I’d written a preliminary Capella character analysis in 2024, and now I’m posting a revision of it with Season 4 content as well as positing that Otto’s the one best suited to curing her trauma of the characters in Re:Zero. I believe that since Otto had similar (Ep. 40) although not 1-to-1 issues as Capella in the past with being feared for his Divine Protection like Emerada Lugunica had been feared for her combination of beauty, intelligence, and cruelty, the last of which may not have always been a core trait of hers, Otto may be the man best suited to curing Capella’s trauma since he has high emotional intelligence, high intelligence in general, and was similarly feared for something he possessed, making him the person most able to relate to Capella on a personal level, in addition to his lived experience in how he’d actually fallen in love with an animal in the past in a cute white cat, which is something Subaru obviously couldn’t push back against when Capella said what she’d did to him regarding if he can still love Emilia if she were a fly whereas Otto can.
Of course, I know Otto has no way of beating Capella in a fight, but in a fight with many people, I believe Otto may be the only person in the world who can alleviate or get to the bottom of Capella’s trauma by talking her down and seeing her for the person she is rather than purely as a monster given Ep. 40 (Season 2 Ep. 15) showed that Otto had lived as a merchant for years and hadn’t really truly opened up to anybody until he decided he’d become best friends with Subaru, and Capella has obviously not opened up to anybody in years, making Otto the best person to cure her trauma from a narrative standpoint.
When Capella stepped on Crusch, which prompted Subaru to tell Capella to get her leg off of her, to which Capella responded whether he’s infatuated with her beautiful legs or just Crusch, who she referred to as female meat, saying she does have quite an erotic figure as she stepped on Crusch’s breasts, that remark about about being infatuated with her legs was clearly an instance of fishing for a compliment. After a bit of a fight, Capella sprouted a long tail and knocked Subaru to the side with it before asking if her beauty rendered him speechless. That was the second time Capella has tried to fish for a compliment, so this likely points to an insecurity she may have.
After she revealed to Subaru that the flies and the black dragon were the hostages, she then prodded him by asking if he found it disgusting, to which Subaru called it blood-curdling. Capella coolly says that it’s so disgusting and repulsive that it makes him hate her. She says seeing that made him hate her on a visceral level, and that’s the “right” answer. She said that no one could love creatures like those. Subaru then requests for her to kill him, to which she says she’d never do something so barbaric and throws out that she wants as many people as possible, for as long as possible, as deeply as possible to love her as being the reason she doesn’t kill him ’cause it’s her wish, which is very particular given she’s been pushing him to hate her, so I take it that she does have an insecurity or perhaps moreso trauma after all, probably about her own worth or ability to be loved.
My takeaway from these incidents is that Capella deeply desires to be loved and that she pushes others to hate her ’cause she fundamentally believes that no one can love her. Capella transformed other human beings into creatures she feels no one can possibly love ’cause that makes these creatures dependent on her to an extent and at her mercy, much like how she may have been treated as a piece of meat in the past by men, similarly at their mercy, and that’s why she refers to others as meat scraps, ’cause she’s projecting her own trauma onto others. Additionally, doing this also makes people hate her, reinforcing her belief that she’s unlovable.
After Subaru says that there’s already someone he likes as being the reason he isn’t into Crusch, Capella remarked that can he really swear he hasn’t had lewd thoughts about Crusch for even a second? She asked him if he didn’t think about stroking Crusch’s hair or kissing her supple lips. Capella then raged about how Subaru shouldn’t dare take his carnal desire for the one he fancies he can’t speak of in the open and call it love ’cause that’s her lived experience with men and projected it onto him. She then belittles Subaru by saying if Emilia were a fly, he wouldn’t still love her ’cause she believes love is not possible without physical attraction.
Wilhelm had noted in Ep. 54 that the Emerada Lugunica who existed over 50 years ago was beautiful and also ruthless, which matches the description of Capella, so whether Capella really was Capella or someone who saw her herself in Emerada Lugunica, both have trauma over seeing themselves as unlovable. Judging from that previous content of Capella, she doesn’t believe that having high sexual desire for someone is the same as having love for that person. When you couple that with her fishing for compliments, I fully believe Capella may have slept around a lot with tons of men, but none of them loved her or accepted her for who she is, which might be why she calls others meat scraps ’cause she personally feels that she herself is a piece of meat like in the manner she spoke degradingly about Crusch. Capella would call others meat scraps ’cause if everyone else is a meat scrap, then that elevates herself by bringing down everyone to her level. Thus, she still fishes for compliments and does all she does ’cause she still clings to the hope that somebody will love her even if nobody has in all her years of living.
Capella’s Authority may have manifested due to her desire to be loved that was tempered by her belief that she’s unlovable, and thus, it allowed her to transform herself and others, making them at her mercy ’cause she doesn’t believe anybody could really devote himself/herself or truly care about her unless she did this, which is how she molded someone like Meili as shown in the flashback of Ep. 76, and that’s why her Authority of Lust ended up being the way it did, as a means to reinforce her toxic belief about herself although I believe her trauma is curable with enough effort and investment in her given she keeps fishing for comments, which is a sign of her not having completely given up.
I may be wrong, but I believe Subaru will increasingly be pushed to make hard decisions in the last few arcs to up the stakes compared to what has already happened, and that may require Otto to be the guy who looks for alternatives or to be greedy, and he has to push through to reverse the transformations of Reala’s husband and the Priestella citizens by thinking of innovative solutions, such as befriending Capella.
A common theory from fans is that Fortuna is Sirius Romanee-Conti given Sirius in the Season 3 anime outside of the Break Time shorts has silver hair, elven ears, and purple eyes and loves Petelgeuse. Personally, I don’t subscribe to this theory since in the Re:Zero fandom it’s very common for fans to come up with the X character is EXACTLY Y character theory, whether it involves time travel or not, which I believe is most likely a result of many fans either not having read much fiction or reading poorly-written works.
I believe Sirius is the result of an impressionable lower-level spirit (lesser spirit or whatever the spirit level of Julius’s spirits are given they directly follow Julius’s instructions) that was in awe of Petelgeuse and Fortuna’s love given Pandora told Regulus how he can look at them and feel nothing, which was likely her taunting him to bait him into killing her ’cause she knew Regulus has deep trauma over being a poor husband with the mere thought of Fortuna’s and Petelgeuse’s love reminding him of his personal failure. I believe she also said that for the lower-level spirits to hear, and one of them was strongly moved by Pandora’s words.
Thus, when Fortuna died, one of the lower-level spirits perhaps matured and fused with Fortuna’s soul, and that’s who Sirius is. Given in Re:Zero Break Time Ep. 79 Sirius said that her hometown was destroyed due to a witch hunt with witch hunts becoming common during that era, and she said that misfortune follows her wherever she goes, Sirius may have been the target of persecution repeatedly and repeatedly attacked for her silver-coloured hair and purple eyes despite her not being a half-elf.
And that’s probably part of the reason Sirius’s Authority manifested in an ability that lets her herd people into feeling the same thing since she’s seen so much hatred, and as a low-level spirit before she became Sirius, it may have thought that love is two people feeling the same thing since it felt Petelgeuse and Fortuna’s love for each other, leading to it wanting their love to continue after Fortuna died, and that’s the second reason for her Authority of Wrath allowing for her to herd people into feeling the same emotion.
And so, Sirius’s biggest regret could be fusing with Fortuna’s soul in the first place ’cause doing so only led to her experiencing pain and suffering due to her past persecution and ’cause of Petelgeuse not reciprocating her love after she fused with Fortuna’s soul, which is why she asked Priscilla if she understood her pain, so if that’s indeed Sirius’s biggest regret, assuming my theory about Subaru’s Authorities being shaped in part by those in the dark world has any truth to it, one of Subaru’s Authority of Wrath abilities may be to split apart souls that have amalgamated with each other.
