Snake Watches Re:Zero, Because He Too Wants to Die and Escape Reality

[Tev]

It's probably for the best. Apparently things go even worse for Rem in this next season...

There is this though:

In the anime industry, TV shows often surpass the manga or light novel source material quickly, which in some cases caused the fans to demand a reboot. The good news is that Re:ZERO Season 2 is unlikely to diverge too greatly from the author’s original intent since there’s plenty of source material to catch up with. But, as might be expected, the anime did have to make some concessions due to time constraints. For example, the anime version had Rem and Subaru merely discussing the possibility of running away together, but the web novel for Re:ZERO Arc 3 has extra “what if” chapters where Rem and Subaru live happily ever after with two children. (The Re:ZERO Blu-Ray includes a 290 Japanese novel Re:ZERO IF which focuses on the couple fleeing to the Japan-like country of Kararagi. No love for Team Ram, I suppose.)

Could a Re:ZERO OVA video eventually ship Subaru and Rem together for all those Team Rem fans? No one has publicly suggested such an idea, although director Watanabe Masaharu once made it clear he considers Emilia to be the real heroine of the story.

“People will get mad at me no matter who I say. But I suppose that Rem’s role in the story is that of a sub-heroine, while Emilia is the main heroine. I directed episode 1 myself and did as much as I could to enhance her presence in the scenes to make up for her lack of screen time. I’d change her outfits and made sure she gave off a strong impression. As far as I’m concerned, the heroine is Emilia, but perhaps nobody will believe me when I say that. After all, Rem clearly acts more like a heroine. But please don’t forget the scenes that showcase Emilia as the heroine.”

[shiney]

Well, since you're apparently not going to watch anymore, you won't care that he's not dead.

[MuMu]

Hahaha that attack move made no sense whatsoever. Wilhelm is falling to the ground and the werewolf utilizes his own broadsword as some sort of fucking launchpad with which to send Wilhelm straight back towards the whale like this is pinball or something.

Whoa there, champ. The Fastball Special is a time honored tradition all around the globe.

[Arcanum]

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

Hahaha the whale looks so silly. I like how the animators draw it to experience emotional responses (it's mildly annoyed with the banisher!) but we still have no freaking clue what this White Whale is, why it exists, why anything whatsoever is happening in this story right now, oy vey.

You learn in a previous episode that the whale is Gluttony. Why it exists is still a mystery because we don't know yet why any of Satella's Sins exist.

So is the whale a sentient creature? Like, does it remember Wilhelm or Crusch and does it recognize people and have some sort of complex reasoning as to what it's doing or trying to accomplish? Or is it just some beast who erases people from existence more on instinct?

As far as we know it's an animal that roams the countryside devouring whatever it wants. It's Gluttony after all.

...Wait. If the fog attack from the whale is erasing folks from existence, how could Crusch's subordinates tell that anyone was lost at all?!? From their perspective their units would always have just been a few short, right?
...I don't understand how any of this works. I barely comprehend why I still care about how any of this works. You know what would've been more effective? If the people who wrote this damn anime bothered to show us how this all worked before the episode where we actually fought the Whale.

But it doesn't erase them entirely from existence, Subaru, or the others wouldn't even understand that folks were lost. They'd be like the merchant in that flashback you just had, they'd respond to any inquiries about missing soldiers by acting like none of them had ever been there. Where's the consistency?

This is, as far as I know, actually a huge plot hole. Like some people are completely erased, while others are still remembered. Like Wilhelm's wife died while hunting the White Whale, and I just kept waiting for the revelation that she actually ran off or got crippled or something which is why Wilhelm still remembers her. But nah, if the plot needs you to remember an erased person then it's okay.

...Subaru's special for some inexplicable reason again, as he is completely unaffected by the Whale's insanity attack.

