Individually, the things that F/Z spoils aren’t that big of a deal, but there are so many spoilers that it just ends up detracting significantly from experiencing F/SN for the first time.

Anyways, this show is great. Just don’t let it be your introduction to Fate, lol

9/10

The first episode alone spoils so much of F/SN that it was pretty mind-boggling, especially knowing that this was a lot of people’s introduction to Fate. It even spoils things that are only in Heaven’s Feel, which wouldn’t be animated until YEARS later!

This show succeeds extremely well as a prequel and greatly enhances the story of Fate/Stay Night. It, however, does NOT succeed as an introduction to F/SN.

Iskandar is as great as I’ve heard he is and quickly became one of my favorites in the series. His dynamic with Waver is fantastic and it makes you want to root for them despite knowing how it ends. Kariya might be the most tragic character here since he isn’t even *mentioned* in F/SN. Poor guy.

Its also fascinating seeing how Kirei was prior to participating in the Holy Grail War and how a certain Servant gaslit him into being a monster! The show even sets up Saber’s character arc in the Fate route! …Shame that most anime-onlies don’t see the conclusion to that since they skip that part.

It was also… much more tragic than I expected (though I really should have expected as much from Urobuchi). Kiritsugu is a character you hear of A LOT but hardly ever see in F/SN, so seeing him and what sets him on his path adds so much to the overarching story.

Despite everything, I do think this is one of the stronger patches in Amphoreus. It also looks like the story is finally wrapping up next patch (with an epilogue the following patch) so I’m really looking forward to closing the book on this arc. Hopefully, the ending lives up to the hype.

My problems with March and Evernight aside, I do really like the climax. March showing Evernight her memories was great, and her finally reuniting with her friends was very sweet. I got my problems with this patch, but emotional beats like this really hit when they’re supposed to.

Even March's plan to deal with Evernight, clever as it was, boiled down to needing everyone else to save her… from a problem that she largely caused. I was also looking forward to learning about her past, but we hardly learn anything at all...

Aside from being part of Evernight’s motivation, March herself doesn’t actually do much in the story here. She gets tricked in the beginning, then appears to help convince Evernight to back down at the end.

I’ve personally never been a big fan of March as a character due to her not really contributing significantly to the story very much, but I was ready for this patch to finally change that. Unfortunately, that didn’t really happen here.