Fate/Apocrypha

THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SOME SPOILERS Ahhh. A-1 Pictures. The studio who have time and time again, blessed us with their heavenly touch. Once again delivering the seasonal train-wreck that they have been doing so effectively since the creation of time itself. Being one of the most popular studios for both Western and Japanese fans; A-1 have made some of the most popular shows to come out of the medium. Many battle shounen such as Magi, Blue Exorcist, Fairy Tail and The seven deadly sins have all been met with a warm embrace from anime fans. Last year’s big hit Erased, two of the most popular melodramas in Anohana and Your Lie in April, and the most important one of all: Sword Art Online. They have a lengthy list of popular shows but most of which are not met with the warmest of critical receptions and many usually have a split amongst watchers. Many casual watchers who are not very invested into the anime medium praise their works for their accessibility and good production values. On the other hand, more demanding viewers have scrutinized their shows for poor writing quality, needless otaku pandering, needless fanservice and in some cases; being an absolute train-wreck. I do believe that there is a lot of truth to what many say. Most shows I have encountered from A-1 are weak and only fill a criteria in order to make the maximum amount of profit they can. To cut a long story short; they are a mainstream magnet. While some of their shows are a little excessively over hated their latest title deserves all of the hate it has gotten and has reminded me why I ultimately dislike A-1. Fate/Apocrypha is the latest title to come fresh off the conveyor belt and put another popular A-1 show in the limelight once again. This particular fate title follows the same basic formula you would expect from the franchise, but it does have its own unique twist in the plot. Instead of seven masters with seven servants fighting amongst each other for the Holy Grail, two factions fight over the grail each with their own set of seven servants and seven masters. Fate/Apocrypha is an alternate universe that branches off the fate/stay night universe where the Holy Grail has disappeared after the third Holy Grail war and has landed in the possession of a mage family that declared that they are in ownership of the grail and secede from the association. As cool as its premise might sound on paper, Fate/Apocrypha is absolute trash. It’s a downright train-wreck no matter which angle I approach it from. Its first mistake was starting off with a draining info-dump. A fantastic way to immerse the viewers! But that is far from the worst problem. The show tries to make the audience in some way, shape or form care for over fifteen named characters all of which either look like generic waifus or characters out of a final fantasy game. When you have Jack the ripper being portrayed as a loli, that really says a lot about what kind of show this is doesn’t it? Let’s also not forget about a certain trap that took the anime world by storm. I wouldn’t blame guys for pulling their dicks out to Astolfo since he resembles a female more than actual females do. Apart from blatant fetishizing, enabling those who want him as their waifbando to better self-insert and fulfill their deviant wishes. Astolfo's backstory was never really dug into enough to make him a distinguishable character with his own vision and ideals which further fuels the point that the only purpose he served in this calamity of a story is otaku fuel. The fate franchise has always used sympathetic backstories to draw attention from the viewer. This worked far more efficiently in previous fate titles because they were about a much smaller group of characters who were a lot more distinctive from each other. Despite my problems with other fate incarnations, their characters were easier to care for because of tighter focus and a more well-structured surrounding plot. In this catastrophe, the show will very loosely reveal glimpses of a character's past while immediately transitioning to another character in a completely different scenario. This is not only immersion breaking for the viewer, but trying to split attention between a huge group of characters all of which look similar and are mostly generic anime archetypes is a huge step in achieving train-wreck status. Most characters lack any sort of meaningful characterization and most are too cookie-cutter which ultimately drags them down to the dirt. In addition to the characters being poor, the relationships between them are equally as dull with barely any engaging character chemistry or dialogue due to the dry atmosphere, dull presentation and lack of charisma from any of the cast bar Ruler who unlike everyone else, has some style and charm embedded in her. The rest are not worth mentioning individually as they generally share the same problems, a perfect example of lackluster script writing and the overall stupidity of most A-1 shows. Furthermore, Fate/Apocrypha takes the extra step of killing off a character that seemed to be important to the overarching plot in just the 4th episode. All while desperately leeching for the audience’s sympathy with a half-baked and ham-fisted flashback right before his death. And you think that’s bad? What is even worse than that scenario is that he gave his life for a self-insert protagonist whom he’d just met by giving him his heart. Fate/Apocrypha cannot only handle its cast properly but it exceeded my expectations by handing me one of the most contrived scenarios in anime I have seen in awhile. Yet again, another perfect example of incompetent script writing. Additionally, the bland self-insert protagonist whom had his life saved in the most contrived manner possible, makes one of the most ridiculous decisions he could ever have made. Being a homunculus made for war he escaped his captives under the protection of his trap-bait waifu and finally had the chance to live a free life. A sane human being would pick that option right? Well think again. This piece of shit character decides to jump straight back into the battlefield to save the other homunculus being held captive all of which he doesn’t even know personally on top of going to fight for a brainless reason just after being held in a container all his life. As bad as the characters and script are in Apocrypha, what ultimately makes this show horrendously disengaging is that nothing in this anime feels important. It’s almost completely devoid of personality and energy making it an absolute snooze-fest nine times out of ten. Energy stems primarily from the characters. A charismatic cast is what gives a show charm and in effect, makes it more immersive. But I feel none of that from apocrypha. Its plot doesn’t have a single shred of significance. What was the final straw for making me realize this is when a character attempted to sacrifice themselves in an attempt to take a formidable enemy with them. At that point in time I gave more fucks about cutting my nails than an artificial character with an artificial flashback that was thrown into an artificial scenario. And to put the icing on the cake, our bland self-insert was revived from almost certain death without any logical explanation. I call a bullshit asspull! If that isn’t the perfect sign of a train-wreck, then what is? Even some minor thematic significance does not stop a train-wreck from being a train-wreck. In the second half the anime started to explore some ideas relating to the nature of humanity and its salvation, ultimately ending in failure. Furthermore, Fate/Apocrypha never showed any illustrations, actions or consequences to serve its themes. Instead it presented them through bland characters who served as mouthpieces telling the audience about the themes instead of showing them through the plot to. It shows glimpses of events through some character flashbacks that support its themes but none of them are developed enoug…

Taking a footstep into the Type-Moon universe feels almost intimidating at first. The franchise consists of an immense fictional universe that’s filled with unnatural ideas. Their flagship titles include the Fate franchise that were adapted into several TV series, OVAs, and movies. However, Fate/Apocrypha came to me as a show that couldn’t hold itself together. What could have been a big hit of the year translated into a nakedly boring storyteller that dropped the ball. To get the obvious out of the way, you don’t absolutely need to watch other Fate shows to understand Fate/Apocrypha. It’s advisable though since getting a better understanding of the general premise (in particular, the Holy Grail War) could improve your experience. Besides, the first few episodes does get into its exposition to explain some of the rules and concepts. It also introduces two sides of the Grail War with its ensemble of characters. I don’t want to jump the boat here but it felt like Fate/Apocrypha had to do a lot to please the viewers. Setting up a show with a story premise that involves two sides clashing for the ultimate prize sounds like a sensational attraction. It could really draw viewers, whether you’re a newbie or veteran of the Fate franchise. As someone in the middle like myself, it felt like a show that could really get viewers to really invest themselves more to what the Fate franchise had to offer. It’s sort of refreshing to see a war drama-like scenario rather than a battle royal. Unfortunately, it didn’t really live up to expectations that made this show feel any refreshing. It felt like a formulaic story that I couldn’t feel attached to or appreciated. As more episodes progressed, it became a chore to watch. Before I get to the what, how, and why, it’s important to understand what Fate/Apocrypha really did wrong. For a show like this, it obviously has a decent amount of characters it had to work with. Given the context that there are at least 7 masters and servants on both sides (Red faction and Black faction), there would be a minimum of 28 characters that gets involved in the main story. Then, there’s Ruler/Jeanne who serves as the mediator of the Grail War. (think of her like a middleman of a game) With 25 episodes adapting a 5-volume light novel series, the main concern lies with the fact that the show won’t have enough time to spotlight all the characters. Indeed, this anime did omit characterization on multiple fronts with its cast. This applies to both sides that includes the masters and servants. What made it worse is that the characters’ roles and motivations didn’t seem interesting to begin with. It just felt like the characters are there like pieces of a chess game. Some characters such as Mordred, Atalanta, and Jeanne has their own background stories. Unfortunately, those are vaguely explored and really doesn’t do justice with the show’s characterization. At the worst part, we have mindless characters like Spartacus and Jack the Ripper that just felt disposable. Now, we do have a main protagonist in the show despite the war-like drama going on. The show introduces Sieg, a homunculus that gets involved in the Holy Grail War. After a series of events, he gained the ability to transform into a servant in Siegfried’s form. To be honest, Sieg’s role in the show felt like a mixed bag for me. Compared to the other characters, he gets a lot of spotlight as he learns about himself, the world, and begins to act on his own morals. However, they are generic to the core and really doesn’t bring interest in terms of storytelling. On the other hand, his character chemistry with Jeanne is perhaps one of the better elements of the show as it makes them both look more human. Still, Sieg is portrayed too much like an average protagonist that just doesn’t stand out compared to the others. Everything he says almost sounds the same and he has a rather uninteresting personality as a character by himself. The only occasional time he shines is through character interactions with others. It’s also sad to say but most of the characters in this show can hardly shine on their own. It’s mostly the character chemistry that sells more interest. They come in a variety of forms such as respect (Mordred/Kairi), greed (Siegfried/Gordes), parental (Jack the Ripper/Reika), among others. Unfortunately, I confess that most of the character relationships in the show ended up being dry and empty. It felt like a lot was missing including insufferable personalities, roles, and in general, characterization. Shirou Kotome is a character that people will begin to take notice more in the latter half of the show. Still, I can’t say his role in the show is impressive given his view on humanity and morals. Shirou’s personality in this anime is also easy to dislike and feels more like they introduced him as an antithesis of Sieg. The clash of ideals gets old fast and tedious. The only plus on this is that both he and Sieg makes the story flow better as their roles are more acceptable. Just be aware of that the show suffers from weak plot devices and doesn’t do justice at telling its story. So Fate/Apocrypha did a lot of wrong. What did the show actually do right? For me, the characters themselves have rather distinctive personalities that can occasionally be entertaining to watch. Mordred is perhaps one of the more dynamic character with a prideful amount of charisma. Astolfo adds a big dose of comedy to this rather moody show. William the Shakespeare also shows a ton of energy through his philosophy and dialogues that can occasionally be amusing to watch. Even Frankenstein can occasionally have windows of moments that draws attention to viewers. Admitingly, I do miss a few of the characters after their demise. The story itself has a thoughtful premise despite the poor pacing at times and omitting/rushing certain content from the light novel. It’s very predictable at times but occasionally feels impactful when you see the plot being carried out. Unfortunately, these concepts are mostly scattered throughout the show and doesn’t connect each other in a balanced way. It’s like a broken toy that still has problems after being repaired. Watching Fate/Apocrypha’s action scenes reminds me of battle-shounen style cinematics. Rather than ufotable, A-1 Pictures takes this project that set off some red flags at first. Through their history of adapting shows with action, it felt like this anime’s technical elements would be mediocre. While it doesn’t live up to the caliber of ufotable, A-1 Pictures does live up to their standards. To put it simply, the show’s action scenes mostly looks sharp and stylish. In one particular episode in the latter half of the series, it really brings out a style of animation that stood out by itself. There are some episodes that suffers from raw visual quality with sloppier action movements but for most part, it lives up to expectations. Character facial expressions is also noticeable that showcases the persona of the cast. Jeanne, Atalanta, William the Shakespeare, and Jack the Ripper are a few examples. Character designs also stands out with noticeable traits such as Astolfo’s androgynous appearance, Frankenstein’s experimental look, Mordred’s prideful knight armor, or Semiramis’ devious dress. Jeanne herself stands out as well with her pure look as a spirit in a French girl’s body. Most of the fan service in the show comes with the violence rather than skin so do expect a lot of that. On the technical front, this anime‘s theme songs and OST delivered what I would expect from an action/fantasy show. It balances between orchestral, eerie, harmonious, and intense. In particular, the moments between Jeanne and Sieg has OST that make them stand out more compared to other character pairs. Character voice mannerism is suitable for most of the casts' personalities although it may take a while to get used to Astolfo and Sieg. Jeanne’s voice sounds too monotonous at times…

