Anime 356 Fate Stay Night Reviews Filter Check 3

**SPOILER FREE REVIEW**

After finishing Fate/Zero, which went on to become one of my all time favorite anime, I couldn't resist checking out the wildly popular prequel know as Fate/Stay Night; an adaptation of what many have called "the greatest visual novel of all time". Considering the attachment to Fate/Zero and the hype around the source material, it's only natural that I got my hopes up for this anime. Well... Whoops.

There are very few anime that I would say have managed to "shock" me. I am usually a relatively unflappable person. However, out of all the shows that succeeded in surprising, Fate/Stay Night is the only ... one that did so in a way that is inherently negative. I couldn't fathom how bad it was. Literally the only enjoyment I got out of this anime was due to the fact that I got to see what happens after Fate/Zero, which was an absolute masterpiece.

The Fate series is basically another "death game" anime. 7 "masters" who can use magic summon 7 "servants" (who are all epic heros) and fight to the death for possession of the Holy Grail; the chalice that can grant any wish. Sounds entertaining right? How can you go wrong? I'll tell you how; insultingly stupid and underdeveloped characters, a ridiculously static plot with no suspense to be found, and having antagonists that are more likable and interesting then the protagonists (ESPECIALLY if you watched Fate/Zero). That's how. I apologize for referencing Fate/Zero so often, but good god I am still in shock that the two are related to one another.

Every single fight in Fate/Stay night is the exact same thing: The protagonists stupidly and foolishly rush into battle without a plan, they get seriously injured, and then something miraculous happens that allows them to win. It is all so predicable and so boring. It feels like watching the same episode 24 times; no suspense or plot developments what so ever until the final few episodes, and those are only interesting if you have watched the prequel. Shirou Emiya is one of my least favorite characters of all time, and I demand that he drop "Emiya" from his name so as not to disgrace Kiritsugu. He is a bumbling, irritating idiot to say the least; it got to the point where I was really and truly rooting for him to fucking die (painfully). The only characters that I found interesting were the ones in Fate/Zero, and even some of those were ruined by this crappy show. I could rant all day about Shirou's cheesy speeches, painful cliches, and general unwarranted stupidity, but I think you can get a pretty good idea of what this character is like with this single quote:
"People die when they are killed"
-Shirou Emiya

Truly inspiring.

If you are thinking about watching this series, watch Fate/Zero and then wait for the 2014 Ufotable remake, because next to its prequel, Fate/Stay Night looks like a droopy-eyed, armless monkey. It is not worth watching under any circumstances. What this show did to some of the great characters in Fate/Zero physically hurt me; the only reason I give it a 4/10 is because it is a continuation of a great anime and it is therefore automatically enjoyable to a certain extent.

This is less of a comprehensive review of the series and more of a reaction to what I saw. The reason here is that I haven't finished Fate/Stay Night. I couldn't finish Fate/Stay Night. My body physically rejected this anime halfway through episode 12, causing fever symptoms. As such, halfway through episode 12 is all I will be able to cover.

The story might have been interesting, had it been presented pretty much any other way. The Holy Grail War sounds like it could be a good concept, and probably is a good concept in Fate/Zero, which I will attempt to watch as soon as ... I get over the whole Worm Crest thing. That concept makes my stomach churn. Anyway, there's not much more I can say about the plot. The show moves so slowly that I really didn't get around to much of it.

The art and sound both left no impression on me whatsoever. If I were to hear a track from Fate/Stay Night, I would not be able to recognize which anime it came from. The art was similarly uninteresting. It might have been good if I had been able to muster the willpower to pay attention to it. Still, considering the main character has a total of two outfits, it can't have been all that impressive.

The characters are by far the most appalling part of this anime. I'll start with the main character:

Shirou is the worst. He is an idiot, thinking that he is capable of fighting superpowered servants with a lead pipe. He is arrogant for the same reason. He is sexist because he orders his own superpowered servant to sit at home and let him fight just because she's a girl. Lastly, he's a disgrace as a mage. The fact that he is Saber's master means she's incredibly weak and doesn't get the mana she needs to continue existing. Shirou doesn't seem to be willing to make compromises; everything has to be exactly how he wants it, and he just sort of expects the universe to comply. Fortunately for him, his plot armor is so thick that it does.

Saber isn't much better. She is basically a robot, with the only "character development" stemming from her own backstory. I have heard that she gets a personality later on, but waiting over 12 episodes for one of the main characters to act like an actual character is insane. She also looks stupid fighting with the invisible sword. I understand that they have to conceal their identities and revealing what her sword looks like would give it away, and I'm aware of the benefits to not allowing your enemy to see your weapon until they have already been cut, but the anime just makes it look so stupid, as if she's playing with an imaginary weapon.

Rin Tohsaka isn't the worst character in an anime, that honor goes to Shirou, but her motivations are questionable. She has no good reason to team up with Shirou. Additionally, she has been a Mary Sue for all of what I've been able to sit through. She knows how magic works, she knows Shirou's magical potential, she has a magical gem that can open his magic circuits, and she doesn't respond negatively to summoning the wrong servant. She just offhandedly mentions that she wanted Saber but she's fine with Archer.

Sakura has exactly one dimension to her character. She likes Shirou. That is 100% of her character up until episode 12.

Taiga is at least entertaining. She is also the last of the characters whose names I remember. Taiga is the character that's supposed to breathe a breath of fun into a dark and serious anime, but she never seems to show up. If Taiga had been utilized better, this show might be watchable.

Enjoyment gets a 1. Shirou is infuriating, it's like watching a dog get fooled by its owner pretending to throw a ball over and over again. At first it's entertaining, but then you just wonder "why hasn't he learned yet?" Additionally, the fight scenes last a few minutes at most, followed by several episodes of people standing around and talking.

