Heaven's Feel Movies

[Altima of the Gates]

Ah, the perils of adapting a novel to a visual medium.

- - - Updated - - -

There are options, but not all of them would work seamlessly.

Its mainly getting the same feeling as one felt when reading it and trying to put that to storyboard that is one of the larger hurtles.
Kinda like when people ask for remake for a game that is decades old but want the same feeling to come across they had all those years ago.
Its hard to nail down something where everyone will go, "yeah that's it". Take Shirou vs. Gilgamesh. Its a short fight and the main CG we see is a slash, so you gotta take that one CG and get the feeling right through a battle that you have to storyboard, plan out every step, because its not just one picture with flowery text anymore.

[TomPen94]

I was writing some bullet points as I watched but eventually I just stopped, I was so into it.

I won't be able to contain myself

I loved the intro sequence. That KnK-style music really helped setting the eerie tone that HF should have.
While the previous movies could be accused for lack of Illya scenes, this one nails them. All of them are here, and they're all great.
Zabaniya not working on Kotomine was a nice callback to Zero. Also I guess that was a cool way of implementing the Kirei flashback without losing time.
Nine Bullet Revolver was okay. It didn't include every slash as I had hoped (but hey Vita Opening has that so nothing lost?), but I think it did a marvelous job of showing the utter hell Shirou was going through to pull out Nine Lives and it did sell his speed when he did slash Herk. I guess this is as close as they could get to a literal representation of the fight without compromising on spectacle. The one thing trully against it, EMIYA should've played until the end of the fight, and not just when Shirou is "overtaking" Archer. It was nice listening to it, but it lacked the catharsis it usually has.
I noticed some slight Monogatari vibes from the way the exposition dump about the 3rd HGW was done. Which is good. Changing the location of the Zelretch summoning from the Emoya household to the Tohsaka one was an inspired decision. It allowed to give the infodump some visual flare and it just kinda feels right.
The flashback to the creation of the ritual was really well done. They managed to expand really well, lay down the plot point that needed to cross (Zolgen lieks Justeaze), and provide a rather natural way for Shirou to spot the Zelretch sword. Neat stuff.

Onto the Boss Gauntlet.
Shirou and Rider vs Saber is probably the visually coolest fight I've seen in this entire series. The camrip can only show so much but DAYUM, it was so creative and it managed to translate the events in the VN so well. Having Rider constantly using her petrification ability on Saber to even the playing field was a really f*cking good idea and it makes so much damn sense. Having Shirou start sprouting the swords from his body here was a good decision too, allows us to see more of a gradual shift from sort-of-regular-Shirou to porcupine-Shirou.
Rin vs Sakura was as good as I thought it'd be. The beamu spam from Rin looked fantastic, and they included some nice choreography while she wasted those Shadow monsters. Speaking of them, they kept the 2D look of the mini-Shadows seen at the end of Part 2. Wasn't expecting that but it's definitely an interesting artistic choice, it makes this incarnation of the fight feel distinct. The finish to the fight was verbatum from the VN, couldn't really ask for more. It's one of the most gripping scenes in the novel, and it keeps its impact here.
And finally the Fistfight. Visually I have no complaints. It looks awesome and even included some of the more complicated movements described in the VN. However, like the Berserker fight, I do feel a lack of oomph in the soundtrack for this fight. Light and Darkness had to be playing here. No other track fits. I was waiting for that moment where Shirou went "You're in the way. Get lost!" and the soundtrack boomed up and the ground started crumbling, and it didn't really come, it was much more subdued than that.
On the other hand, the final Illya scene was fucking fire. Holy shit it was so good. To see a broken Shirou struggling to even remember Illya's name, breaking down even further when he realizes what she's about to do. My God...
The Epilogue was fine, seeing Touko's back was neat I guess. And seeing how they kept Shirou "around" until they found a body for him was a bit funny, but nice.

And finally the ending. The final moment. When Haru wa Yuku started playing I actually teared up. And that was when I realized that I really love this movie. Of course it wasn't perfect and over time this hype will come to pass, but it will always remain one of my favorite things to watch. Cannot wait for the BD release, whenever that comes, so I can fall in love with the HF finale and this movie all over again.

That got a bit cheesy towards the end but it's what I think. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

[lesik]

Spoiler:

While the previous movies could be accused for lack of Illya scenes, this one nails them. All of them are here, and they're all great.

Spoiler:

Die Lorelei?

[Comun]

Spoiler:

Die Lorelei?

No.

[lesik]

Spoiler:

exposition dump about the 3rd HGW

Spoiler:

wait, what?!

