Castlevania Final Season Review: 6 Ups And 3 Downs

When any videogame adaptation is announced, it is rightly met with a degree of scepticism and apprehension. For whatever reason, it is incredibly hard to translate from game to screen and so many have either been mediocre at best or down right terrible at worst.

Castlevania has been an exception to the rule, with a show dedicated to evoking the spirt of the original games while also committing to the new medium in an exciting way. The Netflix show has had a strong following as the audience has witnessed pristine animated action set pieces and extraordinarily written character arcs for the ensemble cast. Castlevania has been dedicated to telling a good story and it has been consistent in doing so.

Season Four finds our separated protagonists drawn into a growing conspiracy to bring Dracula out of Hell and reinstall him as king of the vampire population. At the same time, in a far off land, Isaac prepares his demonic army for an assault on Styria that will finally bring him face to face with Hector once again.

The season is gripping and high octane, although not without some notable scruples that are worth acknowledging. All in all, Castlevania's final season is a landmark piece of entertainment as the king of videogame adaptations.

While the final season largely moves at an accelerated pace, Trevor and Sypha experience some elongated stalling in Targoviste, the city that Dracula decimated after his wife's execution.

The duo are informed that their is a secret underground court that rules the city and that the vampires attacking the citizens are trying desperately hard to find them. Through one of the court's soldiers named Zamfir, Trevor and Sypha are both simultaneously baited and stonewalled in regards to actually seeing this court to the point where they have enough of the whole thing, and who can blame them?

In reality, once Belmont, Sypha and Varney's vampires find the underground court, the whole story moves into high gear towards the finale. This means the narrative has to stall so that the other surrounding plotlines can finish up before it's time for the conclusion.

When we actually reach the court, what is found is hardly a shocking discovery and is ultimately rather underwhelming. The build-up drags for too many episodes for such a weak payoff.