And my overall score is a 1. If you manage to eke out any enjoyment from this pile of garbage, then I envy you. If you're considering trying it out, then by all means go ahead. Other people seem to like it, so maybe there are redeemable features that I don't understand, but don't feel the need to finish Fate/Stay Night just because Fate/Zero exists. It's not worth it. I was trying to watch Fate/Stay Night because I knew that if I watched Fate/Zero first, I would never be able to get through Stay Night. As it turns out, I can't get through it regardless. If nothing else, maybe you can try it out and see just what it is about this show that caused me to give all three of my roommates a lesson on anime just to fully convey how terrible this show is.

Fate/Stay Night - 4/10

It looks awfull, art is lazy and cheap, the writing is horrible and characters do what they do without any reason for them to do so.
The story, the concept, the world and soundtrack were all right.
Might check out the VN itself one day, but the anime was certainly nothing special and quite mediocre, aside from maybe the ending.

This is probably the worst anime I've ever seen. I was very disappointed in this anime, especially the characters and how it carried out. The main character irrates me so much. He acts like he's so strong and he can protect everyone but he's really weak and doesn't use his brain a lot and he's really ugly(In my opinon) He get's a little stronger but not much. Most of the characters seem to only have 1 move they use over and over in a fight. It can get pretty annoying after someone uses this 1 move like 10 times in a fight. The art is ... nice. I have to say that the plot was nice but how it was led out ruined it. There wasn't a nice development in the story.

I finished the series and wished I just dropped it. I didn't understand the connection between Shirou and Archer and all that history stuff at all until I read wikipedia. Maybe I just missed something during an episode. I don't particularly remember anything really special or bad about the art so I'll skip it. The music matched well with the plot, especially the opening/ending songs.

Okay, the characters almost had me trying to murder someone, especially Shirou. I'm sure everyone understands why. The guy with the most obessesive hero-complex I've ever watched was one of the most weakest guys I've ever seen. He gets slightly ... stronger toward the end but still. Okay, if Shirou was strong that'd be a different issue but if all he does is place a burden on everyone, that is really annoying. I guess the producers were stressing that part of his personality too much. And does Shirou seem to think that girls can't fight? Cuz Saber can just kill him one stroke. Shirou aside, there were some characters that had good personalities and made nice contributions toward the story. I also couldn't find much background info about each character. I only know the minimum about Archer and a lot others. Archer seemed like a cool guy but I know like nothing about him, just a stoic guy who has a connection with Shirou.
Overall, I think this anime is seriously overrated. There are a lot better anime to watch.

First let me tell you that this is my first review and that I'll be writing one solely based on my point of view with some SPOILERS!!! even tho' i try my best to avoid them, there are some minor ones, and i will write a warning whenever I plan to go to the SPOILER CITY.

I don't like rating anything on a scale, I don't feel that you can capture your opinion on a scale of 1-10, but in the spirit of this site I'll try my best, also explaining my reasoning behind those grades.

STORY 3/10

I started watching Fate/stay night with some great expectations, I ... watched Zero first, so i had some ideas about the story. But unlike the prequel stay night focuses on, for the first half of the series mini harem anime, and then on some cheese romance. I know that Fate/zero got aired six years later, but i didn't expect this much contrast.
In my opinion character building is a crucial part of the story, so there will be in depth review of the characters down below.

ART 7/10

Art ( in my opinion the least important aspect of the anime ) is the best aspect of the show, the only thing they failed to do on this part is that fights were to much flashy energy beams then actual fights. For example last fight between Gilgamesh and Artoria is nothing but beam on beam action, you see some clashes and kicks here and there but nothing more.

SOUND 7/10

Soundtrack was ok, sometimes catchy, but nothing special
Nothing specific about sound, just that there was some weird moments, like Pegasus sounding like a hawk and that sort of minor things.

CHARACTER 2/10

Now this is where the hate train realy starts building some speed.

Characters are poorly built, servants other than archer and saber don't have any soul, lots of side characters disappeared without explanation for a few episodes, villains aren't built at all, they just pop-up.


I couldn't restrain myself from spoilers in this section, if you didn't watch the series you are warned, if you don't want spoilers I can only say that i harbor great hate towards our main protagonist.

SPOILERS!!!!SPOILERS!!!!SPOILERS!!!!SPOILERS!!!!SPOILERS!!!!SPOILERS!!!!SPOILERS!!!!

Shirou Emiya - let's start with our main protagonist, adopted son of Kiritsugu Emiya, the boy that he saved from the tragic fire and raised him as half trained magus (half is maybe an exaggeration).
Shirou somehow gets himself involved in a fight between archer and lancer, somehow gets to escape with his life against an epic hero long enough to get into a shed that Irisviel used as a lab, and with no incantation summons saber, a woman that he instantly falls in love with but doesn't bother to ask her name, ever, and i mean ever, he even says that he will remember being in love with a girl named saber...realy now, girl named saber...
He than dies a few times, gets train by saber for a few days when he realises that he is useless, gets to do to magic that enables him to summon whatever waepon he visualize, and instantly gets adept with that wepon, and his skill doesnt have anything to do with magic, he just has it, wielding swords, daggers and staves like its nothing. And at the end he defeats Kirei in about five minutes, a skilled inquisitor that in last series was able to deflect bullets, move like Flash and at one point chopped a tree with his hands tied around it.

Artoria Pendragon/saber - The thing that buged me was that she didn't tell anything about the last war 'till the point when it was pointless. Here we have new masters, most of them have strong connection to masters in the last war, but Artoria is like nothing to say here...

