「始まりの終わりと終わりの始まり」 (Hajimari no Owari to Owari no Hajimari)
“The End of the Beginning and the Beginning of the End”

Impeccable execution and a 60-minute premiere starts Re:Zero in a strong position. I’m surprised, and pleasantly so; this felt like an improvement on the source.

Execution, Execution, Execution

In my preview for this series, I admitted to some trepidation. The execution didn’t feel like it was quite there, even if the rebirth mechanic made me kept reading past where I normally would have stopped to write a preview. If there’s anything this first episode did, it was execute the story well. I actually laughed at some of the gags, and I knew they were coming! I had seen them before, and not long ago! That speaks volumes. They executed the story to the hilt, to good effect.

Part of that is the double-length premiere. That’s a huge help. Fitting two rebirths into the first episode without having to rush really helped give us a good, solid foundation. Not only did we meet the Half-Elf Who May Or May Not Be Named Satella (Takahashi Rie), we also got to properly meet Felt (Akasaki Chinatsu) and Rom-jii (Mugihito), as well as an antagonist in Elsa (Noto Mamiko). We needed to get that far to avoid my biggest gripe in the source—it took too damn long for hikkineet Natsuki Subaru (Kobayashi Yuusuke) to clue in on the rebirth mechanic, even though, as a gamer who frequently speaks in tropes, I feel like he should have defaulted to that instead of “weird dream.” I can understand him not thinking of that immediately, but he should have realized it by the time he saw Rom-jii alive. But when everything happens in one episode, that frustration is quickly forgotten, and we end with a solid foundation for the story to proceed on.

Everything else was just done well. Pacing was great. Animation was lovely. The seiyuu were all on point and well-casted, with Kobayashi Yuusuke nailing the comedy and Noto Mamiko being both scary and hot (but mostly scary). Plus Takahashi Rie is quickly becoming one of my favorite seiyuu, so glad to hear more from her. Special props go to Aketagawa Jin, Suehiro Kenichiro, and anyone else who worked on the sound or the OST; there were a few times when the soundtrack absolutely elevated a scene, such as when it completely stopped after Subaru announced he was unemployed in Rom-jii’s shop…and then the conversation started up again as if nothing had happened. Beautiful.

Honestly, I’m almost annoyed. I don’t like even the possibility of blogging two shows on Sunday—hell, I don’t like to blog at all on Sundays—and yet this and Boku no Hero Academia both had strong premieres. I was kind of hoping one would suck. Damn you, anime industry! Why can’t you arrange shows to better suit my needs? *shakes fist theatrically* *trips over one of Subaru’s weights* *gets transported to a parallel world*

Bad Business

Some readers get annoyed when I bring up that I’m an author. They think I’m self-promoting. No matter that intimately knowing what goes into creating a piece of fiction is often extremely relevant when analyzing another piece of fiction; clearly I’m self-promoting. And my protests that I would bring up my other jobs if only they were relevant to anime more often, fall on deaf ears.

So let’s do that. When I’m not writing books, I’m selling things, and I worked as a broker for several years, which is the position both Felt and Elsa were in here. (Elsa had a client, whereas Felt’s supplier was, obviously, unwilling.) Let’s discuss what Felt did wrong, and why she got split down the seam.

(No, I’m not bitter or anything. Why do you ask? Not bitter at all.)

As I said, I worked as a broker for several years. An electronics broker. Buy low, sell high, that kind of thing. Mostly I was a regular supplier, but when a shortage happened and customers got desperate for a part, you can bet the price rose precipitously. That’s part of the game. But you know what I never did? I never made a customer openly compete for parts with another customer when I had already accepted a purchase order. I might occasionally lie to the first customer and say that my supplier fell through, which is not real nice, but I’m not going to claim it didn’t happen. But make them openly compete? C’mon.

