Fate/Apocrypha

Title:Fate/Apocrypha
Overall:Rent
Keywords: , , , , , ,
Notables: Animation - A1 Pictures
Original Concept - Type-Moon
There was once a Holy Grail War waged by seven Mages and Heroic Spirits in a town called Fuyuki. However, a certain Mage took advantage of the chaos of World War II to steal a Holy Grail. Several decades have passed, and the Yggdmillennia family, who took upon the Holy Grail as its symbol, defected from the Mages' Association and declared their independence. Furious, the Association sent a force to deal with the Yggdmillennia, but they were defeated by the summoned Servants. With the Holy Grail War system changed, war with seven versus seven, breaks out. And so, the curtain rises on the epoch-making Great Holy Grail War.
(Summary Courtesy of Anime News Network)


25-episode TV anime that premiered on July 1, 2017.
Animated by A-1 Pictures.
[edit] The ↗Fate/stay night franchise:

Fate continuity Kaleid Prisma continuity
  • (2013) Fate/Kaleid liner Prisma Illya (TV+OVA series, 10 TV episodes and 1 OVA)
  • (2014) _ Fate/Kaleid liner Prisma Illya 2wei! (TV series, ? episodes)
Apocrypha continuity Grand Order continuity Extra continuity Strange Fake continuity
OverallArtAnimationCharacter Design MusicSeries StoryEpisode StoryReviewer
Rent 8 8 8 6 6 6 Ggultra2764 [series:3363#1552]
(Rent-/ Watch+)

This spinoff for the Fate franchise focuses on two factions of Masters and Servants competing against one another to claim possession of the Holy Grail for themselves. As a result, this series sports a bigger cast compared to what is found in the Fate/stay night timeline which contributes some major pros and cons for Apocrypha.

On the one hand, the battle between two sets of Masters and Servants creates a more grand-scale conflict for this particular Grail War and makes for some entertaining fights between the Masters and Servants participating in the Grail War, especially when multiple characters are involved in elaborate action sequences. The series also provides a good amount of fleshing out on many of the major characters within the series and like Fate/Zero, explores the dynamics between a number of the Master and Servant pairings. Pairings like Kairi/ Mordred and Jack/ Reika gave me the most interest in their character dynamics with how they interacted with one another. Also while its major plot twist going into the second half of the series may have some drawing parallels to Fate/ Stay Night with how it plays out, it makes for some more intriguing plot developments with the motives surrounding it and actually gives the series more dimension to work with compared to its first half.

On the other hand, the larger cast does result in a number of characters left being underdeveloped, some of which being reduced to mere archetypes. The first half of the series is a bit dry in its storytelling as it gets too focused on the conflict between the Black and Red factions with its action scenes and there are points where it felt like it was pandering to its audience a bit too much. Also for lead characters, Ruler and Sieg seemed a bit bland in their roles for me with Ruler playing the pure and neutral mediator of the Grail War who later takes on a more active role in it and unconvincingly develops feelings for Sieg, while Sieg does not having much to show in personality beyond taking on a heroic role and mostly being drawn to Ruler. In addition, the ending for the series felt a bit underwhelming for me as it seemed done just to have Sieg be the big hero in the end despite his underwhelming character.

Overall, I suppose that I found Fate/Apocrypha to be inferior in quality compared to titles within the Stay Night continuity of the Fate franchise. In spite of its grander conflict, the larger cast results in a good deal of characters being underdeveloped and its first half feeling a bit stagnant in its developments until events in its second half pick up. Not to mention it felt like the series was pandering a bit much to its audience at points with the noticeably greater emphasis on conventional anime tropes. I would be hard-pressed to pick up the series again with the mentioned issues I covered.

Last updated Sunday, December 31 2017. Created Sunday, December 31 2017.

Other Sites
NameURL
Official Japanese Series Web Site http://fate-apocrypha.com/

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