Because he's got that witch magic all up in his business. It's the same reason he can see the Unseen Hands. He has some aspect of the witch entwined with him that lets him deal with other powers originating from the witch. But it's not like he has the power to beat them, just the power to not get incapacitated, or to be aware of them. So it's likely that the White Whale can also see Unseen Hands, and that Betelgeuse wouldn't get affected by the Whale's attack, since they're all using powers that originate from the witch. In other words, they have friendly fire disabled.

And now Wilhelm's death appears to have multiplied the whales. Or maybe the whale summoned its family or something. I don't even know anymore. This makes absolutely no sense. It makes no sense.

It's explained in the very next episode. But since you're being super dismissive and stated you're not going to keep watching, here it is: the whale has the ability to use its body mass to create copies of itself. Think of an RPG slime enemy splitting into two smaller slimes, only the slimes are the same size they just have less mass and are less dense than the original. The copies are controlled by the true white whale, which in the next episode retreats further up into the sky out of harms way while its copies do the fighting.

Why do people watch this shit
Why am I still watching this shit
It's becoming like the worst most stereotypical of fantasy teenage boy fantasies with all kinds of inexplicable twists and turns and unexplained superpowers magically exploding things and there's no underlying reason why anything is happening or what the story of this Whale even is

Probably because nobody else went into Re:Zero with blown out of proportion expectations, making it easier to roll through the low points and truly enjoy the high points.

While some of the newly introduced powers are sudden they are usually explained shortly after and as far as I can remember nothing (outside of the memory fog) is inconsistent with established rules of Re:Zero's world.

As for the story of the whale, it was established in previous episodes that it roams the countryside and is often treated as a natural disaster like a tornado or tsnumai; best to just avoid it and weather the storm. However in looking online to double check something about the whale while writing this I found later parts of the story will elaborate on the whale's origin (I don't know the details because as soon as I realized what I was reading I clicked away).

I don't know why you have such a seething hatred for the mysteries Re:Zero sets up, but personally I like having things to theorize about while waiting for the next episode or season. They're not perfect, but they are nowhere near as bad as you are making them out to be.

[Solid Snake]

I like that picture, Tev, that's how I'm going to headcanon Re:Zero into ending, except Subaru somehow stops being a douche, which really implies that he's no longer Subaru.

I think that Watanabe Masaharu's statement sheds light on a major problem with Re:Zero, which is that the best stories are ones that happen organically and where the author is willing to deviate from his or her original plans once the story clearly heads off in a different direction that what might have been first intended or anticipated. When it became clear as he started writing Re:Zero that it wasn't headed for the all too conventional, all too stereotypical direction of Emilia being the heroine, the author should have adjusted his own plans and expectations for his series, not expected the audience to adjust for him.

Emilia's a very important person in the Re:Zero universe, so the problem with pairing Subaru with Emilia is that you gotta go the conventional protagonist route of building Subaru up to be 'worthy of her affections' in order to make it work. He's suddenly gotta be assisting the army win major battles and be instrumental in making all kinds of important shit happen or it just becomes an unbelievable farce. But the story of someone like Subaru proving his intrinsic worth through trial and error and rising the ranks isn't nearly as subversive as what Re:Zero claimed it could be in those earlier episodes, nor is it nearly as interesting as the teases of forcing Subaru to accept that he couldn't be that person, that it wasn't his destiny, and maybe the subheroine would be a better match (or no heroine at all, if we're being honest; Rem's no longer a great option for him either.)

Good authors adjust their own expectations as their stories come to life, and are willing to see their original plans dashed when they happen to stumble across themes that resonate more. In the craft of writing, that process is often referred to as 'killing one's babies.' Unfortunately, the guy who wrote this has a baby and it's Subaru and Emilia being in some dopey relationship. And so we're stuck with convention.

