Can you guys please make more Journey to the West episodes. Also you can make a video on Diwali(Deepawali/Festival of Lights) and Dussehra, They're both Indian Festivals based on Good vs Evil. It would mean a lot if you did India❤
The Fair-use trio must make appearances in other videos. I love how it looks like Sypha is the only one actually enjoying the dance, Trevor is doing it because Sypha is, and Alucard is just there cause he has nothing else to do. In short, they are very adorable and I want to see more of them.
Sypha: "I'm having fun dancing with my friends!" Trevor: (I am not having fun, but I don't want to ruin Sypha's fun.) Alucard: "I am spending my infinite time on this earth with my friends, who have finite time, and dancing is not something I oppose."
Weird fun fact. I once read that the concept of the polyergeist literally came from sarcasm. Its like that cliche where the kids break something and none of them confess and the mom yells "oh so I guess we have a ghost then?!" Add a few generations and a few inspired storytellers, and parental exasperation turns into literal malevolent household spirits that break shit and move stuff around.
7:24 If you listen closely, the Bishop tells his men to thank the local wise woman for turning Lisa in. Just moments before when Lisa's treating an old woman, the woman makes mention that the village used to go to a "wise woman" who sold them snake oil (IIRC, her grounded up foot skin). So it's not just someone who's afraid of something they don't understand. It's a scammer who's getting rid of the competition. It's basically like reporting to the Nazis that your business rival is Jewish. Whether it's true or not doesn't matter as long as they're gone
I caught that from someone's analysis or again a comment from analysis video Long ago and the answer to who snitched on Lisa being hinted by only two pieces of info is really amazing. The writting in this entire show is very thoughtful, layered and just peak, a clear sign of passion project
I caught that on a repeat viewing, and it made me sympathize with Dracula even more. Not only was his beloved wife burned at the stake by willfully ignorant people grabbing at power, but she was framed by a someone who saw Lisa as a threat to her livelihood even though Lisa would have helped her without question. Dracula genociding humanity may be evil, but fuck if it ain’t understandable
In a way, it almost harkens back to Ursula K Le Guin's ideas on the "banality of evil", where it was an act of petty malice that snowballed into so many atrocities occuring
The "My boy...I'm killing my boy....We decorated this room. We made these toys. Your greatest gift to me...And I'm killing him...I must already be dead." scene will live rent-free in my mind for the rest of time. Genuinely one of the best scenes in animation!
I think the Night Creature telling the bishop that his "life's work makes Him puke" and saying that the church was "an empty box" before killing him was one of the most cathartic scenes I've ever seen.
I agree. I felt a sense of relief when the bishop got what was coming to him. Although I usually adhore seeing other beings suffer; but I felt lighter when the night creature handled him
@@gerardrbain1972 I think seeing a corrupt priest that's so self-righteous and self-assured getting humbled by a literal demon from hell is just a satisfying conclusion that most people love to see.
Even better is that the bishop's corpse is later used to bless an entire river. A corpse, revived by unholy magic, is used to create a massive miracle, on the order of a vampire. But it is done because it destroys so many vampires. God actively decided to abstain helping the bishop when he was alive because he was a horrible person. But then later used him as a catalyst to strike against other bad people. Probably the only good, god-aligned thing the bishop did, and it was when he was dead.
I think the demon was more accurate than people realize on first watch. Had the church actually not been deconsecrated by the Bishop’s actions, they wouldn’t have been able to enter at all. At least in theory.
As someone who has undergone a major life change, I'd like to note Dracula's degree of mercy. "You've got an hour to flee the blast radius" is going to kill people, even if they get out in time. A full year to evacuate is enough time to get your tools and stuff, your means of living, out with you. It's him showing the kind of mercy his wife would have wanted, very sensible mercy. When they DON'T flee, you can see why he concludes 'These are all idiots, there's no way to help them'
He kind of knew this all beforehand but still chose to be merciful. Considerable restraint in his part given we know his temperament. So they didn’t evacuate after a year, he was disappointingly right. Their cure is death.
This is a good reading of the first episode, but to what degree does him needing time to prepare; summon the vampires, get Isaac and Hector to make enough night creatures to overrun wallachia, play into the mercy? its not really mercy if he plans to use the time to become more efficient?
@@Kris-lu1rs Both is correct. It is violent, suicidal rage to spend that year constructing a machine of unprecedented suffering (during which the ambition of revenge expands beyond just one country to all of them) and a mercy to not just personally rain hellfire like he absolutely could to just instantly lay waste to Targoviste. He wrecks his own extremely well built home with minimal effort, while also extremely starved (as Blue put it in the last one, 1% power level). Razing a city would be well within his basically instant grasp.
@@Kris-lu1rsbut the plans arent intended to happen regardless, it is still pretty reliant upon the decisions of the Wallachians. Ofc you can still argue whether just leaving a way out counts as mercy, but there was still a way out
I disagree, it's like saying "You've got an hour to flee the blast radius" before dropping a nuclear bomb, yes they can escape the initial blast that would have killed them instantly, but it just means they will die slowly and painfully from the radiation
"I can't do it. But YOU could. In your human greed and your human need, you could and would do anything to bring him back." The irony being that Death is the greediest of them all. "Murder the world, just so I don't have to be hungry anymore." Death/Varney doesn't want to experience hunger, he's the only vampire of the show who actually hates this aspect of themselves, because he feels that it reduces him to a level of mortality unbecoming of someone such as him. He wants to be fully satisfied and never experience that weakness again, rather than simply managing his needs, his obsession preventing him from actually being able to live (get it? cuz he's Death?).
I've got a story I'm "Working On" and in it you have demon hunters. They genuinely just punch demons to death, while to others the hellspawn are insubstantial shadows. The hunters can do this because they have one foot in hell already. They're murderers, rapists, sadists and torturers. A common thread among the retired is that the world began to see their sins in a different light as they continue, that they sin so they can do greater good, and so their sins become lighter and lighter, until they aren't sins at all and can no longer do their job. It's not really related, the line just reminded me of it.
"Humanity is boredom. My satisfaction lies elsewhere." One of my antagonists is something similar to a vampire. Violetta "Darkest Witch" Roulet finds herself being bored with everything. She realises that her life is limited and decides to concoct a ritual that slowly turns her into a nocturne. Nocturnes are creatures made entirely of shadow, which feed on light and life energy. To gain immortality, Vio plans to sacrifice the lives of every human being in the city. This feeling isn't anything new for her. Her fear of getting bored of living drives her to do this, after she left multiple husbands with at least one child each, after finding them boring. She took up flower making and music, but neglected both after losing interest. The protagonist, Vio's daughter Rosetta, believes her to be missing and tries to find her. She has the gift of Sunlight Magic from her Sun Guardian father, and her older sister Cello uses Moonlight Magic, in tandem with a dark sword from her mother. As you would've guessed, I'm a Boktai fan.
@@thirdcoinedge I love how Death is basically literally just Vampire squared. All the malice, all the hunger, all the haughty distance and total superiority, multiplied by itself all over again.
A minor point you brought up that reminded me of a thing: the original Dracula book actually has Helsing mention that the vampirism curse likely twisted Dracula's brain, the need to feed actually making him a worse long-term planner. It took him WAY to long to recognize that if he's running out of prey, maybe he should move to a heavily populated city... and it never occurred to him what the dangers of doing that might entail. So the other vampires, drenched in their vampirism, not realizing the long-term threat Dracula is presenting, actually kind of fits!
It's almost funny how all the vampires seem to be in this eternal cycle of "hey the last guy died trying to do this *but surely me being in similar/exact same circumstances can do what they couldn't* " The only difference is that Dracula had a different reason to do it
In one of the sequels to the original Dracula film, the plot is that Dracula has convinced a bunch of aristocrats that spreading a new and improved black plague (or smallpox, can't remember) would be a grand idea and that he would save them by turning them into vampires to rule over the surviving "peasants" (mind you this is taking place some time between ww1 and ww2), secretly Dracula engineered the plague to be so deadly it would just wipe out humanity. Dracula would rather wither and starve in a dead world than be ever defeated even once by 'lesser creatures'. Dracula's ambitions kinda ballooned beyond 'see pretty woman, must obtain' in the sequels.
I think the reason they have Death keep the idiot Varney voice/accent is to drive home that he *_isn't_* a metaphorical concept. He isn't a force of nature, he's just a really big monster with an even bigger ego. As Trevor puts it, he's "a thing." Death is basically just a vampire that eats souls instead of blood. Which I think is nicely punctuated by the fact that in his massive Grim-Reaper Death-Himself Final-Boss true form, _he has fangs._
@@bruuuuuuuuhhhhI do like for story purposes they gave him a more tangible personality and reasons for serving Dracula. The games were more or less a hodgepodge of different creatures and figures from different myths and folklore and so on. Which is serviceable, but not always very deep when telling a story.
personally i think its just cause death is so ancient that he doesn't care about the niceties especially when communicating with beings so below him and who have, presumably for the first time in a while, caused him to feel hunger again. Also I'm biased and like it when cosmic horrors are just like 'sup dude'
@@bruuuuuuuuhhhh Not just tradition. In the og series it was explained that Dracula enslaved death as part of his plot to become the king of vampires. And in the lords of shadows reboot death was just an extremely old and powerful litch that was cursed by god along side the other 2 lords of shadow.
That moment with Striga talking to Morana ABOUT the logistics then going “hey babe, I just fought FARMERS. And it was bad. They weren’t disparaging because I was about to kill them, it’s because they didn’t do enough to die knowing their future generations were saved” Striga understands just how bad this is, how desperately and continuously humanity will fight because of how vast the territory and borders are. “We will keep doing this until we all die in the cold light of day”
Oh dear God i just read Morana's name as Morona and immediately thought of Stupendous from Krapopolis and how those two would be good friends, that's it I'm going straight to bed
I honestly appreciate that besides Isaac's invasion and Hector's sabotage, Carmilla's invasion is portrayed as inevitably doomed because it's just logistically unsustainable. Vampires don't control the world, they control dark & haunted pockets of it. They're parasitic creatures that can't sustain a functioning empire because their very nature as beings reliant on acts of exploitative violence keeps them from building any sort of lasting regime or bureaucracy, which are often reliant on collaboration more than solely domination. Striga & Morana realize the futility of Carmilla's conflict, of a never-ending war to preserve something that'll likely spend more time recorded in history books than actually existing. In a world where ambition is the main driver of a vampire's existence & their eventual demise, S&M chose to simply enjoy their lives together in their own dark corner of Europe, satisfied and content.
