Let me introduce you to the best episode of the second season so far, if not one the best episodes in the series.(Episode 15 remains my top pick with 18 second but this is certainly up there) Re:Zero can sometimes be considered a deconstruction or subversion of the Isekai genre, I myself may have referred to it as such maybe if I look through my old posts, but the fact of the matter is that if it was so then it was subverting tropes that had not even been established yet. Re:Zero is actually one of the granddaddys of the Isekai Genre alongside what can be considered the real kickstarter, Mushoku Tensei(People often wrongly attribute Sword Art Online with the monicar and while the webnovel of that certainly came before Mushoku Tensei, the factors and tropes commonly associated with the genre as well as the popularisation of the concept that lead to many MANY imitators most definitely belongs to Mushoku Tensei. Which is getting an anime by the way.) That was a tangent but essentially in a way Re:Zero acts as a criticism of what the genre would become just by the fact that the tropes that defined it hadn’t been set so the author simply addressed what by accounts most Isekai should address. Namely that a person who is Isekaied to another world did in fact have a life that could affect others before being transported away.
In standard Isekai it’s often pushed aside or they have the character be reincarnated to cut off any ties they had to their previous life. As what can be a main draw of the series is the fantasy that while your life as it is now didn’t turn out as expected, if given a chance in another world you could perhaps reach your max potential.(Aka be a self entitled complete prick that gets all the girls and has the biggest penis without effort) So indeed addressing that the hero may have forgotten about loved ones that they left behind can be a bit of a killjoy to all the showing off and enjoying a new fantasy life without consequence. So for Re:Zero to come back and address what was even a criticism of its first season is very refreshing. What’s more is that the thing that makes this episode great isn’t it’s emotional beats but rather in how it recontextualizes everything we have previously seen. It’s great to get backstory on Subaru but the real jewel is that a puzzle piece that was previously missing from his character is now in place and when you go back to watch the first season, suddenly Subaru’s personality makes so much more sense.
I am reminded in a way of Madoka’s tenth episode which is also a fantastic episode in it’s own right that completely changes how you see a character and all their interactions throughout the series. The flaws we originally coined as oversights of the writer are given context with their backstory. Why is Subaru so physically fit despite being a neet? Cause of his father being a training nut. Why is someone as outgoing and energetic as Subaru a neet? Because it was a coping mechanism that osterised him from his classmates. Why is he so desperate for recognition? Due to always being compared with his dad, a much more successful person. I admit in context you could summarize Subaru’s problems as basically “Daddy issues” though that is a deep oversimplification of it(And potentially a misuse of the term) seeing that the problem isn’t that Subaru has a bad relationship with his father but rather he is failing to live up to his legacy. If anything Subaru has a wonderful loving family and his problems stem from his own insecurities and expectations placed upon him. I like that Subaru doesn’t have some deep scar or dramatic event in his life that resulted in his problems like many would often resort to when explaining character trauma. Instead his problems is the result of his own actions and life choices where they slowly built and manifested over time. In this episode there is a number of aspects of Subaru that can resonate with anyone watching, indeed the point that hits me the hardest is Subaru’s constant need to up the ante only to come to the realisation that he was just a normal person that wasn’t truly inherently special. A realisation that I personally didn’t come to until much later in life and certainly could have saved me from embarrassing memories if I simply just figured it out sooner.
I admit that the majority of this post isn’t so much talking about the episode but rather the episode’s impact though the content of the episode is fairly straightforward. Subaru is in a dream world where he can confront the problems he left behind and say a goodbye to the people he loved. Both his parents have rather unique personalities and show just how much they loved him along with how his current development could have pushed him to make the right decisions in the old world. Though WhiteFox did we need to have a constant blur dream filter over the entire 29 minute episode? I get the context that this is all some sort of illusion but the point was well established and the filter just made the episode look washed out and rough. Along with the reminder that the emotional catharsis is only one sided and Subaru’s real parents are sitting in the real world depressed and emotionally devastated over his disappearance. I would like to thank Tappei Nagatsuki for clarifying that point, oh you magnificent sadistic bastard. We can also see details like Subaru’s preference for white haired anime girls and the contrasting personalities of his parents has me curious as what their love story is like. As I saw someone else put it, Subaru’s dad honestly feels like an anime character who reached his happy ending and the story of how he got there could be interesting in its own right. How he fell in love with someone as quirky as his wife sounds like quite the tale though I can guess that she won him over with the degree of perceptiveness and caring she showed Subaru. Ultimately we have an episode filled with emotional gut punches and character building that made Subaru even more well rounded so that is one damn fine episode. Well…that and it had Echidona in a schoolgirl outfit at the end there so that’s a 10/10 alone.