And people call this anime 'suffering.' Given the guarantee from the author that Subaru will ultimately succeed, the only true suffering in Re:Zero is the suffering I had to endure in watching the least likable protagonist in anime history ultimately promised everything he wants from the God of his universe. How subversive is it to give the protagonist in a 'normal guy wakes up in the fantasy universe of his dreams' plot everything he wanted? Not nearly as subversive as Konosuba's story, which for all its many faults y'all should be watching instead.

---------- Post added at 02:31 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:13 PM ----------

Originally Posted by Arcanum

You learn in a previous episode that the whale is Gluttony.

I have no memory whatsoever of the Whale being gluttony but, I guess it fits, but it leads logically to the next inevitable question: If we don't know what the heck these sins are or why they exist or even have any rules or guidelines as to their existence, how could any scenes with them have any resonance or impact?

It'd be like Godzilla and King Kong showing up to fight in a city but you have no idea what their backstories are, what their motivations are, what their powers or capabilities are, and the sum total of what you understand is what's communicated during the fight scenes as some sort of play-by-play commentary. "Godzilla's firing lasers out of his mouth!" shouts the commentator as it's happening on screen, and you're just like, "Okay, I guess that's something Godzilla can do apparently."

That's just poor writing, is what I'm saying.

Because he's got that witch magic all up in his business. It's the same reason he can see the Unseen Hands.

I don't mind Subaru having the powers.
I do mind the anime not bothering to even give us hints as to why he has these powers or what the significance of him having these powers are.
Good stories have foreshadowing and make sure to have discussions among the characters that provide an audience with some fundamental foundation of understanding as to the why so you're not just fumbling around in the dark but actually are in legitimate suspense.

It's explained in the very next episode. But since you're being super dismissive and stated you're not going to keep watching, here it is: the whale has the ability to use its body mass to create copies of itself.

1) My whole point as to why I am being super dismissive about all this is that these powers should have been explained as the Whale's powers to the viewer before you saw it happening on-screen during the big fight. If it's not explained, then the viewer has no stakes in the fight because the viewer has no rational basis to anticipate anything happening whatsoever because the Whale could do absolutely anything (including making copies of itself, apparently) and the viewer's just gotta be like "Oh, okay, that's a thing." Throughout Episode 20 there's subsequently no way for the viewer to make any rational assessment as to how the fight is even going, because the Whale's capabilities are largely unknown. What's even more annoying is the characters fighting the Whale, and even Subaru, appear to have been informed of the Whale's abilities but the viewers still know virtually nothing, so we're even worse off than the characters.

2) You know what really aggravates me? It's like y'all are incapable of accepting criticism of Re:Zero to such an extent that you'll attack me for daring to dislike it.
Well, I mean, tough? If y'all are going to enjoy the past times when I ranted and raved about how much I loved certain developments I loved, you also gotta accept the possibility in a thread where I'm critiquing each episode that I'm not going to love it. Me not loving something you love isn't some categorical statement on your value as a human being or anything, it's just...me not loving something you love!

And the passion I display in not loving Re:Zero is every bit as consistent as the passion I displayed in really loving it back when I thought it was going in a different direction and telling a fundamentally different story. Like, if you loved that passion and encouraged me to type Walls and Walls of Text gushing over the story when I thought I loved it, then surely you can accept the possibility that I might take that exact same attitude and write with scathing cynicism if I have a genuine reason for changing my mind.

And Re:Zero was just so hyped (including by acquaintances who do not post here, but perhaps especially by some of y'all) as the best anime of 2016, of course I'm going to harp on its faults. Because the default status of Re:Zero is the exact opposite problem, where tons of folks are claiming it's the bestest best. Assuming over-exaggerated praise of Re:Zero wouldn't offend you (because hell, my previous over-exaggerated praise of Re:Zero didn't), over-exaggerated criticisms of Re:Zero that are based on genuine objections and not just ad hominem attacks shouldn't be much different. It promotes good discussion!

And it's not like me hating something you like somehow erases anything you've liked about Re:Zero. It still exists. It's still going to give you all the heroic Subaru earning Emilia's affections you could possibly want.