She had a moment of lucidity, of just how actually impossible the plan is, not the corralling but the maintenance would drive them insane and death become the only way out. They were building their own fate worse than death. An eternal pointless slaughter, with no more purpose than to perpetuate the state that precipitated the slaughter in the first place, devoid of any meaning beyond that.
The lack of voice actors for many side characters is definitely funny once you notice it as Red pointed out, but in the case of St Germain's lover I always thought of it as being indicitive of his own self-absorbtion, that he was obsessed with this woman to the point that being reunited with her was his primary motivation, but he couldn't even remember what her voice sounded like when he thought back to their time together. His love for her is shallow and purely for what she made him feel like, and the fact that she makes absolutely no effort to reunite with him or even speak to him confirmed that for me.
To be fair, she did give him the stone to come find her, but he completely failed to understand what she was offering: He interpreted it as "Come rescue me", but I'm pretty sure it was "When you're ready, come join me." As much of a self-absorbed asshole he is, she still was willing to share her life with him: If we was willing to change, to improve as a person. He dies on the first step of that journey, when he saves Trevor. Saint Germaine's story is ultimately the tragedy of a self-absorbed man unable to understand his own love.
I think my favorite part of Isaac's arc through all of this... Is just all the people he runs into. He meets so many people and the show manages to sell them all, the ship captain especially, as just. Having their own stories going on. Making it clear this world does not revolve around Dracula, there's *so much* out there and we're only catching tiny glimpses of it. It's just masterful worldbuilding.
It's kind of an interesting parallel to dracula's journey walking the earth like a man The same way hector's imprisonment parallels dracula's isolation
@@kentonroush and, moreover, that by bending so directly to Dracula, only Dracula, nothing else, as Issac had been doing, you are blinding yourself to all the wonders of the world, of sharing jokes and drinks with friendly strangers.
Its kind of interesting to me that Isaac starts as a sort of knight happy to die for someone else's cause he believes in to then become a king happy to live for his own cause that he wants to be worthy of.
death retaining the british slumdog voice in his final form was my favorite little quirk of the entire show. As you said, he could have sounded different. a lot of shows would have turned his voice scary and distorted and whatever. But nope. thats what he wants to sound like. thats what death is comfortable with. and i am 100% in on it.
I love that Death is so _base._ After all, Death is really the most egalitarian thing in the world: It comes to everyone, everywhere, without prejudice.
And being so crass too. Could've made him all esoteric and obtuse with his vernacular but nope. We get "are you dictating your fucking obituary to me?"
Isaac has one of my favourite character arcs from this series, its so fascinating to see him go from "humanity is pure evil" to "humanity is capable of evil, but they're also capable of good. Maybe if I do good and help them, that goodness might spread" which is exemplified by the magic mirror gift and the boat captain. It's also interesting how the line "Hell will one day be empty and its doors will rattle in the wind" takes on a new meaning as Isaac grows and realises that Night Creatures are capable of more than bloody violence. He realises that he can give these damned souls a second chance, perhaps even the opportunity to get into heaven if they change for the better on this second life.
To your point of "people can be good or bad", I have always appreciated that during the preparation scene in Gresit Trevor points to a lay-priest in uniform, ask-tells him if he knows how to make holy water, and trusts him to go do it. Up to that point every single holy person we've seen is an irredeemable bastard of one flavor or another and yet there's at least this one person who is trained and knowledgeable in how to bless holy water and he is welcomed into the militia without a hint of hesitation from either Trevor or Sypha.
I hate that he's lowkey the only good priest ever shown in the series, and he's a minor character at best, while every other priest is depicted as an A-hole. Meanwhile, the actual demons, vampires, necromancers and man-eating monsters are allowed to be nuanced and varied in their depiction
@@austenmoore7326 i mean why would they spend time with a good priest if the series is mainly about the characters fighting against the antagonists If you dropped it before the ending of nocturn then you should definitely watch it to the end because they actually explore the whole nuance of the priests thinking they are doing good
Yeah, especially with the whole nomad culture, as well as a fierce aversion to the written word. Jewish people are all *about* the Written Word, so that feels like they by definition can't fit as easily with the ideas that the Speakers represent.
10:19 That scene is basically my favorite scene in the show because of the line after “God is not here” which is “this is an empty box.” It implies that, not only has God abandoned the bishop, but he did it a long time ago. The way I interpreted it, that box has been empty for a very long time because God hasn’t been with the Bishop for at least a year. It does a lot to characterize God without us ever seeing or hearing them and it’s such an incredible moment of catharsis on top of that
Personally, I was thinking about the implication that the church WAS a holy place, until the bishop stepped into it. He's so antithetical to god that places that previously held god become devoid of him in the bishop's presence.
Also implies that maybe the Bishop doesn't have an actual church congregation, they're all too scared of him or hate him or he just doesn't actually hold mass for them, "his" church is basically just his fortress and office.
@@Vinemaple That fits perfectly with my understanding of him, especially after he says heaven holds no appeal for him. He can't PREACH to COMMONERS, he doesn't have the time! He's too busy doing gods work and rooting out more heretics to burn!
I'd say that God has left the Bishop at least a year ago, but I have to wonder. Was the burning of Lisa the first bad thing he has done? While we have no proof, we know that such people don't just materialize. I'm sure he has done other bad stuff before. Similar to a certain judge in the show,.
I will say this. The Day Armour fight scene wasn't an homage to Berserk. That was a resume. That was a 'here is my prior work now when can I get started'.
Oh how I pray that the animator/s from the ‘Day Armor’ scene get explicit permission to adapt Berserk. If Berserk got the same treatment Castlevania got (of animated adaptation), it would be a godsend.
@@snowking2464the golden age arc already had great adaptations though. As much as I wouldn't mind seeing another more modern adaptation, I think the later arcs are in more desperate need of one given their most recent attempt
@@snowking2464 Ah true, I forgot that neither adaptation ever covered that demon knight chase, which would be cool to see since I think it's also the first proper demonic entity that Guts ever kills.
"You... Cannot be in the house of God..." *Snort* "God is _not here._ This is an empty box." "God is in all his churches...! My life's work is in His name!" "Your life's work, makes Him puke." "I-I am the bishop of Gresit...!" "Your God's love is not unconditional. He does not love us, and He does not love you. _This is all your fault, isn't it?"_ _"She was a witch!"_ "...lies? In your house of God? _No wonder He has abandoned you._ But we love you." "What?" _"We love you._ We wouldn't be here without you. Let me... _kiss you."_ *Messy kissing noises mix with the sound of ripping flesh and dripping blood*
I really love how the show calls out the church on its bullsh*t. Cause how many innocent people were put to the torch because they were thought to be witches. How many people were slaughtered in the name of God.
@@1033515 That's because it IS the song for the hot springs! "Reflection" on the album; it plays around most safe spots/benches, and has a sort of radio filter in the lower Queen's Gardens bench and when you're in a Tram. Personally saw the Deepnest spring with Quirrel.
i just clicked on it and the second i heard the first note of the bench theme all of my braincells started lighting up like a christmas tree. i think i need help
The discussion of how Dracula gets "turned" by Lisa and how vampires stagnate easily (though they're not completely incapable of change) reminds me so much of...the original Bram Stoker novel. Like, the thing that makes Dracula so dangerous in the book is the fact that he's suddenly gotten interested in this guy who's introduced him to a bunch of modern concepts and he's like, "Oh cool, maybe I could update my plans, do some murder in the big city, maybe make a big ol' vampire army, why not" and those are all things he could have been doing all along but he never thought of it because his nature is to be who he HAD BEEN. It took peaceful contact with a human in a non-livestock context for him to even ponder who he COULD BE. And that kind of contact clearly hadn't happened in a long time.
Huh. never really thought about it that way. Definitely enhances the twist of Dracula (the book) being "the gothic horror comes back home with you." I always thought Dracula had already decided to go to England, and was just getting Jonathan's advise on good places to stay from which he could fulfill his plans. But Jonathan inadvertently being the one to inspire that curiosity and ambition into a vampiric lord is a compelling read, and it makes me all the more desperate for a modern adaptation of Dracula.
The “We love you. We wouldn’t be here without you. Let me kiss you.” line from the night creature is the best line read and the most cathartic scene in the whole show for me.
I am beyond down for the fairness boogie. Also, I always thought it was a conscious choice to make St Germain’s girlfriend not have a voice because he’s obsessed with her as the object of his love. She’s not really a person, she’s the idea that he’s not wrong in being a rude conniving asshole because if SHE’S smart enough to like him then everyone else is just as stupid as he treats them. She doesn’t have a voice because he never really cared for what she had to say. To me she was the manifestation of his utter unwillingness to change. Where Dracula goes “uh oh. I think I like you. I want to know more about you and listen to your ideas,” St Germain goes “uh oh. I’m madly in love with you. Good for you! Anyways back to what I was saying.”
That's the read I had as well! I'm so glad to see someone else say this! I also wonder if the flashbacks we see in the show of her are accurate, or just St Germain's rose tinted memories of a person who never really cared about him...
Isaac (and the boat): "We want you out of this town, by the least effort/disturbance possible" "I want exactly the same, just let me walk through and we both get what we want" "No, go back where you came from..." "You've seen this is physically not possible, letting me through IS the least effort/disturbance possible" "I don't care, drown or something" "Per your request, just killing every single one of you, became the least effort solution"
@@MrSignman65 Mate, put yourself in the guards position. If a strange man just came into a town with a bunch of demons behind him, you would just let him walk through it? Potentially putting your entire town at risk.?
@@Veles_Ra Given my options are "trust his offer of peace" or "actively provoke him" yeah I think I'd take my chances rather than *choose* the worse option. I mean we saw how that turned out.
The fact that Sypha in the fair use trio is the only one smiling fits her so well lmao. PS cute dancing sword lol. Pos cute magic effects when she dances great job and great detail.
I don't think I laughed harder from anything else in the show than the casual "not now darling the people are talking" she tossed out later when the facade dropped, god it was great lmao
hector tried to act like the vampirizz wouldnt work on him but when i put myself in his shoes, i just hear that 'im only human after all' song. i cant blame him for folding like an origami swan.
