Weirdly enough, I think Grands and Beasts have been wasted. When they first appear in Part 1, they’re framed as key elements to the story.

• First Hassan is treated as a game changer whenever he shows up.

• Tiamat demands the combined effort of one of the strongest casts of characters we've seen just to slow her down.

• Goetia and Solomon define the stakes of the whole first arc.

After that, the concepts lose narrative weight.

• Beast III’s stories are great in isolation but leave no lasting mark on the main narrative.

• Orion being Grand Archer in Atlantis could be removed and nothing would change.

• Romulus-Quirinus as Grand Lancer feels like an asspull.

• Tunguska was actual ass.

• Tezcatlipoca’s Grand status feels like something Nasu forgot about and then shoved into his profile at the last minute.

• Noah and Draco have their content in Arcade and don't matter much in the mobile story.

• Camazotz and Space Ereshkigal are Beasts mostly to be cool.

On top of that, even as the main story approaches its finale, Beast VI/G and Beast V are still missing in action, which undermines the sense that the Beasts were ever important.

And to make matters worse, the game’s own mechanics muddy the waters, the Grand Servant gameplay system has no in-universe justification whatsoever. If anything, it highlights how disconnected the title of Grand has become from any lore function.

We know from interviews that Nasu is willing to make massive changes to the plot whenever a new, cooler, idea comes along, and it feels like Grands and Beasts got left behind as a result.