November 23rd, 2014 
AstroNerdBoy Fate/stay night: Unlimited Blade Works – 07 review
フェイト/ステイナイト [Unlimited Blade Works] – 07
SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:
Assassin holds off Saber on the stairs below the temple’s gate while on the temple grounds, Archer confronts Caster. Archer explains to Shirou how Caster is using the souls of people to gather energy. Archer is troubled when he learns that Caster is the one who summoned Assassin, meaning she is both Master and Servant, though Assassin is not the true Assassin. Caster is annoyed at being called a witch and defies Archer by telling him he won’t be able to scratch her within her temple territory. Archer destroys her illusion, but she’s above and begins raining bolts of magic energy onto him and Shirou. Archer is forced to save Shirou’s life, which Shirou doesn’t appreciate.
After Archer kicks him out of the way, he is captured by Caster. However, Archer’s blades come flying at Caster, forcing her to release Archer. With that, Archer unleashes Caladbolg at Caster, who manages to raise a magic barrier, but it penetrates the barrier, striking her down. Archer refuses to kill Caster since he doesn’t want unnecessary killing. Caster is amused by this since she sees that Archer and Shirou are very much alike at heart despite how they dislike each other. She asks them to join her, but Archer turns her down. Archer lets Caster go, irritating Shirou even though to defeat Caster, they have to get to her Master. Shirou is not pleased that Archer is willing to sacrifice people in order to ultimately bring down Caster after she defeats Berserker.
Meanwhile at the gate, Assassin unleashes his Concealed Sword: Swallow Reversal attack on Saber, who managed to avoid death through precognition, thought the attack hits. Assassin is surprised that she survived, explaining his technique was developed after studying for a way slay a swallow with a sword so that it could not get away. At the same time, Shirou has become angry with Archer and decides to go after Caster himself. Archer strikes him down, which Rin seems to sense and awaken from sleep. Shirou has a vision of Archer in a field of swords dying. Shirou craws away and is struck again by Archer. Assassin allows Saber to save him. When Archer comes in to finish off Shirou, Assassin stands in his well. The two fight as Saber gets Shirou to safety.
At home, Saber bandages up Shirou. She’s amused by his speaking ill of Archer. She’s also amused and impressed by the fact that Shirou doesn’t believe Archer betrayed him since Shirou’s alliance is with Rin, not Archer. She agrees that Caster is a problem that has to be dealt with, but she disagrees with Shirou in thinking that Archer is being cruel. She points out that Archer’s technique against Assassin was pure, meaning his heart is pure. Shirou doesn’t want to concede the point, so he mutters that Archer isn’t that great since Archer failed to kill him with an attack from behind. Saber remarks that she believes Shirou could reach Archer’s level of skill with a sword, so Shirou asks her to train him for a real fight once he heals up. She agrees.
Thoughts/Review:
Man, another good episode with some nice action, and yes, a lot of exposition as well.
Some buddies of mine have told me they don’t like the chatty nature of Fate/stay night. While there is a lot of exposition in every episode, for me, this isn’t wasted time, nor is it boring. The exposition really helps lay out things and explain this very complex world of Fate/stay night. For me, it is very interesting stuff.
One friend pointed out that in reality, Caster wouldn’t have let Archer blather on to Shirou, and Assassin wouldn’t have bloviated away at Saber. Instead, both should have taken care of business right away and slain their opponents (or at least, attempted to slay their opponents).
This made me think about my complaints with the Sailor Moon Crystal series, were the villains always sit around and wait for the Sailor Jailbait girls to go through their tediously long, transformation sequence. Why does this waiting around annoy me there, but I’ve no problem with waiting around in Fate/stay night?
For me, I think it is a matter of usefulness in the waiting. For Sailor Moon Crystal, the waiting is just for pointless fanservice. For Fate/stay night, the waiting is for interesting exposition. When Archer is explaining things to Shirou, Caster does nothing because she’s overconfident that nothing can happen to her within her territory. When Assassin is talking to Saber, it is one warrior to another. Thus in both circumstances, the chats are interesting and meaningful, thus I don’t mind the waiting because it doesn’t feel like waiting.
