Back in February, Netflix announced that it was working to bring a Castlevania TV series to its streaming service. That was basically all we knew until this week, when Netflix shared a trailer for the series out of nowhere, revealing that the series would debut later this summer, on July 7th.
The trailer kicks off with a shot of an original Nintendo Entertainment System (not the NES Classic Edition) and a red Castlevania cartridge. A man walks over, blows on the bottom of the cartridge (as one does) and slots it into the NES. He powers it on and an 8-bit Netflix menu appears on the screen.
“The last surviving member of a disgraced clan fights to save Eastern Europe from Dracula,” reads the on-screen description for Castlevania. “Inspired by the classic NES game…”
We then get our first look at the animated show, which will apparently be exceptionally bloody. We really had no idea what to expect going in to this series, but based on the trailer, it looks like Netflix isn’t pulling any punches. This could very well be the most violent adaptation of a Nintendo game to date.
Video game adaptations don’t have a great track record, but Castlevania is basically a blank slate for Netflix to work with. The entire plot of the original Castlevania game consisted of Simon Belmont fighting his way through Dracula’s castle to kill Count Dracula. From there, Netflix can go wherever it wants with the story, introducing (and possibly killing off) as many characters as it wishes.
Castlevania premieres on Netflix on July 7th.