Now to share some relevant background info, for Ep. 79, I posted a theory that Subaru’s Authorities being shaped in part by those in the dark world (Relevant scenes of the dark world being when Subaru remembered being in the dark world with his heart caressed by Satella in Ep. 8 after Puck used Shamak on him, when Satella whispered, “Aishiteru” to Subaru during the White Whale fight in Ep. 20, and when Subaru saw both Petelgeuse and Regulus before seeing Satella in Ep. 70).
For example, I believe Petelgeuse deeply regretting having killed Fortuna is probably why Subaru gets recoil from using Invisible Providence offensively since that act hurt Petelgeuse so much and drove him insane after whatever Pandora told him to help him cope with what he’d done, and we know it did given Petelgeuse was talking about how Subaru killed Rem in Arc 3 with his (Petelgeuse’s) own hands with tears in his eyes, showing that the moment in which Petelgeuse killed Fortuna with his Authority hurt him to his core, and that’s what prompted him to project his biggest failing onto Subaru. This would be why Subaru wasn’t hurt when he merely entered Invisible Providence into Emilia’s body but was pained when he crushed Regulus’s heart and why he wasn’t pained when he rubbed Joseph’s neck with Invisible Providence.
Petelgeuse even killed Rem in the brutal fashion he did likely ’cause he deep down remembered how he killed Fortuna and since trauma survivors like to put themselves in situations that re-traumatize them, that’s why he was crying in that scene since he subconsciously tried to draw a connection between a man killing a woman he loved, mirroring what had happened to him since he saw Rem’s overwhelming love for Subaru, much like how Fortuna came back to Petelgeuse in the past ’cause she couldn’t take it for him to die all on his own, leaving her behind.
Much like I propose for Regulus Corneas with his remarks about how others are violating his rights and how he says that he never needed his wives to smile, which I believe were coping mechanisms due to avoid dealing with his negative self-worth centered around having failed his first wife, who he’d actually cared about, which is backed by his rambling to himself in Season 3, demonstrating that he had serious trauma over his wife smiling in her final moments even though by self-admission no matter what he’d done before that, she’d refused to smile, showing that her not smiling was not for a lack of trying on his part, Sirius justifies her actions of “spreading love” to avoid dealing with her negative self-esteem, meaning this coping mechanism has also allowed her to stay functional or alive up until this point as I believe was likely the case for Regulus up until Season 3. I believe on some level Regulus and Sirius know what they’ve been doing is wrong, but they stay in denial to avoid dealing with issues core to their being.
If you recall in Episode 13 of Re:Zero in Season 1, Emilia called Puck a Great Spirit of Fire, which shows that ice attacks can be formed through temperature manipulation in Re:Zero. Priscilla’s flames in Ep. 61 based on Yang magic are bright white, which shows that more than one type of magic can produce flames, and this suggests that it’s possible that Sirius’s black/purple flames are based on Yin magic. That’d make the Fortuna and Sirius situation an inverse of the Satella and Emilia situation with Satella’s natural magic affinity being Yin given the mass of shadows and the shadow hands which can be seen by all aren’t the Authority of Sloth while Emilia’s is Fire, which would be a nice contrast to how one who fell from grace in Sirius ended up having the Yin attribute, an attribute associated with darkness, while Emilia doing her best to live despite the prejudice she faces has the Fire attribute with fire often representing life.
My reasoning for this being a good story development would be that individuality and identity are core issues in Re:Zero with the exploration of twin issues in Arc 2 with Rem’s inferiority complex centered around Ram, of Emilia not being Satella in the Frozen Bond OVA, of Subaru being his own person rather than a knock-off of Roswaal, of Subaru having space to grow out of Kenichi’s shadow, and the Ryuzu clone stuff in Season 2/Arc 4, and of amnesiac Subaru being treated as his own person in Season 4/Arc 6 as well as whatever they’re doing with Reid overpowering Roy. I believe aside from the topic of growing to love oneself, there’s nothing more consistent in Re:Zero than the topic of individuality/identity, so a spirit amalgamating with someone else could be explored in the future with both Sirius and Subaru if I’m right about the defeated Sin Archbishops merging with Subaru’s soul. It’d be in line with how Tappei has written his story with further exploration of the topic of individuality and identity as the story progresses.
As I stated in my main write-up for Ep. 79, Subaru’s Authorities are shaped by the biggest regret of each of those who reside in the dark world (Relevant scenes of the dark world being when Subaru remembered being in the dark world with his heart caressed by Satella in Ep. 8 after Puck used Shamak on him, when Satella whispered, “Aishiteru” to Subaru during the White Whale fight in Ep. 20, and when Subaru saw both Petelgeuse and Regulus before seeing Satella in Ep. 70) with Regulus’s biggest regret being that his first wife smiled in her final moments, showing her unhappiness with being his wife, and therefore, he desired to be able to share how he felt about her with her ’cause she never knew that he genuinely cared for her even though he slaughtered her family and the village the two lived in, and since communication is a two-way street, and Regulus wouldn’t have known to think to tell his first wife about his love for her had he not known about his first wife’s dissatisfaction with him, Subaru’s power likely manifested in being able to take what others feel inside their heart and feel it for himself, which is how he felt the warmth of Rem’s love she imparted to him to stop him from spiraling, in addition to sharing what he feels with others (unconfirmed for now). All of this was due to Regulus deep down desiring human connection, which he ultimately failed to do with his wife.
This is not to say that Regulus is meant to be seen as a sympathetic character as he was a horrible guy who did many wretched things, but as can be seen by his rambling to himself in Season 3, the guy had serious trauma over his wife smiling in her final moments even though no matter what he’d done before that, she’d refused to smile, showing that her not smiling was not for a lack of trying on his part. That trauma’s why he forced his future wives to agree to never smile or face death ’cause his first wife actually meant something to him. I believe Regulus was coping in saying that he never needed for them to smile ’cause many people who have trauma create incidents that will re-traumatize them, meaning if Regulus lived long enough, he’d have another wife who smiled in her final moments.
There’s literally empirical evidence of trauma survivors creating incidents that re-traumatize them. Drawing on that knowledge, this is why Kana from Oshi no Ko is obsessed with Aqua, ’cause when he shined a light on her during the Sweet Today adaption arc, she replaced her mother, who used to be the one who validated her talent and feelings of competence, with Aqua, since he stepped into that role for her even though Aqua’s very emotionally distant to the point that her fixation with him led to a proximation of emotional abuse (not actual emotional abuse) when he started ghosting her. And also relevant is that Aqua’s mother, Hoshino Ai, the person he most wanted to support, was a popular idol who died, and he was subconsciously drawn to making this similar situation by having Kana, the one he most wanted to support, join her sister’s idol group, and when someone pointed out that connection, he was distressed about potentially reliving that and his own role in potentially re-traumatizing himself.
This is backed by Regulus stating Subaru violated his rights as an unselfish man who desires nothing but to settle for a tiny bit of simple, ordinary happiness, which shows Regulus most likely just wanted a wife who loved him even though he killed everyone his first wife knew, which is why she never showed emotion and wouldn’t smile no matter what he did with him coping by telling himself he never needed them to to since it makes their faces uglier after she died. He realized he was the reason she was unhappy, and he ragequit life after that and never decided to be a proper man due to subconsciously realizing how he fucked up, and his coping mechanism for this trauma is blaming everyone else for his issues and never take accountability for his first wife’s unhappiness to help him cope with his failure even if that appears to be an oxymoron ’cause the reality is, accepting that he did his first wife bad would mean that he was such a disaster who made the only person he held dear live a life of despair, and accepting that might’ve resulted in him deactivating his Authority and considering suicide, meaning his coping mechanism’s the only thing that kept him alive up until the end of Season 3.
