YMMV / Fate/stay night [Unlimited Blade Works]

• Ass Pull: Just like the VN, Archer's appearance at Ryudou Temple in episode 24 is considered ridiculous by some fans. After running low on mana and being attacked by Gilgamesh, Archer shows up twelve hours later and saves Rin and Shirou from the Grail, with no one wondering how he's still alive.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Shirou. Many of his same character traits from the visual novel are present, but many of his inner monologues and some of the complex logic of his actions is removed, which can give anime-only viewers a different perception of him. This is especially evident between viewers who have read the visual novel (they understand him very well and are much more sympathetic to him) vs. new viewers who have been introduced to the Fate/Stay Night franchise through this anime (where he is borderline The Scrappy to these people). It's not quite as bad as the reception to him from the 2006 anime, but still noticeable. However, for those who watched the 2006 anime first, this is a huge step up from that Shirou.
  • Caster's portrayal in this has been debated with some who feel the show gives viewers a rather one-dimensional portrayal of her and leaves out a lot of the deeper layers to her character found in the VN. On the flipside of things there are those who feel that this portrayal of Caster actually paid off on what was only hinted at in the visual novel, by showing the nature of her first master and the reason for her betrayal of him. Showing her to have sympathetic traits beyond her tragic backstory and her love for her master. On the flipside of things there are those who feel the show gives viewers a rather one-dimensional portrayal of her and leaves out a lot of the deeper layers to her character found in the VN.
• Better on DVD: As with its predecessor, the series is one continuous plot arc and better paced when you can watch all the episodes back to back.
• Broken Base:
  • The anime started adding more and more original scenes while downplaying a lot of other elements from the VN (in particular internal monologues and explanations of some of the verse's more complex subjects). One major point of contention was the anime's expansion of Caster's backstory with her original Master which Type-Moon vets felt took time away from other plot points that needed to be addressed.
  • The choice to use the all-ages Realta Nua version of Rin and Shirou's "mana transfer" scene. Detractors argue that it was a needless case of censorship and criticize the awkward-looking CG dolphins as being Narmy, while supporters argue that the original H-scene was one of the most egregious examples of story-stopping sex, and that changing it to the all-ages version loses nothing as the cleaned-up version provides more insight on Rin's character.
• Catharsis Factor: The momentary slow motion on Shinji's face while being punched by Lancer was largely unnecessary, but very appreciated.
• Contested Sequel: With the Fate/Zero anime adaptation, also done by the same company. People hotly debate which is better between the two adaptations with many leaning towards Zero.
• Creator Worship: The studio ufotable receives this treatment from a lot of fans. After all, there's a reason why this show is called "Unlimited Budget Works".
• Fanfic Fuel: Rin and Shirou's life and adventures in London in the Epilogue episode after UBW's main story are a hot topic for fanfiction writers and fanartists alike to focus on.
• Fan Nickname:
  • Unlimited Budget Works, thanks to the high production values.
  • Unlimited Food Works due to Episode 4's dinner scene.
  • Atomic Gatorade for Atrum Galliasta.
  • Rhino for Rin, due to the Off-Model way she's frequently drawn plus the obvious pun.
  • During outdoors scenes Shirou wears a jacket over his usual costume, averting Limited Wardrobe. Fans refer to it as the "Justice Jacket".
• Foe Yay Shipping: Lancer/Archer is an extremely popular pairing on the slash side of things.
• Harsher in Hindsight:The show's final shot shows Shirou traveling to the Middle East to fight for justice as a hero. While this was already established as far back as Fate/EXTRA, it has a much more sobering tone when taking into account the war against ISIS at the time of the show's airing, and how thousands of foreign volunteers were rushing to Iraq and Syria to participate in that conflict for purely ideological reasons on both sides. Couple that with the meme of Archer taking out ISIS, and you have people worrying about his future.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • When Archer is ordered by Rin to clean up the mess he made of the living room when he was summoned, he comments, "As you wish. And you can go to hell, master." Come Fate/Grand Order, Rin becomes the container of two Sumerian goddesses, one of which is, you guessed it, the Sumerian goddess of the Underworld, Ereshkigal.
  • After Lancer's spear Gáe Bolg manages to penetrate Archer's shield Rho Aias, he praises the spear's power claiming it surpasses even the original Gungnir, the divine spear of the top god of Norse pantheon: Odin the Allfather. Several years later, Fate/Grand Order story arc "Lostbelt No. 6" reveals that Lancer's other potential servant class, Caster Cú Chulainn (who debuted at the game's launch) was not him simply utilising Norse rune magic to make himself classify as a Caster.^note He already could use runes to some extent even as a Lancer thanks to his teacher Scathach. It was Odin operating as a Pseudo-Servant, with his Authority being what allowed Cú to change classes from Lancer to Caster. Gungnir even implicitly appears in one of his updated attack animations as a spear of light which he throws, makes seek back towards the opponent and then explodes into a pillar of light on impact.
