10 years before, I feel like I’ve lost that.
There are a lot of things in the Nasuverse.(And that’s not Counting Tsukihime and Kara no Kyoukai) But a lot of it is loosely connected. The main story of Fate/stay night is basically Fate/zero, Fate/stay night and maybe Fate/Hollow ataraxia but that’s debatable.
Otherstuff like Fate/Extra, Fate/strange fake, Fate/Prisma illya, Fate/Apocrypha…you can consider them spinoffs with new characters or different versions of old ones. Like say an alternate reality.
In Fate/Zero there is no Rin and Shirou being together though Rin does get a whole episode dedacated to her. But the series has new characters that make up for it. It’s a good bit darker and more mature than Fate/stay night. Some say it’s better than Fate/stay night but I think they both have their ups and downs. Fate/Zero does have things that could make this Fate/Unlimited bladeworks series better for you as there are little things hinted about things that happened in Fate/zero as well as the characters histories.
The first episode is pretty hard to get through but I say watch up to episode 5 and see if you want to continue.
How is Zero more canon than ataraxia?
I mean Zero is a spin-off since it was written by a different author even if it was meant to fit into the cannon story…
Ataraxia might seem weird but despite not playing it I heard spoilers that made it seem clear that it’s a canon story.
@;(, Nasu was pretty much working together with Gen on Fate/zero and it ties into the main story of Fate. Hollow Ataraxia is weird in a way where it takes place months after the holy grail war ended but the way it ended left all the servants around and it’s apparently based after one of the routes but which route is never specified. While there is a main story, a lot of it is just you going around having chats with fate/stay night characters. I think it is basically considered a fourth route to Fate/stay night but I find it’s a lot like fandisc materiel or DLC.
I’ve been following your blog a few years now and honestly, I think the reason you’re not as excited about this show is simply that you aren’t as interested in anime in general as you used to be.
That’s not a particularly bad thing. People move on. But I have detected a lot of negativity and jaded sentiment from you on a lot of reviews you’ve done here. Are you sure you’re really enjoying this as much as you used to?
Different writer, mate.
Honestly, I just think the fact is that this UBW adaptation is worse compared to its direct predecessor Fate/Zero. And it being worse is just due to being too dragged out. Two full seasons were too much for this material. One was maybe too little and sadly we don’t do half-cours in anime… so here we are. But the last episodes were waaaay too slow.
I think they ran out of money for the fight scenes. Saved it all for the final one. Sigh.