Well that was pretty fucking fantastic, that fight was immense but at the end I just have one question.

Spoiler

How the fuck did Archer get back?

 

He never died.

 

Yep. Check the particle effects when he disappears.

And holy shit, that was great. Loved the fact that they played Sword of Promised Victory and New Dawn on top of playing Emiya for more than 10 seconds. Hyped as fuck for Heaven's Feel and God Eater.

Also, damn you Porygon, you worthless piece of shit, for ruining Excalibur.

 

Read the visual novel, scrub.

 

Eh, the fight was great and visually stunning but I can't help the feeling of disappointment at Jesus!Archer returning - to me at least - from the dead. I did not read the VN and have no clue if it is handled differently there, but like this I just don't get any satisfaction from the ending.

For me, Archer was somewhat of a cheat to resolve the Rin and Saber issue with the Grail, conventiently also finishing the fight between Shiro and Gilgamesh. Shiro won that fight against Gilgamesh fair and square, and to have Archer end it like that just feels wrong.

In the same vein, the moment I perceived as Archer's death a few episodes earlier was awesome because I thought 'Hey, even in the end and jaded as fuck, Shiro/Archer holds true to his code of conduct'. It was a fitting end for him to die shielding Shiro. Revoking that makes this symbolic sacrifice meaningless and cheapens the whole thing.

I seem to be mostly alone with that opinion, but the end was, well, underwhelming. In comparison to F/Zero (I believe that one was anime only) F/ST loses out story-wise.

Still waiting eagerly on Heaven's Feel though.

 

The second cour has been largely rubbish, but that was the most enjoyable episode in a long time. Nice to at least end on a high note.

Also: HOLY SHIT THAT BUDGET.

 

Spoilers for Heaven's Feel:

Spoiler

Considering how the sex scene in both the Fate and UBW routes got written out, how do you think they are going to handle the far more sexualized content of HF?

The 'prana recharging' sex scenes wouldn't be all that different from what they did with the previous routes, but what of Shinji raping Sakura? And come to think of it, Fate/Zero didn't go into detail of what goes on in the Crest Worm swarm pits, did it? Do you think they will keep that in as well?

 

Well, they (sadly) went with Realta Nua for UBW, so I suppose we'll get RN for Heaven's Feel as well.

Spoiler

IIRC, in RN, Sakura doesn't kill people, she's just a vampire. And Shinji only attempts to rape Sakura once.

 

Shinji brought Sakura to SeaWorld to see some dolphins.

 

Spoiler

Nah she still does. Shinji is just kind of Yandere over her rather than a psycho rapist, and he doesn't really try and rape her at all in his death scene. Sakura gets her mana from drinking Shirou's blood rather than fucking him yeah, but everybody who dies still dies. Sakura still goes over the edge from killing Shinji.

 

Another ANN review.

Gotta say, the levels of salt you guys have about those reviews is hilarious.

 

Well, the epilogue felt incredibly anticlimactic and vastly disappointing. I would rather they had just scrapped this episode and doubled the length of the last.

Although, boy did Waver grow up.

 

I'm pretty curious, what do you guys think about Shirou's decision to stick to his "borrowed" and flawed ideals despite knowing the cost?

 

So I haven't really been following this thread cause I was fairly behind in the anime, only just finishing it off last weekend. And here is the epic rant I've been building up over the last 13 episodes.

Overall, Season 2 was a bit of a let down. I bitched about it in Season 1, but with more and more emotionally climatic scenes available in Season 2, the poor OST really negatively impacted the show.

Listening to it by itself, it's not necessarily bad music perse - a lot of the tracks work pretty well as general atmospheric setters, but it really lacks the sort of tracks that have the right queues and energy for your climatic scenes. For example, compare the two times Gilgamesh pulled out Ea in Fate Zero vs UBW. There is clearly a difference in the levels of "epic" in that scene, and I will make the assertion that it is 90% OST. On a related note, UBW Gilgamesh in general always bothered me - he's kind of petty and pathetic, versus the absolutely godliness that he is in Fate Zero. I suppose that's meant to be the Grail's corruption that changed him though, but a lot less enjoyable to watch.

In addition to that, the anime very rarely directs scenes in a fast paced, energetic way to start with. Any time things seem to be throttled up for a second, there is usually some stand off or dialogue which slows things down again. Interaction always seems slow/calm and there is no real thing such as high tension, fast paced scenes.