Fate/Apocrypha: A Postmortem Review Now that 2017 is drawing to a close, we can certainly say Fate/Apocrypha lived up to its name, given that this is an entirely unnecessary installment to view due to its poor quality. It is arguably the blandest, most forgettable installment in the Fate series, notable only for current memes and trends in the community, such as traps and the meme of lewding fictional characters, as well as for what it tried and failed to accomplish over the course of its run. Now before I delve into the review proper, allow me to answer some burning questions: “Can Fate/Apocrypha be watched as a standalone?” Yes, but I wouldn't recommend doing so, as you want to know the rules of the main Holy Grail Wars first that way you know how this deviates. It doesn't explain all of those rules either nor does it explain all of the new stuff it does despite some attempts. You should at least watch the main timeline installments to avoid possible confusion with this one. So no, do not make this your first, let alone only experience with Fate/ anime. “Should I watch Fate/Grand Order: First Order beforehand?” No. Pretend that abomination doesn't exist. It will not give you any insight into Apocrypha’s deviations either. All the entry does is cause confusion, not explain anything it adds or amends, and advertises a mobile game that contains all of the servants in the franchise. “I'm a guy. Is it gay if I like Astolfo as my waifu?” Yes it is and yes you are unless you're bi. Thankfully for you, he's bi too. Fate/Apocrypha, otherwise known by me as Fate/Steak Sauce, was animated primarily by Studio A-1 Pictures, and to be honest, I feel it may have utterly destroyed itself under its lofty ambitions in a variety of ways, resulting in a relatively dull mess full of improperly explained new mechanics, logical errors and holes, a cornucopia of characters that are as bloated as they are uninteresting to the point of even beating out last year’s juggernaut dumpster fire Re:Zero, and lastly, arguably the worst production values ever given to a major A-1 Pictures show. It simply spread itself too thin, leading to a disappointment in nearly all aspects. Before we really delve into why this show manages to be relatively disappointing in retrospect for me (as I was conditioned by footage and reception over the course of 23 weeks prior to my viewing of this failure to correctly assume this anime would be hovering around the subpar range at all times), how about we look at the one area Fate/Steak Sauce manages to somewhat excel in, that being the music. The composer, Masaru Yokoyama, did a rather decent job with the tracks present here such as its namesake track “Fate/Apocrypha”, among a few other catchy and epic battle tracks. Some of these tracks are rather memorable, for right and wrong reasons. Simply put, these standout tracks get played way too much, particularly “Fate/Apocrypha” and “Jack the Ripper”, the latter of which plays in over ⅔ of the scenes Jack the Ripper and her master, Reina RIkudou, are in. Another issue is that sometimes the music just gets cut off, and while that may work once in a blue moon like in episodes 6 and 17 when a character saves another from a deadly surprise attack, the rest of the time it comes off as sloppy and jarring. Nowhere is this more apparent than with the first OP, where it just cuts off instead of ending and lingering for half a second like it probably should. Speaking of OPs, while OP1, "Eiyuu Unmei no Uta" is one of the weaker songs done by EGOIST, it is nonetheless as pretty good OP that works well given the nature of this show’s “Great Holy Grail War”. OP 2, "ASH", is one of LiSA’s strongest, rivaling, probably surpassing the band’s immensely popular SAO OP 1. This one feels like the perfect 2nd OP of a Light Novel action anime adaptation, which happens to be what LiSA’s songs are primarily used on with the likes of SAO, Mahouka, and Qualidea Code, and quite frankly, this is easily the catchiest LiSA OP to date for me. ED 1, "Désir" by GARNiDELiA, is a pretty decent track by this group as well, and of all the tracks I heard from her this year, this is arguably my favorite, but it certainly isn’t among my favorites she’s done. ED 2, "KOE" by ASCA, is absolutely astounding! If nothing else, Fate/Apocrypha has easily the best ED theme in the franchise to date, because this song is phenomenal, especially the full version! It fits perfectly for this kind of show as well in its 2nd cour too and the vocals are fantastic. I cannot wait to hear more songs from this group, and with this same studio releasing Grancrest Senki soon at the time of writing, I won’t have to wait too long it seems. Of course, you cannot properly review an anime without taking the actual visuals into account and woo boy was it...rocky. For starters, it seems like A-1 Pictures tried their own spin on the Ufotable face and artstyle and it often doesn’t work that well. The models quite frequently look off, and I can’t count the number of scenes where a character (or multiple characters) not horribly far from the foreground doesn’t have a face. There's also that time in episode 9 where Frankenstein’s arms and face became a slinky and turned an emotional scene into unintentional hilarity. The CGI is brief here though sometimes it just looks egregious too (Saber plane from episode 19, anyone?). Hell, the character designs pail massively in comparison to those of Zero and F/SN by a mile. The outfits range from meh to absolutely hideous, with some of the worst offenders being Shakespeare and especially Siegfried, who is easily the worst designed character in the franchise to me. Everything about this design feels ugly and wrong, especially the armorless glowing chest. Other bad designs include Jack the Ripper, who is a little girl (or little girl body that happens to carry the spirits of a plethora of souls of unfortunate children) with an outfit that TV tropes would define as “stripperific”. The fights are probably the most hit and miss aspect. Sometimes the fights look absolutely abysmal with ruthlessly horrendous choreography and shots that are entirely disconnected to the point of the fights becoming beyond incoherent and incomprehensible (see Karna vs Siegfried in episode 3). Not to mention that the frame rate of the fights can be immensely choppy, such as in the main fight of episode 21. Other times, however, many of the fights would actually become tolerable, if not downright wonderful to look at sometimes, such as anytime Karna busts out his fire moves starting from his fight with Vlad the Impaler in episode 8 and pretty much the entirety of episode 22 (yes, the art is less detailed but the animation is bombastic and dynamic, with absolutely wonderful looking flashy art and animation for the imaginative and stellar attacks and newly constructed environments). The actual choreography of nearly all melee is truly terrible, with some of the worst fights this studio has produced, but then we get those exemplary aforementioned examples on occasion and the fact that a lot of the time the flashy visuals are done effectively, and it all sorta averages out even, all things considered. There are two interesting plotlines in this series, both of which directly involve the main characters, Sieg, Jeanne (and technically Leticia), Astolfo, Shishigo, and Mordred. Those are his journey of learning what it’s like to live and have freedom, and what it really means to be good and find salvation. Over the course of the series, this homunculus, with little knowledge of the world, asks these questions and becomes part of an overarching dialogue with these characters who ask the same and end up coming to their own conclusions of at least one of the two answers, with heartwarming and heartbreaking circumstances and great, terrible, and far more morally ambiguous people fueling or at least playing some influence on said answers, especially for Sieg. He tries…

Fate/Apocrypha - a completely new Fate experience. Before I write down this review I will note few things: -This will be a spoiler free review. -I am reviewing it from a neutral standpoint and I have watched all Fate anime so far and I have extensive knowledge of the lore. -This anime has nothing to do with Fate/Stay Night so you can watch it even if you did not watch the original work. The work does good explanation of how the basics of Fate universe works. -I should also note that majority of negativity this show gets is because of fans of the franchise who expected another Fate/Stay Night story, which Apocrypha clearly is not. It has different theme, different characters and different setup. So I would suggest that you venture into this not expecting another FSN to get maximum experience, otherwise you will be as disappointing as many Fate fans were who were expecting something else and missed the point of the show. With that out of the way let the review begin: Intro: Fate/Apocrypha exists as a parallel universe to Fate/Stay Night, the Holy Grail War is not only in different location ( Romania instead of Japan ) but the war itself is bigger than ever. To compensate for the increase danger of something that may go wrong Servant Ruler was summoned to oversee the War. But nothing is at meets the eye as there are others who have different idea of how war should go. And thus our story begins... full of twists and epic battles. Story 8: Now I have read LN ( at least the parts that are translated ) and I can say that A-1 remained some 80% true to the novels. In some areas the change were good, in others... not so much. Characters suffered the most from this as many things that are associated to their background and character growth were removed. Surprisingly, the one character that suffered the most from this is main female lead - Ruler. Even if her introduction scene with main male lead in anime was made better the part they cut to make it possible is one of the most memorable from LN. I would suggest that you check the manga that remained much truer to the LN and didn't skip any character development parts like LN did. That is to say, story is really the weakest part of anime, but then again only to those who never read LN and do not know all the background stuff happening around the characters. Still I am not going to rate this very low as the removed parts did not affect that story that much. Ufotable is also guilty of this in Zero and UBW anime and I consider those very well done as far as adaptation of the main story goes. In Apocrypha the story is decent and interesting to watch. The plot twists are very few but done great, and the battles are just magnificent to watch. p.s. - to showcase the difference between stories I will write down main themes of them. It will not contain spoilers but it will give you some idea what to expect: Fate/Stay Night - Morality and how our choices affect everything around us. Apocrypha - Religion ( Apocrypha is filled with it, from debates to outright symbolism ) and are thing that we made for simple usage just that or can they also be much more than that? Art 9: Despite having low res here and there animation was quite decent and it get the job done. Special note on episode 22 that got praised by anime veterans ( among them Nasu himself, the creator of Fate ) because it was entirely hand drawn episode. Some moments are literally breathtaking as far as animation goes and the rest is decent. I should also note that this is all to TV station lowering the quality of episodes in order to air them. A-1 staff argued about this and when watch BD episodes I tend to agree with them. In that regard anime suffered as many expected better animation due to this being Fate work after all. All in all animation is good and it get's the job done. Sound 9: I really have nothing to add here. All Fate anime have great soundtracks ( 2006 FSN being the one with the best ) and VA really gave it their best here when voicing the characters. The sound was consistent during the entire show and some of the scenes where characters are chanting their special attack and giving important speeches are quite memorable. So as far as sound goes it is also well done. Characters 10: 90% of reason to watch this show, I am not kidding. Tn Fate the story, battle and moral messages are important bits but one thing that really push Fate forward ( and makes it as popular as it is ) are the characters. And Apocrypha has a lot of good and memorable ones with great character development and interesting backstories. You cannot help but liking most of them, even the bad guys. The only drawback here is that they have cut a lot of Ruler's backstory and some story elements ( which to me are very important for her full character development to be fleshed out ), some never get their full potential explored ( like Berserker of Red ) and others were outright pushed back for the sake of others being more highlighted. I should also address the biggest problem with this show here that many had - Main male character. He has very specific original story different from any other Fate MC. As such he is much weaker compared to others who already ahd established deep personality and character traits. Problem with him are also fans of Fate as they expected him to be as deep as the others, which for him was impossible mission. Other than that he is somewhat Mary Sue-ish in the anime, but not to the level where he will break any and all enjoyment from it. So enter Apocrypha accepting MC as he is and you will enjoy it all the more. Enjoyment 10: Apocrypha is really enjoyable Fate anime. The battles are fantastic and biggest in scale in all of Fate with Grand Order being the only exception to the rule, the characters are fun to watch and get attached to, the twists are done great, the calm moments between engagements are nice watch and the ending brings out so much feels... Fate/Stay Night 2006 last episode level of feels - especially the last 3 episodes. It is quite enjoyable and worthy addition to Fate franchise. Few negatives it has are so overshadowed by positives that are barely noticeable, and then again most of them are only if you read LN before watching it. So if you watch this and expect enjoying anime you will not be disappointed. Overall 9: Fate/Apocrypha is unique story in Fate franchise. It deals with different themes, has the biggest Grail War in series beside FGO, has a ton of enjoying characters - both Servants and Masters and when something sad happens to characters you cannot help but feel sorry for them. If you are fan of the franchise you should give this a go - especially if you are fan of Ruler and Saber of Red because I doubt we will see them any time soon ( if FGO get's anime that is, which I doubt will happen so soon ). If you are new to Fate - you can also watch this without fear of ruining yourself FSN experience ( unlike watching Zero before FSN 2006 and UBW anime series ) since the anime itself has very little connections to it. I highly recommend it, as both anime watcher and fan of the franchise.

