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REVIEW: Fate/Apocrypha Blu-Ray




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Staros





PostPosted: Fri Aug 23, 2019 1:39 pm Reply with quote
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Merxamers



Joined: 09 Dec 2013
Posts: 720
PostPosted: Fri Aug 23, 2019 2:04 pm Reply with quote
Interesting review; i think they managed to extract much more depth than i was able to find in the second half, lol. At least for me, the plot and characterization of this second half especially felt overly simplistic, to the point of feeling like a fan fiction at times. Jack's backstory was certainly different and upsetting, but that results in Archer of Red just going "RAARGH, spoiler[THE CHILDRENNN] BLEAARRGH!" for the rest of the show. I didn't get much from Shirou, either; his plan is, in effect, the plan of nearly every anime villain I've seen spoiler[("i must end pain by killing everyone/infinite tsukoyomi/etc.")], and once we learn he's not the "Shirou" we know, i just lost interest, and found him forgettable. I just think the show peaked at Saber of Red's and Berserker of Black's brief but poignant backstories.

I did, however, enjoy the second half for its plentiful action and sakuga. I can definitely understand not liking the off-model or distorted art of some of those sequences, but i personally love that kind of imaginative animation. Rider vs Archer of Black, Sieg vs Lancer of Red, and more, were some excellent fights.

All in all i enjoyed the show, and how it didn't have some of the baggage i don't like that other Fate properties carry, but it fell short in some ways.
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jl07045



Joined: 30 Aug 2011
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PostPosted: Fri Aug 23, 2019 4:13 pm Reply with quote
Shirou doesn't want to kill humans. He wants to make them immortal, change their essential nature to eradicate strife.
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FilthyCasual



Joined: 01 Jun 2015
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PostPosted: Fri Aug 23, 2019 4:20 pm Reply with quote
Quote:
While the interviews included in the booklet that comes with this set mention that the anime's ending differs from the original novel's
That's the first I've heard of that. Did the interviews mention what the difference was?
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Kicksville



Joined: 20 Nov 2010
Posts: 1168
PostPosted: Fri Aug 23, 2019 4:43 pm Reply with quote
Merxamers wrote:
All in all i enjoyed the show, and how it didn't have some of the baggage i don't like that other Fate properties carry, but it fell short in some ways.

Sounds about right. Absolutely worth the time, a very good straightforward action show that I can easily imagine being some people's favorite Fate - but, yes, it does dwell a bit on some themes towards the end it can't really say much on.

The big issue for me, I suppose, was how it kind of had too many likeable characters. A good problem to have, sure, but its ending couldn't quite deliver on everyone. The resolution to Shishigo and Mordred's story didn't feel satisfying at all, which sucked, because they're awesome. (As you might imagine, I am delighted to see Shishigo again in The New Waver Mysteries).
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Princess_Irene
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Joined: 16 Dec 2008
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PostPosted: Fri Aug 23, 2019 5:25 pm Reply with quote
FilthyCasual wrote:
That's the first I've heard of that. Did the interviews mention what the difference was?


Unfortunately, no. I'm now adding the novels to my list of "Novels I Really Want Translated and Released."

Kicksville wrote:
The resolution to Shishigo and Mordred's story didn't feel satisfying at all, which sucked, because they're awesome.


I'm hoping that the next spin-off we get is a Mordred and Shishigo buddy comedy. I would watch that all day.

jl07045 wrote:
Shirou doesn't want to kill humans. He wants to make them immortal, change their essential nature to eradicate strife.


I'd argue that that's depriving them of their humanity to make them without sin, and therefore removing (killing) "humans" by ending human nature. Humans, as the franchise has reminded us with multiple characters, kind of suck.
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killjoy_the



Joined: 30 May 2015
Posts: 2457
PostPosted: Fri Aug 23, 2019 5:46 pm Reply with quote
I liked the second half of Apocrypha a lot less than the first. I think it has interesting things: the whole Saint vs Saint aspect of it is very very good, but it doesn't get explored as well as it should. Instead, we get a lot of Sieg. I can somewhat understand this - he's a fairly new human so he has a less biased view than any of the players involved - but also I don't like Sieg. The romance aspects were also terrible whenever they came up.

I didn't care much for the sakuga in the Karna fight (possibly because I didn't care about any of the pieces involved in that mess anyway), but loved the Rider vs Archer fist fight.

