Hey there people, here I cometh with the second Review. This time of the Anime Series Fate Stay Night.

Here is the PDF version with images but poor layout, sorry, didn’t have the time for that one, just a fair warning, at the second page, left part is from top-down, then the right section):
zmote.deviantart.com/art/Fate-… (https://zmote.deviantart.com/art/Fate-Stay-Night-Review-401082046)

For those who don’t want the visuals, here you go with the text only version:

Fate Stay Night

Plot Overview:

The story revolves around the „Holy Grail War“, a struggle for an object of magical origin that grants the one who touches it any wish. This “war”, better described as a game, is somewhat a cycling event, in which seven masters (humans who possess or exercise magic in some kind, generally inherited by bloodline) fight to exterminate the remaining six masters and when in the end only one master is left, the Holy Grail materializes in front of the last remaining master, allowing his or her wish to be granted. Those seven Master have companions assigned to them or rather they become a master after having summoned that special companion, or generally referred to as a servant. The servants are generally from a specific class of warriors (Sabre, Archer, Raider, Berserker etc.) and generally are “historical” (more mythological to be honest) heroic figures.

The main characters are Shiro Emiya, who became a master unintentionally through an accident, and his servant Sabre, who is female sword fighter obliged to follow the orders of the master who summoned her. Although Shiro has been taught some magic, he is still an utter amateur and beginner. In the beginning, he only knows how to feel and manipulate matter, although which he later develops to be a powerful weapon. Beyond that, he isn’t capable of any other significant magical skill. Throughout the timeline of this “war” they meet different characters, with some they get friendly, with some they’re hostile. I don’t want to dwell too much on this point as it’s kind of very stereotypical. Although story-wise the Holy Grail War is the main plot, over time this subject becomes more and more secondary and the main plot starts to revolve around the relationship between Shiro and Sabre. More details to the story and my personal thoughts on the anime you can find in the spoiler section.

Mature Content Watch – Visual and Ideological

Visuals
Although “generally” there isn’t much sexual display such as nudity or male-female romantic interaction, it’s still quite noticeable. There are scenes where the characters encounter each other naked, sexually arouse each other for some magical performance (nothing naked, but still O_O), visuals can be very revealing at times, and sometimes the clothing of some of the characters are also very revealing to say the least. I can’t list all the episodes in which those scenes appear (although from now on I’ll note them down when I’m watching the episode), but I can tell that the final episodes have revealing stuff in them. Especially the final episode or pre-final episode has a nude female kid hovering in the air.

Ideological

The story is about magicians who fight with mythical, long dead hero characters against one another for an object that grants any wish to whom possesses it. Need any more explanation?

The story is cute and all, especially the interaction between the main characters, but if you are someone who is easily tainted by ideological propaganda, be it by real or fake ones, I’d advice to be careful. Especially as magic is an act of heresy in some religions and beliefs, it is a viable advice to be well distanced from the content (for example you might suddenly find yourself wishing that you’d also experience such a relationship with a mythical character in a magical environment). Some might say that this is pish-posh talk, but stuff like that creeps very easily through your subconscious into your way of thinking and perceiving the world around you, so it’s better to be aware of it. As long as you’re actively aware of it, there shouldn’t be a problem. That’s kind of the general stance you should have towards entertainment from other cultures anyway. You know, enjoy it with a certain distance and decide later what to think of the content, or else the visuals and music will manipulate you. And believe me, audio-visuals can make you cheer on for like anything.

So, should I watch it?

Honestly, if you don’t have any problems with the stuff I mentioned under Mature Content Watch, go for it. Story-wise it is entertaining, sometimes cute and has got some action in it aswell. But especially as a female watcher you might be a little offended of how the female characters are portrayed and I’m not talking about their dressing now. You have those strong independent female types who rhetorically bow down to that one male in the house. Oh, did I already mention that? Shiro lives in a dojo like house-complex in which he stays with four to five girls. Not in the same room maybe, but still under the same roof. There are the occasional exercises to show female lead, but you know the idea that a female needs male protection and that they are independent on them comes through nonetheless. Even more so if you think about Saber being that big “historical” hero character that turns into a little naive girl who just discovered what love is. I mean that woman has lead huge armies into battle, has seen some serious stuff, but gets taught life lessons by a high school kid. I laughed about that.
So to sum it up, it’s more entertainment than engaging stuff. It tries to be serious now and then, but for me at least those serious moments lose their impact with some of the unrealistic characters. At times I’ve been reminded of those special Dragonball moments: “We can’t beat him, even though we have reached the ultimate limit, super saiyan two!” and then the next second you have “Oh what is Goku doing! Oh look, he has reached super saiyan level three…” Of course not chronologically correct, yet I think you get the idea.

SPOILER ALERT

More detailed info on the story en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fate/sta… (https://www.deviantart.com/users/outgoing?http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fate/stay_night)
Although fair warning: the article revolves more around the novel, which has three alternative endings. The Anime focuses around the “Fate” arc as far as Wiki tells. It is also to be mentioned that regarding the content, seeing as it was made for adult audiences, you shouldn’t be too surprised. Well, I acquired that knowledge after I’ve seen the Anime, so there you go… 

Personal Thoughts.

I always like this part of the review, it allows sharing my own personal reaction towards the Anime and also getting some issues out of my system that arose after watching the show. It the end isn’t this most significant part of anything entertainment related, what it moved in us?

