I planned to do this review the day after I finished the anime but life got bad so now here we are now a week later lol. Sorry if some things are wrong or messy, since my memory isn't the best at times. Anyways, let's get right into my review.
UBW is one of the notable parts in the Fate Series right beside Zero and reasonably so, it stands out quite a bit and for a good reason in my eyes. A series just as flashy and unique as its predecessor, with many twists and turns throughout it. I'm sure you're bound to like this one as well if you liked Zero, since it gives you new and refreshing characters to enjoy and also hate.
Story: The Fate series is largely known for its story, being very long and having many different ways to enjoy it and such. There isn't exactly an agreed way to watch it if you've ever bothered looking up a watch order for it. Personally I think Zero had a better story somewhat more than Stay Night did, but both are enjoyable in their own ways really. This time we have a more main character focused story with it being around Shirou, though I wouldn't blame you if you thought it was Rin since she was shown as if she was in the prologue of season one. We have the usual stuff as last time: fight to win the grail, people die, you get how it is at this point. A HUGE difference in my eyes though is unlike in Zero we get a mainly happy ending which felt really satisfying for me. I thought Shirou and Saber were cuter together but Shirou and Rin also had a lot of moments that I thought were pretty funny or absolutely adorable so I didn't really mind them ending up together either. Overall, a nice ending to a great story that I'm sure most people would enjoy.
Art: The animation is looking greater than ever in UBW, keeping the great quality and having scenes where the artstyle is some absolute eye candy to enjoy. A variety of nice atmospheres that compliment the scenes very well. I don't have much to say other than I thought it looked overall pretty great and did the story justice.
Sound: Not much to say here either honestly, wasn't crazy about the openings or ending songs since I always skipped them. The music really was good when it came to the emotional or intense moments though.
Characters: Shirou is easily one of my favorite main characters i've had the pleasure of watching in sometime, his inspiration can come off rather generic but it's one anybody can enjoy and root for really. Sharing his father's ideals but putting his own twist on it of course. Shirou vs. Archer is easily my favorite fight in the series for this reason as well, it isn't as battle heavy as the others were but the storytelling and character dynamics made it shine the brightest for me and it was interesting to see somebody challenge Shirou's view so much, ironically being himself as well. A great twist that was hinted throughout the series well before it was finally shown. Shirou's, Saber's, and Rin's dynamics were all ones I really loved as well. Great mixture of intense moments and lots of wholesome and rather cute ones too. Making me adore the character's relationships wayyyy more than I did in Zero, being the reason why I personally enjoy UBW more. They also had characters I despised, one obviously being Shinji and the other being Kirei. Both done well if they were made with the intent of me absolutely hating them, because I was sure damn happy seeing Kirei get his ass stabbed. I wish Rin didn't save Shinji though, that dude CLEARLY was never gonna learn if he didn't by then. Speaking of character's getting stabbed though, I also enjoyed Lancer even with the little screen time he got. He ironically got the same death he got in Zero, but in a more stylish and enjoyable way i'd say when he took Kireri with him in his death. Starting off as a character I didn't really come to enjoy only until season 2 when he ganged up with Shirou and Rin, being a nice contrast of characters working to fight the rest of the Servants and Masters. The only characters I didn't really care for were Caster and Rider, Rider is fairly obvious with how quickly they got killed in the series, Off screen as well, so she was done pretty dirty. Caster was good in terms of an antagonist, though I didn't really care for them besides for that and I think it took way longer than it should've for her to be killed. Gligamesh was great to see once again in the series, looking like an edgy Justin Bieber while laughing so much and having such a big ego that he might as well been a downgraded Dio. Which sounds like I hate him, but I do very much like him, stirring up chaos the single moment he finally does something in the series and being charismatically sassy as always.
Enjoyment: I had an overall really great time watching this series as a whole and hope Heaven's Feel is just as enjoyable as well like I expect it to be.
Overall: This is definitely in my top 25-20 anime of all time, it was very pleasant to watch and it didn't have a single moment in the series where I got bored. Well deserving of a 9.5-10/10.