That’s where Felt made her big mistake. She traded her reputation for short-term profits. If the customer isn’t valuable and the profits are high enough, sometimes that’s worth it—but usually not. Reputation is worth more than its figurative weight in gold. And to do so with both customers present is amateur hour. It’s faster, sure, but it introduces all sorts of potential problems (them teaming up against her or both of walking out, etc). If Felt were smarter, she would have taken the deal she was originally paid for, maybe earned herself a future client, and kept all of her organs inside her body. Which is another thing—it’s not wise to antagonize people in a world where they might decide to kill you instead of paying.

Though in Felt’s case, it makes sense. She’s a kid, albeit a streetwise, jaded one. We’ll all just have to learn from her mistake, and hopefully Subaru will too.

Looking Ahead – Now It Really Stars

Like I said, the advantage of a double-length premiere is that the stage is all set, and now the strength of the rebirth mechanic can start to take effect. Unlike other magical-fantasy-action-harem anime, this one isn’t an action-adventure so much as it is a mystery or a puzzle. How can Subaru take the information he has and the tools that are available and make sure that everyone gets out of this alive, while also making sure the half-elf-temporarily-known-as-Satella gets to keep her insignia? Oh, and it would also be nice to find out what her deal is, as well as what Elsa’s is, because like I said, she’s scary/hot/scary (but mostly scary). What this episode did was ask a lot of intriguing questions that I now want answers to, which is something they wouldn’t have been able to do with only a single 23-minute episode.

As we did last season, we won’t be announcing what shows we’re covering until 2-3 episodes of most shows have been released. Please comment if you want to see Re:Zero receive regular coverage. Originally I was thinking it wouldn’t, because of the schedule conflict and my early doubts on the source, but now I’m not so sure. Tell me what y’all think.

tl;dr: @StiltsOutLoud – Impeccable execution & 60-minute runtime help establish the world, characters, & story. The puzzle has been set. Now to solve it #rezero 01

Random thoughts:

  • Interspersing the dark death scene with the normal convenience store scene made both of them eerie, and aroused interest from the very first moments. I liked that better than just doing the death scene first, since at that point we wouldn’t have known who even one of those characters might be, and therefore would be less likely to care that they’re dying.
  • One good deed per day is…actually a good goal to live by. Also, it’s a convincing enough reason to help out, especially when combined with Puck (Uchiyama Yumi) vouching for Subaru’s lack of malicious intent.
  • Speaking of, Puck is an adorable little meddler. Neko punch! Nyahaha~
  • For some reason it really tickles me that the only reason Subaru is strong is that he works out to guard the house. It’s not usual for a hikkineet (note: yes, I’m using the KonoSuba term forever more), but throwing it out there early makes it an established fact, and he did presumably have the time. Plus, he kicked that one mugger in the nads, which was funny.
  • It’s the little touches, like including the red-eye effect in the photo or not skimping on the blood. If the first season of Terra Formars had allowed this much blood, maybe I would still be watching it for the current (second) season. Though probably not.

My first novel, Wage Slave Rebellion, is available now. (More info—now in paperback!) Sign up for my email list for a FREE sequel novella. Over at stephenwgee.com, the last four posts: Inside Out: What Emotion Drives You?, Superhot: Storytelling through gameplay, Deadpool: Tonal Balance Through Non-Linear Storytelling, and Through their own flaws.

Full-length images: 29.

84 Comments

  1. “If the first season of Terra Formars had allowed this much blood, maybe I would still be watching it for the current (second) season.”

    Oh god, you haven’t checked out the new season yet? You need to watch it just to see how crappy it is, they’ve entirely destroyed what little the series had… it was better off when half the screen time was occupied by blackness.

    qwert
      1. Personally, I felt season 1 (haven’t seen season 2 of terraformars yet) was decent, and yes the censor got annoying, but from what I know, isn’t the censor put in so it can air on the TV stations? Cause if that’s the case, I’d say the studio and anime didn’t really have too much options when it comes to censorship.

