Anime 6922 Fate Stay Night Movie Unlimited Blade Works Reviews Filter Check 2

Oh, UBW, where should I start?

UBW was probably one of the most anticipated movies, and I can't blame people for that - the original route in the Visual Novel was outstanding, touching, at one time keeping you at the edge of your seat, at another causing you to cry about the pain of the characters, the results of their unfortunate choices, their small mistakes or simply outstanding sacrifices. The movie made me remember that story, made me want to live through it again.

Too bad it doesn't MAKE me live through it again.

IMO the obvious mistake the creators did, was forcing 20 hours of game-play into ... 1,5 hour movie - at the same time being forced to cut some portions of the story in order to squeeze it into the time frame. A 3 part OVA would've been much better, but they decided to make a single movie, and cut things out. Unfortunately, the thing they cut was - of all things - the plot.

I am not amused.

When I first watched the movie, I thought they were doing the same thing as FMA:Brotherhood did, cutting out portions that already were covered in the TV series, as to save some time for later action - It turned out that yes, they did indeed do something like that, except they didn't stop at the moment movie derived from the series. Through the first two thirds of the movie I felt like I was watching that "Previously on..." preview section, that reminds you what happened last week in an episode, and helping you to "get into the mood", to get better enjoyment out of an episode. Large chunks of story were cut out, the only things that were left, were the absolutely-essential-to-the-plot scenes, that push the story forward. There are two main problems with this:

First thing is, you can't have only plot-driving material in the movie, you need to join it together somehow. If you want to know what I mean, try launching any series, but watch only odd episodes (1,3,5,7...) - You'll somehow understand what the plot is about, but in the process you will lose the whole mood, the suspension of disbelief will be broken, because the story won't flow, it will be stitched together - If they really did not want to put in the portions in-between, they could've helped it if they worked around it. They didn't. And yes, watching an anime series with every second episode cut out will get you a pretty decent idea of what this movie is to the original VN route.

But there's another problem - If you throw out all your character development, you also lose any attachment the audience might feel towards those characters. This is especially important in movies dealing with sacrifices, helping others by losing something precious to you. I hope this won't spoil too much, but there's one death in this anime that particularly hit me - in the VN it was display of honor, sacrifice and chivalry, and it really made me sad that that person died in the process - Now what hit me is that in the movie... I felt nothing. Absolutely nothing. I didn't get to know this character, I didn't establish a connection with him/her, so even though I know this scene should be sad and touching - I can't help, but not give a crap. Things in this movie just... happen, but I couldn't help but feel detached.

And that's really a shame, because animation is superb. The fights are exciting, the visual effects are stunning, and the whole animation just feels so smooth and flowing - something I really lack in a lot of animes that have fights in them. It's really dynamic, but you can follow what's happening on screen, and made me jump in my chair a few times, visualizing I was blocking enemy strike :) That effect is something I saw in only a few series, and I personally think that this is how all fights should actually be done in animation. There might've been some inconsistencies, but it was nothing to make a drama out of - and if you look at the way they did the story, all other faults bleak in comparison.

Sounds are... good I guess. I think I heard the original music from VN a few times which is a plus of course, all of the original actors are here... I'm not a sound specialist, so I can't say much, but I have nothing to throw against sounds. I like them.

The movie actually gets A LOT better near the end, where - surprise, surprise - there isn't much plot to deal with, because for the most part it's just fights.
My opinion? Watching TV series is the least you REALLY should do before seeing this - otherwise you won't get half of the things, because they aren't explained, as well you probably won't really understand characters' motivations and personalities.
But in the end - I recommend to just go and read the VN, because there's just so much more to this story than what this movie presents. If I was to use this movie somehow, I'd cut out the fight scenes, remix them and input them into the VN as cut-scenes, and just remove everything else. All in all - considering the hype and my expectations - I am really disappointed by this movie.

6 out of 10

Undoubtedly today is the day I will be burned alive by the internet as some kind of heretic... You are about to find out why.

