Anime: Fate/Stay Night: Unlimited Blade Works

Only for the fans of the game or the tv-series.

Unlimited Blade Works has the difficult task of summarizing an entire 26 episode tv-series while also adding a whole new story to it in order to substitute the latter part. As with most movies, it only succeeds partially and everyone not having seen the tv-series will probably be fairly clueless to what is going on.

For the people who are familiar with the tv-series, this movie feels like a coming home, a polished version of the tv-series with an alternative end. Too bad the movie feels rushed due to the limited time and the strength of the tv-series is being negated due to a painfully obvious lack of character development.

Animation: Outstanding animation

Fate/Stay Night already had great animation. Both backgrounds, characters and effects looked awesome back then and that was already 4 years ago. Times have changed and animation quality has improved as well, so if the show would have been produced in 2010, it would probably have looked like this. And this show looks really astonishing in terms of animation.

The backgrounds look like they have been ripped straight out of the game at times, but the CG backgrounds simply look terrific thanks to the detailed parts and the way they added light reflections to them. A slight lightreflection due to the moonlight in odd places simply gives the background an extra dimension, but also other parts tend to be adding to the atmosphere. And while the tv-show had plenty of parts during the daylight, this movie almost doesn't – resulting in the background being a real help in creating atmosphere.

The characters are not all that different, except that also here they played a bit more with the lighting. And what I personally like most is the clothing; how the wrinkles you see in them due to the clothing being worn by its owner. The sheer detail (for an anime) is impressive and to me it adds a lot to the enjoyment, seeing this high of an animation quality.

The CG for, say, the Realm, looks a bit off in comparison with the characters, but they do their best to camouflage that and it kind of works. While some CG is pretty bad, the integration with the rest of the environment is not bad and most of the environment the characters are in is done extremely well. So while I have a little criticism towards the quality of the CG, it is not disturbing enough to be spoiling the series.

Sound: Good voice acting, good BGM.

Generally the part where I have the least to say about and the same goes for this movie. I thought the voices were excellent and didn't differ much from the tv-series. The BGM used for the show was good too, but if you need 30 seconds to build that atmosphere with a BGM coming up and you only get 12 seconds, it sometimes comes across as nervous and rushed.

The show also has an ending song (and an ending sequence after that), which is fairly okay. I didn't think it was outstanding, but it was good enough to be used.

Story: Grand, plot-driven and literally too much for a single movie, despite its length.

Nothing to comment on the story here, as I liked the original plot and the new story as well.

What is worth commenting about is the way the movie was forced to summarize the tv-series at the start. Where the tv-show had about, what, 5-10 episodes to introduce the characters and set the mood, the movie doesn't have that freedom. The result is that the show does a copy/paste from the original tv-series (albeit in higher quality), although it is hard to grasp the full story from it. Many events which were related to each other all of a sudden aren't anymore, leaving several subtle plot devices untouched. And while one can argue that one should have seen the tv-series beforehand, it doesn't make this movie more approachable for new watchers.

A new watcher might find himself completely clueless to many aspects which made the tv-series good. Someone who has seen the tv-series, however, might find himself feeling at home; a nice recap with some good plot moments from the tv-series are being displayed in order to freshen up your memory and then it fast forwards towards the point where the show has new content to offer. And where one might expect an alternative ending, this movie simply gives you a new show. It takes time to get to a particular point in the story where it was still similar to the tv-series, but from that moment on the show takes a whole different swing and leaves you wondering how they were able to create a story with these many different uptakes – even without being completely unrealistic. Because that is what it is; the show never feels forced and it never feels like they created a different ending to the series and despite you knowing how the other path went, you still feel like this one is just as natural.

The only criticism I can offer is how the show, even after the initial recap, feels rushed. I personally liked the tv-series because many of the characters had doubts, internal struggles and needed time to think things over, whereas the movie skipped most of them in order to focus on the plot. That is pretty much the only thing I can think of where the show should have slowed down some more in order to get the characters more into the story, rather than the story dragging the characters to where they should go. Too bad the only criticism is a pretty important aspect of a good story: pacing.

Characters: Great characters, too bad they weren't round.

The characters haven't changed, so everything you knew about them still applies. They are still solid, believable and well designed. But in every movie which is plot-driven, it leaves little time for them to develop. And that is exactly what they don't do in this movie either.

It's a good thing that we already knew them, otherwise they would be fairly flat in terms of development. While you can see that all of them have a personality and a solid one, there is not much happening to them. Sure there is some character development, but that's pretty much only focused on the protagonist and another person – which is, surprisingly, not Tohsaka Rin. She actually feels less of an important person in comparison to the tv-series, which is very odd. In fact, she kind of feels like a sidekick, whereas in the tv-series she was an adept tactician. Blame it on the plotline, blame it on the fact that this is a movie rather than an OVA, but fact is – she doesn't do justice to herself.

Especially in the character department it is obviously painful how little there is to overthink. Characters do their thing as pawns on a chessboard rather than overthinking what kind of decisions they should make. And while their reactions and actions are by far not unrealistic and it helps the plot majorly, they simply don't really feel like characters.

So, is it worth watching?