        Trap Master
  2. I was so pleasantly surprised by this premiere! I was thinking this would just be a way to fill 20 minutes of a Sunday evening but looks like this has great potential. Would love if this was picked up for coverage.

    Styx
  3. I had a great time with this premier although it being double length threw me a little. It meant I spent too much of the first half wondering how they would have time to show off the rebirth mechanic.
    It throws you out of the story a little if you keep thinking “shouldn’t he have died by now?” 🙂

    I agree that the trope-savvy protagonist should have realised he was ‘replaying’ the day sooner but I really enjoyed that he got the chance to get to know more characters during the day which made it really engaging.

    It would be great to see you keep blogging this one Stilts. Thanks for bringing your work-based expertise to bear.

    leppa790
  4. ” Unlike other magical-fantasy-action-harem anime, this one isn’t an action-adventure so much as it is a mystery or a puzzle. How can Subaru take the information he has and the tools that are available and make sure that everyone gets out of this alive”

    yups, this is more sadistic than Steins gate. Author of this LN likely to torture our MC…
    i don’t think ability to redo after the death that our MC have is cheat ability…its more like a curse IMO.

    i like to see this review every week because its really rare to see this sadistic looping death again and again story in anime form…

    ranoa
    1. To be fair, all authors are to some degree sadists. (Look at me, bringing my author experience up again.) We have to torture our characters to harvest either drama or comedy from their lives. Though we’re often masochistic too, especially if we write long-running series, because we become fond of our characters and hurting them hurts us as well.

      Fiction authors are pretty messed up people, basically.

  5. I have mixed feelings about this premiere, to be honest. My gripes can be easily in Hulkspeak summed with ‘jokes bad, story good’. Because, honestly, I felt that this show’s comedy was like Konosuba in a world where Konosuba wasn’t funny. It mostly consisted of the main character being meta and screaming random things (he sure beat that ‘I’m broke’ joke into the ground fairly quickly), instead of actual snark, parody and absurdity. Not sold on the guy in the first place – I still felt it took too long for him to figure out he was in time-loop.

    That said, when the show actually got serious, it got interesting pretty fast. I love time-travel mechanics in stories to begin with (if they’re used well, anyways) and this is one of the more intriguing applications of them. It also held nothing back in terms of the fights and it managed to build its atmosphere a lot better than the first half. It’s this that keeps me watching for now, because it has potential.

    So yeah, pretty clear 3-episode rule show here for me. I hope it manages to impress me enough to watch the rest of it in the coming weeks.

    Dvalinn
    1. You can try looking in the manga if you don’t want to wait.

      On the side note
      https://randomc.net/image/Re%20Zero%20Kara%20Hajimeru%20Isekai%20Seikatsu/Re%20Zero%20Kara%20Hajimeru%20Isekai%20Seikatsu%20-%2001%20-%20Large%2028.jpg
      https://randomc.net/image/Re%20Zero%20Kara%20Hajimeru%20Isekai%20Seikatsu/Re%20Zero%20Kara%20Hajimeru%20Isekai%20Seikatsu%20-%2001%20-%20Large%2036.jpg
      https://randomc.net/image/Re%20Zero%20Kara%20Hajimeru%20Isekai%20Seikatsu/Re%20Zero%20Kara%20Hajimeru%20Isekai%20Seikatsu%20-%2001%20-%20Large%2057.jpg
      https://randomc.net/image/Re%20Zero%20Kara%20Hajimeru%20Isekai%20Seikatsu/Re%20Zero%20Kara%20Hajimeru%20Isekai%20Seikatsu%20-%2001%20-%20Large%2074.jpg

      In many anime/manga. It has always been an ironclad rule for the anime heroine to have the appearance of a “pure noble girl” while the villainess is always dressed in a very sexy attire, at least more revealing compared to the heroine, along with sounding very seductive and/or sadistic; if you see a character dressed similar to Ivy (Soul Calibur), and/or sounds seductive like Oriana Thomson (Toaru Majutsu no Index) and maybe sadistic like Esdeath (akame ga kill), then I think that obviously imply she is likely evil. Of course, at best they can be a “supporting” character like Freya (DanMachi). Anyway, because our main character read so much manga, you would think he would see that coming, to have the “attracting Onee-san, who shows such much skin,” as a “boss character” he needs to fight.