I have already hinted in the Plot overview that I didn’t like the characters that much. Especially with Shiro always popping up as this weak incapable moral apostle, also called moralizer as dict.cc tells me, who is right in whatever he does. He gives off this forced feeling of being in right. You know generally you feel it due to rational conclusions if someone is right or wrong, or you understand at least the train of thought, but with Shiro I was irritated quite a few times. It’s not like he tramples all over you with that persona from the beginning to the end, but there are those defining occasions where it comes forth.

For example his servant Saber, a female warrior, representing King Arthur from English history or mythology (I think there was something about Arthur having really existed, but in a more different way than we know him from the fantastical tales, also, King Arthur is female in the story, I know, yeah, I know…), who is very well versed in combat and has been dead for like five hundred years by now is fighting a very strong enemy in that one scene in the beginning. What do you think Shiro does in that moment? He steps in between her and the enemy servant and gets fatally wounded. For some magical reason that isn’t revealed at that time he doesn’t die and wakes up in his dojo-house and there is this dialog between Saber and Shiro, which goes like: “Master, why did you step in to the fight, it’s the duty of servants to fight” and Shiro is like “I don’t need a reason to rescue a girl”. Oh ok dude. Although that girl is a killing machine who has led huge armies into battle and one might assume also killed a lot of enemy soldiers during her lifetime needed your protection, and let’s not talk about you dying nonetheless.

It’s even more fun if you think about the fact that Saber has offered to become a servant with the goal to get a hold on the Holy Grail to have her own wish fulfilled, which means she wants to fight and has entered such a degrading relationship (a servant must always obey it’s masters orders) for this one purpose. That tells so much about the Saber character, that she is very determined and her sole goal is winning the Holy Grail War. But what does Shiro say? “Oh no, you won’t fight the other servants, I don’t want you to get hurt”. Imagine a person who hinders you fulfilling your life’s goal, because they are afraid that you might fail, or expressed with Shiro’s words “might get hurt”. The issue isn’t really misinterpreting the meaning of “getting hurt”; it’s reading between the lines and what his attitude actually tells us about their relationship. Especially later in the story where he develops feelings towards Saber and even takes her out for a date, it’s hard to look over that attitude of Shiro. What’s even more hilarious is that Saber falls in love with Shiro aswell. Why you wonder? Because, in Saber’s words: “I have never been treated as a woman, therefore I have abandoned such desires long ago and have devoted my life to that of my people and our nation”, but because Shiro is treating her like a woman, she discovers her own femininity through him and now she can forget all her devotion and duty and find protection in those “strong”, male hands of his.

Of course all of this isn’t as obvious, but it’s very noticeable thanks to all the blushing-scenes, close contact scenes, Shiro-needs-to-protect-that-poor-girl scenes on one end, and all the I-was-a-king scenes, my-people-looked-up-to-me scenes, I-have-abandoned-my-feminine-persona-for-a-greater-purpose scenes on the other hand.
Well I found it very degrading towards Saber and other female characters to be honest. Especially Saber didn’t deserve such a treatment with all of her “historical” persona and what-not.

I’m not per se against the “man protects woman” theme, don’t get me wrong, but your characters need to be able to fulfil their roles for such a story, too. In this Anime you really feel how the shoes don’t fit Saber at all as they are so tiny and in case of Shiro they’re so big it makes it difficult for him to walk.
Ok so that’s the main subject that crystallizes in the end of the Anime, even though in the beginning you think this Holy Grail War would be more prominent, but it dwindles to an excuse towards the middle and final section of the Anime in favour to the afore mentioned setup, the relationship between Shiro and Saber.
Story-wise I was disappointed. Especially this weird setup of the characters put me off a lot. It was interesting at times when we got to know more about the past of the servants and what their wishes for the Holy Grail would be. They added some depth to the story as I came to know more about their ideological struggles, which with some servants, especially Saber, was very touching. But in the end the Gravitas of the Saber character was too much to confine it into a simple love relationship.
Although the ending was kind of sad, seeing how they had to part, I was still relieved, especially because a strong Character like Saber didn’t become Shiro’s pet. But I couldn’t be too relieved though, because the Anime still manages to hit you in the face with a sick smirk in the end.

Guess what happens in the “epilogue”? Shiro, all male and mighty, remembers Saber and says that over the time he will forget her, but he’ll never forget that he once loved Saber. And after that Shiro goes on with his life. No big deal huh, but let’s see what happens with saber. She is back in her time, about to die beneath a tree, thinking that everything she has experienced with Shiro was a dream and asking her companion Bedeviere(or something like that)a final question, that if she could repeat a dream she had dreamed before, implicating that it was so beautiful. Of course Bedeviere, all emotional as Saber is about to die, responds her “Of course you can”. And after that, she dies. She f**** dies, just like that.

You know Shiro will forget about her, marry another girl and be happy afterwards, there are enough candidates for that position as you’ll see. But Saber, who hasn’t ever experienced love because of her great role as King Arthur, just dies like that, betrayed by her people (who seemed to have caused her to be fatally wounded), and is left back like that in her time after experiencing all the stuff with Shiro. Man that’s brutal. Even thinking about it makes me well up in tears just out of compassion for her.
This isn’t about feminism guys. This is about equal treatment of characters, which doesn’t happen here. I feel you Saber, you deserved someone better anyways.

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Originally published by Anime4Muslims on DeviantArt. Source: https://www.deviantart.com/anime4muslims/journal/Fate-Stay-Night-A-review-by-zmote-401083249. Original contributor: zmote.