Castlevania's defining trait, since the beginning, is that it's better than it has any right to be. I'm talking about the animated series on Netflix, which found its groove in Season 2 by combining surprisingly articulate conversations between murderous vampires and ruminations on loss and legacy with explosive action sequences. You could say the same about the original '80s videogame, too, which gave a guy a whip and made him face off against a pastiche of horror movie baddies like mummies and Frankenstein's monster before slaying Dracula.
That flimsy premise somehow sprawled into dozens of games, some of them among the best ever made. Turns out you can't get much cooler than a guy with a whip, if you draw him right.