Think of the worst anime you've ever seen. Is it Mars of Destruction? Pupa? Maybe it's something more obscure, maybe it's some bland magic academy show, maybe it's something very popular that you just you don't like at all. Now be grateful, because if the show you just thought off isn't Fate/Apocrypha, it means that you haven't yet watched this abomination to the Fate franchise. Fate/Apocrypha is A-1's attempt at milking the cash cow that is Fate, written by the dude who wrote the script for the horrid Danganronpa 3 Mirai-hen anime cash in, and it is easily the worst anime I have ever seen. No, seriously, I am in no way exaggerating, out of all the awful shows I've seen, no show can even be compared to how bad Fate/Apocrypha is. I gave Fate/Apocrypha the honor of me finishing it, mainly because of how I wanted to see how bad it could possibly get. Now please, let me explain why you should stay the furthest away from Fate/Apocrypha as possible. Now surely if you're familiar with the Fate universe, or any other Nasuverse show or Visual Novel, you know the various themes Kinoko Nasu or any other of the writers who wrote anything for Fate like to put forward. Fate/Zero focuses more on the ambitions and ideologies of the various servants summoned, while also presenting one of the best dilemmas in anime for it's ending which focuses on the idea of "justice", something that Urobutchi tends to like to base his stories on. Fate/Stay Night serves as an introduction to the Fate universe, and arguably does it even better than Fate/Zero. Unlimited Blade Works presents the idea of "Original vs Fake", and this same idea is developed a lot of more in Fate/strange Fake. Even Fate/kaleid, the fanservice-y loli show eventually puts forward exhilarating battles and does justice to the Nasuverse magic more than any other Fate show. Fate/Apocrypha on the other hand, is empty. The only thing Fate/Apocrypha tried to pull off is some half-assed "justice" conflict, which you have already seen a million times if you're somewhat into anime. And even then, this "justice" conflict is basically "All humans are evil!!!", "Nooo!!! Good humans exist too!!!". I'm not even making a strawman out of what is said in the actual show, "So, please don't say that goodness doesn't exist in this world!" is a real thing that a character in the show said, that is meant to be taken seriously. Either this is intended to be some massive joke, either this show is targeted towards 12 year old kids. Boy is this far from all the problems with the plot in Fate/Apocrypha. While all the other renditions of Fate all have 7 servants which are developed during the course of the show, Fate/Apocrypha has 14. 14 SERVANTS!!! This means that Fate/Apocrypha effectively has 28+ characters it has to develop in the span of 25 episodes. As you understand, this is impossible to do, so obviously most servants are left out, and a lot of masters are sidelined. ...Sidelined. The most interesting aspect of Fate is sidelined and becomes mundane. The show mainly focuses on a few select servants and masters which leaves you wondering "Why do I have to watch all these secondary characters interact? They don't matter in the long run". This thought is completely correct. Most of the characters are useless in the long run. The show would have honestly been better if the cast would be the classic 7, heck 5 servant-master combos. Heck, the plot in Fate/Apocrypha is basically sidelined. It's all just an excuse to have poor action play out. It can be resumed to "big shiny thing, me want. Reason me want? Me don't know". Although, the plot isn't really a strong aspect in any Fate anime (and it truly brings me pain to say this because I know that I'm wrong), what about the "strong" aspect of Fate, the characters? Well, the characters in Fate/Apocrypha are a shit show of their own. Not a single character is interesting. Not a single character brings anything interesting to the show. Not a single character serves any other purpose than just bad fanservice. I realised this fact by episode 3, and eventually started watching this show just for Mordred. Well, to my disappointment, Mordred ended up in the exact same situation as the rest of the cast. Her backstory was rushed, which of course it would be since there's barely any time for any of the characters, and her ambition and desire to get the grail ended up being a poor excuse to fight some people. Then there is Sieg, the walking definition of "Deus Ex Machina". Sieg is the puny homunculus you see in the beginning of the anime which *spoilers* ends up playing a major role in the show (He's literally on the cover of the show). The amount of plot armour Sieg has rivals the plot armour of Emiya Shirou. For no reason at all, every other member of the cast either has a mad crush on Sieg, either cares way too much about him. Even Jeanne D'Arc, the supposed "judge" who should remain neutral until the very end of the war develops a crush on Sieg. Why? Because it's Sieg. Without getting into spoilers (in case you want to watch this shitty show), the amount of times Sieg escaped death is insane. By "escaped death" I don't mean "came really close to dying", I mean "should have been dead". Fate/Apocrypha also ruins some of my favourite historical figures. In Fate/strange Fake, Jack the Ripper is presented as a mysterious incorporeal Berserker, a spirit of madness, which makes a lot of sense since Jack the Ripper literally had origin stories that claimed that the man who committed the crimes was possessed by a cursed watch. In Fate/Apocrypha, Jack the Ripper is a loli in a thong with mommy problems, and no, I'm not making this up, that's literally what she is. In one of the episodes Jeanne D'Arc takes out her sword, which is supposed to be a symbolic piece of rusted metal that she used to boost her troops morale. In Fate/Apocrypha, the said sword is a suicide magic wand that casts fireballs. As a side note, there is also a particular character which I despise that goes by the name of Astolfo. Astolfo is easily the worst thing to ever come out of Fate. Astolfo is a trap, a character type that recently became popular in anime. Astolfo, just by existing in the show, lowers the seriousness of the show by a lot, further implying that Fate/Apocrypha is just a poor fanservice show. What about the """miscellaneous""" parts of Fate/Apocrypha? As in, the Sound and the Art? Well, they're both terrible. Both of the openings of Fate/Apocrypha are boring and uninspired. The first opening is a terrible performance by EGOIST in which the vocalist sounds like a siren. The second opening is the most generic LiSA song ever. The endings are also boring, but hey, I wasn't expecting the endings to be remarkable. The worst part is the sound design. On multiple occasions the loud bass used for literally every single sound hurt my ears. Bullet being shot out? Loud bass. Fire burning? Loud bass. Swords clashing? Loud bass with 2016 Berserk clanking. Oddly enough, the person responsible for the sound design, Iwanami Yoshikazu, has done a good job in his previous works. It's as if he just gave up and used the same sound for every single thing in Fate/Apocrypha. The sound design being terrible heavily ruins the immersion. Fate/Apocrypha has one OST along with a few remixes of that OST. It's loud, it's bombastic, it's annoying, it doesn't fit, and it made me want to stop watching the episodes every time it played. As an insult to injury, my favourite voice actor of all time, Hayami Saori, does a terrible job voicing Atalanta. Finally, the art and animation. The art style is bland. It looks like a cheap knock off of ufotable's artstyle. But the art style isn't the worst part of the visual aspect of the show. The animation, IS AWFUL. I have no idea how a studio can fuck up this badly. Most of the time, nothing is shaded. There are loose keyframes every few seconds. The show abuses still frames, and on one occasion I h…

