I liked the show honestly as there was not much to hate about it on my end. I have always been into the concept of time travel and I am also a bit of a sadist and love to see characters suffer, I guess that is what happens when all you watched before anime is “Doctor Who”, “The Walking Dead” and “Game of Thrones”. The story with Re: Zero is that I just decided to binge watch the whole show in around three days on a free weekend up to the last episode. To be honest I feel kind of empty after watching it and am very sad at the idea that a continuation will likely not happen till 2019 by the looks of things.
Anyway I will get on to the review at hand………(dark hard is crushing heart)………. (drinks alcohol and gets over it)………… Anyway Re: Zero is one of those anime where the character goes to another universe where everything is all knights, dragons and magic. Generally you probably have seen this before in anime like “G.A.T.E.” where the Japanese military go through a portal to a magical world, or the likes of “Konosuba” which is an opposite to Re: Zero in this sub-genre where “Konosuba” is all humor and LOL’s, Zero is all darkness and tragedy.
Unlike “G.A.T.E” where you follow a rag tag team of elite soldiers and harem girls all out winning in an alternate reality. Zero follows a character whom is always losing and must make smart changes in personality and decision making to win against a dark fate. Some would compare this series to SAO MMO alternate reality but the character is not playing an MMO but is playing a very painful version of Dark Souls by the looks of things. Also unlike SAO we don’t follow a harem magnet garry stu but a character we can consider a Jackass called Subaru ……….(noticed grip on heart loosened when calling Subaru a jackass and taking a joke out of SAO)……….
One day our MC like many of us is reading Manga and getting some food at a local convenient store after a whole day of gaming, probably not playing dark souls considering what constantly happens in this show cause you think he know better. When leaving the convenience store he finds himself in another reality where everything is medieval and demi humans walk the streets with humans. So what happens to Subaru then? Does he get a magic weapon? No, does he get told an ancient prophecy? No, does he meet a cute girl? Yes but more likely gets saved by a girl. Subara after an embarrassing confrontation with thieves gets saved by our main heroine for Emilia. Subaru tries to help Emilia in return but sadly dies. When Subaru dies however he gets brought back to a point in the past and is forced to relive his death unless he can find some way to stop what is going to kill him and other characters.
The whole gimmick of the Re: Zero is that Subaru experiences the worse of the world he now resides in and has to repeat/suffer through it until he can find a solution. The story is at most dark through scenes of pure shock value and despair. At times the story can be good with everyone in good spirit only to be followed by more despair then before. The story can be at time too dramatic for its own good and feel a bit forced. Unlike the production of “Akame Ga Kill”, White Fox did not severely rush this series in its final episodes a stuck to balanced pacing. The one thing I hated about the story is that when it ended I just wanted there to be more as the ending did not satisfy me enough to expect a season two and answer all the questions concerning Subaru’s ability.
When talking about the characters Of Re: Zero I will take note of this popularity pole Crunchyroll had a week before the last episode. Out of 20000 people the pole had certain characters voted in a top 5 as favourites so I guess I will talk about these characters since so many people love them apparently (sinisterly chuckles). Beatrice was the 5th most popular character among fans more than likely Crunchy Roll is popular with lolicons, so I guess I nothing much to say here other than she likes animals more than humans since I did not find anything too complex about them. The fourth most popular was Emilia our main heroine. Emilia is a half elf with silver hair who has lived a live troubled by the fact she looks like an evil witch that once tried to cause mayhem in the world. Although you got to like Emilia she is likely the character that will be the most different in every time loop. In the first one her character and perspective of Subaru is different because of how much he interacted with her in that loop. Her position in the world makes it hard for her to interact with Subaru in later arcs which makes her impact as heroine have little effect in the episodes after the first arc.
The Third most popular character in that Poll was actually Emilia’s spirit cat Puck which likely has to do with the fact that the internet loves cats thus his obvious popularity. It would more than likely have to do with the fact that puck can be an absolute savage when he wants to be and is prone to trolling with Subaru. The second most favourite character of that Poll was actually Subaru believe it or not despite all the hate I see for him all over the interwebs talking about how he is a trash character. I see Subaru as Jackass …………… (the dark hand of re zero hate has vanished) ……….. But I kind of like the fact he is a jackass …………..(Cyborg_Dragon just died a result of his heart exploding)….(Cyborg_Dragons Ghost will continue writing the review).
As a bit of a Jackass myself I will have to say I like Subaru more then I hate him despite being a huge problem for health insurance firms everywhere. Despite getting butchered he was able for a while to not let pain of dying get to him and tries and stays humorous. The only point I did not like his Character was around episode 14 where he seemed selfish and acted on instinct. I he is not the best character but I have seen a lot of characters in anime that where so bad they can make a characters like Subaru look like the second coming Jesus. The most popular character amongst fans was Rem the maid who works with Subaru at Roswaals mansion. Despite being classified as a minor character they are likely the character with the most development in the show and it’s not hard to hate this particular character either considering they are the fan favourite. I really won’t say much else about that character since it might spoil the show for those who are planning to watch it. In my view they are the most interesting female character in the show. The characters I had a personal liking to are Roswaal whom makes Subaru his B$tch which is pretty funny and Wilhelm who is a personification of bad ass.
In the Art Department the animation is good and fluid. When there are fight scenes between Characters you can expect top quality animation. The whole thing is very colourful and in the gore department there is more than you would see in the other popular anime out there. The character designs are the most imaginative yet generic for a fantasy world. The only one to stand out is Subaru who is wearing a tracksuit making it seem as if he is that one guy at an anime convention that did not dress up. The special effects such as explosions and magic are pretty and shiny like you would find in a high budget anime by a studio like White Fox.
Now on to the sound department. In terms of Music you have the catchy openings with interesting visuals. The OST can be mixture of music that can have a dark vibe or a happy vibe. I was not a big fan of the ending themes as they did get me to keep listening and I ended up skipping them for the after credit scene each episode. I would like to talk about the voice actors as they seemed greatly picked to produce the emotion. Subaru VA Yuusuke Kobayashi was picked apparently because he naturally sounded like a Jackass to the director of the anime which tells you what was targeting when picking actors to fill the voice roles.
All in all if you somehow stuck to here then you can tell I liked the show or you could just tell that by looking at the score.