I mean hell, the scene where Archer first uses UBW (in the Church after killing Caster) was actually better in the Studio DEEN movie adaption than in the ufotable one. It was rushed and made no sense, but the entire scene had more life to it.

Interestingly enough, while other people in this thread seemed to have liked Episode 24 I found it so awful. Didn't just find myself disappointed, but genuinely bored. The entire Gilgamesh fight felt like that. Like people were just acting out scenes and events, with no emotion or tension in the scenes at all.

That being said, there were some fantastic scenes in season 2:

- Ilya's episode. Her entire flashback was really, really interesting and well done. I dunno if that was in the VN (didn't get to that point before I dropped it), but that was new content for me and it really boosted her character for me. Her death was done well too and did a good job of getting me emotionally involved in it (God, seeing her eyes cut...). Seeing Sella and Leysritt briefly appear as more than statues was pretty cool too.

- Shirou vs Archer fight. This was actually a godlike scene. Maybe those people who have read the VN will say it didn't do it justice, but it is amongst the top anime scenes I've come across. The flashbacks of Shirou's history, the dialogue and the way the scenes were put together were actually fantastic.

I don't think it's a coincidence that the two OST tracks played during the two climaxes were not made by the composer (this scene and this scene. The first one especially, is edited to the music amazingly).

The entire way it was put together was fantastic. From seeing bits and pieces of Archers past (all really cool scenes), to seeing Shirou slowly start to waver in his motivation, then remember just what his dream really was. That even if he understands that it will end in tragedy, even if he understands that his dream may not be genuine, he believes in this ideal of someone chasing after this dream of becoming a hero for justice - even if they fail in doing so, the ideal is beautiful. And to end it beautifully, there was Archer's comment "There really was such a man once, wasn't there?"

- The Epilogue - All new content for me. Everyone else seems to have found it meh, but it did a successful job of filling me with that empty/nostalgic feeling you get after a good anime you immerse myself in. After the boredom I felt during Episode 24, I was definitely not expecting that at all. I think it was largely the time-skip - even without much really happening in the episode and the cheesy fanservice fight, just seeing everyone older and in a setting far away from Fuyuki really cements the "This is over" sort of feel.

As for Archer surviving....I always got the feeling he died as a Servant in the Holy Grail War, but was brought back as by Alaya as a Counter Guardian to stop the Grail? Anyone read the VN who can shed more light on that?


Overall, season 1 worked pretty well in spite of the issues I had with it. The sorts of scenes were fine without a great soundtrack, and the scenes weren't all that emotional either so I'd still be happy to rate it a 8.5/10.

Season 2 on the other hand, was a complete letdown and it really makes me wish that they had simply got Yuki Kaijura to do the OST like ufotable have used for every other Type-MOON adaption they've done. Most of the second season was probably a 6-7/10 at best, but the Shirou/Archer fight was awesome enough to be a 10/10 for me.

Overall it'll still be something I recommend to people as a follow up to Fate Zero (which remains one of my personal highest rated anime I've seen), but with much bitching to follow.

I think Shirou's view was that even though he accepts that he isn't genuine, and accepts that he failed at achieving his real goal, he genuinely believes that this ideal of someone who lives to help others is beautiful. It may be an unattainable dream, but he believes that even striving for that is something fundamentally right.

A lot of people may call him stupid for that, knowing what it costed him personally. But the fundamental belief in his dream is that he really doesn't stack his own well being (emotional or physical) as a real concern in comparison to the dream. This utter distortion in his character is what makes him interesting to me and not just another shounen protagonist.

 

The Shirou vs Archer fight was horrendous. This is because it had a lot of stilted, repetitive dialogue. Had some cool moments but that's it. If they cut out about half of it, it would've been far more enjoyable.

If I didn't have an affection for the VN, which is itself flawed, I definitely wouldn't have been able to watch this whole season. Poor dialogue thoughout the entire season pretty much ruined the emotional stakes for me. I got so bored I didn't really care what happened anymore. Terrible pacing didn't help.

Archer and Rin's farewell scene was by far the best moment for me. If we weren't gonna get into Shirou's head properly, this would've been a much more enjoyable show from the perspective of Rin. Around Shirou she's usually reduced to her character archetype.