Some people with deep psychological wounds/traumas are known to recall traumatizing things in their final moments, and this would explain why Regulus was haunted by his wives smiling at him when Reinhard sent him up into the sky and then remembered young Emilia and how she’d been protected by Fortuna and Regulus ’cause at the time seeing Fortuna and Petelgeuse, a real example of both romantic and familial love, reminded him of his own failure as a husband, which is why Regulus attacked Pandora when she told him to calm his anger ’cause just the thought of Fortuna and Petelguse incensed him by reminding him of how inadequate he is as a person.
As for Petelgeuse, his deeply regretting killing Fortuna is probably why Subaru gets recoil from using Invisible Providence offensively since that act hurt him so much and drove him insane after whatever Pandora told him to help him cope with what he did, and we know it did given Petelgeuse was talking about how Subaru killed Rem in Arc 3 with his own hands with tears in his eyes, showing that the moment in which Petelgeuse killed Fortuna with his Unseen Hand hurt him to his core. This would be why Subaru wasn’t hurt when he merely entered Invisible Providence into Emilia’s body but was pained when he crushed Regulus’s heart and why he wasn’t pained when he rubbed Joseph’s neck with Invisible Providence.
Even Petelgeuse killing Rem in the brutal fashion he did was likely ’cause he deep down remembered how he killed Fortuna and was driven, without intentionally doing so, to make that connection ’cause trauma survivors tend to put themselves in situations that re-traumatize them, which is why he was crying in that scene as he realized what he had did to Fortuna.
Anyway, I’ll leave it at that. I had neglected to delve into this completely for my main write-up, so I felt I needed to do this.
I was late to posting Ep. 78 and given it didn’t actually have all that much to talk about, I decided to do a write-up on both Eps. 78 and 79 instead since I believe they’re better off written as a package. Combined, the two episodes have so many callbacks, which was a joy to watch and think about for me.
Ep. 78 opens with amnesiac Subaru looping and greeting Emilia right away as her having done so much for him in the loops after he had come into being coupled with her confession to him made him legit fall in love with her all over again. And of course since Beatrice was the one that did the most to protect him from physical harm in Ep. 77, he was of course crying over her for ever having doubted Beatrice in the first place given in Ep. 75 the ones he had suspected most were Emilia and Beatrice since he never found their bodies, which is impossible in the case for Beatrice since she dissipates into mana upon dying, and for Beatrice’s sacrifice to save him in Ep. 77 from the discarded piece of the scorpion mabeast (that was probably Shaula after she slowly became it in both mind and body as shown by how she went from standing upright to falling towards a more inhuman posture that was meant for viewers to fill in the gap later after watching Ep. 77) left behind that exploded as a defense mechanism to kill those who pursue her, and probably as a release for all of the suffering he’d gone through.
We then see much of the same happenings as before with Julius being disturbed of amnesiac Subaru having no memories of the previous night, probably ’cause Julius intended to mend their relationship the next day, which he could no longer do since Subaru doesn’t know what exactly happened between them that led to that rift, Meili thinking amnesiac Subaru is so much trouble, and Ram distressed ’cause she had believed strongly in Subaru being the one who’d save Rem, and amnesiac Subaru explained it away as having no episodic memories, meaning he retains knowledge of their names and how he’s connected to them and who he is but can’t remember the specifics of anything involved, which is a legitimate expression of how someone with no episodic memories can experience life.
After amnesiac Subaru revealed to Ram in private that he’d genuinely lost his memories and forgotten Rem, she was of course distraught since she believed he was the one person she believed would never forget about Rem even if everybody was destined to, showing her belief in how Subaru was Rem’s anchor to the world given her state of suspended animation and also how he was Ram’s anchor to her sister as Ram would have no idea that Rem was her sister if Subaru had not insisted on finding Rem among the pile of bodies after Regulus and Lye had attacked the camp heading back to Lugunica’s capital.
Given Ram had forgotten about Rem’s contributions to Arc 2 due to Lye’s Authority of Gluttony, she of course held Subaru in even higher regard than she otherwise would have, and Roswaal having been revealed to no longer allow Ram to bring him his underwear after having learned that Ram genuinely loves him in a Season 3 Break Time episode ultimately has resulted in Ram being in a state of much, much higher stress than normal given Roswaal isn’t here to restore her mana like he usually does and since she loves his presence in general, but she was able to push past that.
I can see why people are upset that Ram slapped amnesiac Subaru, but she had the grace to show him she believes the true him will return even after she took roasted him in saying he was bad at keeping promises, and it just shows Ram and Subaru had built a genuine friendship in this last year he’s been in the fantasy world. Yeah, Ram’s very prickly to most people, and I’m not excusing that, but she genuinely does have belief in Subaru as shown by Eps. 40 and 78, and I enjoy how far they’ve come. This isn’t to say some people can’t get triggered by this dynamic though as what would be seen as a sibling dynamic for some could be seen as a dynamic of abuse by others who had negative experiences in which they were gaslighted by a manipulative person.
Subaru then sets a trap/intervention for Meili ’cause he had realized from the height of the person who pushed him and Meili’s tendency to resort to killing to resolve her issues since she never learned how to deal with her emotions due to her upbringing as a feral child, as Elsa’s apprentice, and as Capella’s underling, and since Subaru believes in the innate goodness of children much like Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Hans Christian Andersen as shown by how Subaru indicated in Season 2 that he doesn’t want to kill kids, he took it upon himself and for the entire group to raise Meili and give her a good example to live by that would be different than the example Elsa taught her.
I mention Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Hans Christian Andersen ’cause I’m also covering Sayonara Lara this season, and those two were both religious, and Re:Zero itself draws quite a bit from Christianity in believing in the goodness of children, and that children are innately good before their corruption of society. Hans Christian Andersen also believed in the unlimited grace of God for humans, and how this is relevant in Re:Zero is that the group decided to work with Roswaal anyway after all he’d done in Season 2 and even in Season 1 with him having revealed himself in Season 2 to have hired Elsa to get Emilia’s insignia in Arc 1, which was centered around the loothouse, and also having allowed the Witch Cult to run rampant in Arc 3 (Eps. 12-25), by not intervening, which posed huge problems for everyone involved, and it also draws from Christianity in how Witches, warlocks, and Sin Archbishops of the Witch Cult are based on sins. Subaru also has at many points forgiven those who have wronged him, while part of it is ’cause he has a fear of abandonment, I believe part of it is ’cause Tappei also deliberately intended for his story to take the stance of God having unlimited grace for humans through Jesus Christ, covering all past and future shortcomings.
The end of Ep. 78 and the start of Ep. 79 have amnesiac Subaru talking about putting his memory loss aside ’cause something in the Pleiades Watchtower caused him to lose his memories, so facing the exams head-on will result in them uncovering the reason for his memory loss, and the group agrees that Reid Astrea’s Book of the Dead almost certainly exists since Reid isn’t the type of guy to stick around too long in one place from what they’ve seen of him based on his lively personality, he shouldn’t belong to that of an extremely long-lived species, and since the Astrea family probably consists of humans, the same should apply to him especially since it was stated in Ep. 70 that he’d died of old age even if a lot of info from four hundred years ago is questionable.
As they were headed to the archive, Subaru decided to have he and Julius stay put as Julius’s body language was negative, and Julius begrudgingly admitted that they they have no other alternatives and that Subaru’s plan is the best one, and Julius’s behaviour born from Julius’s inferiority complex to Reinhard from childhood when Reinhard easily defeated Julius’s swordplay instructor, leading to him having doubts about his own ability up to this current day, as shown by Ep. 72 with the flashback to that, and how Julius took great pride stepping into Reinhard’s role as the sword of the kingdom to defeat Petelgeuse Romanee-Conti in combat in Ep. 24, and Julius’s name having been eaten, resulting in most people in the world forgetting him is really triggering this insecurity, especially since he had a strong belief that the most capable fighters are also those with the best character, only for Reid to run afoul of that AND beat him down twice. Thus, amnesiac Subaru having no memories of that past and his humiliation at the hands of Reid allowed for Julius to regain some of his mojo since even this version of Subaru thinks highly of him just ’cause of his appearance when he had no other person in this world who remembered what he could do on the battlefield at his peak, with Subaru saying of, “That’s one thing, and this is another.” being very impactful for him ’cause amnesiac Subaru was basically telling him to forget whatever happened the other night and not to sweat it, leading to him deciding to treat his previous losses as a throwaway, throwing that same line back at amnesiac Subaru, which is excellent character writing and a good way to alleviate some of Julius’s current issues, and to top it all off, it’s something only this current version of Subaru could’ve done, and there’s a point to this as shown by later in this episode.