      Of course there are exceptions, for any heroines that are “dressed/look evil” and possibly sound seductive, the only ones that fit the description would be certain girls from Highschool Dxd (who are very seductive and one of them is a sadist), Albedo (Overlord), Kate (Sekai Seifuku: Bouryaku no Zvezda), Masane Amaha (witchblade), Lilu (Maou no Hajimekata), Maria Naruse (The Testament of Sister New Devil), and the Demon Lord (Maoyu) when she is the Demon Lord. Can’t think of any other exceptions; notably I rarely see a heroine that is a sadist.

      greed2
  6. I thought these two episodes were quite a slog to get through, the main character lacks any personality with his only defining traits being pointing out tropes for the sake of pointing them out (like anyone who watches anime seasonally doesn’t know any of these tropes) so it just feels like hes wasting time with long conversations where he keeps making up motivations for helping a girl out when we all REALLY know why he wants to help her out. the show doesn’t even a compelling reason for the protagonist to keep trying to help after the rewinds when at this point these people he’s trying to help when hes only known them all for less then a day (two counting rewinds). also for a protagonist who’s supposed to be genre savvy he’s extremely dumb for not realizing what the basic rules for time travel are after his second rewind.

    I also feel the time rewinds take all the tension out of this story for me as the protagonist has potentially infinite lives and a confirmed start zone and that there are shows that do this premise far better (Stiens;Gate, Punchline) without having to combine a generic SAO fantasy world in the middle of it. as a mystery despite all the talking it gives very little information that contributes to the actual mystery (only that there’s some insignia that’s valuable to the Asuna clone for reasons we dont know and that some generic bad people want it for reasons we again don’t know) and the actual conversations feel very dragged out and forced at times.

    what would be interesting is if the series were set in a dark fantasy world, (Garo, Dark Souls games, Berserk) and that the premise wasn’t a mystery but about the endless hardships of constant death that develops a naive protagonist into a cold emotionless being slowly over time with the constant resets and questioning whether or not the end game goal in the end would even be worth it to him after all that he’s been put through or if he is even really a human being while trying to appreciate the little things that make life worth living for those his actions affect. but that’s just me

    if one show that’s aired this season deserved the double length episode treatment it would be my hero academia considering it would fully cover the double length first chapter and get both the setup and the main fight of introductory chapter taken care of right off the bat.

    smat
    1. Honestly, sounds like you want this series to be something other than it actually is. That’s your right, but the author and anime studio isn’t under any obligation to oblige ya. Probably best to drop it if I were you, or give it one more episode and then drop it if it doesn’t tickle your fancy. No use continuing if it’s a slog to you.

      I wouldn’t have minded a double-length Heroaca premiere, though it left off at a nice enough point that it wasn’t necessary.

  7. I’m not recommend you to pick this up. It will only damage your mental state more and more as we go deep into the story. At one point, you will feel you don’t want to write about it anymore due to the depression. If you thought your experience with Steins;gate and Madoka will prepare you for the depression in this show, you are wrong. Skip this. I have warned you.

    Marina2
      1. Nah he`s being over dramatic, I`m almost done with the 5th arc of the web novel series, nothing too morbid, unless some even more serious shit happens after that, which doesn`t seem so since I`ve taken a peek beyond 5. The only gripe I have on the series is that it`s always subaru`s deaths reaching to a certain threshold amount and triggers a major flag event, but he always manages to miraculously one shots the major event despite dying to trivial things before

        Oliviaven
    1. Different people read/watch fiction for different reasons. For example, I don’t much enjoy horror, while others enjoy it for the emotional catharsis. This strikes me a show that will allow me to feel the depths of certain emotions that I, as a generally optimistic (illogically so, at times) person don’t normally feel, and will let me learn more methods by which to torture my own characters. Plus, it’s interesting so far, so I’m game to keep watching at least.

