After a slight “postal service / review disc interface issue”, SFL’s anime reviews are now back on track. Sorry for the delay.

Fate Stay/Night: Volume 6

Label:

MVM

Certificate:

15

Discs:

1. (4 episodes)

Running time:

100 mins approx

Subtitles:

English

Video:

16.9 anamorphic

Sound:

English 2.0, Japanese 2.0

Release date:

7th June 2010

RRP:

£15.99 - Amazon - Play - MVM

Brief synopsis:

The Grail war enters its final stages but even though the war is to be fought with only seven servants, a deadly and mysterious eighth servant now joins the fray. This servant is far more powerful and ruthless than any Saber has previously faced and he will stop at nothing to claim ownership of not only the Grail, but of Saber as well.

When it becomes clear that whichever Master gains control of the Grail can not only use it’s power for great things - but can also use it to bring about a catastrophe of biblical proportions - one servant in particular may have to make a choice between their deepest held principles and their oath of loyalty to their Master. Either way, sometimes when you win, you still lose.

Comments:

And so ends Fate Stay/Night, a rather decent adaptation of a modern day swords and sorcery video game that also spawned the Fate Stay/Night: Unlimited Blade Works movie which formed part of SFL’s successful Manga all-nighter back in May of this year.

The plot’s progressed along quite nicely over these twenty-four episodes with plenty of action, magical ass kicking and sword fights along the way. Admittedly there’s been the occasional stumble along the way, usually when they’ve tried to fit some kind of ill-advised romance element into the story which has taken them away from what this show does well, ie, swords, blood and people generally trying to chop each other up. And there is a fair bit of blood and general unpleasantness going on – this show earns it’s 15 certificate the old fashioned way but without being too in your face about it – with even more nastiness implied along the way.

That said, will all the inference and implication in play here it can unfortunately leave the audience feeling like there’s more going on that you just aren’t getting, and to be honest, that’d be a fairly astute summation. As with most things Japanese and their habit of heavily interweaving their entertainment through multiple medias, there’s a lot about Fate Stay/Night that needs to to have played the video games, read the manga or watched the movie in order for the full story to be revealed.

What we have seen though has been of above average animation quality throughout, the music’s decent and the original Japanese language track solid and enjoyable. The English language dub however, was crap. It started crap, got a little less crap in the middle and then went rapidly back downhill into crapsville towards the end. I did keep going back to give it another chance but I kept fleeing in terror time and again to the safety of the original Japanese version. The worst offender had to be Gilgamesh – ancient King of Kings, demigod and all-round Mesopotamian hero - who comes off in the original as a powerful and arrogant, though slightly creepy, enemy to be feared for damn good reason while in the dub he sounds more like a full-of-himself surfer dude that could do with a good slap.

With so many series these days being released as twin-packs it’s surprising that this series has been put out as six DVD singles. While this is definitely a show that’s worth the time of any true anime fan out there, with only four episodes per disc and not a lot of extras spread around this is a series for which waiting six months or so for the inevitable box-set in order to get the best value for money would be the most prudent choice.

Extras:

There’s a pair of music videos and some trailers but that’s it.

Fate Stay/Night: Volume 6 is available now from all good stockists. Previous SFL reviews for this show can be found here, here and here.