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MAJOR SPOILER WARNING ⚠️ Castlevania spoilers: If you care about spoilers and haven’t watched season 1. Do it. The entire season is only 160 minutes long 4 – 20 minute episodes. THEN comeback. I’ll wait…
Okay. Let’s proceed.
Warren Ellis’, “Castlevania” carves out a rich, macabre swath of fictional 15th century Wallachia (modern day Romania) for our sadistic glee. In four scant 20 minute episodes, Ellis deftly sets up the chess pieces on the board. And yes, it’s dense in it’s world building and perhaps the pacing could be tighter, but these are minor quibbles. Castlevania is better than any video game based, animated series deserves to be.
It’s a cleverly astute commentary on Organized Religion & Patriarchy couched in a well produced anime show. If you can appreciate the long game, Castlevania rewards you with the best example of gothic anime style horror I’ve seen since Black Butler.
At its heart is the clash between diametrically opposed forces of altruistic scientific knowledge and repressive superstitious ignorance. The progressive pursuit of a fact-based medical education to uplift a pesant populace and empower women to improve their lot embodied by Doctor Lisa Tepes (Emily Swallow)Versus the sadistic abuses of a powerful Male Clergy Embodied in (Matt Frewer) as The Bishop, a clergyman who orders the burning of Lisa Tepes for witchcraft, later being named the bishop of Gresit. Uses dogmatic interpretations of scripture only to cling to power, foment religious zealotry and exploit the mobs enforced ignorance by brutally repressing women and immigrants.
Sound familiar?
Not to be lost amongst cultural allegory is the tragedy of two unlikely, star-crossed lovers that sets the stage of this macabre feast. An omnipotent immortal and a fragile mortal in love. Vlad Tepes redescovering forgotten happiness, trying to reclaim his lost humanity for her sake, then cruely robbed of what he held most dear.
This story is far beyond the 1989 video game Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse by Konami I loved escaping a haunted castle with a whip & crosses. It’s art style is heavily influenced by that of Japanese anime and Ayami Kojima’s artwork in Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. But after years of development hell, animation studios Frederator Studios and Powerhouse Animation Studios, along with Netflix crafted more than just a ghost story.
This is the story of a widowed spouses right for vengeance.
Salvation from the Vampiric Horde rests in the hands of three unlikely heroes- Trevor Belmont (Richard Armitage) the brash heir to the Belmont Vampire Hunter legacy and the shows main protagonist.
His comrade in arms, (Alejandra Reynoso) as Sypha Belnades, a Speaker and the Elder’s granddaughter who is young and naive but wields powerful magic.
The final member of Wallichas triumvirate of champions is reveled with florish in an incredible last action set piece. He the enigmatic Dampiric (Vampire-Human hybrid) progeny of Vlad & Lisa Tepes. Alucard Tepes, (James Callis). Wounded Alucard awakenes from his crypt an entire year after he rebels against Dracula’s Genocide. He would destroy his own father to keep his mother’s altruistic vision alive.
However, I straight up had the feels for Dracula’s plight the way he was written by Ellis and voiced by Graham McTavish who does an excellent job as the wrathful Vlad Dracula Tepes. You KNOW these Church motherfuckers had it coming when you can root for Count Dracula!
As the story unfolds, the immortal Vampire lord men call Dracula is interestingly reimagined as a reclusive man of science. An unseen nobleman ensconced in an immense fortress who’s mounatnous approach is lined by the impaled corpses of slain Ottoman soliders sent against him long ago while he was still a living man. Vlad “The Impailer” was a minor lord but tenacious and feared military commander, defending ancient Wallacia and the very Church that condemned him.
Dracula is whispered to be a blood-thirsty demon by the peasantry. This is only half true. He’s also a lonely, reclusive man of science and learning. Surrounded by books and technology massed through the ages in the huge mobile, modularly adaptable, castle of his own design that lends the series its name. His heretofore untapped potential as a scholar and mentor is how he meets his doomed wife, Lisa. Lisa Tepes is written straight feminist. Voiced by the always solid Emily Swallow. She’s a bold, intellectually curious woman with enlightgened, altruistic views, which of course makes her a patriarchal threat and eventually, draws the unwanted attention of The Church.