    2. Really? There’s nothing as soul-crushing as “Now and Then, Here and There” I seriously doubt this series can come close to that, and I survived that one just fine. I’m actually quite interesting in this series, let’s see where it goes from here.

      Kamui
  8. Re Zero started as a webnovel, which is currently a popular medium for writing reincarnated to/sent to fantasy world stories (ie. Isekai genre). One could say there’s a glut of these stories – most read like shameless ripoffs of each other.

    That said, there are the occasional few that really take advantage of its premise, like the Mushoku Tensei/Jobless Reincarnation series.
    There are also others that branch into fairly interesting premises, like the one where the teleported MC (unbeknownst to his friends) is secretly a Fate/UBW-esque modern mage, and his modern magic is far more advanced than the fantasy world’s wizardry (ie. fantasy wizards need a wand and long complex spells; he only needs a finger-snap and at least 1 sentence)*.

    *titled Isekai Mahou wo Okureteru/The Other World’s Magic is Too Far Behind.

    zztop
    1. Maybe, but she seemed perfectly willing to walk away until Subaru revealed what he was going to do with the insignia. We still don’t know why she killed them during the first go, so maybe you’re right, but we can only go off the information we have. All sorts of other things could have gone wrong in the first loop, such as Felt making some other amateur mistake.

  9. If you still feel interested in watching this anime after another 2 episodes, even though you’ve already gone through the source material, then I’d vote to cover it. It’s always nice to see a review with some educated criticism. :3
    I personally like shows like this – funny one minute, and dark and gory the next.

    Timaeus
  10. They think I’m self-promoting.
    You’re not? <g>
    Please comment if you want to see Re:Zero receive regular coverage.
    Yes, please.
    Interspersing the dark death scene with the normal convenience store scene made both of them eerie, and aroused interest from the very first moments.
    Nah, looked more lika a gimmick, and made me doubt for a moment if this was going to be any good. Thankfully, by the end I had forgotten all about the question even arising.
    scary/hot/scary (but mostly scary)
    And with such a distinctive voice that you have to wonder how the protag managed not to recognize her as his killer the moment she opened her mouth in “take 2”.

    Satellatte
    1. My little blurb at the bottom of my posts is self-promotion. When I bring it up in the course of a discussion, it’s the same as bringing up my sales background. It’s me signaling that I’m not just talking out of my ass, this is something I actually know, so you should give it more credence than me, for example, talking about some combat move. I’ve never been in a real fight, much less one with magic and swords, so I don’t have any experience to bring to bear there.

      Elsa’s voice was another of those moments were I was like “Doesn’t he recognize her?” I could believe him not recognizing her at first, but not at all during that big long conversation is a stretch. But this all getting done in an episode helped that too, because the annoyance only lasted a max of like seven minutes.

      1. Well, you said that some readers get annoyed by it, and I’m guessing that’s precisely because they see that you already have a self-promotion blurb under the posts. So they go like “why is he bringing it up again, isn’t that enough already?” The thing is, writing happens to be an area where everyone considers themselves an expert (in judging the quality of it, at least), so unless you’ve already made a name for yourself, saying that you’re a writer to lend weight to an opinion can easily backfire and make people think “self-promotion again” or even just “way to be self-important”. Being a broker/butcher/baker/candle-stick maker/etc doesn’t fall into this sort of “universal expertise” area and I doubt many would complain about mentioning it.

        Satellatte
      2. To be fair, he only heard her voice once a few seconds before receiving a death blow. I seriously doubt that Subaru even remembers that it was a woman who killed him.