In the Great Pleiades Library itself, Beatrice and Emilia both show care for amnesiac Subaru after he declares his intent to read Reid Astrea’s Book of the Dead due to them having found him unconscious in the archive without his memories, and even Ram had shown concern before that by saying none of them have read it due to being concerned about potential memory loss when he asked a leading question. Before that, he also made it clear he intends to find Elsa’s Book of the Dead as he’d cut no corners in ensuring Meili grows up healthy in not just her body but also her mind given the strong connection she felt to Elsa after it was revealed that Meili had found the relevant book. Subaru got everyone to agree to him reading Reid’s Book of the Dead by playfully designating everyone a role, including calling Julius the fighter to lessen the blow to his currently wounded ego, designating himself to be the reader of any Books of the Dead.
However, instead of peering through Reid Astrea’s memories, amnesiac Subaru instead found himself in the Corridor of Memories with Rui, who tells him that it’s the cradle of Od Lagna (Crunchyroll screwed up the translation here with the comma after cradle since it turned the sentence into gibberish), making it sound like Od Lagna and the Corridor of Memories are the exact same thing. As for why Reid’s Book of the Dead led to the Corridor of Memories, I suspect it’s ’cause Echidna’s the one who made the Books of the Dead and can decide who can read them based on my previous speculation. Meili’s Book of the Dead appearing to this group of people so soon when the group had concluded initially that the books aren’t sorted by name or date of death in Ep. 71 suggests that there’s a will behind when and where Books of the Dead that can be read appear. This is backed by how in that relevant episode, both Subaru and Julius were able to find one they were able to read almost right away, suggesting a will or higher power is what allowed for that to happen.
We know from the anime there’s someone who has the power to see a perfect reconstruction of the past, and that’s Echidna with her Authority of Greed: Tome of Wisdom, and if my speculation about Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom and the Witch Cult Gospels are correct, they may be made with pieces of Echidna’s hair, fingernails, toenails, eyelashes, eyebrows, other facial hair, dead skin, zits, dandruff, body hair, and/or her body fluids such as her saliva, sweat, and the enzymes from other fluids, meaning they are connected to Echidna’s mind through magic, and that’s why Otto didn’t appear in Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom, and why Gospels don’t really tell the future, which is why Regulus thought that he’d see Emilia again in the first loop despite it not happening until the 4th loop in Ep. 53 with Regulus telling Subaru to thank him for adhering to his Gospel in not doing worse than shredding off a large chunk of his leg since he could’ve done much worse, and why Sirius indicated that they need to stop hostilities due to the toll of the tower, all of which very much went in Subaru’s favour, likely not by chance.
If Echidna decides what appears in the text of Roswaal’s not-quite-Tome of Wisdom, she can freely decide to omit Otto. That’s why I posit those texts are perhaps connected to Echidna’s mind through magic by being partially constructed with stuff from her body, possibly including her body fluids, meaning she 100% decides what shows up in them. Therefore, ’cause Echidna wanted Roswaal to lose and Subaru to win, Otto didn’t show up in his not-quite Tome of Wisdom. This is backed by Tea Party Echidna telling Subaru that even after 3 days of trial and error that she has no hope of breaking Emilia out of her shell, and maybe he could give the cowardly princess wings, showing she was telling him the way out of the situation was to do have Emilia do the Sanctuary trials. Tea Party Echidna also showed at that moment that she didn’t make the trials as hard as humanly possible but tried to coax Emilia out of her shell. Tea Party Echidna also said what was an evil as humanly possible regarding the reason she had Beatrice hole up in the Forbidden Library, knowing that it would push Subaru to take Beatrice’s hand instead of hers, and her saying that she doesn’t want Subaru to think that she’s the only evil one of the Witches of Sin, resulting in her taking away Subaru’s qualification for entering the tomb since he was using it as a crutch instead of supporting Emilia, was her doing good by Subaru in making sure he was victorious that loop.
Thus, archive’s filing system may be constructed in part from Echidna’s Authority and also magic from herself and possibly others such as Flügel, meaning she can possibly choose which books appear to certain people at any given opportunity based on future knowledge, which is how someone finds a Book of the Dead he/she can read at the lowest floor of the library so as to make it convenient.
Given Echidna’s Authority of Greed: Tome of Wisdom can show all of the past, present, and possible futures, and the Corridor of Memories is the Cradle of Od Lagna (Crunchyroll probably messed up the translation since Japanese doesn’t different from ‘l’ and ‘r’ since “Lagna” in Vedic astrology is the exact zodiac sign rising on the eastern horizon at the exact time and place of a person’s birth), which filters the souls of the dead and cleanses their memories so that they can be used again, making the Corridor of Memories the support system/cradle for Od Lagna, which probably shows that Od Lagna is actually the world’s memories whereas the Corridor of Memories is where the inaccessible memories are, such as the memories of someone whose names and memories had been eaten by Gluttony and the souls of the newly deceased. So it would make perfect sense if Echidna’s Authority drew its power from Od Lagna, and henceforth explains why Reid’s Book of the Dead connects to the Corridor of Memories since when a soul is ready to be reused again, it is ready for rebirth, thus Echidna’s Authority must capture the rebirth of anyone who’s ever lived, and that likely explains why amnesiac Subaru ended up at the Corridor of Memories.
Rui then reveals her background to amnesiac Subaru, and of course, he has no idea what many of the terms she talked about are, not realizing she’s an enemy, and during that conversation, he realizes that she keeps using the ‘we’ pronoun, which she explains as her having too many egos all in once place, so it’s not clear who’s in charge, and her saying all these egos are a gift from her two brothers suggests that Lye Batenkaitos and Roy Alphard are feeding to Rui some or all of their victims, possibly implying that they are all as one even if they are three entities and that Rui can somehow contain all these egos for whatever reason.
Rui then gives amnesiac Subaru a scare in showing they know about his past on Earth, which I’m assuming is ’cause his memories from Earth aren’t from this fantasy world, so they don’t stay eaten even though Rui and possibly the others can still remember them due to their recollection of his memories after consuming them, and this greatly unsettles him, causing him to push Rui down as she continues to use mind games on him, and she self-harmed by digging into her own skin, possibly ’cause of it being a habit she picked up from Subaru given Beatrice indicated he had a habit of getting scratches on himself as shown by Ep. 75, which I believe I didn’t pick up on at the time, and this interaction finally results in him realizing that Rui was the one who had eaten his memories.
Then it cuts back to those in the archive, and Shaula mentions that threats to the Pleaides Watchtower are approaching, telling them to protect her master, and Julius follows her while Ram and Emilia go get Rem. An enormous number of mabeasts were making a beeline to the tower, and Shaula used her Infinite Hell’s Snipe to snipe many of them, but that still wasn’t enough to stop them from breeching it. Ram and Emilia then see Lye Batenkaitos emerge out of the green room, and I’ll get back to this later.
As for why the mabeasts are storming the tower, I can think of three reasons:
1) Given that Lye and Roy are Sin Archbishops of Gluttony and that mabeasts had been created by the Authority of Gluttony, they have direct control over mabeasts.
2) Given Lye and Roy are supposedly both at the tower alongside Subaru, who all emit a ton of miasma, and since Subaru is currently connected to the Corridor of Memories, the miasma of all of Subaru, Rui, Lye, and Roy are at the Pleiades Watchtower, and mabeasts are drawn to large sources of miasma, which is why they are all gunning for the tower.