I'm also interested in how the ending differs from the novels. They are (partially) fan translated so I could look it up, but I thought the ending here fit well enough within what the story was building up and the properties of Shiro's wish and Sieg's constitution.
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kotelo_



Joined: 10 Sep 2015
Posts: 117
PostPosted: Fri Aug 23, 2019 6:33 pm Reply with quote
Merxamers wrote:
Interesting review; i think they managed to extract much more depth than i was able to find in the second half, lol. At least for me, the plot and characterization of this second half especially felt overly simplistic, to the point of feeling like a fan fiction at times. Jack's backstory was certainly different and upsetting, but that results in Archer of Red just going "RAARGH, spoiler[THE CHILDRENNN] BLEAARRGH!" for the rest of the show. I didn't get much from Shirou, either; his plan is, in effect, the plan of nearly every anime villain I've seen spoiler[("i must end pain by killing everyone/infinite tsukoyomi/etc.")], and once we learn he's not the "Shirou" we know, i just lost interest, and found him forgettable. I just think the show peaked at Saber of Red's and Berserker of Black's brief but poignant backstories.

I did, however, enjoy the second half for its plentiful action and sakuga. I can definitely understand not liking the off-model or distorted art of some of those sequences, but i personally love that kind of imaginative animation. Rider vs Archer of Black, Sieg vs Lancer of Red, and more, were some excellent fights.

All in all i enjoyed the show, and how it didn't have some of the baggage i don't like that other Fate properties carry, but it fell short in some ways.


How people can watch shows and don't understand a single plot line is really beyond me.

This man I'm quoting is the perfect example.
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OtherSideofSky





PostPosted: Fri Aug 23, 2019 9:07 pm Reply with quote
I enjoyed the big action scenes toward the end of Apocrypha, but there's so much character background and development missing from a novel series that was never terribly cohesive to begin with that I can't imagine caring if I hadn't read it first. I wasn't shocked that they cut most of Jeanne's solo plot from the first half, but the lack of so many flashbacks and inner monologues from characters like Achilles surprised me (I was sure they would have at least kept the Penthesilea one, since it's so important to his last scenes and she had a character design by the time the anime was in production).

The novel conveys a ton of information through narration (everything from what characters are thinking to exactly what a weapon or ability is doing in a fight), and basically all of that is missing from the adaptation. This leads to situations like Karna's motivation for his last big fight going, iirc, completely unmentioned, as well as several fights where characters use abilities with specific effects that the viewer has no way of figuring out from the visuals.

If you already know what's going on, though, most of the fights are pretty well realized (with the exception of the final fight with Jack, which had a lot of things cut).
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Redbeard 101
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PostPosted: Fri Aug 23, 2019 10:11 pm Reply with quote
kotelo_ wrote:

How people can watch shows and don't understand a single plot line is really beyond me.

This man I'm quoting is the perfect example.


So basically if they don't think the same thing as you they simply don't understand a single plot line? Nice. How about you leave that sort of rude insult at the door. People can actually have their own opinions that don't match yours. Thanks.
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jl07045



Joined: 30 Aug 2011
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PostPosted: Sat Aug 24, 2019 4:04 am Reply with quote
Princess_Irene wrote:
jl07045 wrote:
Shirou doesn't want to kill humans. He wants to make them immortal, change their essential nature to eradicate strife.


I'd argue that that's depriving them of their humanity to make them without sin, and therefore removing (killing) "humans" by ending human nature. Humans, as the franchise has reminded us with multiple characters, kind of suck.


You can use it as a metaphor if you want, but I don't think it does justice to what he actually proposes. It's changing humanity to something else. This is transhumanism, only disguised as Rapture.
That's why Jeanne's argument is not that getting to this state is bad for humanity in principle, but that someone like Shirou should not make shortcuts. Humans must attain salvation with their own hands, lest it becomes a trap that leaves them complacent for all eternity.

Ironically this is the type of nebulous pop-philosophical discourse that the much more personal stories of F/Z and F/SN get accused of.
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Eddy564



Joined: 14 Sep 2008
Posts: 340
PostPosted: Sat Aug 24, 2019 12:47 pm Reply with quote
I enjoyed Fate Apocrypha. Many of the Fate titles suffer from overly complicated thematics that muddy the plot. Whereas this show was very simple almost to the point of mundaneness. However, I actually enjoyed the change of pace. The biggest strengths of this Fate installment is its characters (none were particular deep, but many were fun) and the animation, obviously.

This series last five or six episodes or so were awesome.
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