Castlevania: A Show That Didn't Punish Its Viewers
A show about vampires and the end of the world that showed us that hope is possible.
Castlevania's final season premiered on Netflix on May 13th, and it took everything in me not to binge the entire season in one sitting. Based on the mega-selling video game franchise, the gritty vampire series came to its' close when the trailer had dropped just a couple of weeks prior, announcing that the fourth season would be the last. Like many other fans of the series, I was saddened to find out that the show would end.
I wondered as I waited for the episodes to show up on Netflix how the show would end. Would the characters I came to love and root for have a happy ending? Would humanity be spared? There was so much setup for this impending war, and the future was appearing bleak for so many of the characters that honestly, I was hoping that my favorite characters would make it out alive at the end of all of it.
Over the last few years, I have found myself further straying away from viewing gritty and darker media mostly because I have often found that many creators seem to enjoy torturing their characters just because they can. Often killing off fan favorites or characters who showed remarkable growth throughout a series only to be killed off in an outlandish or unsatisfying way, or have them commit an act so unlike the person we saw them become. This narrative becomes a vehicle to disappoint the viewers and make them feel like they had wasted their time and energy watching. I became exhausted and disappointed to see many showrunners and creators relying on this trope of endless suffering for a character.
While I understand that in storytelling in fantasy, dramas, movies, and TV shows with overall heavier themes, everything is at stake, and there will be casualties. Conflict pushes stories forward, motivates characters to overcome obstacles and save the world. It keeps us as viewers interested in the characters' journey. It is what makes us root for the heroes and fears the villains. After having watched the final season. The show gave the characters the happiness that they deserved.
Castlevania never shied away from talking about some pretty heavy topics, from its themes of religion, war, grief, and trauma. The show was heavy with its symbolism in openly condemning the church and having its viewers see the sides of humanity that were gruesome, vile, and beyond irredeemable. The show really painted a picture of how humanity really wasn’t worth saving, yet, even though it all our main trio and the ensemble of characters we would come to meet along the way showed us that the world is worth saving and that they deserve to be happy.
Along the course of four seasons, you watched as each character came into their own. All of them with their set of problems to deal with on top of a war to fight within themselves and against vicious creatures. You had characters step into their destiny like Trevor and Alucard, who both were the last of their bloodlines and, through their own biases against vampires and humans, came together to defeat Dracula and keep literal Death from taking over the world.
I hope shows can take a page from Castlevania and understand that just because you have your characters go through hell doesn’t mean that they cannot come out on the other side of it. With the pandemic last year, we were bombarded with inescapable grief from all sides. Forced inside and unable to see friends and family, a scary illness that we had no cure for. It was challenging to find comfort in reality when it all seemed so bleak.
Art can often be a mirror of society and can shed light on issues we face in our daily lives. During other times it can offer an escape from the harsh reality. Shows in this genre often fall into the trap that since these situations are so tragic that our characters should be dealt a more “realistic” ending. It was a welcomed relief to see that not only did our heroes survive, but they’re happy. That there seems to be good on the horizon. In its final moments, when the show had you gasping for air, it breathed in much-needed oxygen into its lungs after you came up from the depth of its darkness.
One of the best messages the final season delivered came from the character Isaac. Since his introduction in the second season, you watched him as a loyal supporter of Dracula, someone who had been wronged by every human he had encountered, ready to end humanity alongside the vampires. In his quest to build his monster army and take on Carmilla, who had betrayed a grieving Dracula. Isaac meets plenty of people along his journey that shows him the many faces of humanity. When speaking to one of the soldiers he created, the two can be seen sitting on a crumbled all of the towns that Isaac freed from an evil magician who was using their magic to control its citizens.
Isaac and his soldier sit together while Isaac eats an array of berries, and his soldier Flyseyes asks his leader why he has the other monsters rebuilding the town they took from the magician. Their purpose in life was to be fighters. Isaac enlightens his comrade by telling him that just because you were created with one purpose does not mean that you cannot find a new purpose in life.
With all of its doom and gloom, Castlevania showed us that as a viewer, we could go through the worst but still have something worth fighting for, that we could still find happiness and that our grief doesn’t define us. You can change your purpose in life and not be set firmly in your ways because of how you were made or where you came from.
Me too, Alucard. Castlevania is available to stream on Netflix, and I highly consider it Mirandtory viewing if you love vampires and happy endings as much as I do.
Image Credit: Netflix
i haven't seen the show but as a former game of thrones i relate to the trauma of getting involved in new media in fear of pointless character deaths ㅠㅠ i'm glad the castlevania's ending made you happy!
So true! I'm also glad our heroes got a happy ending. Castlevania will remain in my heart as one of my favorite Netflix series.