10 Things Only Real Fans Noticed in Netflix's Castlevania
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00:00 You broke free of my spell! I like that!
00:05 Demon, death is too good for you!
00:10 Come here little boy and show me what you got!
00:14 Welcome to Mojo Plays, and today we're looking at Easter eggs in Netflix's Castlevania that could only be spotted by fans of the games.
00:21 We're also including a few from the sequel series Nocturne, so look out for spoilers ahead.
00:29 Begin.
00:30 The Cyclops. Let's start with an early one.
00:40 In the first season, Trevor Belmont meets the Speakers, a group of magic-wielding travelers that the Church tries to use as scapegoats for Dracula's rage.
00:48 Their elder asks Trevor for help in finding his granddaughter Sypha. He finds her underground, turned to stone by the beam of a cyclops.
00:56 Cyclops.
01:00 Only after defeating it is Sypha freed from her fate.
01:08 Longtime fans will know this is exactly how the pair meets in the NES classic Castlevania III Dracula's Curse, which the show takes much of its inspiration from.
01:18 Additionally, she's mistaken for a man due to her clothing until the end of the game, which their meeting in the show also calls back to.
01:25 "I wish speakers wouldn't do that." "What?" "Dress the girls like boys." "It's safer when we travel."
01:35 Alrox the Aztec.
01:37 Castlevania Nocturne introduces us to a ton of new characters, including Alrox, an Aztec vampire who killed Richter's mother when he was a boy.
01:45 Alrox plays a much bigger role in the show's story than he ever did in the games, but there are still several similarities that players likely picked up on.
01:55 "I know that feeling. That pain. That hate. That burning, unendurable need for retribution."
02:05 He appears as a boss in Symphony of the Night, and the showrunners kept his bright purple attire.
02:11 Other elements brought into the show are his fondness for floating and the use of flaming, flying skulls as an attack.
02:19 However, the show gives him the power to turn into a giant snake, rather than… whatever this thing is.
02:25 An accurate portrayal.
02:32 Of course, we've seen lots of other attacks adapted from the games into the show, with Alucard being one of the biggest examples.
02:39 Throughout the series, we see him use many techniques from Symphony of the Night, undeniably his most famous appearance.
02:47 During fights, he gives off a faint red glow when he moves quickly, mimicking his movement in the game.
02:52 Similarly, his sword often glows with blue flame, his standard attack. He can also make it float like the unlockable sword familiars.
03:00 In Season 4, he even performs the same jump kick players utilize as him.
03:06 Speaking of Season 4, his outfit and shield are also incredibly accurate.
03:12 "As if my day wasn't impacted enough. It's Trevor Belmont."
03:17 "You mean to stake me?"
03:20 "You want me to?"
03:22 "What? You didn't kill me before. You're not going to kill me now."
03:26 One feature seen in most Castlevania games is hidden food found within walls.
03:31 Players low on health would do well to whip just about every wall they come across.
03:37 While we never see any characters restore themselves with a secret meal, there is a blink-and-you'll-miss-it reference to one of the franchise's biggest tropes.
03:44 During the fight between Dracula and Alucard in Season 2's seventh episode, there's what looks to be a chicken leg uncovered by a broken wall.
03:53 It's off to the side in a dark room in which a fight is taking place, so it's pretty hard to make out.
03:59 But it's still cool the creators took the time to include this silly bit of Castlevania history.
04:05 The Pirate of the Roads.
04:07 The original show's first two seasons adapt the plot of Dracula's Curse, which follows Trevor, Sypha, and Alucard going up against Dracula.
04:16 However, there was a fourth hero in the game, a pirate named Grant D'Nasty.
04:21 Creator Warren Ellis, originally envisioning this as a movie, left Grant out since a pirate character wouldn't fit with the landlocked setting.
04:34 Nor was there enough time to do another character justice.
04:36 It later became a series, with Grant still nowhere to be found.
04:40 But keen-eared fans may have picked up on some references to him.
04:44 In the first episode of Season 3, Trevor makes mention of a silly land-based pirate.
04:50 "Buying some insurance? Between the wandering packs of night creatures and the brigands and opportunistic criminals, and that one guy with the horse-drawn sailboat on wheels that called himself the Pirate of the Roads."
05:04 Saint Germain also makes mention of this unseen character, calling him an imbecile.
05:09 "I trust this isn't a bolder breed of brigand. Or that imbecile who put wheels on his boat again."
05:16 The Succubus.
05:18 Drolta is one of the main villains in Nocturne, basically acting as the second-in-command to the big bad vampire Messiah.