Rin Toosaka - From the start we see that Rin is well trained mage, but she seems to have some weird ass all mighty gems, ok. Another thing, I knew why she is attached to Sakura, but that is from watching zero first, they didn't explain anything in stay night and their encounters are uneventful until she has to save her. And she gets out of her way to help our useless protagonist.

archer - we don't know who this guy is, but he is a badass

Hercules / berserker - lets just make Hercules roar and shit untill the end.

Sakura Matou - I find some things annoying 'cause i watched Fate/Zero first and i know the backstory, but that only confused me more to be honest.

ENJOYMENT 2/10

Overall it's a weak 4 from me, mostly because i watched Fate/Zero first and i was expecting something along those lines.

I do not suggest anyone ever watch this show ever. It's not the worst thing ever but its existence is pointless. It sucks and I hate it and here is why. Okay here you go.

The visual novel is superior in every way. This adaption removes all the good bits and changes the story to shift all the routes into one and make it end kind of like the main route and it turns out bad.

The animation is pretty garbage. It's chopping and unnatural. But if you enjoy terrible things it'll make your life nicer.

Dialogue is bad. Don't watch it.

So I decided to review this 'cause it's really overrated and wanted people to know it's overrated. Anyways...

___CHARACTERS___

Any story needs good characters to carry a good story, however no matter how good the story is, if the characters suck so will the story. This is the case with Fate/Stay Night. Most of the characters are flat with little to no character development. Let me breakdown some of the main characters so you have an understanding as to why they suck.

Shirou: Weirdly both the best and worst character in the anime. Let me explain what I mean. He gets the most character development, he finds ... his reasons to fight and why he wants the grail so he isn't bad in that respect. However I find it really hard to sympathize and root for this guy because he totally unrealistic and annoying (This is subjective so guess this is why people might like this anime.). He will help help anyone out at all costs and doesn't even remotely care about his life. It's taken to the extreme when (Spoilers) he pushes Saber out the way of a fatal blow and sacrifices himself. The thing is though he has known her for less than a day (End). I really could go on and on about his MANY flaws and self-contradictions but I think I will move on.

Rin: Honestly she wasn't bad but she practically zero character development. Did she love Shirou? Why did she want the grail? Why does she even help him? I guess I will never know.

Archer: LOL. This guy is considered a main character. All his screen time consists of are a few fights and those where he tells Shiro he is a little bitch with silly ideals.

Saber: She is probably the best character. Wants to get shit done and somewhat decent character development. Not much else to say really.

Everyone else: Awful, just awful. No character development and really generic. Hell one bad guys reason for fighting for the grail is "I want the grail 'cause I can and I don't mind murdering thousands of people for it".Truth be told he didn't actually say that but he might as well of.

___STORY___

This was really poor. For a seven way battle it is rather convenient that all the bad guys line themselves up for Shirou and Saber to beat one by one. It's frustrating to watch as I know they can't lose so it takes away all the tension and build-up.

Example (Spoilers): Saber is fighting that big guys with all those lives (his name has alluded me sorry :P) and is losing badly. Doesn't mean shit 'cause it ends up Shirou is so op that he can make anything with his mind that can beat anyone instantly. *Facepalms*

It's a Harem.

___ART//SOUND___

I don't really have much to say because they weren't bad at all, actually decent. I guess the most notable thing is that the op was good, not amazing but still somewhat memorable.

___CONCLUSION___

Would I recommend this? Maybe if you don't think Shirou annoying douchebag. I want to say that I LOVE Fate/Zero and i think that it is truly brilliant and it's a shame that it has any connection to Fate/Stay Night. Glad I could finally get this off my chest :P

This is my first review so feedback would great. Thanks for reading.

Fate/Stay Night is as uninnovative, unoriginal, and stale as its name would suggest (I needed a thesaurus for this one, I did not have the words to describe how bad it was). When people talk about Fate/Stay Night, they mostly talk about the visual novel being good or how Fate/Zero is so good or whatnot. Being associated with so many allegedly good pieces of work, one would normally expect something like this to be good. However, this was not the case.

I'll spill out a couple of words on the execution and then talk about how this should've been named "Stale - The Animation." The ... execution was amateurish at best. The art quality sucked, which is not something I say often as I usually don't watch indie stuff. The music was pretty good, and the voice acting was pretty good, but they only stand out because of how bad everything else is. The directing was horrendous, but that might be due to how bad the writing was. It's impossible to arrange a pile of turd into an art piece unless you're into that abstract art stuff. The only redeeming scenes are a very few select fight scenes, like 2-3 of them were kind of cool.

So about it being as stale as moldy bread that even starving mice won't eat. Every cliche line that a hero main character could say is said. Every cliche line that a villain could say is said. It's so bad. It features fights where the characters have enough time in between blows to spill out a monologue on righteousness, but barely have enough time to have deus ex machina last-second escapes. It features fight scenes where instead of having an overpowered bad guy kill the main characters simply because they suck, they're stupid and weak, the bad guy ends up running away, sometimes for no reason at all. Like, they don't even say anything, they're just winning, winning, winning, about to kill good guys... poof, gone. If you're going to insult me like that, at least give me an excuse, any kind of excuse. And on top of all this crap, you give me a bipolar plot with bipolar characters? One second they need to win the holy grail wars, one second they don't. One second the bad guy needs them alive for some stupid reason, one second he needs them dead. One second a character is the evilest, heartless character ever imagined, one second they're trying to show us how nice and human they are. There is a lack of direction here that is almost unprecedented.