She is desperate to become a doctor and needs access to his library and resources, “You don’t need me to kill chickens and read thier entrails.” An indifferent and malevolent Dracula quips as he de-materializes at will, stalking Lisa about his impressive entryway. A supernatural beings beliefs grounded in natural science are surprisingly not contradictory in this instance. Lisa, like Dracula, believes in science and knowledge forbidden by the backward, oppressive clergy.
When Dracula inquires what she offers in return for his help, Lisa scolds him about his lack of manners when guests arrive at ones door. “I could start with a lesson in manners! Not offering a guest a drink or even to take thier cloak?” She is utterly fearless even as Dracula goads her, implying he could simply drink HER dry. She remains steadfast in her request he tutor her to help the townsfolk who fear and dispise him. Vlad is impressed by her courage, charmed with their witty banter and intrigued by her sharp mind. He accepts her as his pupil. And, not unexpectedly, that initial seed of mutual attraction at thier introduction, eventually blooms into love.
Happy years pass by. Lisa studies, becomes a Doctor tending to the peasantry in the small villages that ring Castle Dracula. Vlad, inspired by Lisa’s admonishment. Explores the world of men as a human, to study and reclaim his own lost humanity. Upon returning home he’s startled by the burnt ruins of Lisa’s Clinic. He enquirers about his wife’s whereabouts with an old sympathetic peasant laying flowers in the charred ruins. He’s sure he can clear up any misunderstanding and get a magistrate to release her.
Only then he discovers his beloved wife was abducted and murdered by the Church. Burned at the stake for hearesy in the public square with no trial, and not a single solitary advocate to speak in her defense. Even as she burned, Lisa still emplored her absent husband aloud in a vain attempt he could somehow hear her, to be merciful to her mocking tormentors.
Through a softly building pain and rage in his cadence, echoing an approaching summer thunderstorm, McTaggert as Vlad delivers one of the best-delivered monologues I’ve heard in a while. –
Vlad Tepes: (whispering) “She said to me…. If you would love me as a man,……then live as man,…….travel as a man.”
Peasant Woman: “She said you were traveling.”
Vlad Tepes: (weeping bloody tears) “I was. As MEN do……………Slowly!
NO MORE!!!
Dracula: (suddenly wheeling on the poor woman in cold fury) “I do this last kindness in
HER name! …….She, who LOVED you HUMANS and tended to your ills!
Take your family and leave Walachia TONIGHT!
Pack! And go! And don’t look back!
FOR NO MORE DO I TRAVEL AS A MAN!”
(Dracula suddenly bursts into an incondescent pillar of fire and vanishes. The old woman is thrown by the shockwave and scrambles away)
This series is full of awesomeness but to the filmmakers credit, the impressive occult horror action never overshadows the main themes. You see, Warren Ellis wasn’t satisfied writing a tongue- in-cheek cash grab on a known beloved franchise. Warren Ellis hones this blunt “Guy that kills Vamps” story with off-color humor, rich dialogue, brutally depicted acts of occult horror, kinetic action set pieces and Shakespearian level tragedy to a razors edge. Then stabs you in the heart with it!
Consider this. To be an all-powerful, immortal being ultimately means eternal loneliness. So what does it do to the equation when the impossible happens and you find love?
A person as kind as you were once cruel, that has the power to draw out your forgotten benevolence. What would YOU do to a society that robs you of that love?
I know what I’d do.
I’d harness every preternatural gift at my disposal, in this world, and the next, to bring that society to its knees.
In this way, the best-written villains give us hand holds for empathy. We may not agree with his method but we UNDERSTAND his motivation, in spite of Dracula’s horrifically brutal reprisal.
This series is seriously not for kiddies. But being a bad parent if I’m pestered enough I’ll watch it with them, skip the parts that will have my boy crawling in my bed at night, and talk about the legitimate themes explored in this excellent series. as a HUGE fan of the original game series, and this new crop of anime/graphic novel-style TV shows “Castlevania” stands appart. This is a series Netflix has already renewed for a second season. Expanding season two to eight episodes says Netflix smells a hit! Here’s to Netflix never Chillin’. (See what I did there?) I give this impressive series five peasant skulls!
💀💀💀💀💀
You can see the entire first season, which comprises four episodes, on Netflix right now. Check out a NSFW CLIP, Opening Credits &!the trailer for the first season here- Art Credit: Netflix
Love this series so far! Its too bad what happened to Lisa though, and she wasn’t even a witch. 🙁