This is a spoiler free review on an anime that both deserves and does not deserve a lot of hate. I know my score is relatively high, but I urge you to keep in mind that this review is written by someone who has watched all 25 episodes and has acknowledged both the strengths and flaws of the anime. Story Alright let's get this out of the way. This show is not like Fate/Zero or Unlimited Blade Works or really any other Fate plot in the franchise, but I don't understand why these anime are used to compare against Apocrypha. The plot in Apocrypha is very different and plays with the rules of the Holy Grail War instead of having the standard 7 master-servant pair. We instead have 14 pairs split into two factions with a ruler class servant in the mix. An argument can be said that bigger isn't always better, and I agree with that statement. If the premise alone was to have this standard war, I would be bored to hell. Yet Apocrypha catches me off guard as it tells a more unique story than I've initially imagined. The first episode reminds the viewer that it's a battle between individuals, and right from the start we are in Sieg's perspective. Sieg is a mostly neutral character in the war that knows very little about the servants and masters, likewise we do not know much about the characters because we have been following Sieg's perspective the whole time. What makes the story from interesting to outstanding is the fact that Sieg's admiration for the heroic spirit starts to build and it makes him very different from the other Fate characters that aim to manipulate their friends, servants, and masters; Sieg is true to his values. Fate has changed their narrative from one about a hopeful hero in a reality to a dreamful hero in a fantasy. (10) Art: I do not care about the studio that worked on this, but I will have to say that the art was mostly great. Toward the end of the show, however, you will find a drop in quality for good reason. If you actually read the story section (hopefully), then you should know that Sieg becomes more human and therefore more biased about the side he fights for. The art drops only for characters Sieg sees as an enemy to his goal. This clever use of art to portraying character gives this section a 6, because even though I credit the director for making that choice, I would have to argue that the use of a different animator would be more acceptable. Besides from that, the character designs are precise and describe the characters fully. None of these designs are too complex though, but the choice of more simple designs allows the viewer to absorb this Great Holy Grail War more easily. (7) Sound: I liked the soundtrack. I honestly did, but when the soundtrack changes only after 23 or so episodes, the anime gets a little repetitive. This soundtrack would give this section a 2 or 3, but the music at the last fights bumped the score up. The last fight, for example, emphasized crescendos and Sieg's powerful emotions. Before, Sieg was a very passive character and this would support the reason why the soundtrack hasn't really changed before the last episodes. (6) Character: I think I talked a lot about Sieg before, so instead I will give a basic overview of the cast. I will start with the red side because it is easiest. So the red side has less development than the black side overall, but it still manages to portray its themes in relative ease. Some themes to consider while watching the anime are the use of desire. You will see that with most of the red faction since some of its members want their dreams to be fulfilled without consideration for the rest of the team while the rest are trying to preserve the good of the entire faction. On the other hand, the black faction is much more organized and has more development than the red. The black faction will change the most over the course of the anime and you will generally find the theme of individualism. In other words, the black faction's members mostly respect each other and allows the masters and servants to work toward their own goals without damaging themselves like the red counterpart. Considering all this, the character score is at a 5. Nothing very impressive here. What makes this score better are Ruler and Sieg's character arcs that depict a journey of struggles against their destinies. A common troupe for a fantastic franchise. (8) Enjoyment: I did not think Apocrypha was great, but I also thought it was better than average. There were many times when I was excited about each fight because each one showed a conflict between the characters and sets aside the faction part entirely. I never particularly thought any of the fights were dull, but they were mostly all noise. Yet again, considering Sieg's state in the fights, I would not be surprised to hear mostly noise. (7) Overall: I actually give apocrypha a high 7 and I don't think it should be any lower than a 6. I am shocked about the negative reviews, especially when the review says the anime "lacks creativity" and Sieg has too much "plot armor". I will quickly debunk these reasons so that you enter the story with a less negative outlook. I would like to remind you that the anime is very creative with its presentation in every scene shows a side of a character since mostly everything, including the setting, acts as a noble phantasm for a servant. Also, to say Sieg has too much plot armor is not true in many ways. For example, Shiro from the Fate/Stay Night series went from school kid to servant slayer in a few days. Sieg, a being with perfect circuits, obviously has a better chance than some school kid. So just take the negative reviews with a grain of salt and treat the anime as a separate work. Treat it as a story about a hero trying to realize his dream and taking it with his two hands.

The show is not that bad... but not that good either. The biggest problem with this show is that the characters are only "semi-likeable"; they're not bad but not nearly as likeable as the characters in Fate/Stay Night. Sieg is a very bland protagonist, so if you didn't like Shirou in F/SN, you'll like him even less. There are just too many characters, too, with not enough time for develop them all. For what its worth, the master/servant pairing of Kairi and Mordred clicked instantly, as they both have amazing chemistry together. As far as the plot goes, it's nothing to write home about. It's about the holy grail war and stuff just sort of happens. Things pick up near the end, as more characters are eliminated from the war and more focus put on the remaining ones. The ending is well-made by the standards of this show, so if you find itself invested you won't be disappointed. The main thing that this anime has going for it is that it is Fate. There's magic in a modern setting, waifus, historical figures and historical figures as waifus. If you like the Fate universe then Fate/Apocrypha is at least worth checking out.

If you’ve been an anime fan over the past several years, it’s very likely you’re aware of the Fate franchise. The Type Moon Visual Novel first appeared to the anime world with the infamously mocked “people die when they are killed” 2006 adaptation of stay/night, but people REALLY got hooked with the adaptation of Gen Urobuchi’s Fate/Zero, a harrowing mature, and dramatic clash of ideals positioned as a battle Royale. From there, more and more iterations of the Fate mythos kept coming, with there being an Unlimited Blade Works TV anime, a mobile game adaptation in Fate/Grand Order, a Studio SHAFT Fate production due to air next year, and....in Summer 2017.........this. THIS Fate, based on an alternate universe light novel by Yuuichirou Higashide and animated by A1 Pictures, tries to do everything Fate/Zero and Fate/stay night did and more. More action scenes. More characters talking about whatever’s relevant. More game players, with double the amount of before. More over the top ridiculous antagonists! More genderbends and even a trap now! This alternate continuity wants to do everything bigger, broader and more off the wall! And thankfully, you don’t have to watch any other Fate series to get into it! While I somewhat respect that it seems like it wants to give the show wider appeal, in the process we get a hollow shell of a show, one that owes too highly to its fore-bearers while accomplishing far less, in spite of its shakeups. Taking place in an alternate universe from the mainstay Fate everyone’s all familiar with, the Holy Grail was stolen prior to the events of Fate/Zero, and now we have a new timeline, double the servants and masters, and a different twist on the setup. Now although this is different, not all these differences really work. For instance, since the plot now has double the amount of characters, plus supports, as before, it will inevitably struggle trying to make them all interesting AND deliver a cohesive story that makes the most out of the Fate setup. Alas, we get small potatoes, barely any accomplishments, and an overall meandering story pace. Why the story doesn’t work is quite simple: very little happens ground in character. The first half feels like it was literally built only to do positioning for the second, nothing else, and even the second half takes a detour at one point mainly to drag things out. When not setting up the poorly presented main character and equally poorly presented main villain, the entire first half feels like battle after battle after battle. The continual shift from person to person almost ensures that no one really has much to them, character depth takes quite the backseat to all the fighting. With exception to Achilles and Chiron, who have a dichotomy as two Servants on opposite sides that knew each other in life, is sorely lacking. In Fate/Zero, that was one of the earliest parts established, why the characters are fighting, what ideals will be confronted by the characters, and why we should care. Here, a good 80% of the characters can be boiled down to “fight for the party” which is incredibly lame and boring to think about. Characters that seem like they would have interesting stories basically have them info dumped almost in whole. The show’s not completely faulted in this regard, it does a fairly good job exploring Joan of Arc, but if you wanted the protagonist to be anything more than a generic block of wood who makes Shirou Emiya look like Kiritsugu, too bad. There’s a constant stream of idiocy among this cast. Perhaps the most notable example is the fat uncle character on the way he failed to understand command seals to such an epic level at one point. A few more of these happen. At one point, a character is presented an illusion that we, the audience, know is fake, and the character is told that repeatedly, but it still drives them to insanity that again, is poorly conveyed by backstory. I ended up feeling more contempt for said character than feeling sorry. But this wants to be a bigger Fate, so it increases the count of two of the things the series is known for: Noble Phantasms and Genderfying characters. The other Fate series gave one Noble Phantasm to each Servant for good reason: it was meant as a trump card if all else failed and accentuated strengths and limits. Here, some Servants can have four, or even five of them, which not only devalues their worth individually, but makes it feel like they’re pulling these skills out of their asses. Rider in particular forgets one, and then just does it perfectly remembering the name, and even used someone’s else Noble Phantasm all his own which makes no sense at all. But since this Fate wants more of everything except what actually matters, there’s a staggering increase in genderfying characters, even quite infamously a trap character. The other Fates solely had Arturia be a gender swap, and the show did well to tie that aspect to her character arc, but here, they make Jack the Ripper, Frankenstein, Mordred all girls, and have Astolfo as a trap. Why? No reason, just pandering nonsense it feels. Exception to Mordred, who has the slight benefit of Arturia, it becomes a lot harder to take these characters seriously when they feel so “animed” into the story. Things feel flat out ridiculous at times. One character, who can't walk, basically uses Dr. Octopus style mechanical tentacles to make their way around whenever they get knocked down in pretty funny display. For some reason, the show decides to include not just one, but TWO yelling screaming edgelord characters in the Black Party. The sheer amount of it, combined with the lack of any real intrigue to how they went around things made them more laughable than anything else. What also doesn’t help is facial expressions from other characters. At one point, a character uses magic to reenact a dead person’s last moments and in doing so, his facial expressions and voice acting come off as more hilarious than scarring. When a character later becomes resurrected, his face resembles a nutcracker Guard!Sometimes this even comes from the dialogue, which while under par in most cases, gives us gems like “Do you think we can save all children?” It doesn’t always happen like this but it’s notable whenever it does. As for that conclusion, don’t expect the ending to feel satisfying or sensical. Just don’t. What we have here as an exercise in excess, putting on the image that “everything you love and more” isn’t always a full proof plan. To quote Astolfo “This might be a trainwreck, but we’re in it together”. And the boring and lackluster writing is helped even less by the passé visual style. Let’s get the good out of the way: Episode 22 looks incredible. A1 Pictures brought on the key animator who worked on the Saitama/Boros fight for that episode and the quality really shows in how smooth everything feels, the explosion quality and overall impact. That episode alone is worth seeing just for the animation. And there’s a few other moments of great animation sprinkled in there in the final portion of the show. Also, a few of the character designs can be.... good. Such as Archer of Red, Achilles, Shakespeare, and Assassin of Red. Overall design keeps consistency with the Fate series we knew before, given the existence of the designs prior to draw from. That’s it for the positives. While some characters have good designs, the majority are either bland (Protagonist-kun, Mordred, all the Black masters), a mess (Caster of Black, Lancer of Red), or both (Saber of Black). Others, like Astolfo, Frankenstein and Jack the Ripper look flat out jarring given the gender modifications. Overall it’s more miss than hit, but what about the action scenes they’re thrown into? There are two solid action scenes, one a Fist Fight, and one in episode 22, but otherwise, if you like frame skipping, incomprehensible choreography, and a general sense of empty spectacle, Fate/Apocrypha is there for you! It wants to im…