[shiney]

Your like or dislike of the show has no impact on my viewing or enjoyment, I will state though it seems like you wanted to hard for the Rem/Subaru ship to happen that when it collapsed you started finding reasons to nitpick much of what is otherwise a perfectly fine and fairly standard fantasy anime.

Like a phrase like "this steaming sack of crap" are a lot more than just harping on faults, yknow? So of course people who truly enjoyed it are going to roll their eyes and bite back a little bit, it feels like you decided to not like the show and started going out of your way to find reasons to not like it instead of giving the development a fair chance.

Whether or not this is the case is of no real interest to me inasmuch that you're perfectly welcome to hate Re:Zero until the very end of time! Indeed it seems this is your desire. But I'm not sure it's fair to expect people who enjoy the show for a variety of reasons and who were enjoying your former play-by-play that turned to a dressing-down that turned to something altogether more hostile, to just like, not respond and stuff.

[Solid Snake]

Originally Posted by shiney

Your like or dislike of the show has no impact on my viewing or enjoyment, I will state though it seems like you wanted to hard for the Rem/Subaru ship to happen that when it collapsed you started finding reasons to nitpick much of what is otherwise a perfectly fine and fairly standard fantasy anime.

Funny you should say that, as I'd have to think the worst thing that could possibly happen in Re:Zero would involve Rem and Subaru getting together.
In fact, the one net positive from the assurance that Subaru and Emilia will get together is that their pairing precludes Rem and Subaru ever happening.
Must feel good to justify your own dismissiveness of my perspective by just pretending I'm some aggrieved shipper, though.

Like a phrase like "this steaming sack of crap" are a lot more than just harping on faults, yknow?

But that reinforces my point, insofar as I've been nothing if not consistent.
I've used outlandish language to describe an infatuation with Re:Zero back when I liked it, and that bothered none of you.
I'm using equally outlandish language to describe my disgust with Re:Zero now that I hate it, because that's just my writing style when it comes to these dopey reviews.
Like, it seems silly to accept outlandish praise and then recoil at outlandish insults.

it feels like you decided to not like the show and started going out of your way to find reasons to not like it instead of giving the development a fair chance.

...I've watched twenty episodes and that's not 'giving the development a fair chance?'
Twenty episodes in, the show's had plenty of chances.

But I'm not sure it's fair to expect people who enjoy the show for a variety of reasons and who were enjoying your former play-by-play that turned to a dressing-down that turned to something altogether more hostile, to just like, not respond and stuff.

From the start, this thread was advertised as "Snake watches a show and gives his spur of the moment thoughts, good or bad, as he's watching it." It's not like there was an implicit promise that I'd be an echo chamber for your own opinions or anyone else's about the show. Good or bad, the reactions on my end are genuine, and I was hoping the dialogue it would spur would be interesting whether I liked or disliked it.
It sounds more to me like there are a bunch of people here who can't handle the notion that I'm not fond of a show they love. After all, I'm not forcing anyone to respond or participate. Anyone's free to ignore me if they'd like.

[pochercoaster]

I'm glad I'm at a point where no one can fool me into thinking that a show that appears to be a generic poorly written teenage boy wank fantasy in its first ten minutes isn't a generic poorly written teenage boy wank fantasy.

Edit: how could you deceive us about your anime opinions Snake? How could yooouuuu???

[Sithdarth]

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

1) My whole point as to why I am being super dismissive about all this is that these powers should have been explained as the Whale's powers to the viewer before you saw it happening on-screen during the big fight. If it's not explained, then the viewer has no stakes in the fight because the viewer has no rational basis to anticipate anything happening whatsoever because the Whale could do absolutely anything (including making copies of itself, apparently) and the viewer's just gotta be like "Oh, okay, that's a thing." Throughout Episode 20 there's subsequently no way for the viewer to make any rational assessment as to how the fight is even going, because the Whale's capabilities are largely unknown. What's even more annoying is the characters fighting the Whale, and even Subaru, appear to have been informed of the Whale's abilities but the viewers still know virtually nothing, so we're even worse off than the characters.