And none of that is even my biggest beef with this anime. What I truly hate about it is that they have a cool character which I'm hoping I get to see more of in later series, and they completely butcher her as a character. She has this massive conviction and very strong principles through literally the entire anime up to the last 10 minutes where she gives up all of that.

Let me squeeze in a minor spoiler warning here. It's not a big spoiler, and you really shouldn't be watching this anime in the first place.

(SPOILER)

So the last time Saber was in the holy grail war, her master commanded her to destroy the holy grail. In her words, "I have never cursed the existence of command seals, nor anyone who had betrayed me, as much as I did that day." Absorb that for a second before I tell you that in this holy grail war she voluntarily ends up destroying the holy grail. The same scenario, except this time, because she has the hots for the main character for no reason, she gets talked into destroying it. I don't think it's possible to degrade a character more than that.

(SPOILER WARNING END)

So given how much I borderline hate this anime, why did I give it a 2 instead of a 1? I believe Fate/Stay Night has a strong foundation somewhere deep within the cesspool that is this plot. I watched it solely for the reason of being caught up to watch Fate/Zero because I've heard that Fate/Zero is really good. I'm hoping the true potential of this hidden foundation gets realized there. Aside from that, as I mentioned earlier, the voice acting is okay and there are some decent scenes in this. I didn't give it a 1 in any category, and that's primarily why.

Regardless of how I feel about this anime, I've been told it is kind of mandatory to watch to fully understand and enjoy Fate/Zero. Once I watch that, I will edit this review to say whether or not watching this atrocity is worth the admission ticket to Fate/Zero. For now, I will say to only watch this if your main goal is to get caught up to Fate/Zero. Otherwise, stay clear.

Edit: Yes, you should probably watch this for Fate/Zero's sake, it is a masterpiece.

At the time of writing this review, I have watched around 50 anime series and movies, and not once have I encountered one as appalling as Fate/Stay Night. Poor character development, atrocious characters, nonsense dialogue and predictable action sequences - this anime's got them all. The music and art were fine I suppose, but hardly anything remarkable - definitely something forgettable. The story was generic and predictable, therefore there isn't much to cover on that front.

First off, the character development. Well, it's nonexistent, so there's not much to talk about on this front either. All of the characters stay more or less the same as ... the moment you meet them.

The characters. Good God. The protagonist is a classic Mary Sue with plot armor thick as fog, with neither smart, nor brawn, but a lot of naivete. He's completely unlikable and forgettable. Oh, and he also happens to be pretty damn sexist - he forbids his servant(whose sole existence revolves around fighting for his sake) from taking up the sword because...she's a woman. The other characters are slightly less annoying, but just as one-dimensional.

Nonsense dialogue. If you know the quote "People die when they're killed" - that's where its from. Yup. It's from Fate/Stay Night, and while since that phrase's glory days are long over and the translation has improved...there's still no meaning beneath the shallow dialogues, which goes from stating the obvious multiple times to constantly saying each other's names(seriously, I've heard the name "Saber" called out about 10 times in every single episode for no real reason).

Well, I guess there was SOME amount of merit to be found in the action sequences. They were okay, if it was not for the fact that you knew precisely where things will pick up next as the scene unfolded before you. There were no surprises on that front. Something I found hilarious was the usage of random german words(as spells) and one of the characters suddenly monologuing in english for no real reason mid-fight(I suppose I didn't see that coming).

TL;DR Do not watch this. This is EXACTLY what people who say "Anime is trash" have in mind.

I just had to get this off my chest. I really opened my dead MAL account just so I can find a place to talk about why this anime is just not it.

For starters, I first watched Fate/Zero. I jumped right away into FSN thinking it would give me something as good as FZ. Wrong!!!! I have been avoiding this franchise in general when I heard it was adapted from a VN, which when explained by friends, the Fate VN sounded like an otome game dressed as a VN. Multiple storylines, but it boils down to who the main character romances. Let me be honest. ... Romance isn't my thing. Probably why this anime sucks for me.

But still, I decided to give F/Z a try (since in their timeline, it's what happened first). This franchise must be good, considering its popularity. And people say it's about magic and "war", which I like. So I tried F/Z. And it's amazing. I questioned all those years I avoided this franchise, and thought "wow, my initial impression on this franchise was wrong." Imagine if I didn't try, I wouldn't have known the glory of FZ. Then i came here. And the disappointment this anime gave me is immeasurable. My gut on avoiding FSN was right the entire time. Why?

First off, Shirou, the main character, is trash. At some point he got fatally injured and I was hoping he'd die. Let Rin take over or something. But he's got 100 layers of plot armor so of course he'll recover quickly. And somehow escape death. He's a male chauvinist. "GiRlS cAn'T dO tHaT", "mEn ShOuLd Do ThIs". Geez, stop being sexist. It's not just him though, it's the whole anime, but him being the main character just exemplified that. He's selfish, but the anime tries to makes it seem that he's being selfless. He doesn't understand other people's wants and forces his own ideals. He's a nice guy in general, but to people he actually has relations with, he's a "nice guy". Saber says she wants this? It doesn't matter, because Shirou wants something else and the anime tries to paint it as him being romantic and caring. Utter bs.

Next, it's like a harem but it's not a harem. Of course, Shirou is the only male amongst females, and somehow they gotta live in one roof, right? Oh let's not make it too much of a harem, since this isn't a harem, so the other girls will just regularly visit. There are scenes, positions, and poses of the characters that are provocative for no reason. How does it add value to the anime, really? It's just so uncomfortable and cheapens it. They even got the whole "loli character" simping for Shirou too. It's like the holy grail war is secondary now.