When I first watched Fate/Zero, I was absolutely taken in by the animation and world-build up. The story’s gripping narrative made it one of my favorites. I also enjoyed Fate/Stay Night: Unlimited Blade Works, the sequel to Zero. When I watched the Fate series, I hadn’t watched a lot of anime, so I simply enjoyed the aesthetic quality of the series, so I’m looking over any criticism it has received. Having enjoyed Fate so much, naturally I was really looking forward to Fate/Apocrypha, which aired in the fall of 2017. And what are my thoughts on it? Well, A-1 Pictures managed to present another disaster of an anime this season! I’ll not deny it, A-1 has given us some of the most popular shows in the last decade, but there are several shows by this studio that simply follow the mainstream of anime- throwing in terrible story writing with half-assed animation along with a popular title that draws in an audience. It’s disappointing at the least that studios don’t even try to satisfy the audience who watch their shows. Why is Apocrypha a fiasco? To start it off, let me tell you that the show does follow the basic foundation of the Fate universe, but instead of the usual seven masters and seven servants, Apocrypha has double the number of characters as the original Fate. It’s set in an alternate timeline where the Grail was seized by a clan of mages after the third Holy Grail war. They then announced their possession of the Grail and left the Mage’s Asssociation. Yggdmillennia, the aforementioned clan then declares war on the Association and each of the sides have seven servants and masters each who fight against each other as two collective groups. I know what you’re thinking. “Well, that sounds interesting!”- yes, that’s what I thought, before I actually watched the train-wreck of an anime that Apocrypha is. The basic problem with this anime is the number of characters in it. There are twenty four characters that play a significant role if you count the masters and the servants separately. I kid you not- twenty four characters! Now, the original Fate gives its characters a tragic backstory to get the viewers to sympathize with them. This works because there are a limited number of characters and each character’s backstory is explored separately by the anime, while in Apocrypha, instead of focusing on one particular character, the anime simply shows us a glimpse of someone’s backstory and then jumps to another scene even before the viewer has fully taken in the previous scene. I simply felt no emotional connection with any character whatsoever. Even though the anime fails in character development, I still expected a few intense action scenes. Nah, why would an action anime need those? Almost all action sequences in Apocrypha are lazily animated. They are dull and boring. Nine out of ten scenes are a complete snooze fest. An abysmal story combined with terrible direction. That is what Fate/ Apocrypha felt like for a majority of its episodes. To add more to the farce, most of the characters seem like they’re from some stupid fantasy game. There is unnecessary fan-service because why not? The character of Jack The Ripper being a loli speaks volumes about how carefully the production team thought about each character. I’m presuming the conversation during their brainstorming sessions went something like this: “I wonder how we can get the audience more involved with the characters.” “You know what? We should add a loli. People love lolis!” “Done.” “Wait if we’re adding lolis, why was my suggestion of adding Traps rejected?” “Ugh, fine. We’ll add a Trap too.” “Oooooh, we should add a yandere too then? Make her like the Trap’s master maybe?” “Oh my god, best idea ever! There should be a few scenes where she licks him for no apparent reason too. People will like that.” “We rock.” “YEAH!” Yes, that was totally a great idea. Should have added some smut while they were at it. Great job, A-1 Pictures! There is no comparison between the animation and artwork of the original Fate series and Fate/Apocrypha. It’s god awful. As I said the battle sequences look terrible and there is one particular scene where the Rider of Red does not even look like himself. At this point I was just laughing at the ridiculous job the animators had done. The only battle which actually felt intense was the sequence in Episode 22. The fight between Karna, the Lancer of Red and the Homunculus kid whose name I forgot was pretty well made. Episode 22 was undoubtedly the best out of all 25 episodes. It has a really long battle scene and some great Sakuga sequences. I was quite surprised when I saw this after 21 episodes of foolery. The music is forgettable. The Opening and Ending themes were dry and unappealing. They could have used some great music during the battle scenes, but again they didn’t. The overall animation and sound was far below my expectations. To tell you the truth, towards the end, I had this faint feeling where I felt like the anime got back on track. After most of the characters were dead, they were able to focus on the remaining cast and it made the story far less confusing than it was at first. As I said in the last paragraph, there was also a decent action scene in Episode 22. Then there was this concept of “humanity and salvation” but I felt as if the idea wasn’t presented clearly. It seemed like a vague concept introduced for the advancement of the story because they couldn’t think of anything better. Again, it could have been much better. There was so much space for improvement, yet A-1 decided to give us an anime that is easily forgettable and which would disappoint any fan of the original series. I wouldn’t recommend watching Fate/Apocrypha. Its fails spectacularly as an anime and even more so when compared to Fate/Zero or Stay Night. I would give it a rating of 4 out of 10.

A friend of mine warned me that Fate/Zero was an outlier in the Fate franchise and that I was probably not going to enjoy the rest of it. I should've listened. Fate/Apocrypha is essentially a check list of shit I either hate or find exceptionally boring in anime. Dozens of interchangeable "I can't believe its not isekai" character designs, writing attempting to cover dark topics like slavery and child soldiers with the depth of of a sixteen year old's first fan fiction, and dull super combat moves that are rarely more than big laser swords and explosions. Its so bland, repetitive and interchangeable with every other basic action shonen that it may be the thing that finally kills what momentum I had with the Fate franchise. Plot: The Yggdmillenia family stole the grail with the Nazi's help fifty years ago, and the church doesn't like that. So they fight. Simple and hypothetically effective, if only this had been twelve episodes instead of twenty five. Characters: I can't tell any of the Yggdmillenia apart. They all wear the same uniform and have basic anime hair. Some have glasses, one's in a wheelchair. It's fine, none of them really matter, the summons and the little homunculus kid are the characters who actually matter. Sieg is a boiler plate anime protagonist, he wonders about his personhood, devotes himself to his friends, has to save his people. Blah Blah Blah, its all the same shit on repeat. Frankenstein's monster, Jack the Ripper and Mordred are all the usual anime gender swap's done to appeal to pedophiles. But Mordred is particularly frustrating after how well written Arthur was in Fate/Zero Atalanta is the funniest character in the show. She's not supposed to be, but having a fox/cat girl having a melt down about Jack the Ripper's child servant's/meat shields was hilarious and her spending the rest of the show screaming "WHY WON'T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!" while attacking any other named character, kept me going long after I should've given up on the show. Vlad the Impaler was cool while he was around. His powers being rooted in defense of Romania was interesting, and his power system being influenced by public perception of him, in a way he resented, was definitely the most interesting thing the show did with any of the summons special moves. Shakespeare was fun, if unimportant. His writings altering reality, and his own summoner having to have his own defenses from Shakespeare writing his own tale as a tragedy was interesting. I can see why Astolfo caught on in the anime fandom. He's the exact manic pixie dream boy that everybody loves. Everyone else was so forgettable that I have forgotten that they were in the show. Animation: It's by A-1 pictures, so it doesn't really have much of its own style or identity. The fights are rarely interesting, usually just characters hitting each other with big ol' anime swords, followed by a big explosion. I don't think there's more than one fight that I will remember. All the dialogue scenes are a characters standing in flat environments monologuing to each other with very basic shot composition, so it was very easy to dissociate out of whatever was happening. In the end, was watching it worth it? No, it was a waste of time, and it failed on every front from Type-Moon's business perspective. I don't want to buy its light novel, it didn't make me want to buy lootboxes/rolls/whatever it is in Fate/Grand Order, and it didn't make me want to buy any officially licensed merchandise. It was a complete failure of capitalism.

I really don't get the reason behind why people are being so harsh about this series. I'm new to the fate franchise so i don't know much about the other series but one thing is for sure, Apocrypha was just awesome. The fight scene, the soundtrack, the character development and the execution was just marvelious. And the ending was amazing too! If you're still reading this, then lemme tell you just this, do not let the low reviews fool you. Because of the harsh criticism, i didn't even bothered to watch it until recently. This will be worth your time for sure!

Your enjoyment of this anime will be contingent entirely on your investment in the Fate franchise as a whole. When I say Fate as a whole, I mean that very deliberately, because if the only Fate property you enjoy is Fate/Zero, suffice it to say you will not enjoy Apocrypha. I suppose it will also depend on your enjoyment of action anime as such, but since you’re here, reading this, I’m kind of taking that for granted. When and how should you watch this? Whenever and however you want. Where does this fit in the larger Fate continuity? It doesn’t. Fate/Apocrypha is a completely separate timeline. It is its own thing. This can be the very first Fate show you watch or the very last. It makes no difference. Fun fact, apocrypha is a religious term that is the antonym of canon. So, something like the names of Jesus’ apostles would be canonical content, whereas the names of the various archdemons of Hell would be apocryphal. It’s essentially the original religious word for what we call filler. The premise here, like in any other Fate show, is a battle royale between 7 magical Servants representing historical or mythological characters in order to win the ultimate prize, the Holy Grail, a magical device that will grant the winner any wish. The Servants each fit one of the 7 classes, Saber, Lancer, Archer, Rider, Caster, Berserker, and Assassin. However, also like in any other Fate show, that basic premise gets instantly violated and turned on its head. This is a trope consistently present as a manner of through line in every Fate show, which is the notion that the basic premise is fairly straightforward and simple to understand, but simultaneously there is not a single Fate show that actually holds to the outline drawn by the premise. As much as we like to think of the Holy Grail War as a battle royale between 7 heroes of one kind or other, it is vexing to think about the fact that there isn’t even one solitary Fate incarnation that actually is that. Every one, without exception, has to subvert it somehow and inject all manner of contrived shenanigans into the mix. Before long, all rules established at the outset are invariably thrown out the window and the whole thing degenerates into a trainwreck. Hilariously enough (though you may just consider it lazy writing, depending on your point of view, and you would be completely justified in thinking so), one character explicitly voices this frustration: “All we wanted was a graceful fight of skilled magic and summoned Servants!” F. In any case, the basic outline of the plot is as follows. As it turns out, a certain mage family has already somehow taken possession of the Grail, but their ownership of it is somehow not legitimate, so the Heroic Spirit Summoning Ritual is somehow modified to allow for 2 sets of 7 Servants to be simultaneously summoned, so rather than a battle royale between the 7, it’s a war between the 14 Servants of the 2 factions. On top of that, the Grail summons an additional Servant of a non-standard class, Ruler, to serve as the impartial arbiter of the conflict. Depending on how well you remember 1st grade math, you might at this point be thinking to yourself, hold on, the 14 Servants, plus their Masters, plus the arbiter, that makes for a total of 29 characters to keep track of. How will you ever manage to remember all of them??? The truth is that you don’t have to. The simple fact of the matter is that most of the Masters – with the exception of maybe 5 of them – are either not memorable or just not relevant in any way, shape, or form. You needn’t bother to commit them to memory. If you feel like even 14 Servants are too many to keep track of – which they aren’t, but just in case you still feel that way – then let us assuage those concerns, as well. On the one hand, they’re all a lot more unique-looking than their Masters, so even if you won’t necessarily remember all of their names, which is fine, you’ll still remember them visually as the guy/chick who did/said this, that, or the other. On the other hand, not all of the Servants are strictly speaking relevant, either. Some will get killed fairly early in the conflict, whereas others don’t even have proper combat roles, so they mostly exist on the sidelines. Point being, you don’t really have to commit all of them to memory, either. Nevertheless, the natural main point of attraction of any Fate show is the Servants. We all always get excited to see what new Servants get revealed and what they look like. Unfortunately, Fate/Zero is just about the only Fate show out there that features a cast of entirely non-cringe Servants, that is to say no “UwU, Attila the Hun is actually a cute tan loli with a rainbow lightsaber, teehee” bullshit – Artoria herself is just about the one exception we’ve all come to accept as a given. As such, your mileage with most Apocrypha Servants will vary. The good news? Since there’s 14 of them, so you’re bound to like at least some of them. The bad news? Loads of them have cringy and uninspired designs. We are once again dealing with genderbent characters. There is one Servant that is canonically a centaur, but “chooses” to appear as a regular human for convenience’s sake. What? What do you mean? How? You mean to tell me you guys can arbitrarily change your appearances? Isn’t the notion that your appearance can give away your identity, and as such your weaknesses and abilities, one of the main conceits of the franchise? Isn’t that why you never reveal your True Names? So, if you can freely change your appearances, why doesn’t every Servant do that all the time and become completely unrecognizable? One major mythological Greek figure is turned into a cat girl, whoop-dee-fucking-do. I will say, though, that Apocrypha succeeds in doing something no other Fate show has managed to do. It offended me. I’m not joking. I don’t use that term lightly. Again, whether you find the gay character designs palatable or not is up to individual tastes. Some will love cute girl Frankenstein’s Monster, some will find it lame – whatever. What I found offensive was Apocrypha’s portrayal of Spartacus. I’m not going to spoil anything about the character or the role he plays in the show. Suffice it to just say that I found his portrayal to go way further than just a difference in vision. It was downright disrespectful to a real person who actually existed and one of the greatest heroes of human history. To my mind, his treatment in the series is way beyond the pale. Still, I can’t pretend that I did not enjoy the fact that the entire conflict takes place in my own country, Romania. The city the story is set in, Trifas, is fictional, but it is essentially based on the city of Sighișoara, with loads of places and vistas from the show being replicas of real life locations. It is also worth noting that Sighişoara is also the birthplace of Vlad III, also known as the Impaler. To those not in the know, he’s the one that Bram Stoker’s Count Dracula is believed to be based on, and in popular mythology, he is accepted as the de facto identity of Dracula. As such, it should come as no surprise that Vlad the Impaler is one of the Servants in Apocrypha. Was I excited to see him? Yes! Was I excited by his portrayal? Ehhh. He was nice enough and I really enjoyed the way his temperament and personality were described – certainly a portrayal an order of magnitude more respectful than that of Spartacus. Unfortunately, I was not massively pleased by his visual design. His clothing was not overly impressive or visually striking, I outright disliked the way his spear looked, but by far the thing that bothered me the most was the way his hair seemed to be dyed a different color from about his jawline downwards. I don’t know who thought that dark turquoise color would look good on him, but we clearly do not see eye to eye. As for why Apocrypha doesn’t just use the name of a real Romanian city, that I’m sure I don’t know. It’s not like they’re t…