3) Since Subaru talked about returning and that this is the fifth version of him since Rui had eaten the original Subaru before he returned to the Corridor of Memories, Subaru’s amount of miasma is way high compared to normal, much like when he goaded the White Whale into pursuing him harder in Ep. 21 by talking about how he had suffered in the past, implying he can Return by Death, which is directly part of the Taboo as intentionally hinting about Return by Death is disallowed according to Subaru’s contract.
It’s probably some combination of all of these reasons for why this is happening.
Cutting back to Rui and amnesiac Subaru, she calls it amazing that he was able to come back to the Corridor of Memories once again and then asks him how many versions of him have come and gone since he had last been here (Crunchyroll screwed up the translation in rendering it as how many times had he died) with him replying five times to denote that he’d died four times with this current iteration being the fifth version of him since having his memories be eaten. She then says that she wants to eat him until her stomach bursts, pushing him down, saying that she believes she loves him as she considers appetite and lust to be similar before licking him provocatively to creep him out and make him consider killing her despite his belief that children should be forgiven ’cause they don’t know better.
Rui then continues her mind games against him, asking him if he really could wring the neck of a frail little girl such as her, suggesting he’s not capable of such a thing to basically dare him into doing it before attempting to mislead him in suggesting that if the original Natsuki Subaru came back that his current self would die since the old memories would erase this draft version of him, which is akin to dying. She asks him whether Natsuki Subaru really was worth all of that given memories are what shape a person, this current version of him and the relationships he has built (such as the current relationships with Julius and Meili). She then goes hard in attempting to sour amnesiac Subaru on the original Natsuki Subaru with false reasons for why he had relationships with Emilia (Crunchyroll may have screwed up the translation in saying Emilia had the same birth as Satella. Muse Asia said that it was ’cause of her looking like Satella, but I’m not 100% sure this is correct either given how incredibly different the translation are. I’m going to need someone who knows Japanese to clarify this later), Beatrice, and Rem, calling him drunk on playing the role of the saviour. Rui then goads him into killing her once again, directly placing his hand on her neck, and he starts sobbing about how he wants more time with everybody, implying he’s seriously considering killing the original Subaru now.
Then we get an update of events at the tower with Shaula still diligently spamming her needles, Julius tiring as he tries to prevent more mabeasts from advancing, and Ram having gotten Patrasche to carry her and Rem out of the green room while Emilia was fighting by herself against Lye, and given Lye had come out of the green room without hurting Rem and Patrasche before, this strongly implies as I’ve stated for over five years that Witch Cult Gospels don’t tell the future but are meant to guide the world to a specific future that develops Subaru and other characters in specific ways as an intervention against the world once again being destroyed by the Witch of Envy due to the character flaws of the Hero of the story with Echidna being highly likely to be the one controlling what appears in them as Rem being saved seems to be part of the grand plan.
Back to amnesiac Subaru and Rem, Rui goads him to declare that Natsuki Subaru’s nothing more than the stranger closest to him and to kill him so that he’s the one and only Natsuki Subaru. He then hears footsteps approaching him, and he thinks it’s the original Subaru coming to claim everything that’s his. And now comes a GIF to help explain everything about this scene:
In Ep. 37 (Season 2 Ep. 12) when Carmilla in the form of Rem was telling Subaru that he can rest and leave everything to her, Subaru protested, saying that the real Rem would tell him to stand up as she’s the one who wouldn’t let him shirk his responsibilities as someone who can’t give up halfway through something as her hero.
And now in Ep. 79 (Season 4 Ep. 13), when amnesiac Subaru was being led astray by Rui ’cause the Sin Archbishops of Gluttony wanted to lead him astray so that they could infinitely eat him by getting rid of the original Subaru’s memories through killing Rui, who had split herself into two exactly for the purpose of still being around after the Rui with Subaru’s memories was killed by amnesiac Subaru, Rem gave amnesiac Subaru the strength to be her hero once again.
That blue sphere Rui took out of her body was Rem’s existence/soul since having both your name and memories eaten is akin to your soul being eaten. Rem even as something that should’ve been immobile, used her force of will to give Subaru the strength he needed to prevail. It was a brilliant callback to that Season 2 moment and shows much planning Tappei put into the story.
This isn’t to say that Emilia didn’t also play a very nurturing role in Ep. 77 (Season 4 Ep. 11) and all the episodes she showed her care for amnesiac Subaru. She very much did, and her actions were what drove amnesiac Subaru decide to live up to the spirit of Natsuki Subaru, but amnesiac Subaru needed another push ’cause of Rui’s mindgame, which had seriously fucked him up and made him lose his resolve.
Subaru understood Rem so much in Ep. 37 ’cause Ep. 18 (From Zero) had Rem lay bare how she saw Subaru and how she felt about him ’cause of how he literally saved her repeatedly in the mansion arc by protecting her from danger and also allowing her to live for something other than being Ram’s replacement. I almost cried watching yesterday’s scene even though I’m not even a huge fan of Rem. I was choking up when I was talking about the scene as I watched. This is Re:Zero at its peak.
It’s surreal how amnesiac Subaru fell in love with both Emilia and Rem in a way that parallels how Subaru originally did in Season 1 with Emilia’s unlimited kindness for him, culminating in her giving him a lap pillow when he was struggling supremely due to his fear of abandonment in Ep. 8, and with Rem giving him the strength to not give up and see things through with Ep. 18, From Zero. Tappei loves writing parallels into the story, and it’s rewarding for big fans like myself to catch them.
And what’s more is that that scene foreshadows that Subaru awoke his Authority of Greed in that very moment, and I’ll use a GIF and an image comparison to help me explain this:
As you can see, the lights are meant to be a proximation of stars, and I highlighted in red the general shape of some stars with the one in amnesiac Subaru’s chest depicting the Regulus star, and given Regulus was the Sin Archbishop of Greed, it meant amnesiac Subaru awoke his Authority of Greed right at that moment ’cause of Rem urging him to stand up and save everyone to be as greedy as possible. As for the expression of the power, I believe Subaru can take in the emotions of someone else, who was in this case Rem, which allowed him to feel her overwhelming love for him, and that’s why Rem’s love took the form of a blue petal to depict that it was a part of her. I believe the entire confrontation with Rui is important since it legitimized amnesiac Subaru as his own distinct self, which is a big part of dissociation that many stories don’t get across right that another self is indeed a legitimate person in and of itself even as a part of a greater whole, and this is the reason Rui tried to make him feel completely distinct from the original Subaru so that he isn’t even considered the same guy so that after he killed her, the old Subaru would be lost forever, triggering her endlessly eating him even if it would never really actually satisfy her.
If you recall from my previous theory on Subaru’s Authorities, I believed that his Authorities are shaped by the biggest regret of each of those who reside in the dark world with Regulus’s biggest regret being that his first wife smiled in her final moments, showing her unhappiness with being his wife, and therefore, he desired to be able to share how he felt about her with her ’cause she never knew that he genuinely cared for her even though he slaughtered her family and the village the two lived in, meaning Subaru’s Authority of Greed might allow him to share what he feels with others. What I didn’t consider at the time since it was a rough draft of my theory is that communication is a two-way street, and Regulus wouldn’t have known to think to tell his first wife about his love for her had he not known about his first wife’s dissastisfaction with him, so Subaru’s power likely also manifested in being able to take what others feel inside their heart and feel it for himself, which is how he felt the warmth of Rem’s love she imparted to him to stop him from spiralling. All of this was due to Regulus deep down desiring connection with somebody, which he ultimately failed to do with his wife. For more on this theory and what I believe are the biggest regrets of the Sin Archbishops we know more about and how they impacted Subaru’s Authorities as I don’t want to rehash too much, read the relevant parts here: Re:Zero Episode 70 (Season 4 Episode) Analysis + Important Details – Thorough Watch
During that entire confrontation, Rui confirmed her plan to him, and very interestingly, she asks him about about life being unfair, how you can’t choose where you’re born, who your parents are, your environment, your future, or anything, and this is why she eats and eats and eats to search for the one rosy life that’ll make her life worth living. This makes me believe this is a hint to her biggest regret in life much like how Petelgeuse hinted in Ep. 15 that his biggest regret was killing the one he loved by his own hand, which he projected onto Subaru and Regulus’s biggest regret being what I said it was in Ep. 70. What’s relevant is that no matter how many memories Rui eats, she’ll never find one in which someone never experienced pain or suffering, so I think what she (and perhaps her brothers) are committing to a fruitless endeavor. So consequently, I believe Rui’s biggest regret is eating so many memories just to experience pain and suffering, that which she doesn’t enjoy, and if she could get a do over, she’d prefer to only eat a small piece of someone so that she could only eat a good part, such as someone’s shining moment, and that will have made her believe life was worth living instead of having that good part accompany negative memories/experiences, and how Subaru’s Authority of Gluttony could manifest with Rui’s biggest regret is that he only eats a piece of someone’s name or a piece of their memories, allowing him to perhaps eat the principal traumatizing event that caused great discomfort to somebody.