The movie is rock solid. Both in terms of animation and sound quality, but just as well in terms of plot. It has an outstanding story once again, but the only thing it falls short is the character department. Most movies don't have much character development, only character confirmation and this movie does the same. The depth of the characters is the most excruciating aspect of this show and while you might be in awe of the story, the animations and the fact that all your favorite characters are back in a whole new adventure, in the end it feels like you missed something.

What made the tv-series better than good was the aspect that they spent time to develop a character, by giving them time to overthink their doubts and fears, by connecting subtle plot devices to plot cores. This movie focuses on getting the story out by using the characters, rather than letting the characters play out the story. In that aspect, the movie fails. I think that aspect could be improved if they had made it an OVA instead, but that is still a personal preference.

I just think that, despite the excellent plot and the outstanding animation, it doesn't do justice to the character Tohsaka Rin. And that is sad, considering it is her game-ending.

Note: All the spoilers in this review are tagged.
I try to be as objective as I can when writing a review. But perfect objectivity is impossible and in my opinion, undesirable.
The average grade is completely irrelevant and shouldn't matter to anyone. I personally rated this show 8.

Overview

This movie is based of the second route of a PS2 visual novel called Fate/Stay Night Realta Nua. The mature only version for PC was the highest selling visual novel in 2004 and has been translated by fans in English. The translation patch requires the original game and can even extract and insert the voices from the PS2 dvd :smile:. The visual movel is quite long. It takes about 60-90 hours to fully complete which means about 20-30 hours per each of the 3 routes. I have read it twice and enjoyed it quite a lot, but I will try not to make too many comparisons between the movie and its source.

This is the second animated incarnation of the game. The first one was a TV series in 2006, also extremely popular, that used the first route.

Animation: 10

First off, the art. Well, for once it is consistent with the visual novel which means it looks great. One of the big complains I had with the first anime was the change in art. Why change something great for the worse?

The backgrounds are beautifully drawn and very detailed. Every single one of them. Even if it's on screen only for a split second, never to be shown again. Lighting is used great and adds to the wow factor. Everything looks so good that I even forgot to look at the subtitles a few times.

The movement is quite realistic and lighting fast without losing its detail. The fights are especially great. There is no typical useless shounen banter that lasts over 9000 times more than the actual thing, so the battles are non-stop brutal action. There are a few things that some people might not like though. Like the blood gushing or the sparks from the weapons clashing, but those are just a matter of personal taste.

Sound: 9

What made the games so successful was the fact that the art was gorgeous, the storyline complex and the music score a pleasure to listen to. The movie makes use of remixes of the game's tracks and they sound even better. The ending song is also good. The fighting noises integrate well with the music and are of amazing quality.

The seiyuu are the same ones from the game and the series, so they already have a good grasp of their characters. They fit perfectly and are very expressive which really helps fleshing out the cast.

Story: 6

Although the original is an eroge and each of the 3 routes correspond to a girl, it can hardly be considered a dating-sim. It is very far away from things like Clannad or Kanon. The plot is very complex and has a lot more shounen elements than romance ones. The story is also interwoven, so a lot of things don't become clear unless you complete the whole game.

This movie is based on the second route which has Tohsaka Rin as the heroine. But it expects the viewer to be at least familiar with the series. So in the first 5 minutes the whole setting is explained briefly (and highly confusing if you don't already know the gist of it).

Thankfully, they slow down enough for things to make sense after that. But it's hardly sufficient. As I said the route takes about 20-30 hours to read and 15-16 days in game.Sure, a lot of it is internal monologue, but cutting it off to just 100 minutes was too much. The result is that events that happened in different days are now linked, there is no time spent on anything else but the war, the mystery is gone as everything is explained right away. A lot of character interactions that served to individualize everyone in the cast is completely missing.

And the romance isn't anywhere to be seen. Rin is reduced to being some sort of sidekick for Shirou and little else. She shows some concern for him but that is it.
The fights are epic, but because there is no buildup there isn't any dramatic tension.
The plot finally slows down to a normal speed for the ending which is handled great. But the change of pace is too obvious and unnatural.

Character Development: 7

The characters aren't permitted to establish themselves. Rin, who is supposed to be the heroine, is little more than a magic wielding tsundere. Saber is just a loyal Servant that cares a bit for the leads. Shirou and Archer are more detailed and are the only ones that actual grow and change. But the ridiculous pacing affects even them, as a lot of back-story is lost.

Lancer gets just a bit of screen time and most of his lines are cut. Ilya, Kotomine,Rider, Kuzuki, Shinji are pure and simply EVIL. Caster is EVIL and masochistic. Gilgamesh makes a decent villain mainly because he only appears towards the end when the pacing slows down.
Sakura and Fuji-nee are in there, but it is unclear who they are. People who've only seen this movie might think Sakura is Shirou's sister and Fuji-nee is his mom or something.

The seiyuu save the characters to some degree due to their great performance.

Value: 6

It depends if you've played the game. The movie seems to be made out of FMVs from the game, stitched together in a chronological order. Would have been awesome if that was the case. Maybe someone crazy enough will actually find a way to integrate parts of the movie in the game...
As mindless action fun, its rewatchability is quite high.

Enjoyment: 8

As a Fate/Stay Night fan, I enjoyed it. It was wonderfully animated, the music score was top notch and the seiyuu perfect. Too bad the duration didn't allow for a proper pacing.

It is painfully obvious that this title was meant for fans. Shounen lovers might appreciate the great fights, if nothing else.