Another year, another addition to the ever expanding Fate franchise that has birthed some of the most epic, and not-so-epic, stories to be told in anime. Here with Fate/Apocrypha, we get a new twist on the time honored battle for the Holy Grail. I was happy to see another Fate series get a 25 episode run and was eager to dive in. Story: 6 Being a spin-off version of the typical Grail War, the 2 warring factions idea was a valiant attempt to breathe some fresh life into the established rules; however, this is the root of most of the show's shortcomings. The overwhelming amount of character bios and motivations being condensed from the immensity of the Nasuverse into a neat and tidy 23 minute package each week is extremely difficult. To be blunt, the narrative struggles mightily in the first half of the show. The first 12 episodes were a bit of a slog for me as the sheer amount of exposition needed to place the viewer in the setting slowed down the forward progression of the story heavily. It upset the pacing quite a bit and made the first few battles you witness seem stunted and dubious. Would this have been helped with a longer first episode to get the info dump out of the way? Who knows. However, the second half of the show thrust into a breakneck pace that was a treat to watch. The pacing locked into place and allowed for a thrilling build-up into an action-packed and even emotional finale. The fights had been delayed until this point to build tension and anticipation for the final face-offs, and for the most part it worked. I still feel like some of the battles could have been longer but it left me pleased with what I had seen. Art: 7 Artistically, it was nice to see a slight deviation from the hard and fast designs from the typical Nasuverse characters. The backgrounds were detailed, besides the inside of the Yggdmillenia fortress that is, and helped add to the action in the foreground. It was a solid effort put out by A-1; however, the fight scenes later in the show left me with mixed feelings. I was absolutely awed and wowed by the attack animations in most of the fights. I appreciated the scope in which the animatiors envisioned these epic battles between Heroic Spirits and it left me eager to see if they could outdo themselves in the next fight. That said, the character animations began to suffer heavily in the last few episodes of the series. I know that it can be credited to a more fluid animation style to support the fight scenes, but the drastic change in character model really took me out of it in some moments. The insane amount of smash cuts and motion blurs became dizzying at points as well. But damn when they were on, they were on. Sound: 8 I had originally began watching the show subbed as Netflix had not released the dubbed version upon its airing. The sub was solid and the characters all felt natural. I then began watching the dub once it had finally been released and I have to say, it was really solid as well. No one felt like they were overacting and nothing seemed forced. Special commendations for the VA of Saber of Red as she really nailed the tenacity and barely contained voraciousness in her voice. It was a cool contrast to the famous Fate Saber's calm and collected repose. Keith Silverstein did a nice job in his role as Caster of Red as well. It was refreshing to hear a plethora of actors that I had not encountered before. As for the soundtrack, it fit well into the mysterious and violent atmosphere that the Holy Grail War often emits, but overall it was nothing to really write home about. The battle effects were well done and had a nice variety of fitting weapon sounds that made sense with what they were clashing with. I wasn't a huge fan of the onslaught of audio clipping from the massive attacks displayed as I feel like it downplayed the impact of the attack. Characters: 9 As with every Fate series, the joy, and crux of the whole show, comes down to the Servants, their abilities, their ideals and ambitions, and their interactions with those who summoned them. In this aspect, I feel that Apocrypha did an admirable job at attempting to delve into the backstories of the whopping 14 servants introduced throughout the story. It wasn't always a hit, but it helped give some insight into why the Servants were so set in their ways. The interactions between masters and servants were sometimes heartfelt, comedic, or serious, and I thought, for the most part, that they played off of each other nicely. Some character motivations were questionable and vague, mainly those of the final antagonist, and left a lot to be desired. I blame the overabundance of characters for that as 14 servants and 14 masters makes for a difficult time giving enough backstory to feel connected to the characters. I was left feeling like I should've felt more emotion at certain points in the story, but the lack of character development prevented me from really getting there. I was disappointed with the fates of some of the characters, but as anyone who is familiar with the Fate series knows, only one can win the Grail. I will always wish we got more of Saber of Red and Shishigou as they were the crown jewel of Master/Servant combos in the story. I loved every minute they were on screen and thought that they had the best chemistry and moments in the show. Enjoyment: 8 As I was going through the first half of the show, I was worried that the pacing and plot were going to stagnate and leave me with little to look forward to as the series progressed. I was thankfully proven wrong as the story quickly picked up and even featured cameos from characters of other Fate series which was a welcome touch. Saber of Red was the breakout star in this show and I would love to have her in more Fate material as time goes on. Overall: 7 A flawed but enjoyable ride that left me satisfied with what I had just watched. Not my favorite Fate story ever but one that I felt didn't waste my time either.

Fate/Apocrypha, what a ride it was! When I started, I thought that it can't possibly as good as the previous Fate installments, since it didn't have the backing of an old, established story, neither the perfect animation of UFOtable. Well, I was wrong. What this show lacked in stuff like visuals, it made up by the sheer enjoyment, given by other areas, where I think it did even better than it's predecessors. Sound - 10/10 - a subjective area, but few can disagree here, I am sure. The soundtrack was simply outstanding. Visuals - 9/10, the first parts, 7/10 the latter parts (they rushed it). But that's about it for the bad part, since the scale and the feel of the battles was WAY greater than the previous Fate animes. Characters 10/10. This is not something you see every day, or in any other Fate series. No one here is truly evil, everyone has a goal they want to pursue, so you can't really hate any of the characters. Also, the end the heroes have in the latter parts are really emotional and well done. All in all, even if this didn't have flawless animation, it more than made up for that with very enjoyable characters, music, character development and the good ending, whereas the other Fate series left a bitter taste in your mouth (maybe some like that, but I never really do).

First of all, im being really generous with a 4 as final rating. Secondly, for me this thing doesnt exist in the nasuverse, and thanks god its in its own stupid timeline without ruining any of the billion other ones. Now, if you watched some Nasuverse stuff before, you would be wondering how is there a gap so big between this abomination and the rest of the verse. Well the reasons are 3 mainly: first, its not written by nasu, second its adapted by studio A-1, third,it was originally supposed to be a game originally and half of the cast was different, but they decided at the last moment to change that and make it a light novel. The story is basically non existing, if you have to compare it to something its like the random uninspired "stories" that various anime's fighting games get (One Piece Unlimited Cruise and Jojo Eyes Of Heaven just to name a few) so basically is complete shit, so many things arent explained, half of the supposed cast doesnt even appear, plot armor is everywhere and logic is unexistent. The art is like any other A-1 anime: uninspired generic garbage, im not even going to mention what the fuck episode 22 was because halfway through it the drawings looked like they were being drown by a 5 years old. Waver and Flat which appear only in the first episode dont even look like themselves. Sound is as bad is it can get: anything at all happens? BASS BOOSTED EXPLOSION SOUND. Seriously the sfx are so fucking bass boosted that earrape edited hardbass videos are nothing compared to it. The character, as many know, are the best thing about fate, but GUESS WHAT. supposedly the cast was going to be made of 29 characters: 7 red masters, 7 red servants, 7 black masters, 7 black servants and 1 neutral ruler servant, but since obviously making something out of such a large pool of characters in 25 episodes is impossible, 5 of the 7 red masters never actually appear, dropping already the count from 29 to 24. But wait, its actually 25 because the main character is this random homunculus which broke free for no reason! i'll say what i think about every character now. Red Team Kairi Sisigou: litterally the only master of this "team", he is the only decent master of the anime, altrough his death is pure bullshit: we see him take no actual damage in his last fight but when it ends he is apparently dead from wounds that he took during it. im glad that he isnt entirely wasted since they made him a character in Lord El Melloi II Case Files, which is probably my favorite Fate anime ever. Amakusa Shirou: he had the potential to be a good villian and a good character, but what is explained about him? ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. his reasoning of why he thinks the 3rd magic is the salvation of humanity is never told, his backstory of how he survived after the 3rd grail war is never actually told, how he got a training from the church and the Kotomine surname is never told, the magecraft that he has in his arms is never explained and used only once. Saber Of Red Mordred: i hate this character. in this entry she was fine, but fucking god with grandorder out she is EVERYWHERE, now Artoria isnt even the postergirl of the franchise anymore because this retarded version of her has more appearences then her in the stories, also her backstory and motivation are never expanded or explained because apocrypha, and the end of the fight against Semiramis doesnt make sense: Mordred destroyed her fucking spirit core yet semiramis manages to live for a whole another day while mordred dies with her master. Archer of Red Atalanta: as one can see from my pfp, shes best girl. Now, this is the most biased opinion ever because anything from greece/greek mythology or the voice of Haori Sayami is enough of making me automatically like it, but shes both and also a catgirl and her actual backstory (which guess what isnt explained in this show) is amazing and i love it. honestly the fact that her final fight against Jeanne wasnt over before achilles arrived is pure bullshit, without even using the command seals she shouldnt have been able to beat her, or do things like block a noble phantasm (Tauropolos) without even using her own. Ah and also using her og Noble phantasm Phoebous Catastrophe against random homunculus and golems made no sense Lancer of Red Karna: oh boy oh boy. i love Karna, seriously his concept is amazing, but what the fuck did they think with putting a god from one of the most broken god pantheons of the Nasuverse among normal heroes and a couple demigods from a weaker pantheon. Now the worst thing that comes with this terrible decision is how his fights are handled. On paper, nobody should be able to hurt him (except for Vlad)thanks to Kavacha and Kundala, and his power should be able to one shot everyone without even using any of his offensive Noble Phantasms: litterally his fire and thunder manipulation alone are powerful enough to one shot most servants, and even then he has Brahmastra and Brahmastra Kundala that are things he can casually throw even though their power is comparable to a Clarent Blood Arthur or a Balmung, and then theres Vasavi Shakti, which is litterally sure win at the cost of losing Kavacha and Kundala. Now guess how his fights are handled since he is clearly the most powerful servant in the war: one of the first episodes he clashes against siegfried, and this is the only fight that kinda makes sense since both shouldnt be able to hurt each other with just normal attacks, but then the fight against Vlad happens, and for some reason its wrote as if Vlad was so much of a threat to Karna, when all the writer does is making Karna just jump around without actually attacking for some reason, and when he is about to actually attack the author remembers that it would end the fight in one shot so he just makes him retreat. then we skip all the way to the last episodes, where the peak plot armor happens: he uses Vasavi Shakti and for some reason Balmung can block it, which is complete bullshit since Balmung is supposed to be inferior even to Brahmastra and Brahmastra Kundala, which in this fight are used as if they were random stuff, making them no impact at all. Ah and also he dies in this fight in a stupid way because plot armor again. Rider of Red Achilles: as i already said, i love greece and greek mythology and for this reason Achilles is a character i love, but his lasts moments show peak nonsense of this anime's writing: he willingly gives to his enemy one of his own noble phantasms (things that makes no sense because you cant just use someone else's noble phantasm, WITHOUT A CHANT, only by knowing the true name) and kills one of his own team members for no reason at all and dies with them. Assassin of red Semiramis: honestly i couldnt care less about her lol, i already said how much bullshit was her last fight when i talked about mordred. Caster or red Shakespeare: he is amazing at entertaining whenever he is in a scene but his screentime is almost 0 and is basically a wasted character slot. Berserker of red Spartacus: THE VERY DEFINITION OF WASTED CHARACTER, he litterally just explodes in the first 4 episodes without any explenation about his noble phantasm, his backstory, why is he even a berserker when he was a general, stuff like that. at least for the short time he lived he was funny to listen at. now time for team black Sieg: he is pure dogshit, im not even gonna waste more then a sentence on him. Siegfried Saber of Black: another wasted character, suicides himself for the already mentioned pile of dogshit, has no explenation about his motives, goals and backstory. Archer of black Chiron: hes cool, greek mythology again, nothing much to say about him, but the fact that his actual appearance as centaur was never even showed once when we know he could switch whenever he wants is bullshit. Lancer of black Vlad III: hes cool too, his reasons to why he wants to win is somewhat explained, but his backstory isnt, also his Vampire form is …