That portion about Rui about how you can’t choose anything is very particular. Given Rui only came into the physical world when she either swapped places or possessed Lye after he got hit by the powerful metia Felt and Beatrice had used, which knocked him unconscious, Rui may not have a physical body, and that’d mean she knows the Corridor of Memories filters souls and cleanses them of memories ’cause she has been there for the entirety of her existence with her soul somehow not having completed the cleansing process, leading to her not being born into the physical world. However, even if she strongly desires to live, and she had never been born in the first place assuming my theory is correct, I believe her never being born wouldn’t count as a regret as being born or not is something you can only regret from a meta standpoint if you had actually been born, so I don’t consider that a legitimate expression for how Subaru’s Authority of Gluttony can manifest itself.
In any case, I now fully buy into Sirius Romanee-Conti’s comment about Petelgeuse’s soul having amalgamated with Subaru’s, and I believe Regulus’s has as well. If that’s the case, assuming my theory about Subaru’s Authorities being shaped by those in the dark world is true, one could look at it from the lens of Christianity and say that the Sin Archbishops would be getting their redemption through the expression of Subaru’s Authorities to be kinder versions of themselves that they couldn’t be in the past. I believe this would make for an excellent plot twist if I’m right about all of this.
All in all, I’m extremely satisfied with Ep. 79 and believe it was one of the best episodes of the season with excellent character writing, great subject matter, story beats, foreshadowing, as well as absolutely stupendous voice work from Rui’s seiyuu. Truly it is an example of the best of what Re:Zero has to offer, and I encourage any Re:Zero fan to sing its praises.
For the relevant Break Time shorts for Eps. 78 and 79 that delve more into Elsa and Meili’s relationship as well as provide more backstory for Sirius, here they are:
As can be seen with both Roswaal and Rem, Ram was very passionate about her love for the pair in wanting to bring Roswaal his underwear and in making sure Rem gets less work and gets validation from others. Rem herself falling so hard for Subaru and having previously done so much to be a stand-in for Ram due to having thought of how it’s great that Ram lost her horn also supports this read of oni/demons feeling great passion for what’s important to them.
As such, since it was revealed in a Break Time segment that Roswaal was no longer allowing Ram to bring him his underwear, after she revealed she loves him, more of her passion was directed to Rem, who shares the same oni blood in her veins as she did and could feel something was amiss in her life as Julius did when he fought Roy Alphard, leading to her reacting angrily to amnesiac Subaru saying that he’d lost his memories since she felt a sense of powerless due to not having memories of her and also ’cause her relationship with Roswaal wasn’t as great as it used to be, which increased the baseline stress she felt.
To Ram’s knowledge, Subaru’s the only one who remembered Rem and was her anchor to her sister, and given Rem’s contributions in Arc 2 and 3 were erased, and everything Rem had had prior to that was forgotten by her, of course Ram would flip out since Subaru was Rem’s greatest champion. To Ram, Subaru forgetting Rem is like having Rem’s greatest hope disappear, which she was personally hurt by as well as feeling hurt in place of Rem since she can’t feel anything right now and given the saying on how you only die when the world forgets you even if I believe that Foxidna remembers Rem since she’s given hints that she remembers Julius.
In a sense, Ram also kind of glazed Subaru hard in that scene since it showed she thought that if there’s one person in the world who would never forget Rem, it was Subaru, and that was part of the reason she reacted as strongly as she did given he had charged at her to attack her, so I believe this makes her reaction more justifiable given she thought that it was a possible imposter instead of the real Subaru.
I’m not saying people can’t dislike or hate Ram, but Tappei intends for his audience to see the perspectives of all the characters in his series, not just Subaru’s. Self-inserting into Subaru to mald against those who’ve hurt Subaru physically just hurts one’s ability to comprehend and enjoy the story as Tappei intended, which is to treat it as a serious work and not like generic male power fantasy isekai series and see how flawed characters would react and struggle much like everyday people do.
While I guess Season 1 might make one think of Elsa as being nothing but a vicious predator, Season 2 had Elsa deliberately save Meili, her little sister figure, and Elsa revealed in Episode 48 that owing to her having been abandoned as a child, she came to love disemboweling people when she’d nearly gotten sexually assaulted in Gusteko with its very cold climate that both served to ensure that she didn’t think about things such as living well or being happy while potentially numbing her emotions due to your body doing what it can to preserve heat and served to alter the regulation of serotonin and endorphins in her body, so when she killed for the first time and felt the warmth of blood and innards, she thought to herself that if there’s happiness in the world it’s the warmth that makes one forget the cold, in essence sharing how she became the Bowel Hunter. Maybe this was a twisted happiness, but her horrible life up until that point is what resulted in her becoming what she was, and Re:Zero has a big emphasis on nurture versus nature.
But the Bowel Hunter isn’t all Elsa is as she was kind to Meili when she taught her how to be civil, allowing Meili to bite into her without retaliating against her, and while it may have been on Capella’s orders, I believe Elsa felt for Meili on some level due to them having both been abandoned as children. I believe Episode 76 showed that Elsa wanted more for Meili than just being a killer as she said that for anyone other herself, no number of lives would be enough, implying that if Meili took on enough jobs she’d eventually find a job too tough for her, showing very much that Elsa cared about her well-being, which is why she told Meili not to be Capella’s puppet, and they were very much sisters as Garfiel had called them in the relevant episode. Elsa also protected Meili when part of the ceiling was about to fall on her, and Elsa stopped her assault on Garf when she’d been in a winning position, so she definitely cared about Meili and wanted her to live on to put herself in such a bad position with a reset of sorts when she’d otherwise have won against Garfiel.
Elsa and Meili was also shown having a sisterly relationship in the Re:Zero Break Time Season 2 shorts, and given one of them pointedly had Elsa talk about how she hates Subaru’s eyes ’cause they show that he believes that death isn’t the end for him, Elsa may have alluded to this in some way between the end of Arc 2 and the end of Arc 3 or even between the start of Season 2 and before the pair began their duties later, leading to Meili having a curiosity about Subaru dying, which may partially be why Meili mused about whether a Book of the Dead would spawn if Subaru were to drop dead in Episode 71. I believe that Break Time content actually shows that Elsa values life on some level given her hatred for Subaru’s eyes, which demonstrates that she believes that you should live life to your fullest, whereas at that point in the story in Season 2, Subaru had been treating his life as disposable and a means to an end, and it’d also be why she treated Meili well, highlighting that she’s not just some monster even if she developed an unhealthy fixation on blood and innards.
I don’t believe Meili really wouldn’t feel sad about Elsa, which is why she was the most likely candidate for having pushed amnesiac Subaru to his death twice, and look at him in anger during the recollection of her life when her Book of the Dead had been being read while tiptoeing in anticipation of killing him, if she had never once thought Elsa had ever genuinely cared for her, showing Meili felt shame about being caught caring, frustration over caring at all, and anger towards Subaru since she was indeed sad, and given she had never really properly processed her emotions aside from killing what stood in her way, of course it likely ended up in her desiring to kill amnesiac Subaru since he was no longer her big brother figure but the one who killed her big sister figure, who she had affection for.