Lastly, the bs romance. It just came out too strongly and suddenly, like yo, isn't the anime about masters, servants, and the Holy Grail War? Or at least they made it seem like that when boom! It's about romance now. Though it is an adaptation of a VN with romance, maybe they should've made the transition from "we're here for a war" to "I'm in love with you" smoother. I will admit, I am biased and I don't like watching romance anime, but it would've been better if it wasn't so abrupt. I also, though having a gut feeling this was romance anime, thought it wasn't because of FZ. The "I am in love with her" scene by Shirou is so cringe and made me so angry. The whole romance made me question this whole anime. Just. No. And why???? And yes Shitou, I mean Shirou, just had to kiss Saber when she's crying and emotionally distressed and has asked Shirou to stop. Way to take advantage of someone in an emotionally unwell state. Of course go ahead and paint it as romantic too. Blargh. Even add a scene where they were cutting vegetables with Shirou back hugging. Barf.

I stopped at that episode. I couldn't go any further. I'm really trying to continue it, but it's just bad and I couldn't bring myself to waste more time.

So, if I watched this anime first before fate/zero, I would've definitely dropped this after the first few episodes. I am thankful I watched this after FZ since if this was my introduction to the Fate franchise, I wouldn't have even been bothered to be interested, and I wouldn't have seen FZ. Probably my fault watching this without research. I thought the main genre was action fantasy, with romance being minimal.

Just to add, some characters are both in FZ and FSN. I tried to think of it as "this is a different anime" since Saber isn't the same in FZ and FSN. And also, Ilya's age doesn't make sense. Shouldn't she be the same age or just a bit younger as Rin and Shirou? Or is it because she's a homunculus (or half?) that doesn't age? Idk. I'll try to finish this anime, but holy crap is it bad.

Edit: I finally managed to finish it. After... I don't even know how long since I had to stop watching for weeks after every few eps just to calm my disappointment. The last few eps was finally okay and then in the last one, they just had to end it with some out of place, annoying af romance. Blech.
If you're planning to watch this after FZ, you're gonna be disappointed. 4/10, just for the mere fact it's related to FZ.

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| Fate/stay night : Review |
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Ah the infamous Fate series ! This is something that I wanted to get into for a long time , But my mind went numb when looking at all the different series , the alternative stories and sequels in the franchise and I had no idea where to start.
So with a suggestion from a friend , I jumped straight to the firstly aired series of the franchise. I don't have any experiences with the Fate Visual Novel and I don't intend to read it either. So let's discuss the series shall we ?

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Story - 5
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...
Stay night takes place in modern day japan introduces us to a world of Magic , Fantasy and Mythology. and does a solid job at it too. The world and all it's concepts are explained properly and the story was very straightforward (take that as you will) and it was very easy to follow.
Story follows the story of Shirou Emiya as he's forced to take part in a Holy Grail war. Although despite being called a war , this feels really small in scale.
Story focuses on Shirou's morals as he refuse to kill and he can't back out from the war either but this falls flat on it's face because of all the cringe-worthy dialogue and the flaws of the character himself but we will get into that later.

The first half of the show feels like a really average slice of life anime with some action scenes and story picks up pace in the second half with it taking a turn towards romance/harem genre and action scenes increasing. Yes it does have some twists but most of them are blatantly predictable. It felt like they were going for a grand climax in the last few episodes but I couldn't help but feel it's half-baked and cliched.

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Characters- 3
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This is where Studio Deen royally screwed up. The premise of stay night does have potential to be really good if it's characters can back it up. Disappointingly , that's not the case here.
No beating around the bush , let's jump straight to the point.
The main character of the series.., "The most frustrating , idiotic and sexist dumbfuck I've ever seen" , and nope I'm not over exaggerating.
Sadly his character doesn't get any development as the series goes on and he's still the same dumbfuck when the series ends too.

As for the other characters , Saber stands out. There's not many faults with her and she's a genuinely existing character to watch.
Most common flaw for all the characters is that the series doesn't even give characters a motivation for their actions. Even the main characters tragic backstory is not fully explored.

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Art and Sound- 6
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I'm going to keep this section very brief. Animation for the series is beautiful considering this is made in 2009 , even tho the art doesn't impress me too much.
Character designs of Saber and Archer stands out but others characters are pretty generic looking.
As for the sound department , All is well here. Soundtrack fits the atmosphere perfectly. It's no surprise because this soundtrack is composed by the same person who composed the soundtrack of Ghost in the Shell.

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Overall - 4
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Should you watch this ? Depends on whether you're trying to get into the Fate series or not. If you're looking at it as a standalone series , it's pretty bad and you should probably pass. But If you're looking to get into the fate series , I'm assuming this is where to start.

Finished this anime a few days ago and I must say I was utterly disappointed by the series.I really liked the Fate/Zero and Fate/SN:UBW series so I though of giving this anime a shot too but I deeply regret that.

Art and Animation: 4/10
The art and animation is pretty decent but its really horrible compared to the any other fate series which right of the bat added a negative point to this anime for me. Many of you may not agree with me but to me the animation just felt like an eyesore to me.

Sound: 2/10
I didn't like the op and ed tracks but the soundtracks ... which played during the fight were so pathetic to listen to and I don't think there was a single ost from the anime which I liked.

Characters: 1/10
All the characters are so damn annoying from this anime especially our protagonist Shirou.Maybe I wouldn't have hated them so much if I haven't watched Fate/Zero and Fate/SN:UBW cause this series literally shitted over their characters especially on Saber character.
So lets first start with the mc
Shirou Emiya - He is a person who puts other before himself and wants to be a hero of justice. He will help anyone who asks him no matter even if they are only using him like rider's master once did (forgot that dumbass's name already) which is kind of annoying but leaving that aside the bigger problem is that he jumps in to help other even when he himself knows he won't be of any use.
He never seems to understand his limits and jumps in to protect other even when he knows that he won't be of any help and would end up dying in vain like when he jumps in the fight between Saber and Beserker and almost ends up dying while being of zero help. If Illya wouldn't have stopped after Shirou jumped in the battle b/w Besrker and Saber, Saber would have surely died and thus his death would have been in vain.