• Ho Yay: Caster's just a bit too touchy-feely with Shirou in Episode 6. For an added dose, she gives lots of lingering caresses to Saber in later episodes.
• Inferred Holocaust: As it is a story for another time, Shinji's abuse towards Sakura remained unaddressed.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • "Unlimited Budget Works." due to the out-of-this-world animation, which, as of 2014, was arguably the best-looking anime that had been broadcast on TV at the time. Some would even go so far as to say it's the best-looking animated television show ever shown.
  • Kinoko Nasu's hard-to-translate writing style provoked a couple of hilarious subtitles that have joined the infamous People die if they are killed from the VN and the 2006 anime. Except that this time they don't have the excuse of being fan-translations.
    • "The Archer class is really made up of archers!" ^explanationRin to Archer in the prologue episode. The line is intended as Rin teasing Archer, but the slow, awkward pacing of the exchange makes the intended joke to fall flat, making the line hilarious in a completely unintended way (This line made it to the English dub as well).
    • "Just because you're correct doesn't mean you're right!" ^explanationShirou's line to Archer at the end of Episode 20. Except, this is only because people THINK it's a Distinction Without a Difference, when there is a difference between the two words and their intended meanings, which is essentially saying "Just because you are factually correct, it doesn't make it right".
  • 360 No Scope! ^explanationIn Episode 7, Archer does an MLG-worthy gratuitous 360-degree spin jump right before he pulls his bow out and shoots down Caster in one shot
  • "Archer took out ISIS!"◊ ^explanation: The episode revealing Archer's backstory as a Counter-Guardian shows multiple instances where the threats to humanity he destroyed involved men who look a lot like Muslim terrorists. The same day this episode aired, the U.S. military announced they had killed a senior Islamic State leader, the first actual instance of American soldiers being offensively deployed against ISIS. It becomes twice as amusing when you take into account another Archer leaving another organization named ISIS due to the same current events.
  • People comparing the Lancers from here and Fate/Zero, especially after Cu Chulainn is forced to kill himself like Diarmund was. Cu Chulainn's line "I wouldn't be much of a Heroic Spirit if I died right away from a scratch like this." evokes images of Diarmund being pissed at the implicit insult.
  • Kougami Eliminated Shinji ^explanationGilgamesh stuffing Illya's heart into Shinji caused him to swell as if he'd been shot by a Dominator in Eliminator Mode. It's made even better since Gilgamesh and Kougami share the same voice actor.
  • So Assassin fights King Arthur with a swalow-slaying technique, eh? Is it African or European swallow?
  • DOLPHIN ^explanation: Episode 22 has the 'mana transfer ritual' between Shirou and Rin, which featured CG dolphins in the DEEN movie adaptation and Realta Nua remake, so many fans have been crying out DOLPHIN in anticipation. They were proven right when ufotable did indeed use more CG dolphins in lieu of the sex scene. Well, mutant dolphins at least...
  • Kill Steal! ^explanation: In Episode 24, Archer kills Gilgamesh instead of Shirou. As a result, on reddit there are a lot of comments basically amounting to Archer 'kill stealing'.
  • Unlimited Salt Works◊ ^explanation: Due to some exaggerated reaction from fans who were very disappointed with the adaptation, people started to use that term when someone was ranting too much about the series (even in the things that ufotable adapted well).
  • Rin is a rhino ^explanation: Refers to the Off-Model way that noses are drawn throughout the show, ironically in an attempt to be more on-model with the way original character designer Takeuchi draws characters nowadays. Usually attributed to Rin because she appears first, plus the obvious name pun.
• Moral Event Horizon: See here.
• Narm:
  • After Illya and Berserker's deaths Rin and Shirou sit down and have a chat about Gilgamesh and his epic. While in the VN this information is unnecessary since players would have already played through the Fate route and therefore know what Gil's deal is the anime needed to introduce him to its audience for this adaptation. Unfortunately, they decided to do it with a painful exposition dump where they discuss his epic and status as the first hero. Now, while it's a little bit of a stretch that the two would know something as obscure as Gilgamesh's Epic off the top of their heads, it's not completely impossible. What's ridiculous is that the two then proceed to guess, with 100% accuracy, how exactly his Gate of Babylon works and why, which is such a bizarre leap in logic that it could only come about if the two had glanced at the script beforehand.