        Kamui
  11. If this is going to be 2 cours, it will certainly go up to the third arc. I can`t see it starting the fourth one as the web novel of the fourth arc has 100+ chapters while the third one has 60~70 ish chapters. I can see the entire second half of the adaptation devoted solely to the third arc, volumes 4~8. Which means “satella`s” role of Show Spoiler ▼

    and all hail Show Spoiler ▼

    Oliviaven
    1. There was certainly some censoring going on, but it took the form of carefully chosen angles as opposed to flooding the screen with mist or darkness. You could still see plenty of blood around Rom-jii in that first death scene, after all. If they gotta censor, this is the way I prefer ’em to do it.

      Besides, sometimes the imagination makes the wound much worse than reality ever could.

  12. Meh that was boring. The premise is fine and all, but everything else is just, duh…The thing that i hate about LN adaptations is that they seem almost self indulgingly verbose, scenes always seem to drag on more than they should, things are over described, and worst of all, having protagonist be the usual type of dude spelling out everything for the audience. It felt borderline patronising. Yeah, that last scene was quite shocking, but considering all the things the episode has built into, it just felt like a slight warm breeze more than anything.

    Amiluhur
  13. its been a while since we last hear noto mamiko voice. then i hear megumin’s voice again through satella. depending on my tolerance on mindfck tropes like timeloops, this show would be part of my watchlist.

    Jeffers
  14. Please comment if you want to see Re:Zero receive regular coverage. Originally I was thinking it wouldn’t, because of the schedule conflict and my early doubts on the source, but now I’m not so sure. Tell me what y’all think.

    If you find the time, please do! Great start, beautiful animation, interesting plot, likeable characters (heck, they even threw in some Megumin). It’s going to be an awesome ride ’til the end of summer and I’d love to see it covered.

    JayDrink
  15. This certainly looks good, nice to see a light novel adaptation not being rushed, getting 2 cours to really flesh the story (not all light novels need that tho) and having good production values. Based on first episode of course, so everything could still change, but the start is promising. Which is a lot more that can be said for Gyakuten Saiban
    To be fair, this show getting these things right rather than your average fantasy-action-harem-in-other-world-school makes me extra happy since I like to see these Light Novels with little twist on the usual recipe.

    I would be thrilled to see Re:Zero blogged, things should get pretty interesting with this one. And an anime season without fantasy anime blogged by Stilts wouldn’t feel right.

    Erimaki
    1. Oh, I’d be very surprised if I didn’t end up blogging a fantasy series this season. Hell, I intro’d Heroaca, and that’s definitely fantasy in my book, even if it’s not what some people think of as fantasy (it sure as hell ain’t sci-fi). But I’ve got my eyes on a couple other good-lookin’ fantasy shows, ufufu~

  16. Really though, “Parallel World” is the first thing he concludes 10 seconds into unceremoniously being dumped into one, but 2 “rebirths” in and he doesn’t even consider that?

    Still, pleasantly surprised with what I got as someone with no expectations going in and I’d be interested to see more posts in the future.

    MrB
  17. I’d say this desperately needed the 1 hour premiere. I can’t imagine anyone seeing the first half hour and saying it’s great.

    Now, taking into account the whole hour I found it pretty interesting but definitely not thanks to our protagonist. There were certainly moments where he felt somewhat irritating. The rest of the cast felt interesting enough though so once we got past the first 10-15 minutes it got to the point where it was enjoyable. I suppose the part where Subaru couldn’t understand what was going on did seem a bit unlikely but maybe the shock played it’s part in that.

    I will be watching the future episodes because if nothing else I have an unusually small starting line-up this season.

    Also, Elsa is more hot than scary to me… I need help.

    erohakase
    1. he felt somewhat irritating

      An intelligent idiot. He clearly understands what’s going on,
      but refuses to accept the potential jeopardy he’s in even after
      getting injured.

