Clive Bradley says one of the biggest quandaries of creating and writing the anime series Castlevania: Nocturne has been introducing a bevy of colorful characters, then giving them enough screen time.

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Premiering Thursday on Netflix, the eight-episode second season of the video game adaptation continues the adventures of Richter Belmont (Edward Bluemel), Alucard (James Callis) and their band of heroes as they try to vanquish the Vampire Messiah (Franka Potente) and her followers during the 18th-century French Revolution.

The voice ensemble also includes Zahn McClarnon, Nastassja Kinski, Sophie Skelton, Thuso Mbedu, Pixie Davies and Richard Dormer.

"We set out with quite a large cast of characters and had a lot of stories that we had to interweave and, continuing all those stories to give justice to them, was a challenge," Bradley told UPI in a recent Zoom interview.

"I feel -- and I hope our audience agrees -- that we did a good job of that," he added. "There was a learning experience about how to manage the complexity of the different story lines."

Producer Kevin Kolde added: "The challenge for Season 2 was to give everything the space it needed... to land in a meaningful way for people, so they're not disappointed that some story line we introduced in the first season doesn't bear fruit in the second season."

Bradley said there is a fine line between pleasing fans and letting them dictate where the show should go.

"There were fans who didn't like, for instance, the character of Annette. There were fans who adore the character," he explained.

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"What do you do? What you have to do, I think, is stay true to your vision of it and to the logic of the story you're telling. So, obviously, you're always aware of how your audiences perceive [what you're doing] and sometimes that can be painful, but sometimes that's very rewarding, too."

Nocturne is a sequel to Castlevania, another Netflix anime series adaptation, which took place in the 15th century and ran for four seasons from 2017 to 2021.

Because most of the actors were new to the franchise, they influenced the story through their vocal performances, as opposed to requesting script changes when they thought their characters should do or say something different than what was written, according to Bradley and Kolde.

Bradley and his writers were inspired by what the actors brought to the project in Season 1 and tailored the scripts to play to their strong points for Season 2.

Callis was the exception, however, since he is reprising his role of Alucard in the follow-up and has lived with his character -- the half-human, vampire-slaying son of Dracula -- longer than anybody else in the cast.

"He definitely did bring thoughts to the recording sessions and there were definitely conversations with him about how Alucard would behave in situations," Bradley said. "His performance is marvelous. I could listen to him forever."

The Castlevania tone is a unique blend of horror, comedy, romance, drama and history that doesn't shy away from serious themes like social injustice and class struggles.

This season will see the rise of Jacobin revolutionary Robespierre and the execution of France's King Louis XVI.

"The difference between a history lesson and not is that we deal with these things through the experiences of characters that we care about," Kolde said.

"We're learning, but we're learning through the eyes and the context of these characters."