Saber - She was a mature woman in the other series but for the sake of the dumb romance b/w her and Shirou she is changed into a dumb dead pan airhead which is seriously annoying. (I know that this is a different anime and all but still can't ignore this shit)

***Some of my complains with the story***
1. Why does Rin keep on helping Shirou even after Archer dies ? Their alliance is broken now and its not like they love each other neither is clear whether she loves him or not. There is practically no reason for her to keep on helping him and put her life in dqanger as they were not even friends to begin with.

2. Saber takes magical circuits from Shirou but that seems to have no effect on him. His magical abilities didn't seem to be affected one bit but rather his projection magic keeps on getting better and better for no fucking reason.

3. Why does Illya starts living with Shirou and exactly why is she in love with him? Just why? Can you please give me one fucking reason.

4. Whenever Gilgamesh attacks with his noble phantasms how does all the swords and spears change to fucking light beams ;-;

5. In episode 21 Saber is knocked out almost dead by Gilgamesh and is just as good as dead but after hearing some bullshit spouted by our mc gets up after about 4 minutes as if nothing happened to her -_-

6. Literally wtf was that in ep 21 during 12:06 , how does the strike from Ea got reflected back. I still can't wtf was the golden shining shit Shirou projected but no matter what it was there is no way that replica made by him and the excalibur together could match up to Gilgamesh's ANTI-UNIVERSE NOBLE PHANTASM EA -_-

7. How the fuck did Shirou defeat Kirei? T_T Kirei was been stronger than him in every aspect then how was he able to do so ?

8. In the last episode Gilgamesh dies with just one blow from Saber sword while she was able to survive strikes from the fucking Ea -_-

This is my first review, so I will do my best to explain my points and separate any spoilers from the preview.

I will state upfront that I don't recommend this as someone's introduction to the Fate series. The best parts of the show will have no impact if you haven't at least seen Fate Zero. As for the show itself, it has some great music and decent animation for the time. However, the story suffered greatly because of how it handles the main character: Shiro.

I can confidently say that almost all the problems I had with the show is because the story was ... about him. I say this because other aspects of the narrative and other characters had to both be dumbed down to accommodate this decision.

However, to fully explain my point I have to dive into some deep spoilers.

The best way to describe Shiro's personality is that he's stereotypical Shonen Protagonist from the early 2000's. He constantly goes out of his way to help people, he has a temper, he's pretty slow, he's easily flustered around girls, and he has a tragic past.

Now, this personality isn't inherently bad. I've enjoyed many Shonen protagonists with this type of personality. The issues lie with his ideals. Shiro has a hero complex. He wants to save everyone, but the narrative constantly tells Shiro (and shows the audience) that this type of ideal is incredibly stupid, dangerous, and immature.

The problem gets worse when it's shown that Shiro constant wants to have his cake and eat it too. He doesn't want Sabre to fight but he also wants the grail. He wants to protect people but he refuses to use Sabre so he tries fighting himself (despite knowing he has no combat abilities).

All of this results in Shiro constantly endangering himself and the people around him (when he's not doing this just cause he's stupid). And what's worse is that when he causes trouble he can't fix it. It's always Rin or someone else that bails him out.

He's not selfless. He'd need to have the power to succeed to be selfless. He's just stupid and naive. And it's not hard to figure that out cause the series constantly reminds both Shiro and the audience of this fact. Every episode one of the characters will tell Shiro that he's being stupid and these ideals are very dangerous. But, he keeps brushing them off and makes the same mistakes.

This leads to my second problem with Shiro, he never faces lasting consequences no matter how many stupid decisions he makes. Most of the characters (including him) are capable of healing, or their opponent leaves before doing anything permanent. The story constantly gives him a pass no matter what stupid act he commits.

This reaches a climax around episode 16. After 16 episodes of dealing with this nonsense Shiro's finally backed into a corner. He realizes he's not as strong as he wants to be. He can't protect everyone and this is all his fault. The narrative has constantly reminded him that he needs to grow past his naivety. But, no, the narrative ignores what it built to for 16 episodes and pulls a Deus ex Machina so Shiro can be the hero and add to his harem.

To explain, so Sabre is on the verge of disappearing. This was due to Sabre using a powerful attack to protect Shiro. So something of lasting consequence is set up and Shiro doesn't fix it. Rin does. However, the series at least states the ritual will have negative affects on Shiro (except it doesn't. It didn't weaken him at all. It just takes away magic he was never using). And this isn't even the deus ex machina. This is the set up.

So, Shiro's backed into a corner. Archer's dead and they need to kill Hercules (someone who has been built up as basically suicide) 7 times. So what does Shiro do, he creates excalibur out of thin air. Yeah, the series briefly mentions he can create things he imagines. This was never taught to Shiro nor was he directly told (it was just vaguely hinted to him by Archer. Even though it was constantly shown that Shiro's pretty slow. He needs things explain point blank). On top of that, Shiro's not good at magic. Yet, he can out of no where create Excalibur and one shot Hercules...

He doesn't mature, he doesn't work hard to reach this point, he just gets this on a silver platter after annoying the audience with his bs for 16 episodes. Cause all the build up to Shiro maturing and realizing his ideals are wrong can't have a satisfying conclusion.