Please note this review assumes that you have finished watching Fate/Apocrypha and while care has been taken to not spoil the story there may be potential spoilers within character analysis. Based off a light novel of the same name Fate/Apocrypha is part of the Fate Stay Night franchise but rather than being a part of the main universe it’s a spin off of the series taking place in a parallel universe that has its own events and characters. True to the theme and premise of its parent series Fate/Apocrypha revolves around the struggle for the holy grail a mythical item that is said to be able to grant whoever attains it any wish that they want. However, while the previous series of the franchise have restricted this to relatively small-scale engagements between magus’s the difference and arguably the main draw point of this series is the scale of the battles. Here rather than having small groups of magus’s fight each other with their servants the main story of the anime revolves around a large-scale war between two relatively large factions which pits the two factions both of which have 7 masters and servants against each other. As the Fate franchise has until now largely been contests between smaller groups of masters and servants the large-scale battle that was promised for this series was one of the main reasons why I decided to watch this series and I'm glad that I did as not only did the series have plenty of excellent battles it also had plenty of well-designed characters as well. The first episode while slow paced did a great job of introducing the setting and the main characters. The overall story of Fate/ Apocrypha revolves around the struggle for the franchises main prize the Holy Grail though with some differences to the established formula that was used in the franchise as this is a spin-off series. The war for the holy grail in this series revolves around the major powers struggles to control the grail and use it for their own goals with these factions being the red faction that is represented by the Clock Towers Mage Association and the Black faction which is represented by the Yggdmillennia family a group of mages that is based in Romania. The setting for the series, for the most part, is also Romania. The overall story for the series while looking at the struggles between the masters and servants of the two competing factions also follows the life of two characters whose fates have become intermingled with this war. These are the homunculus Sieg and the servant Ruler who was summoned by the grail itself. These two characters while at first uninvolved with the war soon find themselves dragged into it as the war between the two factions change dramatically as new enemies and nefarious plots reveal themselves and turn what should have been a conventional war into something else entirely. Sieg Sieg voiced by veteran voice actor Natsuki Hanae of Digimon Tri and Tokyo Ghoul fame is one of the main characters of the series. Initially, Sieg is an artificial human being that was created by the Black faction in preparation for the war for the grail that they have been prepping for years. However, unlike the others that the faction created beforehand Sieg from the beginning exhibited a number of behaviour characteristics that made him stand out. These included a reluctance to fight, self-preservation and being afraid to be alone. In the beginning of the series, Sieg was also very weak at first barely able to stand at first and needing some time before he can move on his own. Indeed, in the beginning, because of his lack of a personality and even of basic knowledge Sieg, in the beginning, wrestled with his feelings as he was unsure of what purpose he had for his creation. These doubts of Sieg however gradually start to disappear after he meets Siegfried and Ruler and the subsequent events that happened between them that ultimately caused Sieg to change not just in terms of personality but also in the role that he will have in the larger war. After Sieg’s ascension Sieg’s personality gradually starts to change because of not only meeting Ruler but also meeting many other people in his journeys and learning from them. While still remaining quiet and composed Sieg begins to develop an interest in humans and their struggles in life largely as a result of wanting to forge a new life to repay the debt that he feels he owns to both Ruler and to Siegfried. As the series progresses his personality is gradually created as a result of learning more about human society such as the towns and villages that they inhabit and the hopes, wishes and desires that they have in them as they go about their life. In this Sieg becomes visibly kinder and honest while also developing a determination to protect the innocent from harm. The insight into humans and their society also had the effect of not only allowing him to draw strength from them but also allow him to understand the concept of freedom and what that entails. The concept of freedom itself is something that can be seen to have a large impact on Sieg’s personality as it becomes his main motivation for his second life with this being to help others gain their freedom as he believes that all life whether they are artificial, or natural should be free to walk on the path that they choose. Sieg’s new life while giving him the opportunity to live his life the way that he wants to also gave him the opportunity to directly affect the war that’s being fought around him and in this, we can see one of Sieg’s core personality traits as well as one of his main struggles. In terms of personality traits one of Sieg’s core personality traits is without a doubt his determination whether it’s used to protect someone that’s dear to him or to repay someone for a great deed that they have done for him. This trait corresponds nicely with one of Sieg’s main struggles that he faces in the series namely the reason for wanting to fight. Overall the character of Sieg was an interesting one and while his origin story and second life were unusual to say the least his development that focused on him learning how to not just be human but also what it means to be a human was something that I thought was done well. His struggles as he tries to understand the differences between the actions that humans take was also interesting. His increased role on the battlefield and his struggles in doing so I felt were also well designed. Ruler Ruler voiced by veteran seiyuu Maaya Sakamoto of Mobile Suit Gundam Seed Destiny and Persona 3 movies fame is one of the main characters of the series and is the main heroine of the series. A servant that was summoned to this realm as a result of the start of the Great Holy Grail War Ruler was summoned with the direct purpose of acting as a moderator for the war whose main role was to oversee the war itself and make sure that the conflict is being waged fairly. Though a servant that was summoned to this world as a result of the war Ruler is also someone that can easily pass as a human being due to both her past origin story as well as her experiences in this world. A kind, Caring and honest person by nature Ruler is also someone that is righteous and is someone that believes greatly in god despite her origin story which was quite surprising. Because of this faith Ruler is also someone that is humble, honest and modest and as a result is able to forge bonds easily with people and strike up friendships quite quickly. As a result of both her origins and the understanding that she had of humans, Ruler was also someone that was always willing to help people no matter their allegiance which often clashes with her duties as an observer to the war but demonstrates her determination to help the innocents that were caught in this war. While Ruler herself readily accepts that her origin as a saint meant that she served as a leader of a vast host that fought during a time of turmoil in human history, Ruler readily …