I think the best use of the Castlevania series establishing that Holy Power is a thing, but not fully aligned with the world's religions, is in Aria of Sorrow: The Belmonts have had an iffy relationship with the Church throughout time, as the Belmonts are willing to draw upon unorthodox powers and methods if it helps people. And in Aria, you can get a Holy element sword that just makes mince-meat of pretty much every monster, smiting them with it's power. But towards the end of that game, you fight a Belmont. And your Holy sword suddenly ISN"T HELPING, as he resists Holy. So whatever is powering the Holy artifacts does have a good sense for who is truly trying to do good.
A little sad they didn't bring up when Hector and Carmilla used the undead Bishop to bless the river Dracula's forces were walking over and he was actually able to bless it.
kinda implies that rituals like creating holy water are just a form of magic, not really tied to a divine source, and the church just exploits it to create the illusion of divinity.
@@glitterboy2098 Oh that is most certainly a valid interpretation. One that I do favor. I know it was mentioned in the video, how the demon who Sala and the monks worked with mimicked the crucifixion of Christ. Either Red or Blue, I forgot which, did touch on the same topic of anyone can channel holy power as long as they go "through the motions." In turn making it just another form of magic. I know when I first watched that seen I was under the interpretation of God has allow a priest to use holy power. As it is in quite a lot of fantasy. So the Bishop blessing the river to kill both the vampires and himself is his "one good deed" in the eyes of God.
@@glitterboy2098 Debtable, Trevor just asks for someone who was actually ordained in a church. The corrupt priest obviously was actually ordained in a church
I remember seeing Red’s initial reaction to the season 4 poster on Twitter. “I've been doing a little too much trope-based media analysis and may I just say that trevor's new Oops All Death Flags redesign looks absolutely marvelous -R”
Minor correction; Death in this show isn't so much a force of nature (read: ACTUAL death), but a being of a higher plane that feeds off death in the same manner a vampire feeds on the blood of the living. Not a huge difference, but a notable one.
The lines. "This is an empty box" and "lies? In your house of God?" They are so raw. Another thought: Draculas' response feels like a person with unfinished therapy. Like blown out of proportion for sure but it gives the vibes of. Someone whose. One reason for living was just taken.
I'm part of the religion that's being demonized in this show and I know not everyone is so cartoonishly evil or ignorant as they are depicted. That said the key words are "not everyone" even in my personal life I've met people that made me think "You're the reason we're shown like this" so their was a particular level of catharsis in seeing him being cornered by monsters that I'm not sure others can appreciate
@@Broomer52Having the actual priest bless the well water earlier helps with that scene as well for comparison purposes, and shows that with actual faith even the mundane folk can square up against evil when the time comes. It also kind of helps they're a minor character, and is practicing the show don't tell aspect of faith by not being massively blinged out and perpetually yapping like the bishop. Reminds me of Michael Carpenter from Dresden Files in that aspect.
Given their penchant for orality and their inherent nomadism i'd say the Speakers are much closer to an allegory for Romani people, specially given the area and timeframe and subject matter of the show.
Jews and Romani people shared many struggles in the euro-asiatic erea. We suffered under christian and islamic rule and we where one was perdecuted the other was also usually persecuted. I think that in castlevania the speakers are an alegory for the Romani people for the simole reason that they are more nomadic. Jews never wanted to be a nomadic people, we always wanted to return to our ancestral land and lived amonge other nations for the time.
@@astoroidea6502 yhe I think thats the most probable case, especially in noctutn the speakers seem much more jewish. In any way I dont see why it has to be exvlusive. Every persecuted nation or ethnic can see itself in the speakers.
Fun little fact about the predator brain geometric shape thing; Lion tamers use chairs for a similar reason, the lion can't focus on all 4 points of the chair legs at the same time thus it stuns them briefly.
Something I've thought about this show, there's actual magic? Like people do full ass magic and the church just had to go after the lady that grinds herbs
It's a easy win, they get to posture about saving humanity and there is little chance of any reprocessing cause it's just a peasant from a shitty little village.
What @Eiskralle1 said. Sypha was a well-kept secret, hidden among the Speakers, until the prophecy basically meant she had to go with Trevor. And the Speakers' predilection for cultivating magic-users is a big part of why they're nomadic, making it hard for the church to get a good whiff of suspicion on them. We see lots of magic because we see the protagonists. But notably, we don't see much Church.
@@Duiker36 yeah, that's very true. My thought behind it was there are actual magicians, like the people that summon the skeletons from season 3 iirc, and I'm sure they were doing that before dracula happened, and THEY have to be taken care of by a Belmont and Belnades while little turtle man causes the apocalypse over a lady that lights her fire with a flint. The church is just terrible, and went on an actual witch hunt instead of going after the people making the woods sound like a xylophone exhibition
Sypha really is the ideal partner. Shes smart, witty, driven, confident, and has the ability to murder hordes of invading night creatures with kickass ice magic. Honestly all pluses in my book.
It is 45 seconds into the video and I already absolutely ADORE the "Fair Use Protection Trio". I think it's the incredibly in-character facial expressions. Alucard is bored, Sypha is having a great time, and Trevor is annoyed that someone is making him do fun things. They must return.
All the talk about evil, actually kinda reminded me of Tolkien, where one of the themes in Tolkien's works is that just killing evil things is not enough, and that having kindness and compassion is more important to being a good person than killing the bad guy.
I actually think Saint Germaine’s ex not having a voice works, because it was never really about her, it was about him and the story he made in his head. _I just need her, she has to take me back, I need this more than the world needs to live._ She was an idea, an image of the unattainable.
I love that this loops back around to Symphony of the Night's opening: "It was not by my hand that I was once again given flesh. It was by humans who sought to pay me tribute." And the disdain in Dracula's delivery of that line.
Vis a Vis the "crucifixes hurt all night creatures how can we reconcile this" i like how the Dresden Files handles it. It is not the symbol itself that harms creatures of the night but it is the Faith that those symbols inspire. The main character Harry Dresden remarks at one point that a crucifix in his hand is so much matchwood to an angry vampire but when he focuses his will upon his pentacle amulet, the symbol of Magic, he is able to use that to ward off a vampire because he has Faith in magic and that Faith has power
It also works similarly with the Swords of the Cross. Our first impression is through Michael Carpenter, The Most Catholic Lawful Good Paladin Of All Time. But then we meet Shiro, who is only technically a Baptist, yet wields the Sword of Faith expertly, and Sanya, who blatantly doesn't believe, yet is the ideal wielder of the Sword of Hope.
Still working through the video, but one of my favorite bits about Castlevania is how wildly different people can advance the same cause, whether that’s good or evil. Lisa and The Captain both approach the problem differently, but still employ a heavy dose of empathy and compassion to remarkable results.
Warren Ellis (though aterrible human being) has a very distinct writing style where characters (good and evil) say exactly what they are going to do, then set out doing it. There are very few "shocking reveals" because of this. The thing that makes it enjoyable is watching how these competing declarations of intent unfold. I have always enjoyed this style of storytelling and Castlevania is one of my favorite shows.
This shows up to a lesser extent in the games as Dracula ends up unwittingly inspiring a series of cults dedicated to either reviving or replacing him. The last one in particular decided to deliberately stage an execution to look like Lisa's just because they wanted another scapegoat for humanity. Then there's Brauner, who's explicitly a villain because his daughters died in a World War and he went mad with grief
Btw, the cross being a confusing geometric shape is a direct homage to Peter Watts sci-fi novel “Blindsight”. In that book, vampires are confused by right angles.
Having existed within the *Castlevania* fandom for a reasonable amount of time, I can no longer partake in any discussion revolving around geometric shapes vs. vampires. Some time ago I came across a comic of Trevor showing Alucard a geometry text book to scare him, and it's lived in my head rent free ever since. I just internally burst out laughing every time I see the topic getting brought up.
The crucifix brain short circuit was also employed in Peter Watts 'Blindsight' It's the reason vampires went extinct when architecture became a thing in that setting (vampires being humanity-adjacent like homo erectus or the neanderthal), their brains working in a different way that actually works to an advantage in some settings (they can see both the duck and the rabbit simultaneously in the duck-rabbit illusion, as an example because they process visual information differently).
To me, Sala's panic at the end of season 3 was because he wasn't ever ACTUALLY on board. Sala was quick to convert and just as quick to abandon the new faith. He's just not very strong in ANY conviction when he's challenged (first by the monster and then the corridor)
That's interesting. I interpreted it as the night creature having a form of mental manipulation on Sala and once the corridor was open it no longer needed him and he snapped out of it. "What the f*ck is that?"
Castlevania Nocturne actually backtracks on the holy symbol thing, it appears that crosses have magic power to turn vampires. Though it may also be that the vampire's own faith gave him that weakness to crosses
I do personally believe that it was the vampire’s faith that made him weak to it. Cause even in Castlevania Season 4, Sypha asks why the cross also works on vampires of other faiths. Altho, he had pledged himself to erszebet as his god? Maybe that just says how he really views her. Following her because she is powerful.
I am very much a fan of religious symbols being bad for vampires only if they have faith in them. A book I reread often as a teenager had a Jewish vampire, and when someone threatened him with a crucifix, he plucked it out of their hand and remarked that they had the wrong religion.
Conversely, sometimes holy symbols only work if the hunter has faith in them, which was the case in Dresden Files. A Star of David or non infernal Pentagram has as much power to dispel vampires as a crucifix.
@@bthsr7113 I remember Classic Who had an insanely fun version of this, where an atheist Communist in WWII held up the Red Star from his uniform, and his faith in Communist Ideals was enough to give it power.
As soon as I saw Isaac in the thumbnail I clicked it immediately. They did such an amazing job with his character growth and I wish they delved deeper into the interesting perspective of any demons who could speak
Sala bailed because while he was a lunatic fully lost in the sauce, he was also an idiot. He didn't have any idea of what he was doing; he was just doing what the Night Creature told him to. When it all turned out to be real in ways his mushy little brain could never conceive of, he panicked.
A thought I had around 53:13; It's mentioned later that "divine" work can only be done through human will in-universe. Death says something along the lines of, "Only human hands can reach into Hell. How fucked up is that?" It's interesting to have that brought up well before Death and his plan are introduced into the story, and it's rad to see those dots connected in this format.
Vampires in Dracula's Court: Who could have forseen the "kill all humans" party would actually kill all human. Even my humans that I need to feed off of. 😯 27:50
Still the best religious horror I've seen to date. "You make Him sick... Lies? In your house of God?" So so so so much scarier and more compelling than "your god isn't real" "yes he is" "nuh uh" "yeah huh" "nuh uh" "you make a good point time for me to crash out"
Little clarification I would like add as a viewer. Death, as portrayed in the show, is not the actually force of nature/concept of death. Trevor does say it isn't actual death, it's just a parasite that feels off of people dying, and I believe he says it pretends to be the actual Death.