Spoiler:

Changing the location of the Zelretch summoning from the Emoya household to the Tohsaka

Spoiler:

wait, what?! In 3rd HGW Grail summoned into Fuyuki church

No.

sad

Spoiler:

can we see Kirei's exorcise ritual on our cute Hassan?

[Comun]

First question:

Spoiler:

Illya explaining who Angra is.

Second question:

Spoiler:

The place where Shirou projected Zelretch's jewel sword.

Third question:

Spoiler:

The exorcism is on Zouken, not Hassan.

[Holiday]

Spoiler:

Having Rider constantly using her petrification ability on Saber to even the playing field was a really f*cking good idea and it makes so much damn sense.

Didn't she do that in the VN as well?

[You]

Do we have a translation of this or even just a few words recap?

It's Rin's London Trial where Zelretch appears and says he'll take responsibility by taking 3 apprentices and then Rin comes home to give Sakura the keys to the Tohsaka house before going off to Hogwarts.

[GarlandGreene]

I was writing some bullet points as I watched but eventually I just stopped, I was so into it.

I won't be able to contain myself

I loved the intro sequence. That KnK-style music really helped setting the eerie tone that HF should have.
While the previous movies could be accused for lack of Illya scenes, this one nails them. All of them are here, and they're all great.
Zabaniya not working on Kotomine was a nice callback to Zero. Also I guess that was a cool way of implementing the Kirei flashback without losing time.
Nine Bullet Revolver was okay. It didn't include every slash as I had hoped (but hey Vita Opening has that so nothing lost?), but I think it did a marvelous job of showing the utter hell Shirou was going through to pull out Nine Lives and it did sell his speed when he did slash Herk. I guess this is as close as they could get to a literal representation of the fight without compromising on spectacle. The one thing trully against it, EMIYA should've played until the end of the fight, and not just when Shirou is "overtaking" Archer. It was nice listening to it, but it lacked the catharsis it usually has.
I noticed some slight Monogatari vibes from the way the exposition dump about the 3rd HGW was done. Which is good. Changing the location of the Zelretch summoning from the Emoya household to the Tohsaka one was an inspired decision. It allowed to give the infodump some visual flare and it just kinda feels right.
The flashback to the creation of the ritual was really well done. They managed to expand really well, lay down the plot point that needed to cross (Zolgen lieks Justeaze), and provide a rather natural way for Shirou to spot the Zelretch sword. Neat stuff.

Onto the Boss Gauntlet.
Shirou and Rider vs Saber is probably the visually coolest fight I've seen in this entire series. The camrip can only show so much but DAYUM, it was so creative and it managed to translate the events in the VN so well. Having Rider constantly using her petrification ability on Saber to even the playing field was a really f*cking good idea and it makes so much damn sense. Having Shirou start sprouting the swords from his body here was a good decision too, allows us to see more of a gradual shift from sort-of-regular-Shirou to porcupine-Shirou.
Rin vs Sakura was as good as I thought it'd be. The beamu spam from Rin looked fantastic, and they included some nice choreography while she wasted those Shadow monsters. Speaking of them, they kept the 2D look of the mini-Shadows seen at the end of Part 2. Wasn't expecting that but it's definitely an interesting artistic choice, it makes this incarnation of the fight feel distinct. The finish to the fight was verbatum from the VN, couldn't really ask for more. It's one of the most gripping scenes in the novel, and it keeps its impact here.
And finally the Fistfight. Visually I have no complaints. It looks awesome and even included some of the more complicated movements described in the VN. However, like the Berserker fight, I do feel a lack of oomph in the soundtrack for this fight. Light and Darkness had to be playing here. No other track fits. I was waiting for that moment where Shirou went "You're in the way. Get lost!" and the soundtrack boomed up and the ground started crumbling, and it didn't really come, it was much more subdued than that.
On the other hand, the final Illya scene was fucking fire. Holy shit it was so good. To see a broken Shirou struggling to even remember Illya's name, breaking down even further when he realizes what she's about to do. My God...
The Epilogue was fine, seeing Touko's back was neat I guess. And seeing how they kept Shirou "around" until they found a body for him was a bit funny, but nice.

And finally the ending. The final moment. When Haru wa Yuku started playing I actually teared up. And that was when I realized that I really love this movie. Of course it wasn't perfect and over time this hype will come to pass, but it will always remain one of my favorite things to watch. Cannot wait for the BD release, whenever that comes, so I can fall in love with the HF finale and this movie all over again.

That got a bit cheesy towards the end but it's what I think. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

It's such as shame they are so adamant on keeping the runtime under 2 hours no matter what. Another year in the oven and an extra 20 mins could have made it even better but that's just wishful thinking.

