And we are back with another anime review!
Warning: This post contains spoilers
Plot
Okay let me break it down for you; Fate/Stay Night is based on the Japanese visual novel of the same title. Originally, it is a video game with three separate story lines, and this anime tells us the first storyline entitled "Fate". This orphan guy named Shiro joins the Holy Grail War, which is a competition for the Holy Grail and this cup has the ability to grant any wish. Why did he join this war? Well, he has no idea, either. In order to participate, you need to summon a servant that are categorized in seven classes: saber, lancer, assassin, caster, rider, berserker, and archer. After summoning them, these servants will not only put their lives on the life to protect their masters, but they have to at least kill each other off like the Hunger Games. Yes, they can kill the masters but if they can't do that, they might as well settle for each other. And the interesting is that these servants are actually notable historical figures. Shiro, for instance, summoned Saber who is actually a female King Arthur. However, in the long run, Shiro decides he does not like violence and aims to destroy the cup himself. And of course, he falls for Saber in the process regretting not being able to see her after she disappears. Because ending the Holy Grail war means your servants will have to leave.
When I first heard of the plot, wow I said to myself, "I'm all for it. Let's go." It had a really good concept and the action scenes were surprisingly good. Unfortunately, the comedy parts were leaning more to the corny side. The drama was not so sympathetic, either. I didn't have much feels for this anime, and the only time my heart tug was at the end when Saber was slowly dying in peace. I guess the reason why I couldn't appreciate the heartwarming moments too much is because plot twists would just come out of nowhere, completely looking out of place and nonsensical. Like the Sakura arc did not make a lot of sense to me. That moment between Rin and Sakura seemed not only off but it was too sudden and irrelevant to the main story, but then again this was only a filler arc. And as much as I hate to admit it, the romance between Shiro and Saber was so out of the blue. If it wasn't out of the blue, then the development between could use a little more work. Basically the story of Fate/Stay Night is like a game of Uno. You get a consistent round of cards until all of the sudden a wild card suddenly changes everything with no question. It will leave you flabbergasted, you will try to keep up with the current events until bam! Another inconsistency gives you another reason to adjust to the changes.
Characters
Goodness, where do I even begin with these characters. I can only point out one good thing about these characters and it is their design. I like Shiro's "Trace-on" ability, and Saber's excalibur. I also love Rin's enigmatic aura as well as her knowledge about the Holy Grail War. The servants were pretty cool too. I love the ferocity of Heracles the Berserker and Gilgamesh's villainous cockblocking moments. Caster was deviously interesting too. Unfortunately, the time duration of this anime was not enough for everyone to get a full story on. There were so many characters that didn't get to have their own time to shine or a moment to prove that they do have a meaningful story to tell. And even if they were giving some minor characters a moment in the sun, it didn't work and Sakura's arc is a perfect example. After watching that part, I still couldn't comprehend her character and there was barely any development, assuming that was the goal in the first place. Rider and Lancer, looked so small in this show. They only appear for a short time and I didn't get to see them grow in the story. Same goes for others such as Assassin. Not only that, everyone was so freakin' flat. Especially, the main characters. For me, it felt like this show is avoiding to be complicated by not including much character development. It's like they're saying,
"Here's Shiro. He's naturally selfless and heroic, in spite of the fact that he's been so alone and mundane for such a long time. And he is going to be like this until the very end. And this is Saber, she's just going to be emotionless and headstrong until bam! We reveal that she loves Shiro this whole time." ...are you kidding me?
Saber, on the other hand, is basically the same. She is almost flat, but she only showed a few wavelengths that displayed acts to prove that she's certainly not just a serious dedicated warrior. She's actually a mixture of sensitive, sweet, seriousness, and toughness. What really annoyed me was that there wasn't much solid interactions between her and Shiro for me to even comprehend whether or not what they had was romantic or not. I get that they got each other's back most of the time in this film, but realistically, they had a "partners-in-crime" kind of chemistry rather than a genuine romantic one.
And the mysterious characters remained way too mysterious. I wish we had a much bigger hint on who Archer really is. Because wow, he is such a good character and he had so much potential. Why do you think there's a movie that focuses on him? I get that mysterious characters are cool. But the main reason why they're so cool is that when they slowly reveal themselves, their secrets will shock us. Their back stories will blow our minds out from our butts! But no, this anime barely didn't do any of that. There were so many strings in this story that were either untied, or tied loosely at the end. There wasn't much conclusions. I get that there are probably multi-time frames and that there is more than just one show for this, but please tie what needs to be tied down.
Music
Ok. Music is music. This anime had good music from beginning to the end. Enough said.
Art
And here's the best part. Guilty, I got attracted by this anime because of the art. The characters look so simple but detailed at the same time. And the details from the blood to the trace lines of Shiro's powers are pure genius. The details on Saber's uniform was absolutely gorgeous. Rin looked almost outlandish in her clothes, but her costume is absolutely eye-catching. It didn't have much of the typical anime comical things like the huge sweatdrop and the rage vein on the forehead, which I didn't mind. The anime's art was just really good, okay? I would like to give this anime kudo points on that.
The anime had so much potential but it ended on many loose ends. This was supposed to be a completely independent alternate story line, which differs from the other two in the visual novel. But in my opinion, it didn't live up to that. Don't get me wrong, though. But in spite of the messy gaps of plot confusion, I appreciated many other things in this anime. I consider myself a shipper of Shiro and Saber. The fighting scenes were super epic, and the art is great. I love how it is portrayed as something grave and very serious. I'm going to have to give it a hard-boiled.
Till the next post~
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