Happy Halloween! For tricks this year, I found myself watching Castlevania, streaming on Netflix, because we all know how much I love vampire stories. ^_^

The descendants of vampire hunters, the descendants of vampires, humans (almost all of whom deserved an ugly death) and magic users all become involved in two grand plans that will essentially destroy humanity. It…wasn’t bad.

Castlevania has decent enough animation, lots of blood, sex, some creative magical nonsensery and enough cursing to satisfy even this Jersey Girl. In fact, I have added Carmilla’s frustrated and exhausted “What the FUCK is going on?” to my store of mottos. ^_^

Okazu readers are smart enough to know that I am not reviewing this animation because I think vampires are a nifty Halloween tie-in. Clearly there must be some reason I felt it’s appropriate for Okazu? Indeed there is.

In the later half of the story, as our attention turns from Dracula’s decrepit legacy toward Carmilla’s scheme for a new age of vampire supremacy, we are introduced to Carmilla’s vampire sisters, Lenore, Striga and Morana. When we meet them, Striga and Morana are and have been, a couple. Striga is also highly amusing, voiced with brutal sarcasm by Ivana Miličević, which balances beautifully with Yasmine Al Massri’s highly ironic, and only slightly idealistic, Morana.  The two of them are delightful and their fate is a high point of the what is objectively a very, messy, if slightly dewily romantic plot. (I mean romantic in both senses here. The plot tends toward romanticism and Romanticism, if you take my meaning.)

The voice cast was quite good, with the exception of the heavy mumbling by Richard Armitage as Trevor Belmont, and James Callis as Alucard. I kept shouting “What? Speak up!” at the TV, despite the fact that I watch everything with captions now. It’s not that I’m losing my hearing, I just read faster than people talk and I have no patience. ^_^ Nonetheless, mumbling is not a personality.

I particular loved Alejandra Reynoso’s voice work for magic using Speaker Sypha.  She was a delight. Jaime Murray’s Carmilla was also brilliant – angry, imperious, violent. Kind of my perfect woman, except for her being a vampire, which I would find just so tiresome. And last, but not least, everything about Lenore, from her cute blushy cheeks to Jessica Brown Findlay’s masterful voice work, was fantastic.

For the rest of the story, expect lots of body parts, blood, and copious amounts of heavy cursing written in a way that kind of almost sounds like I wouldn’t mind being around these people, except for the stench and the threat of death and undeath. Other than that, they seem kind of fun.

Ratings:

Animation – As good as 8, as bad as 5
Story – It was three or four messes worth of mess, but does it matter? 7
Characters – 9 The main reason I kept watching, honestly
Service – 10 I did mention, the blood and violence and sex, yes?
Yuri – 9  It’s only one little piece of the story, but a nice one

Overall – 8

Alucard was all out of luck
Human lives were all in the muck
Magic and mayhem
Meant monsters and brain stems
And all anyone really wanted was a good…roast duck.

And maybe a beer. And a shower. And fewer undead monsters trying to kill them.