You could tell they made some obvious cuts on some parts of the movie to make fit under 120 mins, like the whole Kirei and True Assassin confrontation. It made it look like they were about to throw down but then awkwardly transitioned into Kirei reaching the church with TA already inside somehow. Pretty sure there was initially going to be a fight/chase in-between those two scenes.

[Inuhanyou]

Spoiler:

ufotable would be not of this world to top the alter vs rider and shirou fight in a future work. Thats like the top of what you want to see out of an action scene. They actually made alter vs berserker look subdued somehow

[aldeayeah]

I don't think there are a huge number of people who can spare the time to play a VN with more text than the longest running fantasy series out there.

Not to mention it isn't even released in english, you've got to LEGALLY OBTAIN a copy of the game, find the right version of the translation for your version, and then sit through hours of Ginger Cooking, The Not-Really-A-Videogame.

Which longest running fantasy series? Because even unfinished ASOIAF must have a far longer wordcount than FSN, and then there's Sanderson who writes absolute doorstoppers

Also, not really a spoiler: love Kirei's vintage BMW (an E28 model 5 series looks like?)

[fumei]

Considering the one OST mention above, I have to ask:

Spoiler:

did they keep EMIYA for NBR?

I assume not but please oh please

[Comun]

Spoiler:

Yes, they used a version of EMIYA that slowly transitions into Believe (Ufo UBW ED1) towards the end.

[madarra]

Considering the one OST mention above, I have to ask:

Spoiler:

did they keep EMIYA for NBR?

I assume not but please oh please

Spoiler:

100 seconds of slow build up Emiya from the start of the wind scene till "Trigger off"

[fumei]

Thank god

[eddyak]

Which longest running fantasy series? Because even unfinished ASOIAF must have a far longer wordcount than FSN, and then there's Sanderson who writes absolute doorstoppers

Also, not really a spoiler: love Kirei's vintage BMW (an E28 model 5 series looks like?)

https://www.reddit.com/r/fatestaynight/comments/96avbc/wordcount/

Not quite the longest, but it gets close.

[Radoom91]

It's Rin's London Trial where Zelretch appears and says he'll take responsibility by taking 3 apprentices and then Rin comes home to give Sakura the keys to the Tohsaka house before going off to Hogwarts.

Thanks a lot.

[Altima of the Gates]

It's such as shame they are so adamant on keeping the runtime under 2 hours no matter what. Another year in the oven and an extra 20 mins could have made it even better but that's just wishful thinking.

You could tell they made some obvious cuts on some parts of the movie to make fit under 120 mins, like the whole Kirei and True Assassin confrontation. It made it look like they were about to throw down but then awkwardly transitioned into Kirei reaching the church with TA already inside somehow. Pretty sure there was initially going to be a fight/chase in-between those two scenes.

You gotta consider the fact as fans themselves, they wanted to keep everything they could, and what they couldn't fully give the proper love to certain scenes to get the proper feeling.
Let's say you gave that extra 20 minutes, then when storyboarding out the idea, with that length of time you'd struggle over how to setup the scene, and if you have time left over what else to include, but you can't slap that in like a block when playing Tetris, you have to make sure that other scene you include has the proper setup.
That was why I waggled my finger at people suggesting movies in the first place. I mean, if you can air Mnemosyne, you could air what you see in HF no problem imo. And I think a lot of the setup would be appreciated. I would say the only difference would be the reduction of animation quality because yes, you're doing less, so you can do more. Now despite the fact this has been commercially successful and critically acclaimed ALL THREE MOVIES, it'll still be forever stained with "well, you could have added this here" and "why didn't I get this?!", so when people talk.about it it ends up looking worse than it was.
A Fate adaptation followed up where they are not only likely unburdened from taking on multiple projects as they were during HF, more experience, and allowed a TV Series? You can see why I aired my grievances at people clamoring for one so soon after the finale. It wouldn't matter how successful HF was, the money it made, or how well.things were done if it LOOKS worse by myopic comparison.
Though, UBW was shit on too, so eh.

