Why Netflix's Castlevania Adaptation Works, According To Its Directors
The crew behind the scenes of Netflix’s Castlevania, Season 4 of which just premiered, vary widely in experience. Executive producer Kevin Kolde shepherded the series for years, having licensed it via his production company Project 51 originally in the early 2000s. Brother directors Sam and Adam Deats, meanwhile, came from a background in video game cutscenes to direct what is generally considered one of the best video game adaptations to date. GameSpot spoke with all three to look back at the show and get a better understanding of how they managed to put together something that has captured such a devoted audience.
Kolde has been in animation production for over 30 years. Working on series like Ren & Stimpy, Adventure Time, and Bravest Warriors put Kolde on both sides of creating animation–creative and production. “I kind of did it all for Castlevania,” he told GameSpot.
For directors Sam and Adam Deats, on the other hand, Castlevania is just the start. “This is our very first series-based show,” said Adam. “Primarily what I was doing right before this was actually video game cutscenes and trailers. Cutscenes for, I think it was Mortal Kombat 9. Maybe it was 10; I don’t even remember at this point. Battle Chasers, Banner Saga, stuff like that.”
“To be frank about it, [making Castlevania] was daunting,” Adam continued. “The first season was an extremely difficult task for us because we didn’t know quite how to make that beast move. So we had to learn how to do that and kind of structure giant schedules and teams to allow for that to happen, and so it was a very new thing.”
Castlevania picks and chooses from the series’ extensive lore, starting with the NES game Castlevania III for Trevor Belmont, Sypha, and Alucard Tepes. Saint Germain, though, comes from the PlayStation 2 title Castlevania: Curse of Darkness, which acts as a sequel to Castlevania III. The creators had to balance respecting the lore with making an interesting story.