Introduction: Type-Moon have delivered us splendid shows in the past already. One of them is the 'Fate' series. Due to ufotable's great job of adapting Fate/Stay Night: Unlimited Blade Works and Fate/Zero, it's safe to say that the 'Fate' series are those series you can't just miss out. In Summer 2017 season, A-1 Pictures delivered us "Fate/Apocrypha". With it's attempt of trying to make a good 'Fate' adaptation, I just want to say it really didn't planned out to be better than any 'Fate' series out there or it's not really that good. Story: The story followed the two factions fight for the 'Holy Grail' in a never before seen type of royal rumble. Instead of 7 masters and 7 servants in total, there were 7 masters and 7 servants on each faction which was known as the Red and Black Faction. When I went to the official information page of Fate/Apocrypha, I'm already guessing this will not be good unlike the other past Fate adaptations. Why?.. It's because of the vast amount of characters it have. Let me tell you something, the past 'Fate' series were all having 7 masters and 7 servants. Having 14 characters in total (+ some extras) is already a bother as you have to plan out everything for each. Whether they die or live. Whether they quit or not. Planning is tough when you have a bunch of characters on a story. Since Fate/Apocrypha focused on a Holy Grail War, you will expect that the masters and servants will kill each other and as episode 25 grew closer and closer, you will notice just one fight that should have killed any servant from the beginning, made one servant die in order to dispose their purpose for the conclusion. Apocrypha, from the first 12 episodes, gave us a one big hint on how the ending will have. I will not tell you as it will be a spoiler but it's within the main protagonist of the story which was Sieg. Sieg here was a huge problem. Though before he became a participant, he was a third party and suddenly he participated, thus, giving us a hint of the conclusion of this anime. One thing was certain that Sieg, when alone without Ruler, felt like he was just a supporting character. Other characters like Mordred, Astolfo, Karna and even Shakespeare stood out in a great way when they have screen time. Ruler, on the other hand, was an important piece to the story. It made the fighting of both the sides which summoned Jeanne in a reasonable way. Hence, Sieg only stood out when he was with Jeanne (except the fight with Shirou because that was his time to shine). I want to talk about the fights as well. The fights were very dynamic and predictable as we go through it. Predictable like the Karna vs Sieg battle and non-predictable like Chiron vs Achilles (I was shocked in this fight.). Also, what happened to Berserker of Red (Spartacus)? Just because he was just an overpowered servant, they just have to get rid of him? It seems that he didn't get enough screen time at all (except on the first opening). We were also told by the story of Jack The Ripper that was a huge development for Archer Of Red (Atalanta), Though, there were still few things I liked in Apocrypha and I will tackle it next. Characters: Sieg not getting a shout-out or in conclusion not standing up high with himself was quite a prickle and a problem. Although, we were given a variety of characters that made apocrypha at least a bit of an enjoyable series. Astolfo gave us comedic laughter and memes. Mordred with her charm and traits like her father gave way fan to favor with her. Caster imitating what will Shakespeare's attitude is if he was still living on this current era. Jeanne (Ruler) as a referee of the war kept on meddling and meddling on both sides having her stood out from the rest. Karna with his loyalty and pride to fight any Heroic Spirit in a sport-manship way and there was Berserker (Frankenstein) who rose up from the dead (seriously). With 14 servants, there is a certain that each one of you have picked at least one servant to gain hope for. I said earlier in the 'story' section that having too many characters is a problem and quite risky, although, one advantage of having this many characters is having a favorite or side to choose from. Apocrypha was about a Holy Grail War so I am sure almost anyone made a bet that this servant will win (even though we already know the outcome after a few episodes). Sound: First opening (episodes 1-12), which was by EGOIST, was a disaster in my ears. Don't get me wrong. EGOIST made a ton of good songs but this one doesn't fit my ear drums. With it's slow narration after the sign 'Fate/Apocrypha' showed in your screens, the narration was just bad and we don't get that 'hype' feeling which was common in the past Fate series. Although, the first part was really bad, only the chorus we get to hear the good part along with the animation. But still opening 1 was a rock-bottom. Although, the first opening was not suitable for my hearing, the second opening by LiSA was a success to keep me watching more. Both endings was quite fine as they sounded smoothly for an episode to finish. Art: Oh boy this section... I was really not hoping for A-1 Pictures to present a godly animation (like what ufotable did), hence, I would like to give a round of applause to the studios. The animation and art was decent enough to be fascinated or get enjoyed by the fights although some fights (Karna vs Sieg) was over the top that my eyes hurts a lot after the fight. I can't describe it to be good or bad. It's decent. Overall thoughts and Enjoyment: My overall conclusion about Apocrypha is that it was a decent adaptation and attempt by A-1 Pictures. Although, there's a feeling that something was missing to the story. It lacks something that we just can't understand at first. That feeling is quite a bother to the plot and to the audience perspective. Even though the community judged this Fate anime to be all negatives, there were still some positives outlook to Apocrypha itself. To wrap this up, I enjoyed and I disliked it as well. Enjoyed because of the fights (and the opening and ending), then disliked it for its predictable outcome of the story and lacking of it.

Hi, fellow Fate/stay night fans here. Let me start with what I actually liked: the cast is interesting, the premise is promising, and the first 7–8 episodes had me hooked. Seriously, the early setup looked like it could’ve been great. But that’s about all the praise I can muster. Once the male protagonist..... yes, our “Mary Sue” MC steps in, most of the rules, lore, and internal logic of the show start bending around him. The characters that were intriguing early on? Gone before you even get to know them. The stakes? Quickly evaporate. And Jeanne the supposedly “neutral” Ruler-class Servant? Yeah… spoiler-free: she’s anything but neutral. Her actions exist almost solely to prop up the MC, ignoring her own role in the story. Our MC? Should’ve been dead multiple times, but somehow survives everything. By the end, he’s suddenly capable of defeating the main antagonist a character who’s spent the entire show building up and hasn’t done a single thing “wrong” through sheer force of will. It’s unearned and frustrating. BTW MC is a 1 week old homunculus whereas antagonist is few hundred years old. Final verdict: the show is not boring you will definitely be entertained… but mostly in a “rolling your eyes every episode” kind of way. The fights and Servant designs look cool, but the writing, character logic, and story progression are painful if you care about consistency. Honestly, if you’re a Fate fan, stick with the original VN, anime, Zero, or Heaven’s Feel movies. Even generic isekai power fantasies handle their main characters and internal logic way better than this. Apocrypha squanders its potential and, for me, was a major disappointment, especially after strong start. Rating: 5/10 – fun to look at, painful to watch if you care about story and characters.

Sooooo... i see everyone trashtalking about this anime and saying that it was probably one of the worst anime of the season... of course it wasn’t ! I’m not specially a fan of the Fate franchise but I like it and i’ve seen the other Fate series. I liked all of them and Fate/Apocrypha is not an exception. I really enjoyed this show and I don’t know why there is so much hate about it. Generally, people judge an anime from his plot and his development of the characters. This anime has 29 characters and it seems that most of the trashtalkers say that it’s too much... Of course it’s too much ! 14 masters + 15 servants is a lot and there’s no way that the studio can develop everything in 25 episodes, but take it in the good way ! They focused on 5-6 masters and 5-6 servants, and it wasn’t too bad ! They gave us 29 characters, yes, but they never promised to develop every of theses characters. Complaining about that is nonsense ! Honestly, who cares about the background of the red team’s masters ? Or Spartacus ? Or the randoms in the Yggmilenia family like Fat-man and Sadistic-girl ? We don’t give a shit about them, just take what the anime gives you. About the characters, I can’t say that they were GOOD, but they weren’t BAD either ! And furthermore, giving us a lot of servants brings a lot of fights too ! I like seeing all theses heroes and discovering the powers they have. They developed the characters the less they could, but at least we can enjoy fate/apocrypha. More would have been great, but what we have is sufficient. Like every fate series, there are a lot of fights that happen, just sit, relax and enjoy them. Speaking about fights... it seems that the animation can be called “trash”. Really ? The animations is so fucking beautiful, the colors are nice and everything is smooth. “Yes but when the servants are fighting some frames are poorly drawn and the servants look like nothing”. Hey you, just tell me... why would you pause when two servants are fighting ? Theses moments are meant to be epic, you know, animation is money, I think that the animation is really well made because they added theses “ugly frames” to make the fights more intenses and smooth. It wasn’t a problem at all and I liked it a lot ! Complaining about that is only rage because in a fight, everything is fast, everything moves, you have no reason to pause. The animation in general is even more beautiful so i’m not gonna talk about it. About the OST and the sounds effects. Well, the OST aren’t incredible or memorable, but they are still good. Personally, I think that they accomplished their role of bringing me in the anime and giving me good feelings, above all during the fights. It is true that the sounds may be frequently loud with bass boosting. But for my part is wasn’t a problem. It didn’t blew up my ears or destroyed my car either. All they did was bringing me this feeling of power. I liked it and I hope to see this in other animes. If you are crying because you think it was too loud, maybe you should rethink about the volume you put while watching anime. It seems that people love crying when the a studio tries new things. The plot was not bad but it wasn’t incredible either. It’s about whether the human is good or evil. I think that something in the end was missing, and that some relations are a bit too pushed. But they didn’t really had the choice in a short span of time of 25 episodes. Finally, I can’t compare it to the other animes of this studio. I don’t know if the animations is really that horrible compared to precedents anime. All I know, is that I was always thinking « omg it’s beautiful » while watching. I enjoyed it and i don’t think that this anime deserves that much hate. Hope you guys will find the path to enjoy fate/apocrypha as I did :3

What do you get when a drunk person watches a masterpiece like fate/zero and tries to recreate it? Ponder no more because fate/apocrypha comes along to answer that question. I love the fate franchise, and have given a 10 to every other tv fate series so far that I have seen (unlimited blade works, zero, and even deen/stay night). I really wanted to do the same here, but fate/apocrypha just wouldn't let me. This series could have been great but the writing of the show was either done by drunkards or by lazy people wanting to get paid for minimum effort. As to my earlier question, why is fate/apocrypha a watered down version of fate/zero? Let me explain: The plot of both series are the same; win the grail war. Masters (humans) are granted heroic spirits (servants) by the holy grail to fight in a battle royal until the last ones remain and the winners are granted any wish they desire. But while f/z had seven servants and seven masters, f/a has fourteen servants and fourteen masters (separated into two teams on seven pairs) . And they both had the same number of episodes. So right off the bat there was a problem with character development and pacing since there was no way we could get a good introduction to every character in f/a. And there were also two additional main characters introduced in f/a just to make it more confusing. Also, while f/z is famous for not having an obvious main character and thus making it difficult to decide who would win and who to route for since all the characters have a lot of screen time and plenty of development, the f/a writers thought they could pull the same trick of not having an obvious main character by overloading the screen with thirty plus characters who get little to no development and thus since no character is defined at all, there wouldn't be an obvious winner and we wouldn't know who to route for. Additionally, while f/z had many deep conflicting philosophies between the characters which drove them throughout the story, in f/a each character is as flat as they come with very simple beliefs which are very rarely brought up and explored. I could rant about the drunkenness of f/as writing all day, but there are more things to talk about, so here I go. F/As writing might be atrocious, but the show has positives and negatives, although f/a has both in many categories. Sound: The show has a pretty good ost and I really like the main soundtrack theme and the battle theme along with a few others. I don't like the first op, the second is okay. The endings are a lot better, the first being good and the second being in my top 10 eds. Shout out to the new band ASCA for their song Koe. Animation/action: I will put these two categories together this time as it is an action anime. The animation and action in this show changes throughout the series. At first the fights are messy and things are just moving on screen and nothing really stands out as good but starting at episode 22, the animation and action go all out to give us some of the best looking fights ever put to screen (Achilles vs Chiron, Sieg vs Kotominei, and of course, Sieg vs Karna!!!). Characters: The worst part of the show. The charters are only given slight backstories and development in the second half of the show, and even then they aren't given enough humanity to latch on to so whatever the outcome would be, there would be very little impact on the audience. Sieg is one of the most bland protagonists of all time and Ruler isn't much better as she falls in love with Sieg for no apparent reason (not really her but her vessel, but there isn't much of a difference). And the antagonist Shiro Kotominei is a stereotypical villain with a cliche goal and motive for his apparently evil actions. The rest of the servants/masters who are alive get development in the second half, but by then it is too late, and I will explain why later. Story/plot: One of my main gripes with f/a is that at first, they pair up obviously noble pairs of servants/masters with obviously sinister pairs of servants/masters on both teams (each team has seven pairs). Thus it is obvious that there would be a rift which would cause both teams to change into more obvious good vs bad groups. Once that happens, more focus is done on the characters, but by then it is too late because we already have a side to route for. The obviously noble side. Also, there are many plot holes and butt-pulls throughout the series which really ruin the overall suspense of the series. Enjoyment: Despite all of my problems with this show, I enjoyed it a lot after the abysmal first half and I thus deem f/a worthy of an 8 (although it would have been a 7 if it wasn't for the last five episodes). 8= Good and had a lot of great elements, but I wouldn't rewatch it. There is so much more that I could dissect with f/a, but I don't want to spoil the entire show.