From my point of view, ofc ufo will cater to their zero while working at UBW/HF, because... it's their own work and they thought that zero did a good job on explaining/worldbuilding for standard anime viewers

Do remember that nowadays Fate viewers are not from the fsn VN or even DEEN anime, but other medias such as Zero, UBW, Apo and the majority is from FGO. Ofc ufo will cater to the viewers that already familiar with those "newer" past works

Hell, my offline friends that watched part 1 and 2 with me are coming from FGO (as in, they only knew FGO) and they still enjoy both movies immensely

Well look about this from the lens of the anime only crowd. An anime bolsters exposure that a VN just doesn't often enough. Look at what it did for Key works, it sparks interest in franchises.
In Fate's case, DEEN and Zero lot the match even though Fate was such a popular thing it gets referenced in other anime. That, and if you know your audience is really tuned into Zero, they will know a lot of things already (for instance, lots of viewers of ufo's UBW asked many Zero like questions during watching it). Its out of the bottle so to speak, why wouldn't they include what is logically a part of that universe's timeline of events? It brings more flavor to the characters and shows a continuity that draws you in, and you get more impactful scenes for it.

[GarlandGreene]

You gotta consider the fact as fans themselves, they wanted to keep everything they could, and what they couldn't fully give the proper love to certain scenes to get the proper feeling.
Let's say you gave that extra 20 minutes, then when storyboarding out the idea, with that length of time you'd struggle over how to setup the scene, and if you have time left over what else to include, but you can't slap that in like a block when playing Tetris, you have to make sure that other scene you include has the proper setup.
That was why I waggled my finger at people suggesting movies in the first place. I mean, if you can air Mnemosyne, you could air what you see in HF no problem imo. And I think a lot of the setup would be appreciated. I would say the only difference would be the reduction of animation quality because yes, you're doing less, so you can do more. Now despite the fact this has been commercially successful and critically acclaimed ALL THREE MOVIES, it'll still be forever stained with "well, you could have added this here" and "why didn't I get this?!", so when people talk.about it it ends up looking worse than it was.
A Fate adaptation followed up where they are not only likely unburdened from taking on multiple projects as they were during HF, more experience, and allowed a TV Series? You can see why I aired my grievances at people clamoring for one so soon after the finale. It wouldn't matter how successful HF was, the money it made, or how well.things were done if it LOOKS worse by myopic comparison.
Though, UBW was shit on too, so eh.

Tbh I'm glad they went with the movies format rather than a TV anime due to the structure and pacing of the route itself. A lot of stretches in HF would simply not work well in 20 mins chunks, with some SoL sequences slowing the pacing down to a crawl and killing the tension in the process which was already an issue in their UBW adaptation.

My previous post was mostly referring to Spring Song though. Personally I liked how Presage Flower and Lost Butterfly were paced, because despite its occasionally choppy transitions (that could have been more natural), they both felt focused and did a lot to get the viewers invested in Shirou and Sakura's relationship/dilemma (while leaving breadcrumbs for the following movies), rather than being all over the place. The 3rd film on the other hand felt like it tried to cram as many scenes as possible under 2 hours with little to no breathing room which kind of hurts each individual scene since you barely have time to process what just happened before moving on to the next important event. It's a bit like the anime adaptation of Prison School. While the vast majority of its events were faithfully recreated from the manga, the breakneck speed of its pacing really hurt the impact of each of the jokes/set pieces since it's just one scene after the next in quick succession that leaves the viewer no time to reflect on anything that just happened. That's why I thought an extra 20 mins in the final film would have smooth things out a little. I'm still satisfied with it though, especially with it being the end of a 11 year personal journey for myself. It's also by far the most re-watchable F/SN adaptation imho.

[Holiday]

I second the notion that an anime series would be a bad format due to structure and pacing issues. At least, an anime series with industry-standard episode runtimes. Despite all the cuts and changes they've made, I've largely found the HF movies enjoyable to watch as movies, in the sense that they're well-paced and do a good job balancing out drama, action, character development and plot advancement. They never feel like they're dragging on without really advancing the story, but they also never feel like they're rushing through too many plot points at once (even if that comes at the cost of some secondary plot points having to be cut outright).

By contrast, the UBW anime mostly consisted of two types of episode: "the characters stand around delivering exposition for most of the episode, then at the last moment something exciting happens to set up a cliffhanger" and "the episode opens with a few minutes of excitement, then everything is resolved and the characters stand around delivering exposition for the rest of the episode". There were only a few episodes, mostly toward the end of the run, which felt like drama, action and plot advancement from start to finish.

The 45-minute episodes were by far the best because they felt like the slow dialogue scenes were actually building toward some kind of plot-advancing climax, and the climaxes themselves were much more satisfying because they weren't undercut by being split in two for the sake of creating a cliffhanger. They felt like actual episodes in an episodic story, rather than inscrutable little snippets of a larger narrative. In lieu of a series consisting entirely of 45-minute episodes (which I would love, but probably isn't very likely), I think movies are the best format for adapting F/sn into an anime.