      His character could ruin this series. I’m hoping that
      doesn’t happen, though.

      Other than that, looks pretty good.

      mac65
      1. Edge of Tomorrow is movie OK. Original, All you need is kill manga is far better in no small part due to medium having more room for pacing and impact.

        Just think Groundhog’s day with military and aliens.

        Drasca
      2. Edge of Tomorrow is a very good movie and far better than most people give it credit for. My mind immediately went to that when I saw this series, because unlike Erased or Steins;gate that everyone is comparing it to, the hero actually has to die in order to keep going through the time loop. He starts as a sniveling wimp and ends up being an awesome warrior because of how many times he’s had to die to get better. It’s very similar to this series, the big difference being that instead of fantasy, it’s sci-fi.

        If you get a chance to, after you see the movie, read the LN that it was based on called “All You Need is Kill” by Hiromi Sakurazaka. It’s even better.

  18. I like how fun but brutal the it is. Happy, laid back attitude with some joking and then immediately buckets-o-blood. Combined with already likable characters and a good pace which I hope they keep it definately jump to the top of my watch list for this season. Looking forward to seeing where it goes. Hopefully it won’t disappoint.

  19. In the run for best anime premier of the season. True enough, Subaru needs to do better going forward, but other than that, I loved everything.
    I loved how he isn’t powerful with a clear purpose from the get go. I loved how the world isn’t revolving around him and that he needs to struggle to get through. I was hooked by the questions the episode already asked (the real Satella is someone big in their world apparently).

    So yeah, if you have the time for it, please blog it. It’s really interesting so far.

  20. Compared to what has debuted so far, this is certainly worth blogging (bloggable?). Compelling story, solid production quality, consistent and appropriate comedic relief, characters we actually care about (!): this show has a lot to look forward to. NOT blogging it would be downright sinful! :]

    Smeef
  21. I would really like to see you cover this. I’m not usually interested in shows that seem to have so much potential for being dark and depressing, but something about this one is rather captivating. Also, the rebirth mechanic constantly dangles the hope that, no matter how terrible things might get, there is always the chance that he can set it all right.

    Wanderer
  22. The previews on Anime News Network critically panned this one, so I expected it be downright awful. But nope! It was quite good. Even despite the shift in tone, it all just worked. I found it very interesting, so it’s a keeper for now.

    Mormegil
    1. Really? Granted, I can maybe see where they coulda been coming from, since the source didn’t quite tickle my fancy as much as this did. Still, I’ll remain happily ensconced in my anime optimism. I’d always rather talk about why something is rad, until it passes such a point where doing so would be lying.

  23. If you have to choose between Re: Zero Kara Hajimeru Isekai Seikatsu and Boku no Hero Academia, I would vastly prefer if you would cover this show. The first episode and the mystery about to unfold certainly picked my interest.

    Kayano
  24. Please cover this. As long as no one spoils anything to me, I can honestly not predict what’s going to become of this show, which is a good sign. Also, there hasn’t been a trapped-in-a-fantasy world anime that has been this dark and depressing yet, so it would be such a waste to leave this behind.

    Red HeartGold ZX
  25. This was way more interesting than I thought.
    This kind of execution is what I’m constantly looking for in an anime, yet I can rarely find it. And like you said, the details elevated it even more, they are really rewarding for the viewers, for instance the paw shaped slap mark, or spotting Felt jumping over the roofs while Subaru is whining in the back alley (I was like wait, wut ? and had to pause and see the scene again).

    I think I can’t complain about anything about this premiere. Usually, I’m not fond of the rebirth/time travel/reset mechanism in anime: it resets everyone’s development as characters, except for the MC. But in this case I’m actually glad it’s there because, as someone stated above, it let us hope for the better even in desperate situation.

    tl;dr: I’d also like to see this covered.

    Voyager
  26. Comercial ethic aside, Elsa would kill Felt and the old man anyway , the first time Subaru came to the store she had already killed them so i think they were already screwed the moment they acepted to fetch the item.