Which is especially frustrating because other characters don't get this treatment. Rin did something very similar when she decides to save Shiro, but she loses her servant in the process. But, she still finds the strength to find ways to contribute despite this great loss. Rin is just an excellent addition that made it so much easier to get through this.

The only time I found Shiro bearable was in the last 4 episodes. But, this wasn't because his toxic ideals were changed. It's cause it's never brought up and an entirely new (but more interesting and likeable ideal) comes up to set up the climax.

A climax that only has satisfying moments if you watched Fate Zero (things like Gilgamesh's death or Shiro talking with Kirei if you didn't). Also, if you were invested in the romance between Sabre and Shiro which I was not because I didn't like either character in this series.

This brings me to my last point: the servants. They have little to no development or character. Sabre is the only exception, but even that is pretty minimal. And I don't think is nearly as satisfying if you didn't know her history from Fate Zero. And this was because more focus had to be put on Shiro and his relationship with Sabre.

And that's my overall message regarding this show. It leaves you with nothing if you don't have other source material to draw from. And even if you do it constantly annoys you with a POV character that constantly acts stupid, is rewarded for this, and yet is told he needs to change. I would only recommend this show for hardcore Fate veterans since it does provide a lot of nice expansions on the lore. But, a wiki page and watching the last 4 episodes does that too. And would've been far more enjoyable.

**THIS REVIEW MAY CONTAIN A FEW SPOILERS**

I really don't get why this anime gets so much praise and gets even more praise with the remake made by studio ufotable, Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works. What I find really surprising is that this a sequel to Fate/Zero which in my opinion is leagues better than this. So now I will explain why I didn't like this.

Story: (3/10)

The story of Fate/stay night begins with Shirou Emiya who has learned somewhat how to use his magical powers begins to help people around with it, but one day he suddenly gets involved in battle between 2 magus which then ... causes him to get further involved in a battle called the Holy Grail War. In this war there is 7 masters that have 7 spirit servants that are supposed to fight to the death until only 1 master with a spirit servant remains in order to get the holy grail which is capable of granting the master's greatest wish. One of my problems with the story is how every fight that Shirou's in he always loses but then at the very last minute he figures out a strategy on how to beat them or something miraculous happens that makes him able to beat them and this happens pretty much every fight in the anime which then makes it start to get very predictable on what is going to happen. Another thing that really bothers me is how the villains don't take the chance of killing Shirou when he and his allies are almost dead, they either leave or give him more time for no apparent reason. Another thing worth mentioning about the story is that the pacing is pretty bad which is mostly shown during fights.

Art and Animation: (5/10)

The art in this I found out to be alright at best, some of the backgrounds were nice looking, the character designs of the spirit servants were good, and the magic attacks looked okay. I thought that the animation during battles moved much to slow to be exciting and looked choppy at some moments.

Sound: (5/10)

The soundtrack in this was pretty forgettable, the first OP was good and the ED was okay but the second OP I thought was below average. The soundtrack didn't really help making the action scenes any better. The voice acting was fine with nobody really standing out and the sound effects were average.

Characters: (2/10)

The characters in Fate/stay night is definitely the worst thing about the anime. All of them have barely any development. Shirou Emiya is a really bad character because of how stupid he is with his decision making whenever he is in a battle, he usually goes into every battle saying that he will save everyone with Saber fighting the villain and him having no backup plan if it goes wrong which is pretty much every time but since he is the main character it always goes his way no matter how dire the situation may look for him. Another character in the anime is Rin Toosaka who is severely underdeveloped because of how little screen time she has and she is occasionally put into the story because the anime doesn't want us to forget that she is still a character. There is also a character that dies in the middle of the anime which I will not say because that would be going into spoiler territory but they make this death seem like it is really effective but when they show the characters reacting to this death it seems that they were hardly fazed by it. The only thing I liked about the characters is that I got to see the old characters from Fate/Zero again.

Enjoyment: (3/10)

The only enjoyment I got out of Fate/stay night is how there were many references to Fate/Zero.

Overall: (4/10)

I think that Fate/stay night shouldn't have been a continuation of Fate/Zero and I would not recommend this anime.

The Fate/stay night story has had a couple of incarnations up to this point―Studio Deen’s Fate/stay night and Ufotable’s Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works. Both each have their issues, but this version of events is a lot more cringe-worthy than Ufotable’s presentation. Both have marketability because of Type Moon’s pension for making memorable character designs.

• The aesthetic to the cell drawings in Studio Deen’s version appealed to my taste; it had a tessellated, pixel art feel to it―it was like they were created from a Dreamcast. The animation, on the other hand, was a disaster. I clearly remember the scene which made me go, “Good God, ... this is crap animation,” when Rin and Archer were flying off of the balcony and there was no detail with the animating process. They just swiveled the bodies diagonally and slide them across the screen like a Power Point presentation! Truly awful. And there’s a bad CG scene with a dragon that is so bad that it sits among the likes of the infamous Golgo 13 helicopter scene from that OVA, which is just full of camp! It’s jarring and difficult to look at with how awful the computer graphics are! As the series goes on, the pointillistic artfulness was replaced with cheap, seemingly rushed through scenes and a plethora of completely static scenes that poured out of miles of exposition.

• The story needs no introduction; the massive Fate/stay night visual novel legacy has practically become The Odyssey of anime tales. There were notable differences in the characterization of Illya in both adaptations; Studio Deen’s version kept her the primarily creepy murderous loli that she is in all of the arcs (save for Heaven’s Feel), while Unlimited Blade Works goes into her backstory and makes her more sympathetic while being a psychopath. Other than that, the only things that I can really complain about that deviate from this overly narrative is the hellacious exposition and a confusing and rushed ending that left me scratching my head. The scenes that are obviously supposed to be the ero-scenes from the original game are set up and then drop off awkwardlyーI honestly think that the vampirism effect that the first Heaven’s Feel film used was more effective than the implications and set-ups that were just a nudge to those who had played the source material.