I watched the bluray of F/SN UBW because I wanted to know why everyone was like "OMG UBW COMES OUT TODAY!" and, well... Watching it did NOT answer that question.

I have very little good to say about the movie. In fact, "The sound and visuals didn't suck." is about the extent of my praise. So I won't bother trying to divide this into pros/cons.

First of all, the narrative is almost non-existent. The movie is 105 minutes ... long, and at least 90 of that is action scenes.

No real character development. It's obvious that the characters progress to some degree, but it all feels random and very little is offered by way of explanation.

I was going to bump it up to 6/10 overall, just for a disturbingly brutal death scene, but later disappointments made me knock it back down to a 5.

The animation and art would be high-quality for a terebi-anime, but are not good enough for a gekijouban. (Including some really shoddy CG that did not blend AT ALL and exhibited some pretty bad aliasing in a few cuts.)

I gave it a rating of 'average' based simply on the fact that I was able to finish it and didn't totally regret wasting time watching it. But it has few redeeming qualities and is otherwise SUB-STANDARD.

Fans of the F/SN franchise will probably enjoy it, but as my only connection to F/SN is as someone who enjoys another Type-Moon creation (Melty Blood) the movie did nothing for me.

So, as everyone should know, Type-Moon is infamous for having poor adaptions of anything not named 'Kara no Kyoukai'. Tsukihime's was so bad its worth thinking of it as an entirely different franchise because the characters are nothing alike, and Fate/Stay Night decided 'hey, we can't decide what route we want, so let's remove defining plot points and replace them with akshun.' I decided to ignore this and went into Unlimited Blade Works hoping it'd be okay. After all, its just one route, right? They can get the important stuff in, right?

If the important stuff is action, then they did pretty good. All the good ... fights from the route are in, and done pretty well. One of my favourites from the visual novel remains one of my favourites in this movie, and it certainly is easier to convey a good fight scene via a movie than text. The sound, as well, is done pretty well, and certainly adds to these fight scenes. So, if you're a Fate/Stay Night fan and you just really want to see one fight in particular animated, you should probably watch this and get what you came for. Otherwise, its probably going to be a bit lackluster.

To make time for these fight scenes in such a short timespan relative to the amount of time the route contains, the vast majority of the plot points are thrown away to make room. This leads to the fight scenes being fairly poorly strung together, and if you're not familiar with the route (i.e. having not read the visual novel, only seen the anime, or even worse, going into this as your first F/SN experience), it's rather difficult to follow what's happening. A lot of character development for everyone was lost as well, which leads to many characters seeming very one-dimensional, even if you've seen the original anime. There are a few fights where the outcome seems highly unlikely to the viewer, and while this difference is explained in the visual novel both before and after the outcome occurs, in the movie it is simply left blank and you just have to assume the victor is more badass than you thought before.

All in all, if you've only seen the original Fate/Stay Night anime, then your expectations probably aren't too high in the first place, so you might as well watch this anyway. You probably won't be too disappointed since you don't know what you're missing. If you haven't seen the anime or read the original, then you'll likely be utterly confused, but if you like action and don't care too much about why the action is happening, it'll still be fine. If you liked the original VN, then you've probably already seen this and were disappointed and this review won't change much. Overall, I give it a 5/10 from my experience as a disappointed VN fan.

I'm not going to write a really long review. So getting to the point.

Story-4- If you have not read the visual novel, then you might of enjoyed this better than I did. The story wasn't to bad, only thing that really got on my nerves was that they really didn't seem to give a time frame. Most of the scenes were messed together and you could easily think that it was all done in 2 or 3 days. In reality it happens in 10 days.

Art-9- I would have to say my two favorite parts of the movie was the art and the music which I ... will get to. They did a really good job with the art keeping it flowing well.

Sound/Music-7- I'm very surprised that they didn't use most of the music from the game (they did use one track called emiya), but some of the music they did use was nice.

Character-5- There wasn't much character development. I guess that they really didn't need to. If you either watched the anime or read the novel you would pretty much know the story behind Emiya.

