Castlevania: Season Finale – Belmont Forms His Team

Here we are; the breakdown of the final episode of Castlevania, Season 1. Will the series pull more from the source material, or will it continue to feel like a standalone?  Read on to find out.

As the episode opens, Dracula’s monsters confront the Bishop in the church.  One of the monsters lets him know that God has abandoned the Bishop for his wrongdoings, and proceeds to bite off his head!  Meanwhile, the mob who was chasing Belmont eventually joins him after Sypha Belnades (one of The Speakers Belmont saved in the catacombs — also a playable character in Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse) saves him allowing the opportunity for Belmont to confront one of the corrupted clergymen, and assemble the mob in order to prepare for the attacking demons. Destroying the creatures leads to an explosion sending Belmont and Sypha back to the catacombs.  Through their search, they come across Dracula’s son, Alucard (also a playable character in Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse). A fight between the two ensue leading to Alucard joining Sypha and Belmont.  Due to him being half-human and half-vampire, he has taken the mindset of his mother, Lisa, to not hate humanity, which is why he believes in destroying his father.

With the early concept art, and main feature poster, resembling the original Castlevania, I had thought that the series would be more influenced by the first game in the franchise. As the show began, one could clearly tell that it would actually be based on the third installment in the franchise. Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse, which was a prequel to the original NES game even though it was the third game to be released. Set a couple centuries prior to the original Castlevania, Dracula’s Curse consists of the same plot we see in the Netflix series, which makes sense from a chronological perspective. Aside from the general plot, the first couple episode made the series seem like it could have been its own standalone, but Episode 4 was much closer to the source material. The incorporation of Sypha and Alucard in Belmont’s quest to defeat Dracula made the concept almost identical to the game.  I agree with one viewer saying that Alucard’s look was very much like a late 80s early 90s rockstar, which I could have done with out, but adding these characters definitely boosted the nostalgia for me. Trevor Belmont’s character was clearly displayed in this episode as a strong leader proving his worth against the demons. We get to see Trevor use Holy Water, as well as showing that the Bishop’s excommunication of the Belmont family was due to jealousy rather than true “black magic”. Belmont also used his whip much more this episode, which was fun to see. The fight between Belmont and Alucard was entertaining with a fun reference about it not being a bar fight — a nice nod to the drunken fight in Episode 2 — as well as Alucard using a move from one of the video games.  Did you catch it? The culmination of the fight made way for the team-up of the three, and that badass last shot of the season…

As a Castlevania fan, I thoroughly enjoyed the season.  I wish there were more episodes, but it felt like there was finally a video game adaption done correctly (at least done well at best). What did you think of Season 1 of Castlevania?  Are you excited for Season 2?  Should they aim to make more episodes? Will Grant DaNasty join the team next season? Do you think this is the way to successfully bring video games to the big and/or small screen? Leave your thoughts in the usual place, and thanks for reading!

 

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