Castlevania Season 2: 10 Reasons To Be Excited
Back and bloodier than ever.
When Netflix's short animated series Castlevania dropped in 2017, it was a revelation for fans and newcomers alike, with its superb writing, stunning animation, and some of the best voice acting ever heard in television, with a hard R rating that delivered on the gory action and X-rated hilarity of Warren Ellis's witty dialogue.
Produced by Adi Shankar based on the shelved film script by prolific comicbook writer Warren Ellis, Castlevania only had four episodes to its name for its first season, episodes that didn't even cross the thirty-minute mark. It was, however, met with an enthusiastic and positive reception from both critics and general audiences alike, with compelling characters and a story that begged continuation.
The only real complaint was that people wanted more, which speaks to the quality of this anime-esque gothic production.
With Season 2 coming in October to usher in the Halloween season, there's more than enough to be excited for for Studio Frederator's anime-style American production. One which may hold the trophy for the best American adaptation of a game franchise to screen.
10. A Longer Season
With the new season comes eight new episodes, twice the size of the first season's four, giving characters more time to be explored, and events more time to unfold. One of the main gripes of anyone who's watched the fantastic series, touted as the animated Game of Thrones of Netflix's lineup, is its brevity, with four 25-minute episodes making fans and newcomers alike hunger for more.
The promised eight episodes is a big step up in terms of content, especially knowing that production had technically been going on for over a decade, with the original idea for an animated film, then a live action film, tossed around until the decision to bring it to Netflix and extend it into seasons. Ellis's script already separated the story into three-act structures with the intent of a franchise, so with the new format, he's able to tell more of the story than before, not needing to condense too much of it into a film or three.
Though eight episodes has long since been thought as the ideal for a Netflix series, the show's 25-minute runtimes per episode will likely leave fans hoping for a full thirteen in the next season.