I really like that they used the geometric shapes explanation for crosses, because afaik it originally came from Blindsight by Peter Watts which is a _great_ book.
IIRC, Carmilla is also the only vampire during Season 2 who realizes "Oh, this isn't some plan to rule the world. This is the most elaborate murder-suicide the world will ever see".
Godbrand seemed to figure it out. He directly asks Dracula what they will drink if humanity is gone. He's also the one to put together that Dracula doesn't seem to be feeding and is in a weakened state. He might have been a blowhard but I don't think Godbrand was as stupid as he might look at first glance. Then again he made the boneheaded decision to bring his plan of a coup to Isaac so maybe this is one of those "broken clock" moments.
This is quite fortuitous; I literally just rewatched the “You must be the Belmont” video and subsequently picked up the other seasons I’d yet to watch.
I believe Lenore could’ve been like Dracula, in that she would’ve found a better way of living despite being a vampire, if not for her sisters’ awful influence and Hector being the human she unfortunately gets attached to, instead of someone like Lisa who would willingly seek out a vampire and try to change them to be better for the sake of humanity instead of for herself. Dracula being a recluse with no other insight besides his own allowed him to be in a head space to at least entertain a different life for himself, a somewhat luxury Lenore didn’t have.
I was thinking about this last night - so she said that she wouldn't let Isaac, Hector or anyone else cage her before she decided to bite it. Right, it reminded me of the berry conversation Isaac had with the philosopher night creature - Isaac was suggesting that though creatures of the night may be something like a hammer, a blade, etc, they could also be constructive forces. It's like how someone said in a comment, it's very hard for an immortal being (esp one that's demonised for its very nature) to cope with a short term change of that scale, and have faith in the world and themselves that it could turn out to be okay. It's as you said, she didn't have the influence of someone like Lisa long enough to allow them to...dream, I suppose. Tragic when you think about it, that Isaac could have been that for her, but it's a hard one to ask when you just murdered her old time close friend (and may do the same to her if she "slips up" and eats people). I get her feelings though, in a way, because humans only have to deal with so many decades of change before dying of disease essentially. Vampires won't die of old age, so it takes someone with immense mental resilience to endure a super long life. Which ties in to their whole conversation in the end about strength vs power. What Red said about some vampires rather dying than accepting a change probably mirrors the same dynamics people who do end up committing suicide undergo, they often mistake a death of the ego to be literal, so in that instability, they can't bear it and kill "themselves" in literal terms. Gotta say, I just finished rewatching (after only having seen it when it came out) and really enjoyed everyone's character arc. It's hilarious when CARmilla calls Isaac the least interesting man in Dracula's court, but upon this rewatch, he was one of my favourite characters to follow. Hit me at the same stage in life, yknow : )
I grew up in a very catholic area in Europe and i felt like the way this show portrayed the ignorance and way the church tells the people what is right and what is true, was incredibly accurate to how going to church and having religious classes in school and kindergarten felt to me as a child
I liked how the Thunderstruck webcomic did the "holy item that works vs one that doesn't" by tying the holy power to the crafting process and the person who made it. If you've got some factory-made, mass-produced cross necklace made by the cheapest paid rando's some manager could find? Good luck. Might as well be a lump of slag. But that sword that the craftsman reveres and considers it a sacred art to make? Please put that away, ma'am, you're scaring the ghouls.
Bit off topic, but I like the idea that capitalist consumerism is antithetical to the idea of true religious faith. Faith exists beyond the material, into the very best qualities of our humanity as a means of connection with the divine. You can't mass-manufacture belief. It has to be cultivated and sought for by one's own sincerity.
The Dominus collection has had me binging Castlevania content for the last week. What a great night for a curse 😊 *Omg. I've written on random forums so much about how humanity, the thing Dracula thinks humans lack - and that lack of it killed his wife - is exactly what gets Dracula killed. It's weirdly what also almost made him win the fight, when Sypha couldn't stop blasting Drac with fire because Alucard was getting a bit toasty too. That moment was pivotal in wearing him down, and Sypha let up because she was feeling *too* humane. If they gave you every opportunity they had because it put another in a risky situation, they probably could never win. Heck, taking on, and defeating, Dracula's meteor thingy required all 3 of them to stand in the line of fire. Dracula's ENTIRE last moments are defined by what humanity *is* and *isn't.*
The "you are all so f***ing rude" scene has now replaced the Alucard talking to his companion dolls as the funniest thing to come out of this show thanks to you. It used to be an epic line for me, but now I can't stop giggling while thinking of it. Love you guys
The "shape of the cross" thing felt like it might have been yoinked from the Peter Watts novel 'Blindsight', which was a sci-fi novel providing a reason why the strictly-superior vampires hadn't ended up running the earth and put it down to a processing problem in their visual cortex. Like, it was literally the same explanation.
14:10 on this note, Trevor gave that speech in Gresit, about how the man of the church that had misled them all into committing murder, of people that just wanted to help, by just leveraging their fears.
the explanation of holy symbols working is also an interesting scene in that it demonstrates that Hunters like the Belmonts know *far* more about science, biology, etc than the regular people of the time. using scientific concepts that wouldn't be developed IRL until centuries later. clearly the belmont's did a very good job of learning from the vampires as well as hunting them. (no doubt a lot of that library of theirs was obtained from the libraries of vampires and other immortals) the subtle anacronism there really helps get across the idea of secret knowledge that regular man does not have access to, that pervades the lives of the vampires we see.
You've missed a significant point about The Judge. He's not just a guy who's all about protecting people and being orderly while killing children on the side, he kills those kids in furthering the order he's trying to create. He had a rule about no running in the village. Who constantly broke that rule? He's furthering order in the village, that's how he saw it, that's how he justified it. He's like Dexter because on the one hand he genuinely believed he was helping by removing these "troublemakers" but also kept trophies and understood how everyone else would view his actions.
![ร้อยพ่อพันแม่ - WanMai [Official MV]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/XY2pNYASEbg/mqdefault.jpg)
PIIIIIINS - overlysarcastic.shop/
The cosmic scales are available in our merch shop! The LIBRA enamel pin is on sale now!
-B
piiiiinis lol i'm a comedy genius
Can you guys please make more Journey to the West episodes. Also you can make a video on Diwali(Deepawali/Festival of Lights) and Dussehra, They're both Indian Festivals based on Good vs Evil. It would mean a lot if you did India❤
@@PrabalSinha-eg1vh Every time you ask about JTTW, Red pushes it back another week out of spite.
@@DrBrangar I NEED THE LORE
Hey Red, have you and Blue seen KAOS?
The Fair-use trio must make appearances in other videos. I love how it looks like Sypha is the only one actually enjoying the dance, Trevor is doing it because Sypha is, and Alucard is just there cause he has nothing else to do. In short, they are very adorable and I want to see more of them.
It would be amazing if we have different versions for different shows/movies or anything else they cover
:| :3 >:|
I didn't even refognise them
Sypha: "I'm having fun dancing with my friends!"
Trevor: (I am not having fun, but I don't want to ruin Sypha's fun.)
Alucard: "I am spending my infinite time on this earth with my friends, who have finite time, and dancing is not something I oppose."
The lengths creators have to go to to exercise their rights are both hilarious and depressing...
"being haunted by a poltergeist, but the poltergeist is also me " is the perfect description of ADHD
cries in relatable
Weird fun fact. I once read that the concept of the polyergeist literally came from sarcasm. Its like that cliche where the kids break something and none of them confess and the mom yells "oh so I guess we have a ghost then?!"
Add a few generations and a few inspired storytellers, and parental exasperation turns into literal malevolent household spirits that break shit and move stuff around.
Literally listening to this while battling my own poltergeist to try to focus on work. I’m not used to feeling that seen.
also a great description of epilepsy...
After years im finally getting my meds next week, if all goes well
Trevor finding out the church killed Dracula's wife gives me extreme "They stole John Wick's car and killed his dog" energy
7:24 If you listen closely, the Bishop tells his men to thank the local wise woman for turning Lisa in. Just moments before when Lisa's treating an old woman, the woman makes mention that the village used to go to a "wise woman" who sold them snake oil (IIRC, her grounded up foot skin). So it's not just someone who's afraid of something they don't understand. It's a scammer who's getting rid of the competition. It's basically like reporting to the Nazis that your business rival is Jewish. Whether it's true or not doesn't matter as long as they're gone
I caught that from someone's analysis or again a comment from analysis video Long ago and the answer to who snitched on Lisa being hinted by only two pieces of info is really amazing. The writting in this entire show is very thoughtful, layered and just peak, a clear sign of passion project
I caught that on a repeat viewing, and it made me sympathize with Dracula even more.
Not only was his beloved wife burned at the stake by willfully ignorant people grabbing at power, but she was framed by a someone who saw Lisa as a threat to her livelihood even though Lisa would have helped her without question.
Dracula genociding humanity may be evil, but fuck if it ain’t understandable
In a way, it almost harkens back to Ursula K Le Guin's ideas on the "banality of evil", where it was an act of petty malice that snowballed into so many atrocities occuring
they mention that in-text in the powerpoint even if they don't say it out loud
~Notices my husband's eyes wander to our neighbor's big naturals~ Goody Susana is a witch! I saw her dancing at the devil's sacrament!
The "My boy...I'm killing my boy....We decorated this room. We made these toys. Your greatest gift to me...And I'm killing him...I must already be dead." scene will live rent-free in my mind for the rest of time. Genuinely one of the best scenes in animation!
The delivery was flawless
+
That scene hit like a TRUCK, I actually teared up when I watched it the first time.
Made me cry so hard when I rewatched the show after my son was born.
That scene was absolutely beautiful.
Another great scene is when Alucard is alone and he says "I'm talking to dolls. My God, I must be mad"
I think the Night Creature telling the bishop that his "life's work makes Him puke" and saying that the church was "an empty box" before killing him was one of the most cathartic scenes I've ever seen.
I agree. I felt a sense of relief when the bishop got what was coming to him. Although I usually adhore seeing other beings suffer; but I felt lighter when the night creature handled him
@@gerardrbain1972 I think seeing a corrupt priest that's so self-righteous and self-assured getting humbled by a literal demon from hell is just a satisfying conclusion that most people love to see.