05:25 However, while she initially appears as a regular vampire, she later transforms into a succubus.
05:32 Fans of the games have gone up against many of Drolta's kind before.
05:36 It was cool to see her utilize similar battle techniques, like extending the points on her wings to stab her enemies.
05:42 Of course, Drolta didn't make it out of Season 1 alive.
05:46 Alucard appeared during the cliffhanger finale to put an end to her.
05:49 It's actually quite fitting that he was the one to do so.
05:52 In Symphony of the Night, the succubus tries to manipulate him with a twisted vision of his mother's death.
05:58 "You must despise humans. They are to be your prey."
06:04 "What?"
06:06 "Better for them to die than to let them compound their sins."
06:10 Carmilla's Mask.
06:13 The vampire Carmilla has given us several boss fights, but in her first appearance, Castlevania II Simon's Quest, she took on the form of a giant floating mask.
06:22 In the animated series, she's humanoid much like most other vampires, though the creators still paid homage to her first outing.
06:29 "Virgin's blood. Oh, bless your dead little hearts. You do still love me."
06:38 Season 3 introduces the Council of Sisters, Carmilla's fellow vampiric rulers that don't appear in the games.
06:44 All three of the characters wear a ring that highly resembles Carmilla's mask from Simon's Quest.
06:49 Lenore wears it on her finger, Morana uses it as an earring, and Striga wears it in her hair.
06:55 The mask version also bleeds from its left eye as an attack, symbolism that's used in Carmilla's final fight.
07:02 "I win."
07:05 Barkerville.
07:07 [Music]
07:11 This one's a deep cut, not only for fans of Castlevania, but for those of Giant Bomb.
07:17 In 2014, several members of the site's staff were streaming Simon's Quest.
07:22 One of them, Brad Shoemaker, remarked how when he was a kid he used to refer to one of the music tracks, the now famous Bloody Tears, as Barkerville.
07:32 "Uh, when I was a kid I decided that the song was entitled Barkerville."
07:36 "What?"
07:37 "Can you explain the context of that?"
07:40 The discussion led to many laughs, and they even came up with some words to go along with the melody.
07:45 "I'm going to Barkerville, gonna whip some dudes, out in Barkerville."
07:52 It became a running joke in the community, some of which apparently worked on Castlevania Nocturne.
07:58 One scene in the fifth episode takes place in a graveyard, and one of the headstones is for Bradley S. Barkerville.
08:05 A shopkeeper's wares.
08:07 In the second episode of season three, Isaac the Forgemaster visits a shop in Tunis.
08:12 The proprietor owns many artifacts, some of which are taken straight from the games.
08:18 [Sniffing]
08:20 "I smell you, Forgemaster."
08:24 "Interesting. Not many people can smell an education."
08:32 He's holding a stone mask, a beneficial piece of armor seen in a handful of entries.
08:36 Scattered around the shop, and therefore harder to see, are many others.
08:41 You can spot a Moai, modeled after the famous Easter Island heads,
08:45 a death doll, which revives the player upon death,
08:48 a Mobius brooch, which lets you use sub-weapons without consuming hearts,
08:52 and many others.
08:54 Most of these items are found in Curse of Darkness, which heavily focuses on Isaac and Hector's relationship.
09:01 So it's fitting that the former should find them here.
09:03 "Ha! There you are. Are you breathing, betrayer?"
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09:15 The Belmont Hold's treasures.
09:21 Similar to the shopkeeper's wares, but on a much larger scale,
09:25 the Belmont Hold features a ton of Easter eggs only fans of the games will notice.
09:30 When Trevor, Saifa, and Alucard first enter the family's massive estate,
09:35 players and newcomers marvel in all there is to behold.
09:38 One shot features four unique, but run-down, statues.
09:42 Each of these appears in a save room of four different games.
09:46 Another shot shows a cabinet full of various monster parts,
09:50 all of which appear as enemies throughout the series.
09:52 Not only that, but they're each numbered to match the order of the Master Librarian's enemy list in Symphony of the Night.
09:59 In a later episode, Saifa finds a glyph for Dominus Anger, a powerful fire attack from the games.
10:06 We then get to see Dracula use that very attack in the next episode.
10:10 "I am Vlad Dracula Tepes, and I have had enough!"
10:16 Did you spot any of these Easter eggs? Are there any cool ones we left off?
10:24 Share your Castlevania knowledge in the comments below.
10:28 "If you want to defeat Elizabeth, you've no choice but to trust me."
10:32 "There is always a choice."
10:35 Check out these other great clips from Mojo Plays,
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10:43 [outro music]