I'm going to have to disagree with this on a fundamental level. For starters I can't think of a single story in any basically any format (with a caveat below) where the audience was given perfect information about even the heroes powers before a big fight much less the enemies. Lack of information creates drama. The very fact that you can't actually anticipate what is coming next is what makes basically anything worth watching/reading/whatever actually worth watching/reading/whatever. You're not really supposed to be able to evaluate how well the heroes are doing at any moment in basically any fight because that literally kills the dramatic tension. You usually can guess the good guys will win but you don't know 100% for sure and you certainly shouldn't know how or what it is going to cost them.

The one caveat I would make is that the one medium where this does not work is videogames. Doing this in a videogame is probably a recipe for disaster. Not telling me what my characters are capable of or what to expect from the next boss is just going to piss me off. But the key here is that I control the actions of the characters. The drama and excitement comes from the decisions I have to make and the uncertainty of those decisions. Because that uncertainty exists you don't actually need to create uncertainty by hiding information from the audience.

In short, for a story to be compelling in anyway requires some source of uncertainty and generally speaking the best (and almost the only) place to generate that is the antagonists. Except in interactive media where the audience can be the source of the uncertainty.

[Solid Snake]

Originally Posted by Sithdarth

I'm going to have to disagree with this on a fundamental level. For starters I can't think of a single story in any basically any format (with a caveat below) where the audience was given perfect information about even the heroes powers before a big fight much less the enemies. Lack of information creates drama.

To some extent, I agree with this! But I think lack of information works better when audiences have most the information necessary to make reasonably informed assumptions about how a fight is going...but might be missing a single crucial tidbit that could swing the tides, that was subtly foreshadowed but not explicitly revealed. That's when I feel it works.

Where it doesn't work, in my mind, is when you know virtually nothing whatsoever about the antagonist and therefore anything is possible. That level of lack of information just completely removes me from the action because I see no reason to be invested when something like the Whale can do literally anything -- make sudden duplicates of itself, for example -- and I'm in no position to ascertain much of anything beyond shrugging dispassionately and saying "Okay. Now that's a thing."

Take a Sith in a Star Wars movie, for example. I may not know this particular character's exact skillset or powers or moves, but the unwritten rules of the Star Wars universe allows me to make certain assumptions; he probably wields a lightsaber and has some control over the force, but he probably can't make sudden duplicates of himself or completely bend the fabric of reality to his will. Our understanding of the broader universe the characters are in informs our expectations of relative power levels and gives us reasons to anticipate certain outcomes...for example, a single Sith can probably handle a Jedi or two but not an army of Jedi. Subsequently, expectations can, in limited yet extremely effective contexts, be thwarted -- perhaps a brilliantly executed plan tailored to his strengths enables the Sith to pull out a miraculous victory against that army of Jedi, but we expect the catalyst for his victory, even if surprising in the moment, to be something that's been subtly foreshadowed or at least something within the realm of possibility that doesn't shatter any suspension of disbelief.

It's one thing in that kind of context to write in an unexpected twist that surprises, but creating a whale in a universe where the whale has no context to compare it to or understand it with and giving the audience no understanding of its powers whatsoever before the fight creates a situation where literally anything whatsoever can happen and the audience just has to roll with it, which kills dramatic tension for the opposite reason -- there's no tension because literally anything could happen and I'd just have to roll with it and say "Okay, that's how that works now."

In my opinion, a single source of uncertainty works -- maybe you don't quite understand how a Sith's single specific new power works that differentiates him from others you've seen before -- but you gotta have some baseline, some degree of comprehension or there's no reason whatsoever for me to invest myself in the conflict because I barely even know who or what the antagonist is.