Re: Zero 20 Overview / Review

 That intro was so fucking good... at first I was wondering "wtf is this? I want to see white whale hunting" but this was so much better, giving us an in depth look what Wilhelm is going through, remembering what he has lost in a brief scene with barely any dialogue it conveys so much to us the audience... this is what we call  "Good writing". The fact that  gives a lot more emotional depth to the action we're about to consume makes action NOT gratiutous.

Speaking of which, ITADAKIMASU, ACTION!

 Now the white whale chases after Subaru because he carries "The Stench of the Jealous Witch" but the question has still not been answered; Why is Satella doing this? what does she have to gain by giving him his ability? furthermore why are mabeasts attracted to Satella's tracks? these are questions for future episodes but for now it continues to raise the spectre of suspense and shows us how an anime , or any show in general can create mysteries from such simple concepts.

But more importantly; they don't have to bash us over the fucking head with it..... as in, it wasn't explained again because it has already been explained before, I appreciate that. That they treat the audiece as NOT retarded.

 Plot point; Crutsch's infinite range sword... alongside her wind-reading (For lies) continues to make her the best candidate. Emilia has nothing to compete with this level of competence and power.  Looks to be an easy victory but somehow I doubt it. I suspect they're about to get a beat-down .... I wonder if Crutsch might die here.

Felix notices Subaru's massive change from the past and this goes to show how sometimes the viewer can forget that NON main character are experiencing this linearly so for Felix, it has been very little time that he's interacted with Subaru. Bonus points for consistency and logic in such a complex story.

Anyway they lay the smackdown on the white whale for awhile before suddenly... something occurs;

Lines up with the previous cycle where the fog is what signaled the arrival of the white whale. Continuity, I like it. But the writing here is either inconsistent or there is something wrong; We know that Wilhelm's wife was killed by the white whale, and yet he can remember her .... also several men have gone missing during this time and yet the characters remember them. Previously only Subaru remembered them.  I understand that only "The Fog" can erase people from existence but it seems awfully convenient that that has only happened very few times here but it happened constantly in the previous cycle.

Anyway the extra (begging the) question; Why is Subaru able to remember regardless of mode-of-death? damn it Satella, you are ever present. I hope that the season doesn't conclude before we meet her.

 The protection of Satella once again comes with a myriad of questions which only makes me want to watch more. Damn you writers, you're slick.


16:40 OHHH our first look at Satella, the jealous witch... only a brief glimpse, yummy.

21:10 So he took her name? and she's part of Reinhard's family? not surprised. the hair was a dead give-away. Cute twist though.

22:50 OH SHIT, nice twist. I legitimately did not see that coming.... but it makes perfect sense since whales communicate through those noises and the noise prior to the fog was probably a distress call. Nice.


The writing is top notch, the pacing once again was a bit off, the flashbacks begun to get a little excessive towards the end and the action was a bit less intense than it should have been. It didn't feel like anyone was in danger until the very end and Crustch seems wildly overpowered.  Either way it built a good mythos and tried very hard to get us to form an emotional connection to Wilhelm which I sort of did but not enough for his apparent death to matter.

This is something they should have established earlier and although they did a good job with their current time, we simply didn't have anything invested in this character prior to now.... I'm sure it was different in the manga but I am not reading a manga, I am watching an anime and this anime , screwed up here.

Last episode although it had less action, was better.
 So was the pay-off worth the build up of the previous episode? in my personal opinion; No. The action was a bit too subdued and there simply wasn't enough death, it seemed like a complete one-sided beatdown and then suddenly the whale wins so it was imbalanced is my point. The adaptation from the source material should have had the fight be more even, to present a bigger threat rather than just having the whale win by default before the twist is revealed.

I liked the episode but it wasn't very good.... again it had severe pacing issues and the action was subpar (Compare to the bar scene againt Elsa in episode 03 which was fast paced and very intense.... this one was neither), anyway I am still interested in seeing where this anime goes, do note (AND I WILL NOT READ THIS BUT YOU MIGHT BE INTERESTED) that the author had a discussion about Rem vs Emilia in this link, read at your own peril I don't know if it contains spoilers;
http://www.crunchyroll.com/anime-feature/2016/08/13/feature-rezero-director-and-composer-discuss-who-the-true-heroine-is-emilia-or-rem?utm_source=community&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=rezero

(Will clean up this post soon)