"God abandoned us long ago. And even if he were here, he wouldn't be in Spain."
-Max0r
Even better is that the bishop's corpse is later used to bless an entire river. A corpse, revived by unholy magic, is used to create a massive miracle, on the order of a vampire.
But it is done because it destroys so many vampires. God actively decided to abstain helping the bishop when he was alive because he was a horrible person. But then later used him as a catalyst to strike against other bad people. Probably the only good, god-aligned thing the bishop did, and it was when he was dead.
I think the demon was more accurate than people realize on first watch. Had the church actually not been deconsecrated by the Bishop’s actions, they wouldn’t have been able to enter at all. At least in theory.
As someone who has undergone a major life change, I'd like to note Dracula's degree of mercy. "You've got an hour to flee the blast radius" is going to kill people, even if they get out in time. A full year to evacuate is enough time to get your tools and stuff, your means of living, out with you. It's him showing the kind of mercy his wife would have wanted, very sensible mercy.
When they DON'T flee, you can see why he concludes 'These are all idiots, there's no way to help them'
He kind of knew this all beforehand but still chose to be merciful. Considerable restraint in his part given we know his temperament. So they didn’t evacuate after a year, he was disappointingly right. Their cure is death.
This is a good reading of the first episode, but to what degree does him needing time to prepare; summon the vampires, get Isaac and Hector to make enough night creatures to overrun wallachia, play into the mercy? its not really mercy if he plans to use the time to become more efficient?
@@Kris-lu1rs Both is correct. It is violent, suicidal rage to spend that year constructing a machine of unprecedented suffering (during which the ambition of revenge expands beyond just one country to all of them) and a mercy to not just personally rain hellfire like he absolutely could to just instantly lay waste to Targoviste. He wrecks his own extremely well built home with minimal effort, while also extremely starved (as Blue put it in the last one, 1% power level). Razing a city would be well within his basically instant grasp.
@@Kris-lu1rsbut the plans arent intended to happen regardless, it is still pretty reliant upon the decisions of the Wallachians. Ofc you can still argue whether just leaving a way out counts as mercy, but there was still a way out
I disagree, it's like saying "You've got an hour to flee the blast radius" before dropping a nuclear bomb, yes they can escape the initial blast that would have killed them instantly, but it just means they will die slowly and painfully from the radiation
“Why is it that only human hands reach into hell? Don’t you think that’s weirdly fucked up?” -💀
"I can't do it. But YOU could. In your human greed and your human need, you could and would do anything to bring him back." The irony being that Death is the greediest of them all. "Murder the world, just so I don't have to be hungry anymore." Death/Varney doesn't want to experience hunger, he's the only vampire of the show who actually hates this aspect of themselves, because he feels that it reduces him to a level of mortality unbecoming of someone such as him. He wants to be fully satisfied and never experience that weakness again, rather than simply managing his needs, his obsession preventing him from actually being able to live (get it? cuz he's Death?).
I've got a story I'm "Working On" and in it you have demon hunters. They genuinely just punch demons to death, while to others the hellspawn are insubstantial shadows.
The hunters can do this because they have one foot in hell already. They're murderers, rapists, sadists and torturers. A common thread among the retired is that the world began to see their sins in a different light as they continue, that they sin so they can do greater good, and so their sins become lighter and lighter, until they aren't sins at all and can no longer do their job.
It's not really related, the line just reminded me of it.
"Humanity is boredom. My satisfaction lies elsewhere."
One of my antagonists is something similar to a vampire. Violetta "Darkest Witch" Roulet finds herself being bored with everything. She realises that her life is limited and decides to concoct a ritual that slowly turns her into a nocturne. Nocturnes are creatures made entirely of shadow, which feed on light and life energy. To gain immortality, Vio plans to sacrifice the lives of every human being in the city. This feeling isn't anything new for her. Her fear of getting bored of living drives her to do this, after she left multiple husbands with at least one child each, after finding them boring. She took up flower making and music, but neglected both after losing interest.
The protagonist, Vio's daughter Rosetta, believes her to be missing and tries to find her. She has the gift of Sunlight Magic from her Sun Guardian father, and her older sister Cello uses Moonlight Magic, in tandem with a dark sword from her mother.
As you would've guessed, I'm a Boktai fan.
I for one find it incredible that death talks like a chain smoking dishwasher with an ankle monitor
@@thirdcoinedge I love how Death is basically literally just Vampire squared. All the malice, all the hunger, all the haughty distance and total superiority, multiplied by itself all over again.
A minor point you brought up that reminded me of a thing: the original Dracula book actually has Helsing mention that the vampirism curse likely twisted Dracula's brain, the need to feed actually making him a worse long-term planner. It took him WAY to long to recognize that if he's running out of prey, maybe he should move to a heavily populated city... and it never occurred to him what the dangers of doing that might entail. So the other vampires, drenched in their vampirism, not realizing the long-term threat Dracula is presenting, actually kind of fits!
It's almost funny how all the vampires seem to be in this eternal cycle of "hey the last guy died trying to do this *but surely me being in similar/exact same circumstances can do what they couldn't* "
The only difference is that Dracula had a different reason to do it
In one of the sequels to the original Dracula film, the plot is that Dracula has convinced a bunch of aristocrats that spreading a new and improved black plague (or smallpox, can't remember) would be a grand idea and that he would save them by turning them into vampires to rule over the surviving "peasants" (mind you this is taking place some time between ww1 and ww2), secretly Dracula engineered the plague to be so deadly it would just wipe out humanity. Dracula would rather wither and starve in a dead world than be ever defeated even once by 'lesser creatures'.
Dracula's ambitions kinda ballooned beyond 'see pretty woman, must obtain' in the sequels.
@@airplanes_aren.t_real”rip to them but I’m different”
I think the reason they have Death keep the idiot Varney voice/accent is to drive home that he *_isn't_* a metaphorical concept. He isn't a force of nature, he's just a really big monster with an even bigger ego. As Trevor puts it, he's "a thing."
Death is basically just a vampire that eats souls instead of blood. Which I think is nicely punctuated by the fact that in his massive Grim-Reaper Death-Himself Final-Boss true form, _he has fangs._
I myself love Death in the games, and for the entire show wondered when he'd show up. Whenever he's on screen I am immediately enthralled
@@bruuuuuuuuhhhhI do like for story purposes they gave him a more tangible personality and reasons for serving Dracula. The games were more or less a hodgepodge of different creatures and figures from different myths and folklore and so on. Which is serviceable, but not always very deep when telling a story.
@@acgearsandarms1343 yeah, in the games he's usually just there because it's a tradition, the show does a great job of actually making him a character
personally i think its just cause death is so ancient that he doesn't care about the niceties especially when communicating with beings so below him and who have, presumably for the first time in a while, caused him to feel hunger again. Also I'm biased and like it when cosmic horrors are just like 'sup dude'
@@bruuuuuuuuhhhh
Not just tradition. In the og series it was explained that Dracula enslaved death as part of his plot to become the king of vampires.
And in the lords of shadows reboot death was just an extremely old and powerful litch that was cursed by god along side the other 2 lords of shadow.
That moment with Striga talking to Morana ABOUT the logistics then going “hey babe, I just fought FARMERS. And it was bad. They weren’t disparaging because I was about to kill them, it’s because they didn’t do enough to die knowing their future generations were saved”
Striga understands just how bad this is, how desperately and continuously humanity will fight because of how vast the territory and borders are.
“We will keep doing this until we all die in the cold light of day”
Oh dear God i just read Morana's name as Morona and immediately thought of Stupendous from Krapopolis and how those two would be good friends, that's it I'm going straight to bed
I honestly appreciate that besides Isaac's invasion and Hector's sabotage, Carmilla's invasion is portrayed as inevitably doomed because it's just logistically unsustainable. Vampires don't control the world, they control dark & haunted pockets of it. They're parasitic creatures that can't sustain a functioning empire because their very nature as beings reliant on acts of exploitative violence keeps them from building any sort of lasting regime or bureaucracy, which are often reliant on collaboration more than solely domination. Striga & Morana realize the futility of Carmilla's conflict, of a never-ending war to preserve something that'll likely spend more time recorded in history books than actually existing. In a world where ambition is the main driver of a vampire's existence & their eventual demise, S&M chose to simply enjoy their lives together in their own dark corner of Europe, satisfied and content.
She had a moment of lucidity, of just how actually impossible the plan is, not the corralling but the maintenance would drive them insane and death become the only way out. They were building their own fate worse than death. An eternal pointless slaughter, with no more purpose than to perpetuate the state that precipitated the slaughter in the first place, devoid of any meaning beyond that.
The lack of voice actors for many side characters is definitely funny once you notice it as Red pointed out, but in the case of St Germain's lover I always thought of it as being indicitive of his own self-absorbtion, that he was obsessed with this woman to the point that being reunited with her was his primary motivation, but he couldn't even remember what her voice sounded like when he thought back to their time together. His love for her is shallow and purely for what she made him feel like, and the fact that she makes absolutely no effort to reunite with him or even speak to him confirmed that for me.
To be fair, she did give him the stone to come find her, but he completely failed to understand what she was offering: He interpreted it as "Come rescue me", but I'm pretty sure it was "When you're ready, come join me." As much of a self-absorbed asshole he is, she still was willing to share her life with him: If we was willing to change, to improve as a person.
He dies on the first step of that journey, when he saves Trevor. Saint Germaine's story is ultimately the tragedy of a self-absorbed man unable to understand his own love.
I think my favorite part of Isaac's arc through all of this... Is just all the people he runs into. He meets so many people and the show manages to sell them all, the ship captain especially, as just. Having their own stories going on. Making it clear this world does not revolve around Dracula, there's *so much* out there and we're only catching tiny glimpses of it. It's just masterful worldbuilding.
It's kind of an interesting parallel to dracula's journey walking the earth like a man
The same way hector's imprisonment parallels dracula's isolation
@@kentonroush and, moreover, that by bending so directly to Dracula, only Dracula, nothing else, as Issac had been doing, you are blinding yourself to all the wonders of the world, of sharing jokes and drinks with friendly strangers.
Its kind of interesting to me that Isaac starts as a sort of knight happy to die for someone else's cause he believes in to then become a king happy to live for his own cause that he wants to be worthy of.
blue: *sits down for a minute, has a new idea, takes a shot and runs back up stage* AND AN OTHER THING
Blue is Martin Luther reincarnated confirmed.
One MOOOORE ting!