That out of the way, I liked how Caster comes off in this episode. She looks like a butterfly when she’s up in the air with her cape spread. Of course, she’s a deadly butterfly, what with her raining magical death beams from the sky.
Caster’s battle with Archer was cool. I didn’t have a problem with Archer not killing Caster since he had clear reasons to want to keep her alive for now.
It is a shame we only got to see a bit of Archer’s battle with Assassin. That would have been fun to watch for a bit.
And of course, there’s the stuff with Shirou. On one hand, he needed a kick in the arse when he was angry at Archer for saving him. On the other hand, Shirou is on the interesting path.
This series, more so than the original anime produced by Deen, shows more clearly how Shirou would eventually become Archer. I loved how Caster could see how similar they were, even if she didn’t realize that the two were the same. It is interesting to see how Archer accepted the reality of how it isn’t possible to save everyone. No wonder he dislikes his younger version so much.
I’m sure I’m forgetting something, but I’m behind (as always) and need to move onto my next thing. That being said, I can say that I have yet to be disappointed by ufotable’s adaptation of Fate/stay night, and this episode was no exception.
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Actually, it was Rin who saw the vision of Archer in a field of blades. She woke up after that, so you’ve got that part the wrong way around.
I totally misunderstood that. ^_^;;;
Well… the battle between Assassin and Archer wasn’t really shown in the VN either… although I was hoping they’d actually show it in the anime. Seems Archer didn’t use a certain line that I spoiled way back then when he slashed Shirou for some reason.
[spoiler]Actually, Shirou from any of the true endings of all the paths in FSN won’t become Archer. I’ll leave it at that.[/spoiler]
He said the line. It just was differently translated.
I went ahead and peeked, and I think I remember being told that during the time I watched the Deen adaptation.
Yeah, well. I mentioned ufotable left out a dream scene last week, didn’t I? That’s the scene (or at least parts of it). It’s Rin who is dreaming. Masters see the past of their Servants in their dreams and vice versa.
I’m confused. When exactly was Caster supposed to kill Archer? At the beginning of the episode? She wanted to test Archer at first to see whether she could use him, didn’t she? Saber doesn’t really want to talk, but I guess for someone like Assassin whose only duty is guarding the gate for a fox like Caster, he has nothing better to do.
“Let me go, I can take care of my own!”
“Is that so?”
–> https://38.media.tumblr.com/dab70f15e938db74df8cdf50c3e5c7aa/tumblr_nfgg71vwXm1slt1smo1_500.gif
Comedy gold. That scene and the idiot talk. I’m glad ufotable doesn’t leave things like these from the novel out. 😉 (Well, Shirou probably doesn’t want to be a burden for anyone.) I can understand his angry attempt to punch Archer though. I would have tried to do the same. Archer went way too far.
[spoiler]
I wish I could respond to that. It’s more complicated with Archer.[/spoiler]
Small changes in Archer’s battle vs Caster. His twin swords actually cut off her robe and they changed that line that made clear Archer missed with Caladbolg on purpose. And it still dealt heavy damage. The aftereffects alone did this.
Additional Notes:
1. Still shots and reused frames again. Yeah, they try to save costs as much as possible, I know. That distance shot that they had shown for (someone counted) around one minute especially was bad, though.
2. Tsubame Gaeshi (gif: http://i.imgur.com/cvyBSsg.gif) is born from pure stubbornness. Kojirou tried to hit swallows by striking three times simultaneously, until the world gave up telling him it’s impossible, and suddenly he was able to do something on the level of the Second Magic, lol. Saber’s instincts that saved her were nicely shown though. Tsubame Gaeshi’s third strike shouldn’t have connected properly because they are not fighting on a comfortable ground.
3. Caladbolg is said to be the Irish predecessor of Caliburn. Type-Moon did not ignore this. Blurred out, it looks (http://i.imgur.com/LzRHVrH.jpg) a lot like the sword that they had already shown in Fate.