Technically, SAO’s light novels also came out before Mushoku Tensei’s did, in 2009 whereas Mushoku was written in 2012. Although you’re not wrong about Mushoku being particularly trashy and awful.
ANN did do a really neat article about the whole concept of going to other worlds as a whole: https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/the-mike-toole-show/2019-01-21/.142332 I found it to be really cool. There’s also this top 8 list that they did of the old ones: https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/the-list/2017-08-19/.120298.
Ah I never actually called Mushoku trashy and awful. As a matter of fact out of reincarnation Isekai i would say it’s the better of the bunch as it really does take the idea and follows through with it. Even dealing the protagonists life in another world from baby to adulthood at a good pace. It certainly does have it’s degree of trashy tropes however and it’s those aspects that others took and unfortunately, amplified.
On another note, SAO light novels coming out first isn’t really all that important. The thing is that long before the first Isekai show aired(At least Isekai of which the term was coined. I know old school works have Isekai aspects but are not quite like the Isekai shows we Identify the term with today), it was a tired concept in the world of webnovels. And one of the ones that clearly started the surge of those webnovels is Mushoku.
Whoops. I really need to look before I check something. Sorry!
I’d also rank this episode as the third best in the show but I think overall it’s the most important because basically like you said it contextualizes all the previous stuff. There absolutely no denying how cringe season 1 Subaru was. Its also funny how his character reverted to that (which fits since it seems to be his coping mechanism) in his new world before having it brutally beaten out of him by circumstances well beyond his ability or control. Luckily he had Rem and Emilia there this time. Who knows, maybe the witch is doing him a favor by helping him mature in a tough love sort of way haha. But with this episode, pretty much my only criticism of the show is gone.
It is a pity that it took a second season to remedy that criticism though. I feel that a lot of the criticisms of the first season would essentially disappear if the full story was adapted as a lot of it is based on how incomplete the story is. The kings selection for example is clearly setup for a later arc but unless that arc is adapted it will remain inconclusive and unsatisfying setup without payoff.
Yeah can’t really defend that tbh. Maybe they could have done better. Makes me wonder how much of these decisions come down to financials since unlike the author the production committee has a more singular focus on selling a product. Other than that, yup still waiting on The kings selection plot…
But what about Fushigi Yuugi, Magic Knight Rayearth, Escaflowne, etc., etc.?
@Swa, He’s talking about the isekai genre in relation to the formation of later, modern version of it, as opposed to proto-isekai.
As it stands I find this a hard show to ignore, whereas I can easily not think about any shounen power fantasy story (which re:zero isn’t) and forget those series exist until I’m reminded, I can never seem to get re:zero nagging out of my head, there’s a voice that repeatedly tells me, look at it again, look at parts of it to try making sense of why people like it and every time I come away feeling “I can’t get onboard with this show, why do I keep wasting my time, why can’t I ignore it and never go back to it in the same way I ignore Kimetsu no Yaiba or Promised neverland”
That said, I thought that the actual review of the show on here did a good job of being sensible, understanding why people might’nt like the series.
Yeah, I quit Re:Zero after the first season because Subaru was just too cringey and possessive for me, and Rem too annoying, although I did like the Frozen Bond OVA about Emilia and Puck’s backstory, but that was possibly because it had almost no Subaru in it, and Puck was one of the few characters I liked anyways…
After a while of trying to see why people like a show, eventually I just give up and figure they just have different tastes in anime than me. With Re:Zero if my college anime club didn’t show the first season (alongside shows I actually liked) I would have dropped it long ago.
I am half-tempted to give the newest season a try because of the good reviews…but people had good reviews for the first season too and that one was just a waste of my time.
If you didn’t like the first season cause of Subaru then this new season isn’t gonna change your mind. The things you dislike about him are still there, just there’s more justification as to why it’s there.
Thanks! Guess I’ll skip it then. It’s too bad there isn’t more Re:Zero content like the Frozen Bond OVA…I really liked that one.
Why can’t all our parents be funny, considerate, moon-walking pranksters who never miss an opportunity to literally kick some sense into our heads?