@aidengray3998 a Jackie chan adventures reference? In 2024? Amazing!
@@hollymccombs7316shoutouts to Jordan Fringe
death retaining the british slumdog voice in his final form was my favorite little quirk of the entire show. As you said, he could have sounded different. a lot of shows would have turned his voice scary and distorted and whatever. But nope. thats what he wants to sound like. thats what death is comfortable with. and i am 100% in on it.
I love that Death is so _base._ After all, Death is really the most egalitarian thing in the world: It comes to everyone, everywhere, without prejudice.
And being so crass too. Could've made him all esoteric and obtuse with his vernacular but nope. We get "are you dictating your fucking obituary to me?"
Isaac has one of my favourite character arcs from this series, its so fascinating to see him go from "humanity is pure evil" to "humanity is capable of evil, but they're also capable of good. Maybe if I do good and help them, that goodness might spread" which is exemplified by the magic mirror gift and the boat captain. It's also interesting how the line "Hell will one day be empty and its doors will rattle in the wind" takes on a new meaning as Isaac grows and realises that Night Creatures are capable of more than bloody violence. He realises that he can give these damned souls a second chance, perhaps even the opportunity to get into heaven if they change for the better on this second life.
To your point of "people can be good or bad", I have always appreciated that during the preparation scene in Gresit Trevor points to a lay-priest in uniform, ask-tells him if he knows how to make holy water, and trusts him to go do it.
Up to that point every single holy person we've seen is an irredeemable bastard of one flavor or another and yet there's at least this one person who is trained and knowledgeable in how to bless holy water and he is welcomed into the militia without a hint of hesitation from either Trevor or Sypha.
I hate that he's lowkey the only good priest ever shown in the series, and he's a minor character at best, while every other priest is depicted as an A-hole. Meanwhile, the actual demons, vampires, necromancers and man-eating monsters are allowed to be nuanced and varied in their depiction
@@floricel_112yeah honestly i quit watching nocturne because they did the whole priest is secretly evil thing again and it was getting super lame
@floricel_112 it's almost like religion is almost universally a backwards facing problem rife with abuse of power or something...
@@austenmoore7326 i mean why would they spend time with a good priest if the series is mainly about the characters fighting against the antagonists
If you dropped it before the ending of nocturn then you should definitely watch it to the end because they actually explore the whole nuance of the priests thinking they are doing good
@@austenmoore7326 He got a lot more nuance to the end
I pegged the Speakers more as an allegory for the Romani
That seemed pretty obvious to me too.
I was going to come into the comments to say the same thing.
Yup, this was my take on them as well. So, perhaps more subtle than blue thought, heh.
Yeah, especially with the whole nomad culture, as well as a fierce aversion to the written word. Jewish people are all *about* the Written Word, so that feels like they by definition can't fit as easily with the ideas that the Speakers represent.
Yeah, Blue's interpretation caught me a little off guard.
Trevor is dancing cause he has to be there
Alucard is indifferent.
SYPHA IS HAVING A BALL
Yeah she is shooting fire to make the dance cooler
10:19 That scene is basically my favorite scene in the show because of the line after “God is not here” which is “this is an empty box.” It implies that, not only has God abandoned the bishop, but he did it a long time ago. The way I interpreted it, that box has been empty for a very long time because God hasn’t been with the Bishop for at least a year. It does a lot to characterize God without us ever seeing or hearing them and it’s such an incredible moment of catharsis on top of that
Personally, I was thinking about the implication that the church WAS a holy place, until the bishop stepped into it. He's so antithetical to god that places that previously held god become devoid of him in the bishop's presence.
Also implies that maybe the Bishop doesn't have an actual church congregation, they're all too scared of him or hate him or he just doesn't actually hold mass for them, "his" church is basically just his fortress and office.
@@Vinemaple That fits perfectly with my understanding of him, especially after he says heaven holds no appeal for him. He can't PREACH to COMMONERS, he doesn't have the time! He's too busy doing gods work and rooting out more heretics to burn!
I'd say that God has left the Bishop at least a year ago, but I have to wonder. Was the burning of Lisa the first bad thing he has done? While we have no proof, we know that such people don't just materialize. I'm sure he has done other bad stuff before.
Similar to a certain judge in the show,.
I will say this. The Day Armour fight scene wasn't an homage to Berserk. That was a resume. That was a 'here is my prior work now when can I get started'.
Oh how I pray that the animator/s from the ‘Day Armor’ scene get explicit permission to adapt Berserk.
If Berserk got the same treatment Castlevania got (of animated adaptation), it would be a godsend.
@@trika91 Hopefully they can get past the Golden Age arc, or at least show all of it
@@snowking2464the golden age arc already had great adaptations though. As much as I wouldn't mind seeing another more modern adaptation, I think the later arcs are in more desperate need of one given their most recent attempt
@@convergeman7825 Yeah but we don't get to see that cool assassin team that they have to fight, or that demon knight
@@snowking2464 Ah true, I forgot that neither adaptation ever covered that demon knight chase, which would be cool to see since I think it's also the first proper demonic entity that Guts ever kills.
"You... Cannot be in the house of God..."
*Snort* "God is _not here._ This is an empty box."
"God is in all his churches...! My life's work is in His name!"
"Your life's work, makes Him puke."
"I-I am the bishop of Gresit...!"
"Your God's love is not unconditional. He does not love us, and He does not love you. _This is all your fault, isn't it?"_
_"She was a witch!"_
"...lies? In your house of God? _No wonder He has abandoned you._ But we love you."
"What?"
_"We love you._ We wouldn't be here without you. Let me... _kiss you."_
*Messy kissing noises mix with the sound of ripping flesh and dripping blood*
That entire scene was so raw
I really love how the show calls out the church on its bullsh*t. Cause how many innocent people were put to the torch because they were thought to be witches. How many people were slaughtered in the name of God.
@@equusheart3344Far too many from the looks of it.
The average estimate for people killed in european witch hunts is between 35,000 and 60,000.. So far, far too many, I'd say.
The mock-offended way it says "in your house of God?" is _so_ c*nty, I love it
ANOTHER Castlevania detail diatribe?!
AND Hollow knight music in the background?!
Yeah, I'm okay with this.
YEHA HOLLOW KNOGIT MYSIC
And the specific song makes it feel like the Crossroads spring but the two bugs are Red and Blue
@@1033515 That's because it IS the song for the hot springs! "Reflection" on the album; it plays around most safe spots/benches, and has a sort of radio filter in the lower Queen's Gardens bench and when you're in a Tram. Personally saw the Deepnest spring with Quirrel.
I was almost a full hour in when I finally noticed the music and had to rewind because I missed what they were talking about focusing on it.
i just clicked on it and the second i heard the first note of the bench theme all of my braincells started lighting up like a christmas tree. i think i need help
The discussion of how Dracula gets "turned" by Lisa and how vampires stagnate easily (though they're not completely incapable of change) reminds me so much of...the original Bram Stoker novel. Like, the thing that makes Dracula so dangerous in the book is the fact that he's suddenly gotten interested in this guy who's introduced him to a bunch of modern concepts and he's like, "Oh cool, maybe I could update my plans, do some murder in the big city, maybe make a big ol' vampire army, why not" and those are all things he could have been doing all along but he never thought of it because his nature is to be who he HAD BEEN. It took peaceful contact with a human in a non-livestock context for him to even ponder who he COULD BE. And that kind of contact clearly hadn't happened in a long time.
Huh. never really thought about it that way. Definitely enhances the twist of Dracula (the book) being "the gothic horror comes back home with you." I always thought Dracula had already decided to go to England, and was just getting Jonathan's advise on good places to stay from which he could fulfill his plans. But Jonathan inadvertently being the one to inspire that curiosity and ambition into a vampiric lord is a compelling read, and it makes me all the more desperate for a modern adaptation of Dracula.
The “We love you. We wouldn’t be here without you. Let me kiss you.” line from the night creature is the best line read and the most cathartic scene in the whole show for me.
I am beyond down for the fairness boogie.
Also, I always thought it was a conscious choice to make St Germain’s girlfriend not have a voice because he’s obsessed with her as the object of his love. She’s not really a person, she’s the idea that he’s not wrong in being a rude conniving asshole because if SHE’S smart enough to like him then everyone else is just as stupid as he treats them. She doesn’t have a voice because he never really cared for what she had to say.
To me she was the manifestation of his utter unwillingness to change. Where Dracula goes “uh oh. I think I like you. I want to know more about you and listen to your ideas,” St Germain goes “uh oh. I’m madly in love with you. Good for you! Anyways back to what I was saying.”
That's the read I had as well! I'm so glad to see someone else say this! I also wonder if the flashbacks we see in the show of her are accurate, or just St Germain's rose tinted memories of a person who never really cared about him...
Isaac (and the boat):
"We want you out of this town, by the least effort/disturbance possible"
"I want exactly the same, just let me walk through and we both get what we want"
"No, go back where you came from..."
"You've seen this is physically not possible, letting me through IS the least effort/disturbance possible"
"I don't care, drown or something"
"Per your request, just killing every single one of you, became the least effort solution"
A perfect scene to make you root for the villain.
@@zj6074 Root for a guy who bought a bunch of monsters in town?
@Veles_Ra The same guy who was openly non hostile, has full control over said monsters, and offered to leave peacefully? Yeah.
@@MrSignman65 Mate, put yourself in the guards position. If a strange man just came into a town with a bunch of demons behind him, you would just let him walk through it? Potentially putting your entire town at risk.?
@@Veles_Ra Given my options are "trust his offer of peace" or "actively provoke him" yeah I think I'd take my chances rather than *choose* the worse option. I mean we saw how that turned out.
The fact that Sypha in the fair use trio is the only one smiling fits her so well lmao. PS cute dancing sword lol.
Pos cute magic effects when she dances great job and great detail.
Dracula and Magneto.
The patron saints of: "I'm not saying they are right... i'm saying i get it."
"Lenore, who's every second of screen time drags the audience further from god."
Look, Blue, you're not wrong.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
There is no But.
No, no, he's right. Redhead vampires are definitely a weakness of mi- I MEAN a lot of people. Others. Not me. Yep.
I don't think I laughed harder from anything else in the show than the casual "not now darling the people are talking" she tossed out later when the facade dropped, god it was great lmao
She's kinda goals.
hector tried to act like the vampirizz wouldnt work on him but when i put myself in his shoes, i just hear that 'im only human after all' song.
i cant blame him for folding like an origami swan.
