Castlevania TV Series

Castlevania - Netflix TV Series - Warren Ellis

Castlevania is a video game series by Konami, but in this post, we're discussing the Netflix animated series produced written by comic book legend, Warren Ellis. I have watched the currently available three seasons, and eagerly await the fourth. As the reader, you will find this post spoiler-free.

I can't ignore the origins of the series, which is worth discussing. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, released back on the PlayStation 1 in 1997, is hailed as one of the best video games of all time. However, the first two seasons of Castlevania adapt a much earlier game in the series, Castlevania III that was released way in 1989 on the original Nintendo (NES), which received moderate reviews.

Honestly... whether you have an interest in video games at all, let alone Castlevania, is irrelevant. I for one have played only a few hours of the first Nintendo DS release, Dawn of Sorrow, and whilst I enjoy it as a game, as I do Nintendo's Metroid games of the same genre, I find them difficult -- even more so on a handheld system as I suffer from hand cramps when using them.

Castlevania is a strange thing to adapt, especially from the third game in 1989, as video games weren't known for their storytelling prowess back in the 8-bit era. In fact, the third season adapts the 2005 entry, Curse of Darkness, which was released on the PlayStation 2. which actually received mixed reviews.

There is a dark fantasy world depicted in these games, of which the series boasts a whopping thrity-one titles. The games are feature vampires, vampire slayers, curses, monsters, monster slayers... but also quite a lot of video game lore, which for a series spanning multiple decades, isn't surprising.

What is surprising, is that the games haven't seen a release since 2014's Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2, from the PlayStation 3 era, and that Konami, insead of giving gamers a new Castlevania title in this now six year hiatus, instead decided to produce an animated TV series distributed by Netflix.

What surprises me me, as a comic book fan, especially of Warren Ellis and his work on comic series like Transmetropolitan, Hellblazer, and X-Men, is that via my research, I've discovered that Ellis didn't even know what Castlevania was when this was pitched to him twelve years ago. The main thing of note wrote Ellis' works, is that he has written for Marvel animated series before, and even the widely acclaimed horror video game, Dead Space.

My surprise doesn't end there. My fiancée, who is not an avid comic book fan, or gamer, marathoned the entire series on Netflix, and wanted to rewatch it with me.

Nor does my surprise even end there. I was surprised at how good the quality of the writing was: the plot; the turns and twists; and, the characterisation and quality of English voice acting from The Hobbits'  Richard Armitage and Graham McTavish, amongst others delivered so well.

Whilst produced by experienced Japanese animators, Castlevania doesn't feel like Japanese anime (of which I am not an expert), with all its usual tropes and clichés. I actually felt that the quality of writing was on par with Game of Thrones' first four seasons.

We had a climactic finish in the first season that opened the story up to a wild, spiral of plotting and intrigue, followed by excitement and wonder throughout. We have character redemptions, and characters portrayed as truly grey: neither atypical evil villians or good heroes. Of course, each episode is condensed into a mere twenty minute run time, and the first season is only four episodes, but such constraints for me now make sense as to why they hired Ellis with his experience of writing Dead Space and comic book issues.

This is a true gem of a well-written series, whether you have an interest or not in video games, comic books, or animation. I think after the bitterly sour taste that the ending of Game of Thrones still leaves me with, there is more to explore in what you could call an alternative to big budget media.

Animated series, video games, and comic books: I feel this is their time to be noticed now more than ever as a salvation for the storytelling abilities power house productions have failed to achieve. They are a viable solution in tackling the greed, egos and overall derailing we saw from the directors and celebrity actors in larger budget releases, and the aforementioned areas are ones where I certainly am going to be dwelling in for a while, and perhaps blogging more about with an open mind.   

Nosferatu: eine Symphonie des Grauens

This is a German film from 1922 directed by F.W.Murnau.

It's a B&W silent horror film and uses title cards (with an eye-burning cyan background in my version) to explain what's going on in the story. Nosferatu is based on the Dracula story that the team were unable to require the rights to at the time, hence different names, locations, etc. They outright stole it.

After seeing the Herzog/Kinski version of Nosferatu, I think both versions have merits unique to their own. This isn't because this is the original and I feel a 'loyalty' towards it, it's because of the huge time difference. Herzog had a lot more to work with, namely audio. I'd like to see a silent film today. I think good visuals, good acting, and good music aren't exploited enough due to dialogue trying to do the work of literature.

In the 2000 release starring more commercial actors like William Dafoe (played the Green Goblin in the Spider-Man films) the plot follows a fictionalised secret making of this film in which the actor (in the image) Max Schrek really was a vampire and was hired to play the part for realism. That, and the fact Klaus Kinski played the character can tell what sort of inspiration this had on people.

This is hailed as a classic film, hence the remakes and copious amounts of directors being inspired by it. I'm not a film or art student, and therefore I don't go to class and learn how to analyse silent films, the German expressionist movement, etc. This guy will tell you that you need to be if you want your opinion to be of worth (or at least seem to). You'll also need to structure any thoughts and opinions with as many obscure synonyms you can muster.

To spite him I'm going to say I enjoyed the film. I don't care if it's of high artistic quality. The facial makeup was brilliant, the aura and feeling of the film was eerie -- the fact it's a silent B&W film helps -- the way Nosferatu moves all spider-like and very authentically puts later films to shame. I believe this was shot in places like Slovakia, a lot of the scenery is really impressive, especially the Count's castle and surrounding countryside (there's no real emphases on this though), the acting isn't "realistic" because the actors move too fast, the camera's a little shaky, there's no dialogue, there's "ye olde" English title cards.. But all this helps to stylise the film. That style isn't gimmicky, and I won't say "it's more relevant to today" (as reviewers love to say), it gives the film character. To me that is what I appreciate with any form of art.

I don't like vampire or horror flicks because it's a (crap) genre. It's the same with anything: fantasy/sf books, rock music, etc. I'd like to ignore all genres except Good and Bad. This film goes into the former.