I’m just going to let readers know ahead of time that this write-up will be different than most of what I’ve done before since the bulk of the episode is dedicated to one character, so it’s only fitting the crux of my post is a complete character analysis of Julius across four seasons. Any other miscellaneous points will be dumped at the end of the post. I love when previous episodes properly build up to something, which is why Episode 29, Parent and Child, is still my favourite episode of the series since it used the build-up from Episodes 7 and 13 to outright confirm just what the entirety of Subaru’s issues of self-worth involved, and this episode was similarly a long time coming with all of the foreshadowing.
What I realized after this episode after seeing the brief flashback with child Reinhard and child Julius is that Julius’s mantle of being the most knightly of knights is a mask he puts on due to feeling inferior to Reinhard, which is why this episode flashed back to child Reinhard easily defeating Julius’s swordplay instructor. This is also why Julius insisted on being called Juli when he and Subaru met again, both ’cause he subconsciously wanted a break from being Julius the most knightly of knights due to having had to do things he detested as a knight in beating Subaru even though he wouldn’t like to have if the circumstances had been different and not speaking out about so many people smearing Emilia during the initiation of the Royal Selection, not just ’cause it was unbecoming of a knight to take on the role of a mercenary, and ’cause he may have thought Subaru would react better to him if he did that even though Subaru ultimately didn’t at the time since he found it to be annoying roleplaying.
This is why Julius said in Season 3 that he was extremely angry at what Heinkel did and wished he could have done what Subaru did, which was yell at Heinkel since everybody was mad at that bumbling oaf but didn’t dare say anything ’cause of Heinkel’s rank as he saw proper decorum as being a liability in that moment with Subaru’s outburst allowing everybody to stay calm. This is why Julius kind of saw the light when Subaru told him to be Juli more since the mask he puts on is very much a burden to him with him realizing how much brighter the light out is when he first decided to be Juli ’cause Subaru was right about how having more flexibility would help him out in more situations rather than being so rigid with closing off his heart.
People who are less discerning when consuming media or have a very rigid worldview saw Episode 51 (Season 3 Episode 1) of Re:Zero as lowering Re:Zero to that of being like standard isekai slop, which is straight up incorrect, and I will call it as I see fit. Julius himself said that sometimes Subaru’s imprudence is useful on certain occasions, showing he understands the ugliness of Subaru’s actions, but nonetheless, he saw Heinkel turning what was an otherwise orderly gathering between people who respected each other with a reconciliation between Wilhelm and Reinhard being near given they were acting at least somewhat warmly to each other for possibly the first time since Theresia, his mother, had died, into a dumpster fire was disgraceful, and that’s why Julius thanked Subaru for his righteous indignation, not ’cause he was trying to put out there that every time Subaru has an outburst that it’s a good thing, but basic media literacy is dying off quickly in this day and age, partially due to kids and adults alike being glued to slop from their phones, resulting people in being unable to remember things said on screen a few minutes ago due to acting mostly on emotion and wanting immediate gratification.
Julius saw some of himself in Subaru in Episode 13, only Subaru chose a different path than he did, and even if he recognizes that what Subaru did was quite ugly and doesn’t condone all of what he did, which is why he took multiple shots at Subaru’s behaviour, saying that it can reflect badly on those around him, some people, such as Julius, feel a sense of awe or kinship with those who allow you to see a different approach to life. He saw Subaru as being someone rough around the edges but still fundamentally a good person even in spite of Subaru’s flaws, and that’s why he was calling Subaru a friend after the White Whale fight.
The reason Julius deliberately challenged Subaru to a duel ’cause he knew one of the knights or multiple of them would probably attempt to execute Subaru for insinuating that they inherited their status as knights from their families, and Julius saw that as being an injustice that must not be allowed to happen given he knows that Emilia is a good person and since he himself doesn’t discriminate against demihumans as seen by how he did a curtsy to kiss her in Episode 12, which is typical for someone to do for a woman of higher status, and nobody in Anastasia’s camp is allowed to think of demihumans as lesser. So of course he shared those same values and took to Subaru to an extent after the latter said that he chooses to stand by Emilia’s side ’cause she’s special, and Julius acknowledged those feelings given his own feelings for Anastasia. This is backed by how in Season 2 Subaru’s second Sanctuary trial had Julius saying, “I wanted to call you a friend.” since he ultimately sees that both he and Subaru want to fight against the injustices of the world.
As for the Kingdom of Lugunica itself, Julius knows that it’s far from a utopia given he acknowledged to Subaru that the White Whale was left unchecked for too long, which is why he thanked Subaru from the bottom of his heart for ensuring it was defeated in Episode 22. He most likely personally believed that the job should’ve been carried out much sooner and that that too was an injustice, which is why he was so keen on mending fences with Subaru since Subaru took action to make that happen when the kingdom would probably have kept dillydallying.
Basically, since Julius can’t be the strongest, he used the mask of the most knightly/courtly knight since that was something he could realistically aspire to, and now that most people don’t remember him he doesn’t have that anymore, which is why he took to heart Subaru saying that his humiliation is a testament to Julius’s strength and why he’s so adamant about proving his strength, mirroring Arc 3 Subaru to an extent.
This is backed by how Julius thought back to being made Anastasia’s personal knight in Episode 72 and defeating Petelgeuse, which he considered badges of honour that validated his self-worth. I believe even Julius saying, “I am the Kingdom’s sword that will slay you.” was also potentially signifying his insecurities about being inferior to Reinhard while also signifying kinship with Reinhard with it not being just a cool line for a knight to say but something Julius said to mean he’d be the weapon of the Kingdom that slays Petelgeuse, much like how Reinhard is first and foremost thought of as weapon of the kingdom before he is a person. Thus, it both signified that he was stepping into that role and that it was something he very much relished doing. The flashback to Petelgeuse was followed by a shot of Emilia, who Subaru had indicated passed Reid’s exam, and then to Subaru, who remembers him, intermixed with shots of him being frustrated about his current predicament after becoming a Gluttony victim, before finally remembering Subaru saying that his humiliation is a testament to Julius’s strength and then finally hearing Subaru call out to him, which was showing to viewers that Julius was going through much of the same thing Subaru was going through in Arc 3 and that Subaru rushing toward Julius was to stop him from having something worse happen to him, much like how Julius beat down Subaru in that arc to prevent worse happening to him, which is backed by how Subaru remarking that he hopes Julius isn’t too feeling too down since he’s realized that Julius also has self-worth issues from the talks he’s had with him, like during the scene he mentioned that his humiliation is a testament to Julius’s strength and his talk about the situation regarding Julius’s spirits when he said that Subaru is currently the one who knows him best.
There’s even a bit of a Subaru Season 2/Arc 4 parallel in that after Subaru lost Rem, who was his main pillar of support, to Gluttony, he saw no value in himself aside from Return by Death ’cause of the transactional nature of the events of Arc 3 that allowed him to win given the main point of Arc 3 for Subaru was to see that others have their own wants and goals, and how that applied to Julius is that since his reputation as being the most knightly of knights was gone due to the masses forgetting him, which was his big loss, he would use the only tool he believed he had at his disposal, which is his sword skills, to prove his worth given he believed that he had nothing else left that could validate him as a person, although it’s not a 100% parallel since Subaru was struggling due to him taking on the role as Rem’s hero only to lose Rem, resulting in him losing the mask he put on, and Julius right now is struggling ’cause of all the self-worth issues he had in the past, which have been exacerbated by the world forgetting him, as well as trying to live up to the ideal of being the strong knight Subaru believes he is, so the difference ultimately lies in his emotional support ultimately being an able-bodied person right now.