• All in all, I think that the classic Studio Deen Fate/stay night TV series is worth watching―ONLY if you’re a really big fan of the Fate series or Type Moon’s creations (which I couldn’t really see why unless you’re into the designs, Melty Blood is among one of the worst things that I have EVER read). Otherwise, don’t do it! I give this Fate adaptation a 4/10.

This review is coming from someone who watched Fate/Zero first. This is also my first review so bare with me.

Personally, I loved Fate/Zero. It told a story of a game of life and death. The players were divers. Coming from all over the globe, they ranged from Assassins, and naive teenagers, to child murders and people trying to save their family. They were paired with some of the greatest heroes/villains from history and were forced to fight. The game was brutal. Even if you lost the game, and try to walk away, you're still not safe.

When I heard there was a sequel, I was super ... excited. I shouldn't have been. The ultimate battle to the death turned into a stupid children squabble. Literally! Just about all the contestants were prepubescent children with unstable emotions. It was more a shitty high school love story than an actual fight. And for some stupid reason, they just happen to be from the same area in Japan. What is up with that.

In conclusion. If you haven't watched Fate/Zero, I would recommend you go watch that first. And if you have, I would recommend you not watch this pitiful excuse for a sequel.

I feel as though my child had been murdered right in front of me. I was behind a glass wall, and couldn't do anything but watch as he died. This anime is an atrocity of man. The UN says there is eleven acts against mankind? I would like to propose a twelfth. This anime takes what was Fate/Zero, an amazing anime that makes you philosophically think, and destroys it. It turned Fate/Zero into a comedy where the characters are crackin' some funny jokes as they are trying to kill each other. This anime is as close as you can get to a Marvel movie for ... anime. It completely destroys the integrity and legacy of the characters. At the time of writing this, before watching this I had never ranked an anime less than 5 stars and this got a one star. Please, if you just finished watching F/Z DO NOT watch this. It could very possibly ruin how you view the Fate series as a whole.

I understand most might not see my review as "credible" because I have only watched five episodes, however, dear reader, I ask you this. Would you trust a man to tell you CIA torture is terrible if he "only" went through five minutes of it? Hell; I couldn't even enjoy the OP! I love OPs and this was the only anime where I consistently skipped it.

Want to watch this as a "turn off your brain" anime? Don't. I know what a "turn off your brain" anime/movie is when I see one; I liked Moonfall for Christ's sake! The surface level one-liners don't even work well. I would have an easier time laughing at Amy Schumer than at any of these jokes.

Just like how WW2 brought us computers, at least one good thing comes out of this atrocity... "People die if they are killed." If you're going to watch ANY part of this, simply look up the 4 second clip and call it there.

To summarize: F/SN ruins the integrity of the characters and their story, tries to be a marvel movie with all the jokes, isn't even funny, and can't be enjoyed be anyone who respects the story of Fate. 3 hours of my life wasted, but 20 minutes well spent typing a review if this even causes one person to not watch F/SN.

This anime is such trash it took me years to finally complete it. I'd watch a few episodes, then stop, then come back 6 months later, watch a few, stop. The only reason why I endured this was because I watched Fate/kaleid liner PRISMA☆ILLYA and enjoyed it. But, I watched it out of order and heard I needed to watch Fate/Stay Night and then I had to see Unlimited Blade Works, because that's the bomb apparently. I tried to get to it years ago, but this anime is so dull, drab and meh, it just couldn't hold my attention for long, ... with so many other far better animes coming out.

The main problem I have with it is the protagonist Shiroh. Who is about as self-righteous and unlikeable an MC as I've ever seen. By contrast, he made me root for the villains to kill him. Because in all honesty, the one good thing this anime had was villains. They were much more interesting than the heroes. The heroes were completely mediocre and boring. Their personalities were cliched, their jokes were unfunny, the motivations were paper thin. They were all weak, including Saber, who was stoic to the point of boring. She's totally overrated as a heroine.

Also, where is the logic? (Spoiler: She worked so hard to get back and continue her fight in her realm, only to immediately die at a tree? Well, I guess I'd rather be dead than be stuck with Shiro for life, too...) I mean, dang this guy's whole character was about being a burden to her, from getting in her way during fights, to try and stop her from fulfilling her duty (to apparently die on a tree)... I hate that guy.

I won't knock it too much for the animation, because this is old now and was decent for its day. I know from Iilya, that the animation style gets MUCH better than this and I've seen that UBW is a well animated work. But, everything about THIS anime was garbage. I even hated the soundtrack. That's rare.

This is trash and I'm hoping sitting through this in intervals will be worth it. I hope UBW isn't overhyped.

Story: 4
Art: 5
Sound: 1
Character: 1
Enjoyment: 1
Overall: 1

I won't be repeating what everybody else has already said. This adaptation is just trash compared to the VN route. If you want to experience Fate, just read the VN. And even though it's this awful, at least it's the better of the two F/SN anime series we got. Honestly, if you're gonna just be watching the anime instead of reading the VN, you shouldn't even be getting into this franchise, as the anime is just used as meme fodder and nothing else

Shirou is an insufferable fuck in the VN as well, but here's he's double so, even though the anime spends way less time ... on him than the VN does

The only good thing about this trash heap is that you'll at least get some laughs out of it. Just be careful not to accidentally vomit instead