Enjoyment-3- Ok the reason I gave this a really low score was because they took a story line and pretty much all the details laid out and they cut out A LOT of the enjoyment of the novel. In the movie they didn't quite use all of the "shining" moments from the novel that would of made the movie probably the best one that come out this year. When a friend and I sat down to watch it after 8 long months (we both had read the novel). We tried to keep up with the movie they jumped around a lot and cut out most of the days that explained what the holy grail was (that to me would of gave this movie a lot more depth). Well I think this rant has gone on long enough, so if you really enjoyed the anime series then go ahead and watch it. BUT if you have read the novel save your self the trouble and don't even bother with it.

I will write this as a non-gamer person, and someone who never played (nor will play) this game, so this comes from a no gamer anime fan.

Being such I need to say that this anime was confuse and too rushed, and lucky me I saw the first series and talked with friends who played the game, so I could enjoy some of the show, but being aware that studios should be more attentive to viewers who might not be interested in games but would watch a given show by its quality, story and artwise.

Artwise it was really good and you can enjoy it if only ... by it, but again be warned, if you never heard of the story, never played the game nor talked with someone who played it, nor saw the first adaptation, you will be at a loss on many parts, and you will feel the story rushed and with many gaps.

Fans may flame me for saying these words but will not be able to say I am wrong on this.

One thing is good though, Rin got better attention, which is good.

The only Fate Stay Night anime I have watched is the original 2006 version which I really enjoyed. I know that this movie is based on the anime of the same name, which I will also watch however, as a stand alone movie, it was shitty.

I find anime movies based off a series are usually just a really long summary of the anime and as a summary this sucked pretty bad. I usually never watch anime movies based off an actual anime because most of the time they tend to be just summaries. This is where I would rather have a filler anime movie ... instead of a whole retelling of the story in movie format. It's just pointless and a waste of money and resources.

I love Studio Ghibli movies so much more, because the movies are originals, they don’t just hash out the same material even if they have a source, like Howl’s Moving Castle and Ponyo which are both based on books.

First off, the first hour of this movie, was way too choppy. This is supposed to summarize the series yet, if I hadn’t watched the original and had a basic knowledge of the show and characters, I would have no clue what this anime was about. Especially, considering they edited it in really weird places. I had to mentally process how we got from point A to point B and before I knew what happened, I was already on point C. It made no sense. As a story as a whole, if someone were to just pick this movie up, they would be totally confused. They wouldn’t know what was happening at all.

The animation was nice to look at and a lot better compared to the original, especially the fight scenes. However, during that first hour, you just get this fast pace, basic knowledge of the plot: Of seven hero spirits in history who fight alongside magi (sorcerers) for the Holy Grail that grants any wish. They literally explain that in less than 2 minutes.

From that measly introduction, you get the main character Shiro, cleaning up after dinner, walking his friend back home and than you cut to a magi summoning a spirit and from there is goes everywhere. You get snip bits of characters meeting and fights and before you can wrap your head on what’s going on, the pace slows down a little, to where characters are finally having full fledged conversations with each other rather than just fighting.

The only real time the pace of the movie really slowed down and stopped being choppy errrr stopped being as choppy compared to the beginning was during the fight scenes.

It felt like the animators wanted to bombard you with characters so you couldn't recognize the lack of plot and story in this anime and before you know it, these characters are fighting again.

This movie to me is more confusing than Akira. I understood Akira, even though I really need to watch it again because, dame that movie really fucked with my head. Hell, the mangaka made Akira before he had concluded his manga series, so the movie and manga are different. That's what I call original!

But, this was in a completely different category of mind fuck. This turned my brain into putty with it’s choppy editing and terrible pacing. This is even worse than Angel Beats and that had 12 episodes, they had good solid episodes but terrible over all pacing. Too rushed. That’s what this was. Too rushed. They wanted to go to point A,B,C as fast as possible so they could take their sweet time on Z. Which is absolutely pointless, because a GOOD movies has a solid beginning and middle but this one lacked all three.