    Stocke
      1. He is right. As seen in Subaru’s second death, Elsa is a psycopath who enjoys eviscerating people (urgh, that scene while Subaru is dying).
        It was all a charade to get information before killing them anyway, as it was shown the 1st time where they were already killed and there was no competition (nobody came into the store while Subaru was there in the 2nd try).

        Ebisu
  27. definitely would like to see this get blogged. I really liked the manga and I think the anime did a pretty good job of executing the story. Not to mention it looks nice. Definitely one of the one’s I’m watching this season

    aimless
  28. I don’t remember the manga to have so much background on demi-human activity. The anime is less subtle at giving info about how this world works. And I truly hate when they try to spoil a series at the start. It crushes the surprise factor.

    Just give the show to somebody else if you don’t think you’ll have enough time. What’s wrong with swapping projects with other writers to match schedules? :3

    Ebisu
    1. That’s not the concern. We do that all the time. But we all don’t have the same tastes, and this season is fairly packed. I don’t know how many alternatives there are if I’m not the one to blog this, though we’ll see once more shows have begun airing.

  29. Honestly, I was skeptical of the “die = reset” gimmick so I test drove the manga (I think LN is source, but manga good enough for a trial run). Have to say it was better (and darker!) than I expected. Wasn’t aware that this is two cour (it is -right?), which also potentially bodes well (been burned by that before).

    Overall, I think this was a solid introduction. Definitely agree that a double episode introduction was the way to go though IMO the first episode pacing was a bit slow along with noticeably hit/miss humor. That being said, so far humor/serious integration has been pretty good (something shows can struggle with). I also think the second episode pacing was right.

    ML’s pretty good, but not sure why he needs to be a hikikomori/neet unless it’s so he can be the generic “blushes if any female is within 50m” type which I think was even noted. While ML’s reaction is nothing different than 39480256 others, I do wish there would be some modicum of restraint when it comes to that more often. Getting to be a pet peeve of mine. :< Have to admit, I was surprised how well he embraced getting thrown in to RPG world. Seems to be rather pleased about it… well, before all the dying. Regardless, he's still a pretty likeable ML with some positive qualities. Other characters are interesting to some degree which is also a plus, though Elsa seems a bit one dimensional bat-shit crazy villain. Has she licked her sword yet (can't remember if she did)? That seems to be a thing for such characters.

    TL:DR = Show/series has my interest. Despite some quibbles, overall a good, solid start. Technically on 3-Episode rule, but given what I read of the manga and the adaptation quality thus far, can’t imagine dropping this. This one has potential IMO.

    ————————–

    @Stilts: Re. “Bad Business”: I get your point, but I also think the comparison is a stretch. Felt is a thief after all, so it’s not surprising at all she’d take advantage of an unexpected opportunity. However, fair point about possible repercussions in terms of “rep” IF the client would even speak of the matter to anyone else (again, illegal activity). The real issue IMO is that she didn’t know who she was dealing with, and in the “underworld”, that can be deadly. She just assumed that Rom could handle any trouble, and clearly Elsa is a far different client than they normally deal with.

    As for blogging the show, IMO this is looking good, and if the next two episodes pan out, this would be a strong candidate to blog. That being said, I’ve been wrong before with initial impressions. (See Utawarerumono: Itsuwari no Kamen. >_>)

    daikama
  30. Someone told me me I should watch this since they said it was likely to be better than Boku no Academia and man, do I have no regrets! Really amazing opening. This shows really strong promise. Easily the best opening episode(s) I’ve seen so far.

    Nic
  31. this is very awesome anime! very touching and worth watching!
    some says that subaru is pussy but they havent experience death
    that’s why they will never like subaru because they didnt understand it.
    also as you keep watching it subaru will always be fragile and powerless but
    sooner or later subaru will become a great person. im sure of that.

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