There is no But, there is only butt
I think the best use of the Castlevania series establishing that Holy Power is a thing, but not fully aligned with the world's religions, is in Aria of Sorrow: The Belmonts have had an iffy relationship with the Church throughout time, as the Belmonts are willing to draw upon unorthodox powers and methods if it helps people. And in Aria, you can get a Holy element sword that just makes mince-meat of pretty much every monster, smiting them with it's power. But towards the end of that game, you fight a Belmont. And your Holy sword suddenly ISN"T HELPING, as he resists Holy. So whatever is powering the Holy artifacts does have a good sense for who is truly trying to do good.
A little sad they didn't bring up when Hector and Carmilla used the undead Bishop to bless the river Dracula's forces were walking over and he was actually able to bless it.
And then he dies for a second time because the holy water straight up burns him alive.
kinda implies that rituals like creating holy water are just a form of magic, not really tied to a divine source, and the church just exploits it to create the illusion of divinity.
@@glitterboy2098 Oh that is most certainly a valid interpretation. One that I do favor. I know it was mentioned in the video, how the demon who Sala and the monks worked with mimicked the crucifixion of Christ. Either Red or Blue, I forgot which, did touch on the same topic of anyone can channel holy power as long as they go "through the motions." In turn making it just another form of magic.
I know when I first watched that seen I was under the interpretation of God has allow a priest to use holy power. As it is in quite a lot of fantasy. So the Bishop blessing the river to kill both the vampires and himself is his "one good deed" in the eyes of God.
@@glitterboy2098 Debtable, Trevor just asks for someone who was actually ordained in a church. The corrupt priest obviously was actually ordained in a church
I remember seeing Red’s initial reaction to the season 4 poster on Twitter.
“I've been doing a little too much trope-based media analysis and may I just say that trevor's new Oops All Death Flags redesign looks absolutely marvelous -R”
Minor correction; Death in this show isn't so much a force of nature (read: ACTUAL death), but a being of a higher plane that feeds off death in the same manner a vampire feeds on the blood of the living.
Not a huge difference, but a notable one.
He may be Death but he’s not Death, Straight Up.
@collecter343 he's not even a wolf in vampire's clothing, he's just a skeleton
The lines. "This is an empty box" and "lies? In your house of God?" They are so raw.
Another thought: Draculas' response feels like a person with unfinished therapy.
Like blown out of proportion for sure but it gives the vibes of. Someone whose. One reason for living was just taken.
I'm part of the religion that's being demonized in this show and I know not everyone is so cartoonishly evil or ignorant as they are depicted. That said the key words are "not everyone" even in my personal life I've met people that made me think "You're the reason we're shown like this" so their was a particular level of catharsis in seeing him being cornered by monsters that I'm not sure others can appreciate
@@Broomer52Having the actual priest bless the well water earlier helps with that scene as well for comparison purposes, and shows that with actual faith even the mundane folk can square up against evil when the time comes.
It also kind of helps they're a minor character, and is practicing the show don't tell aspect of faith by not being massively blinged out and perpetually yapping like the bishop. Reminds me of Michael Carpenter from Dresden Files in that aspect.
Given their penchant for orality and their inherent nomadism i'd say the Speakers are much closer to an allegory for Romani people, specially given the area and timeframe and subject matter of the show.
Jews and Romani people shared many struggles in the euro-asiatic erea. We suffered under christian and islamic rule and we where one was perdecuted the other was also usually persecuted.
I think that in castlevania the speakers are an alegory for the Romani people for the simole reason that they are more nomadic. Jews never wanted to be a nomadic people, we always wanted to return to our ancestral land and lived amonge other nations for the time.
@@נדבישרהוכמןthe speakers could also just as easily be a combination. Mainly Romani but with hints of Jewish lore and culture sprinkled in.
@@astoroidea6502 yhe I think thats the most probable case, especially in noctutn the speakers seem much more jewish. In any way I dont see why it has to be exvlusive. Every persecuted nation or ethnic can see itself in the speakers.
Fun little fact about the predator brain geometric shape thing; Lion tamers use chairs for a similar reason, the lion can't focus on all 4 points of the chair legs at the same time thus it stuns them briefly.
Something I've thought about this show, there's actual magic? Like people do full ass magic and the church just had to go after the lady that grinds herbs
Same reason cops shoot unarmed civilians rather than respond to actual armed firefights
Cowardice in complacent authority
It's a easy win, they get to posture about saving humanity and there is little chance of any reprocessing cause it's just a peasant from a shitty little village.
I see where you're coming from... But they do very much also persecute the actual magic users.
What @Eiskralle1 said. Sypha was a well-kept secret, hidden among the Speakers, until the prophecy basically meant she had to go with Trevor. And the Speakers' predilection for cultivating magic-users is a big part of why they're nomadic, making it hard for the church to get a good whiff of suspicion on them.
We see lots of magic because we see the protagonists. But notably, we don't see much Church.
@@Duiker36 yeah, that's very true. My thought behind it was there are actual magicians, like the people that summon the skeletons from season 3 iirc, and I'm sure they were doing that before dracula happened, and THEY have to be taken care of by a Belmont and Belnades while little turtle man causes the apocalypse over a lady that lights her fire with a flint. The church is just terrible, and went on an actual witch hunt instead of going after the people making the woods sound like a xylophone exhibition
Sypha really is the ideal partner.
Shes smart, witty, driven, confident, and has the ability to murder hordes of invading night creatures with kickass ice magic.
Honestly all pluses in my book.
Also sass.
She's the best
It is 45 seconds into the video and I already absolutely ADORE the "Fair Use Protection Trio".
I think it's the incredibly in-character facial expressions. Alucard is bored, Sypha is having a great time, and Trevor is annoyed that someone is making him do fun things. They must return.
Which kind of lines up with their characterization, doesn't it
All the talk about evil, actually kinda reminded me of Tolkien, where one of the themes in Tolkien's works is that just killing evil things is not enough, and that having kindness and compassion is more important to being a good person than killing the bad guy.
I actually think Saint Germaine’s ex not having a voice works, because it was never really about her, it was about him and the story he made in his head. _I just need her, she has to take me back, I need this more than the world needs to live._ She was an idea, an image of the unattainable.
I love that this loops back around to Symphony of the Night's opening: "It was not by my hand that I was once again given flesh. It was by humans who sought to pay me tribute." And the disdain in Dracula's delivery of that line.
Vis a Vis the "crucifixes hurt all night creatures how can we reconcile this" i like how the Dresden Files handles it. It is not the symbol itself that harms creatures of the night but it is the Faith that those symbols inspire. The main character Harry Dresden remarks at one point that a crucifix in his hand is so much matchwood to an angry vampire but when he focuses his will upon his pentacle amulet, the symbol of Magic, he is able to use that to ward off a vampire because he has Faith in magic and that Faith has power
It also works similarly with the Swords of the Cross. Our first impression is through Michael Carpenter, The Most Catholic Lawful Good Paladin Of All Time. But then we meet Shiro, who is only technically a Baptist, yet wields the Sword of Faith expertly, and Sanya, who blatantly doesn't believe, yet is the ideal wielder of the Sword of Hope.
Still working through the video, but one of my favorite bits about Castlevania is how wildly different people can advance the same cause, whether that’s good or evil. Lisa and The Captain both approach the problem differently, but still employ a heavy dose of empathy and compassion to remarkable results.
Warren Ellis (though aterrible human being) has a very distinct writing style where characters (good and evil) say exactly what they are going to do, then set out doing it. There are very few "shocking reveals" because of this. The thing that makes it enjoyable is watching how these competing declarations of intent unfold. I have always enjoyed this style of storytelling and Castlevania is one of my favorite shows.
This shows up to a lesser extent in the games as Dracula ends up unwittingly inspiring a series of cults dedicated to either reviving or replacing him. The last one in particular decided to deliberately stage an execution to look like Lisa's just because they wanted another scapegoat for humanity.
Then there's Brauner, who's explicitly a villain because his daughters died in a World War and he went mad with grief
Btw, the cross being a confusing geometric shape is a direct homage to Peter Watts sci-fi novel “Blindsight”. In that book, vampires are confused by right angles.
Having existed within the *Castlevania* fandom for a reasonable amount of time, I can no longer partake in any discussion revolving around geometric shapes vs. vampires.
Some time ago I came across a comic of Trevor showing Alucard a geometry text book to scare him, and it's lived in my head rent free ever since. I just internally burst out laughing every time I see the topic getting brought up.
Wow! Last time I was this early, Dracula was still human
Me too lol
1094, that was a while a go.
Last time I was this early, the first game was still being made.
@@Hawkatanagood times
Last time I was this early, Lisa was still alive.
Lisa and Dracula got the best ending in the entire series:
"What the fuck just happened?"
"Who cares, just roll with it."
The crucifix brain short circuit was also employed in Peter Watts 'Blindsight' It's the reason vampires went extinct when architecture became a thing in that setting (vampires being humanity-adjacent like homo erectus or the neanderthal), their brains working in a different way that actually works to an advantage in some settings (they can see both the duck and the rabbit simultaneously in the duck-rabbit illusion, as an example because they process visual information differently).
God when the bishop's getting wrecked: "I'll allow it!"
"Diplomacy with her meat" is one of the wildest sentences I've ever heard
That's just what shepherding is.
I mean that’s basically what Lenore did at the end of season 3
To me, Sala's panic at the end of season 3 was because he wasn't ever ACTUALLY on board. Sala was quick to convert and just as quick to abandon the new faith. He's just not very strong in ANY conviction when he's challenged (first by the monster and then the corridor)
That's interesting. I interpreted it as the night creature having a form of mental manipulation on Sala and once the corridor was open it no longer needed him and he snapped out of it. "What the f*ck is that?"
I always interpreted it as him just not fully grasping what he was getting himself into until giant demonic angels started crawling out
What I think is so interesting about Red is her extensive vocabulary and catalog of phrases
Castlevania Nocturne actually backtracks on the holy symbol thing, it appears that crosses have magic power to turn vampires. Though it may also be that the vampire's own faith gave him that weakness to crosses
Who knows how Vampires have continued to evolve alongside magic during the intervening centuries between Trevor and Richter
I do personally believe that it was the vampire’s faith that made him weak to it. Cause even in Castlevania Season 4, Sypha asks why the cross also works on vampires of other faiths.
Altho, he had pledged himself to erszebet as his god? Maybe that just says how he really views her. Following her because she is powerful.
