Okay okay, let me go through this slowly and thoroughly this time.
Is Steins; Gate more about its characters than its plot? Yes. Are there a lot of slice-of-life elements in it? Yes. Is it just a simple SOL spiced up with time travel, as your terrible review tries to paint? Hell no. The sci-fi/time travel aspect is INTEGREAL to the plot. It literally drives the actions Okabe and the others take, and is key in exploring the characters and showing their character growth (mostly for Okabe).
Okabe and the show care more about characters than grand plot details. He even states that he places more value on saving Kurisu than preventing war world 3 and the death of billions of people.
Does Okabe permanently stop time travel from being invented in the future? No, he doesn't. Time travel is possible in the world of SG with the right approach, and eventually, people are going to discover it. The whole point about stopping SERN was that they had a monopoly over time travel and it resulted in a dystopia. That and world war 3 are what they sought to avoid.
They did end up solving the grand problems and the show ends on a hopeful note, but it's a sure thing. A dystopian future and world war 3 could come under different circumstances, just later in life. The only reassurance they have that this is not the case is that nobody from the future (like Suzuha) has come back in time to prevent this.
It is implied in the show that raiding the FGL and the time travel documents were integral in accelerating SERN's progress to building a successful time machine. It is also implied that without detecting the first D-Mail that SERN would give up its attempts on inventing time travel. SERN may still invent a time machine sometime in the future, and have done so in other parallel universes.
Still, without something like the reading Steiner, meaningfully interfering with other world lines is impossible. Okabe didn't permanently stop SERN's time travel endeavours nor stop the possibility of time travel in the future, nor an eventual world war. That wasn't the point. That's not what his journey is about. He's not some Time Lord whose duty is to oversee timelines and prevent evil, as you may like him to be.
Okabe tracking down the leader of SERN and offing him or something would be a terrible idea. Not only is it impossible given the timeline, but Okabe isn't some James Bond or anything. He is an ordinary person who fell into a situation way over his head, who had to contend with absurdities beyond his understanding and fight, to ultimately return to a somewhat normal life. Your expectations from the get-go were absurd.
Now about the "in the background". Ever heard of a looming threat? That's what SERN and its manufactured dystopia and war world 3 were. They were in the background, as in they were never fully shown thrust in the spotlight, and this was done for effect, to great effect. It follows the same logic as a horror movie. As soon as the monster is revealed, it automatically becomes less scary.
Snippets here and there with a lot of blank space allow the audience to fill in the gaps, and what one imagines is usually far more menacing than the actual reality. The show's refrain from overly showing the SERN dystopia and world war 3 (with Russia) was a good decision, as not only does it detract from the characters, which are the show's main focus, but it would also downgrade these very real threats.
Have you seen Steins;Gate 0? Now, that is some trash. Give it a go if you're willing. SG0 attempts to flesh out the future dystopia that is shown snippets of in the original Steins;Gate. Watch it and compare the two versions and you'll understand what I mean.
I think you need a third watch then, or just google the answers.
Okabe did stop both SERN's ability to time travel (by undoing the first D-mail that he sent about Kurisu getting stabbed which SERN detected with their network, which allowed them to successful create a time travel machine in the future) and prevented world war 3 by using the plastic toy (ompa, I think its called) to destroy the time travel documents Dr Nakabachi (Kurisu's dad) had when he fled to Russia. These big threats were in the background (to their benefit in my opinion) but they were real and Okabe did solve them in the end.
Just read your Steins;Gate review...what was that about? A troll review? From the looks of it, you must have only watched the first few episodes and nothing else because things like "...Instead of diving deeper into SERN, what their goal is for human time travel, & how to stop it..." this is covered in the anime.
All Comments (3) Comments
Okay okay, let me go through this slowly and thoroughly this time.
Is Steins; Gate more about its characters than its plot? Yes. Are there a lot of slice-of-life elements in it? Yes. Is it just a simple SOL spiced up with time travel, as your terrible review tries to paint? Hell no. The sci-fi/time travel aspect is INTEGREAL to the plot. It literally drives the actions Okabe and the others take, and is key in exploring the characters and showing their character growth (mostly for Okabe).
Okabe and the show care more about characters than grand plot details. He even states that he places more value on saving Kurisu than preventing war world 3 and the death of billions of people.
Does Okabe permanently stop time travel from being invented in the future? No, he doesn't. Time travel is possible in the world of SG with the right approach, and eventually, people are going to discover it. The whole point about stopping SERN was that they had a monopoly over time travel and it resulted in a dystopia. That and world war 3 are what they sought to avoid.
They did end up solving the grand problems and the show ends on a hopeful note, but it's a sure thing. A dystopian future and world war 3 could come under different circumstances, just later in life. The only reassurance they have that this is not the case is that nobody from the future (like Suzuha) has come back in time to prevent this.
It is implied in the show that raiding the FGL and the time travel documents were integral in accelerating SERN's progress to building a successful time machine. It is also implied that without detecting the first D-Mail that SERN would give up its attempts on inventing time travel. SERN may still invent a time machine sometime in the future, and have done so in other parallel universes.
Still, without something like the reading Steiner, meaningfully interfering with other world lines is impossible. Okabe didn't permanently stop SERN's time travel endeavours nor stop the possibility of time travel in the future, nor an eventual world war. That wasn't the point. That's not what his journey is about. He's not some Time Lord whose duty is to oversee timelines and prevent evil, as you may like him to be.
Okabe tracking down the leader of SERN and offing him or something would be a terrible idea. Not only is it impossible given the timeline, but Okabe isn't some James Bond or anything. He is an ordinary person who fell into a situation way over his head, who had to contend with absurdities beyond his understanding and fight, to ultimately return to a somewhat normal life. Your expectations from the get-go were absurd.
Now about the "in the background". Ever heard of a looming threat? That's what SERN and its manufactured dystopia and war world 3 were. They were in the background, as in they were never fully shown thrust in the spotlight, and this was done for effect, to great effect. It follows the same logic as a horror movie. As soon as the monster is revealed, it automatically becomes less scary.
Snippets here and there with a lot of blank space allow the audience to fill in the gaps, and what one imagines is usually far more menacing than the actual reality. The show's refrain from overly showing the SERN dystopia and world war 3 (with Russia) was a good decision, as not only does it detract from the characters, which are the show's main focus, but it would also downgrade these very real threats.
Have you seen Steins;Gate 0? Now, that is some trash. Give it a go if you're willing. SG0 attempts to flesh out the future dystopia that is shown snippets of in the original Steins;Gate. Watch it and compare the two versions and you'll understand what I mean.
Okabe did stop both SERN's ability to time travel (by undoing the first D-mail that he sent about Kurisu getting stabbed which SERN detected with their network, which allowed them to successful create a time travel machine in the future) and prevented world war 3 by using the plastic toy (ompa, I think its called) to destroy the time travel documents Dr Nakabachi (Kurisu's dad) had when he fled to Russia. These big threats were in the background (to their benefit in my opinion) but they were real and Okabe did solve them in the end.