  • In Episode 21, Shinji being warped and mutated by Illya's heart into the grail core is indeed horrific... but then a bunch of disembodied arms come out of nowhere and turn it into a Big Ball of Violence reminiscent of something you'd see from a Looney Tunes episode, not to mention his face expression during that scene◊ that looks like he's been kicked in the balls, turning the scene from horror to pure hilarity. And even then, with a different character it might still have been frightening or disturbing... but in this case, it's Shinji, so it's 'k.
  • "Just because you're correct doesn't mean you're right" is pretty much the new "people die when they are killed" in that the intention is meaningful and works in context ("just because you're factually correct doesn't mean you're doing the right thing"), but the redundant-sounding wording turns it into hilarity. Tellingly, the English dub translates the line as "I see being right is the only thing you care about."
• Older Than They Think: Unlimited Blade Works wasn't the first time in a work of fiction both Hercules and Gilgamesh clashed, with Gilgamesh killing someone close to Hercules like he murdered Illya. Back in the 90s, Hercules: The Legendary Journeys featured Hercules journeying to Sumeria where he fought Gilgamesh and in that battle, Gilgamesh murdered Herc's best friend Iolaus.
• One-Scene Wonder: Both Luviagelita Edelfelt and Waver Velvet (as Lord El Melloi II) appear in the last episode of the series during the segment of Rin and Shirou living their lifes in the Clock Tower. The former has one of her classic rivalry scenes with Rin (with a short but well-animated fight scene), while the later has a brief but interesting conversation with Shirou about his ideals. Both cameos were well received by the fans, especially since it revealed to anime-only people what was of Waver (one of the fan favourites from Fate/Zero) after the end of the 4th Grail War.
• Ship-to-Ship Combat: Comes with the territory of being an adaptation of a visual novel with several possible love interests.
  • Shirou/Rin is the Official Couple of this adaptation, and although this pairing has a big share of followers, there's a number of viewers who think Shirou has more chemistry with Saber despite the fact that this is not her route.
  • Then there are those who still thought Rin was a much better match with Archer (even after he betrayed her, kidnapped her and gave her to Shinji), although this one has been an FPC since as long as the original VN has existed. It's ironic because Archer and Shirou are the same person, so in the end Rin's going to end up with him either way.
• Tainted by the Preview: While the recast was expected by most people, Shirou and Archer being recast for the English version did not sit well with English-speaking fans.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!:
  • The anime started adding more and more original scenes while downplaying a lot of other elements from the VN (in particular internal monologues and explanations of some of the verse's more complex subjects). One major point of contention was the anime's expansion of Caster's backstory with her original Master, which Type-Moon vets felt took time away from other plot points that needed to be addressed.
  • The English dub cast was announced on July 2015, and... to say that Bryce Papenbrook as Shirou is controversial is a pretty big understatement. Replacing Liam O'Brien with Kaiji Tang for Archer also got people worked up (though this ended up working out, partially because it turns out Tang is an enormous fan of Fate and Archer and turned in a killer performance).
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: A somewhat... odd example in the case of Sakura. Although there are some nods to the events of Fate/Zero, her torture at the hands of the Matous isn't addressed in this anime because it wasn't meant to be outside of Heaven's Feel. The Heaven's Feel adaptation movies of course make this a core plot point, but coming right off of F/Z it can feel disjointed.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: As mentioned above, if you watched Fate/Zero before this and expected Unlimited Blade Works to be a direct follow-up that gives closure to all of the plot points from the prequel series, you would end up... disappointed. Sakura's torture by the Matous isn't even remotely brought up. Gilgamesh's Hidden Depths and subtle character development from the prequel where he showed himself capable of mercy and even camaraderie with his enemies is nowhere to be seen at all. Illya's past and potential to bond with Shirou as siblings who both shared Kiritsugu as a father is thrown under the bus as Illya gets brutally killed before she can make any real connection with Shirou. Rin does find out that Kotomine was the one who killed her father but by that point, she isn't in the position to take any revenge. The only thing that really carried over from Fate/Zero to this series is Waver, and his appearance is brief. Of course, given that Fate/Zero is supposed to be read/watched after reading Fate/stay night and not the other way around as Nasu himself has stated, this is somewhat inevitable.
• Visual Effects of Awesome: Some people have argued that ufotable has made one of the best-looking televised anime of all time. It's not hard to see why, especially when you compare the 2006 series to this.
• Win Back the Crowd: Episode 24 has won the praise of a lot of VN fans who were dissatisfied with the way the anime was taking things by providing a faithful recreation of one of the most climactic scenes and for finally delving more into more of Shirou's mental state.

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