4. Mistranslations again. There is small stuff like Archer actually complaining about his own stupidity and not Shirou’s, then there is stuff like Assassin saying he is nameless, when he was referring to his sword, which I think is a lot more relevant. Too bad Archer’s iconic line “理想を抱いて溺死しろ!” (Drown in your ideals and die.) was differently translated, but whatever.
5. Okay, they have kind of shown the dream about Archer, but I think this scene confused the viewers more than make them understand Archer better.
6. Shirou acting like a kid:
http://i.imgur.com/G32DEPf.gif
Archer shoots Caladbolg:
https://33.media.tumblr.com/a5c33511f65a39370b43b1496f9919e3/tumblr_nfgdlmfckh1s3dw0xo1_500.gif
And great work showing off Archer’s dance-like technique:
http://i.imgur.com/6MSKAES.gif
Bonus:
These gifs are from the PS VITA OP:
http://33.media.tumblr.com/906d7818c3a1d3f54c1f5e854913bc53/tumblr_mzx8sj01NR1sdmvmso2_500.gif
http://38.media.tumblr.com/ddda43157486c0bb3acee6801c7326da/tumblr_mzx8sj01NR1sdmvmso1_500.gif
7. [spoiler]http://i.imgur.com/hZUMnm5.jpg
That’s from last week. The arrows point at Archer and one of the signs says “CAUTION”. Subtle hints only Japanese will probably notice. The mirror also says a lot, though.[/spoiler]
8. Assassin’s stat sheet:
http://i.imgur.com/HiyopAR.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/Aw4jvxb.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/P2ANNyx.jpg
Additional personal skills:
[spoiler]http://i.imgur.com/MLT55Lp.jpg
Transparency: B+
Clear and serene. A barrier that nullifies mental intervention. Since he is not an assassin, he cannot use the Assassin Ability, Presence Concealment, but he can conceal his presence as a master of martial arts.
Knowledge of Foremost Harmony: B
A special ability that prevents reduction of the effectiveness of an attack, no matter how many times it is used against the same opponent. Attacks will not be perceived by the enemy.
Shirou admires Archer’s twin swords and Archer’s technique (even though he doesn’t want to admit it), but he couldn’t understand Assassin’s technique at all and Saber couldn’t see through his technique either, due to his skills.
Speaking of Archer’s swords, Shirou was thinking about them too, when he fought Rider (and needed a better weapon). They look very simple, but he thinks they look beautiful.[/spoiler]
9. Can Archer really just block Caster’s A-rank spells with his swords? Yes, he can. Kanshou and Bakuya improve one’s resistences.
http://i.imgur.com/kgO6Xgq.jpg
10. Looks like we’ll get a new scene next week. I think. Shinji’s line is something I don’t recall hearing in the VN, so maybe he’ll get more screentime.
11. An interview with Rider’s seiyuu Asakawa Yuu, if you are bored:
http://metanorn.net/2014/11/exclusive-interview-with-yuu-asakawa
This and many other scenes are one reason Ufotable use many still scenes for conversation. Totally worth it though.
Yeah, those battle scenes do make up the difference.
Side note, Archer’s kill attempt was serious. If Shirou hadn’t reacted to Archer’s hostility and jumped slightly away, Archer might have killed him.
Oh, and too bad Caster’s beam spam didn’t look more like this:
http://static.comicvine.com/uploads/original/13/134077/3948766-illyadodgex.gif
And looking back on it, that explains why he showed up at the end of the episode and ended up battling Assassin.
Heh!heh!heh!
Man, I hadn’t realized I’d gotten so far behind on comments. ^_^;;;
Well, exactly. I think these friends of mine see all this as an excuse to allow the Servants to stay alive for a while longer. That may be true from a writing perspective, but the reasons for Caster chatting with Archer isn’t a BS one. It is perfectly legit as far as I’m concerned.
Me too.
Yeah, leaving it hanging there like that isn’t good.
It is amazing how badly the translations have gone.
Anyway, thanks as always for the great info. ^_^
Silly Caster. Archer knows his stuff when playing bullet hell… Especially when you think about his Noble Phantasm. xD
She knows now. ^_~
crack fate stay https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCJc0P3oc3s