I am very much a fan of religious symbols being bad for vampires only if they have faith in them. A book I reread often as a teenager had a Jewish vampire, and when someone threatened him with a crucifix, he plucked it out of their hand and remarked that they had the wrong religion.
Conversely, sometimes holy symbols only work if the hunter has faith in them, which was the case in Dresden Files. A Star of David or non infernal Pentagram has as much power to dispel vampires as a crucifix.
@@bthsr7113 I remember Classic Who had an insanely fun version of this, where an atheist Communist in WWII held up the Red Star from his uniform, and his faith in Communist Ideals was enough to give it power.
As soon as I saw Isaac in the thumbnail I clicked it immediately. They did such an amazing job with his character growth and I wish they delved deeper into the interesting perspective of any demons who could speak
Sala bailed because while he was a lunatic fully lost in the sauce, he was also an idiot. He didn't have any idea of what he was doing; he was just doing what the Night Creature told him to. When it all turned out to be real in ways his mushy little brain could never conceive of, he panicked.
Hello fair use protection trio! 1:06
I love the designs for the fair use trio! I never knew I needed a Chibivania until today
Red- Alucard
Blue- Trevor
Cyan- Sypha
Red should really be Trevor
But Red fits Trevor's vibe more, and Blue Alucard's as well
@@fallingskymedia4421 blue and cyan are married or at least live in the same house
Like how no one disagrees with Cyan as Sypha
Cringe
I love all your Castlevania Diatribes. Hope Noctune gets time in the spotlight.
A thought I had around 53:13;
It's mentioned later that "divine" work can only be done through human will in-universe. Death says something along the lines of, "Only human hands can reach into Hell. How fucked up is that?"
It's interesting to have that brought up well before Death and his plan are introduced into the story, and it's rad to see those dots connected in this format.
Vampires in Dracula's Court:
Who could have forseen the "kill all humans" party would actually kill all human. Even my humans that I need to feed off of. 😯 27:50
1:06:41 Lenore actually drinking when red says “that’s what I think”
Having the Hollow Knight stag station theme for your background tune was inspired.
It's the bench theme! Iirc it's called Reflections, which, I mean, appropriate!!
@@essneyallen6777 Ah okay! I just came to associate it with the Stag Stations because there's a bench at nearly every one.
That’s what it was! Recognized Hollow Knight but was about to look it up. Saved me some effort
CASTLEVANIA DETAIL DIATRIBE LET'S FUCKING GOOOOOOOO!!!!!!
Still the best religious horror I've seen to date. "You make Him sick... Lies? In your house of God?"
So so so so much scarier and more compelling than "your god isn't real" "yes he is" "nuh uh" "yeah huh" "nuh uh" "you make a good point time for me to crash out"
Man. The Fair-use Golden trio are adorable 😊
"You're not you when you're hungry. Have a berry," has got to be the best joke out of OSP! Fight me! xD
Little clarification I would like add as a viewer. Death, as portrayed in the show, is not the actually force of nature/concept of death. Trevor does say it isn't actual death, it's just a parasite that feels off of people dying, and I believe he says it pretends to be the actual Death.
I really like that they used the geometric shapes explanation for crosses, because afaik it originally came from Blindsight by Peter Watts which is a _great_ book.
IIRC, Carmilla is also the only vampire during Season 2 who realizes "Oh, this isn't some plan to rule the world. This is the most elaborate murder-suicide the world will ever see".
Godbrand seemed to figure it out. He directly asks Dracula what they will drink if humanity is gone. He's also the one to put together that Dracula doesn't seem to be feeding and is in a weakened state. He might have been a blowhard but I don't think Godbrand was as stupid as he might look at first glance. Then again he made the boneheaded decision to bring his plan of a coup to Isaac so maybe this is one of those "broken clock" moments.
This is quite fortuitous; I literally just rewatched the “You must be the Belmont” video and subsequently picked up the other seasons I’d yet to watch.
The Captain was probably my favorite character in the series. He had only a few minutes of screen time, yet he made such an impact.
I believe Lenore could’ve been like Dracula, in that she would’ve found a better way of living despite being a vampire, if not for her sisters’ awful influence and Hector being the human she unfortunately gets attached to, instead of someone like Lisa who would willingly seek out a vampire and try to change them to be better for the sake of humanity instead of for herself. Dracula being a recluse with no other insight besides his own allowed him to be in a head space to at least entertain a different life for himself, a somewhat luxury Lenore didn’t have.
I was thinking about this last night - so she said that she wouldn't let Isaac, Hector or anyone else cage her before she decided to bite it.
Right, it reminded me of the berry conversation Isaac had with the philosopher night creature - Isaac was suggesting that though creatures of the night may be something like a hammer, a blade, etc, they could also be constructive forces. It's like how someone said in a comment, it's very hard for an immortal being (esp one that's demonised for its very nature) to cope with a short term change of that scale, and have faith in the world and themselves that it could turn out to be okay. It's as you said, she didn't have the influence of someone like Lisa long enough to allow them to...dream, I suppose. Tragic when you think about it, that Isaac could have been that for her, but it's a hard one to ask when you just murdered her old time close friend (and may do the same to her if she "slips up" and eats people).
I get her feelings though, in a way, because humans only have to deal with so many decades of change before dying of disease essentially. Vampires won't die of old age, so it takes someone with immense mental resilience to endure a super long life. Which ties in to their whole conversation in the end about strength vs power. What Red said about some vampires rather dying than accepting a change probably mirrors the same dynamics people who do end up committing suicide undergo, they often mistake a death of the ego to be literal, so in that instability, they can't bear it and kill "themselves" in literal terms.
Gotta say, I just finished rewatching (after only having seen it when it came out) and really enjoyed everyone's character arc. It's hilarious when CARmilla calls Isaac the least interesting man in Dracula's court, but upon this rewatch, he was one of my favourite characters to follow. Hit me at the same stage in life, yknow : )
I grew up in a very catholic area in Europe and i felt like the way this show portrayed the ignorance and way the church tells the people what is right and what is true, was incredibly accurate to how going to church and having religious classes in school and kindergarten felt to me as a child
I liked how the Thunderstruck webcomic did the "holy item that works vs one that doesn't" by tying the holy power to the crafting process and the person who made it.
If you've got some factory-made, mass-produced cross necklace made by the cheapest paid rando's some manager could find? Good luck. Might as well be a lump of slag.
But that sword that the craftsman reveres and considers it a sacred art to make? Please put that away, ma'am, you're scaring the ghouls.
Bit off topic, but I like the idea that capitalist consumerism is antithetical to the idea of true religious faith. Faith exists beyond the material, into the very best qualities of our humanity as a means of connection with the divine. You can't mass-manufacture belief. It has to be cultivated and sought for by one's own sincerity.
OH WE ARE EATING GOOD TODAY
Hell yeah we are!
We eating blood
You were not the master of your Castlevania if you didn't dance along to the Fair-Use Golden Trio.
‘It feels like I’m haunted by a poltergeist but the poltergeist is also me’ is an extremely funny line lol
I've got to Point out OneTake's video: "What is Castlevania Realy About?" Its so good and I think it adds so much to this videos discussion.
Detail Diatribes to receive more than one part
Superman
Spider-Man
Castlevainia
Truly the most important works of fiction in human history
The Dominus collection has had me binging Castlevania content for the last week.
What a great night for a curse 😊
*Omg. I've written on random forums so much about how humanity, the thing Dracula thinks humans lack - and that lack of it killed his wife - is exactly what gets Dracula killed.
It's weirdly what also almost made him win the fight, when Sypha couldn't stop blasting Drac with fire because Alucard was getting a bit toasty too. That moment was pivotal in wearing him down, and Sypha let up because she was feeling *too* humane. If they gave you every opportunity they had because it put another in a risky situation, they probably could never win. Heck, taking on, and defeating, Dracula's meteor thingy required all 3 of them to stand in the line of fire.
Dracula's ENTIRE last moments are defined by what humanity *is* and *isn't.*
The "you are all so f***ing rude" scene has now replaced the Alucard talking to his companion dolls as the funniest thing to come out of this show thanks to you. It used to be an epic line for me, but now I can't stop giggling while thinking of it. Love you guys
Holy shit the whole "night creatures walk into the church and he's all 'wait a minute, that's illegal'" part fuckin got my ass lmaooo
The Fair-Use Golden Trio are amazing. I smile every time they come up. Sypha is so cute.
Fun fact: Saint Germain is voiced by Bill Nighy aka Davy Jones :))))
RATTLESNAKE JAKE VOICES THE FUNNY ALCHEMIST TIME TRAVELER MAN???
Thank you. Very fun fact. I can absolutely hear it now
Oh Blue gets to break out the philosophy hat with the “what is evil”
The "shape of the cross" thing felt like it might have been yoinked from the Peter Watts novel 'Blindsight', which was a sci-fi novel providing a reason why the strictly-superior vampires hadn't ended up running the earth and put it down to a processing problem in their visual cortex. Like, it was literally the same explanation.
me sitting like that one scene from totally spies agreeing with dracula as he starts raining actual hellfire on wallachia
you tell em sista
14:10 on this note, Trevor gave that speech in Gresit, about how the man of the church that had misled them all into committing murder, of people that just wanted to help, by just leveraging their fears.
The “Fair-Use Protection Trio” is absolutely wonderful.
I LOVE the fair-use golden trio!
Love the Golden Trio partying through the video
💛💙🤍
Just started the video, LOVIN the FAIR-USE PROTECTION TRIO!
I love this kind of detail diatribe because you can really feel the best friends energy between Red and Blue.
the explanation of holy symbols working is also an interesting scene in that it demonstrates that Hunters like the Belmonts know *far* more about science, biology, etc than the regular people of the time. using scientific concepts that wouldn't be developed IRL until centuries later. clearly the belmont's did a very good job of learning from the vampires as well as hunting them. (no doubt a lot of that library of theirs was obtained from the libraries of vampires and other immortals)
the subtle anacronism there really helps get across the idea of secret knowledge that regular man does not have access to, that pervades the lives of the vampires we see.
You've missed a significant point about The Judge.
He's not just a guy who's all about protecting people and being orderly while killing children on the side, he kills those kids in furthering the order he's trying to create.
He had a rule about no running in the village. Who constantly broke that rule?
He's furthering order in the village, that's how he saw it, that's how he justified it.
He's like Dexter because on the one hand he genuinely believed he was helping by removing these "troublemakers" but also kept trophies and understood how everyone else would view his actions.