And that’s why Subaru and Julius’s voice-acting during the stairs scene, the direction overall, the effects regarding the footsteps, as well as the silence and tone of melancholy as Julius struggled, followed by Subaru seeing just how much Julius’s current situation reminded him of what he went through, allowing for him to comfort Julius and for the pair to grow closer made for a fantastic viewing experience.
I believe Julius’s character arc this season will almost certainly involve not clinging to his identity as the most knightly of knights since Reid was having the most fun with him when Julius tried to kick him instead of using just the sword, showing that Tappei very much intends for Julius to embrace Juli to finally overcome Reid. Julius can very much stay true to his character and fight against injustice without needing to stay fixated on chivalry and fighting with knightly honour, which would get him to be more on Wilhelm’s speed, who said in Episode 22 that chivalry was becoming a thing of the past. Tappei has plotted out Julius’s character arc so well from the beginning in making him a foil to Subaru, and he’s an amazingly well-written character. If I can make even one person realize how great of a character Julius is with this post, I will consider it mission accomplished.
Now for the stuff on the periphery, this episode provides further proof of Foxidna remembering Julius with how she aggressively used Jiwald to try to defend Julius when he was fighting Reid. Someone who barely knows him wouldn’t go to such lengths, and Subaru even pondered about why she’d go to such lengths, which means Tappei intended for viewers to think hard about that detail. After Episode 67 with Foxidna putting it out there that Reinhard and Felix were more than just friends to Julius and her general gaze at Julius along with her look of discomfort in Episode 70 when Shaula was shattering Julius’s fantasy about Reid Astrea being a man of great character ’cause of his sword skills when nobody else was paying him any heed, showing she knows that Reid had been Julius’s idol since childhood, there is a clear pattern of Foxidna showing a level of connection with Julius no one else in the group has, not even Subaru.
A line from Episode 48 (Season 2 Episode 23) depicting a possible future had Julius remarking about how he’d bent his knees and lost even his sword, pondering what he even had left, which could’ve been a future in which Reid forced Julius to yield to him, stripping him of all his dignity, and given Julius was thinking his sword skills were all he had left, implying he may have been borderline suicidal, this could suggest that Foxidna, again, as I have speculated has the Authority of Greed: Tome of Wisdom that I have posited she has like the original Echidna and Tea Party Echidna did, which is why she suggested to Subaru to take Rem with him to the Pleiades Watchtower and why she forced Shaula to reveal her hidden rules/orders for protecting the tower, the reason being she’s invested in Subaru’s success as the Hero of the story and also didn’t want to see Julius be reduced to a hollow shell of himself with nothing to live for, preventing that future from happening, meaning that her spamming of Jiwald was to deliberately signal to Subaru to think hard about why she’d do that instead of thinking of how to overcome the exam for the entire group, leading to his thoughts drifting to Julius instead of the mission of passing the exam even though Ram wanted him to focus on the exam given Subaru is somebody who follows his instincts and hunches as shown by Episodes 69 and 70.
As I have stated in the past, I believe the reason Satella knows what savepoints to choose for Subaru is that she has a soul link with Echidna, whose Authority allows for her to see into the future, meaning they are close collaborators and that Echidna is also observing Subaru, which would make her statement that she was watching Subaru every step of the way on his journey a true statement, and I believe Foxidna much like Tea Party Echidna has the Authority of Greed: Tome of Wisdom, so she was attempting to advance Subaru to a point in which Satella could update his savepoint to a point favourable for him to succeed, which would be sometime after Subaru has gone down the stairs with Julius. I believe Foxidna acting like she doesn’t know how Anastasia acts in Re:Zero Break Time Season 4 Episode 6 was meant to take away Julius’s sense of pride of being Anastasia’s personal knight and push him into starting a second duel against Reid due to him feeling he lost even that role as her knight, making him feel isolated much like Roswaal would isolate Emilia by making it snow in the Sanctuary Arc in addition to summoning the Great Rabbit. As for a link to the short, here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8DLpvo_4cc
As for Emilia, it was smart of her to appeal to Reid’s ego and get him to agree to passing her if she can make him move a single step. Reid seemed to really appreciate her appealing to him like this and relented, saying that she’s the biggest idiot he’s met since Trisha, who is likely to be a character from four hundred years ago although it remains to be seen how long it’ll take for Trisha to be relevant since it took until Season 4 for more information to be revealed about Flügel. To sum it up, Reid lost ’cause he decided to cop a feel on Emilia’s boobs with his chopsticks, and she didn’t even realize that she had been sexually assaulted, probably ’cause the person responsible for her education, Roswaal, doesn’t care to teach her about that. Of course, the episode wasn’t condoning sexual assault given Subaru’s reaction and how the series has previously tried to humanize Elsa by depicting her as having become a cold-blooded killer when she was close to getting sexually assaulted, so anyone who says otherwise is incorrect. Of course, Reid wasn’t satisfied with letting them all pass if Emilia beat him, and everyone aside from Rem will also have to do it since the seven people Reid referred to are Subaru, Beatrice, Emilia, Ram, Julius, Anastasia, and Meili, which is a real predicament.
The group heads back to a lower floor due to not being up for that task, and Ram revealed that there is one person in each nation that can claim to be the strongest with Cecilus Segmunt the Blue Lightning, Divine General from the Empire of Vollachia, the Mad Prince from the Holy Kingdom of Gusteko, and from Halibel the Admirer from the City-States of Kararagi, but none of them fit the description of the stick swinger ’cause they had forgotten Shaula’s nickname for him and don’t know anything about him aside from his wearing Kararagi folk clothes and being skilled with chopsticks, and Shaula reveals that it’s Reid after Subaru gives her a description not long after she has woken from her sleep due to having fallen unconscious due to intense fear ’cause of Reid being a sexual predator. Subaru wanted to ask Julius what he knew of Reid, but Julius had already headed out for a second bout with Reid after having been healed in the same room Rem and Patrasche were in.
Subaru of course was reminded of himself with the way Julius was acting in that he didn’t want Subaru to carry him down the stairs and was straight up iterated that he doesn’t desire for help from him since Subaru was acting out hard at the start of the White Whale and Petelgeuse arc ’cause the world was making him feel small and insignificant, leading to him behaving as if he was more important than he really was due to both an inferiority complex stemming from comparisons with his father, Kenichi, and a fear of abandonment from childhood, and showing his growth Subaru supported Julius the best way he could by not going against his desire to not be carried by lending him his shoulder instead, saying that he doesn’t need to act tough since he knows from experience that Julius shouldn’t be walking down the stairs, implying he knows how alone Julius feels.
After all the negative thoughts Kana thought this episode after the reporter confronted her, when she thought of letting everyone involved with B-Komachi down after losing the guy, her thoughts on what the haters and online mob would say, and finally at the spot where Aqua found solace in Kana while playing a game of catch, Kana decided that she wouldn’t be a damsel in distress who turns to a guy, namely Aqua, for help only when she needs it, and that she didn’t become an idol only for Aqua but as a means to stay in the industry, and it’s brilliant for depicting a character in the early stages of overcoming her trauma.
This is significant as for much of Kana’s life, she turned to her mother for validation, which isn’t wrong as everyone needs validation to some extent growing up to develop normally, but Kana’s mother emotionally abusing Kana due to her popularity declining with the end result being that she abandoned Kana led to her daughter developing a huge inferiority complex as well as having abandonment issues. This is why Kana deciding that she doesn’t need to be saved by Aqua is an important moment for her.
Growing up, Kana’s acting career likely wouldn’t have started without her mom’s approval, so as a child growing up, Kana counted on her mother for validation and saw her mother as being the one to allow her to shine. When this arrangement ended, it was obviously a huge blow to her self-esteem, which led to the issues she currently has, and that’s why she fell head over heals in love with Aqua since he basically set her up to shine the Sweet Today live-action adaptation by increasing the level of acting from Melt and bringing about a high enough level of acting for Kana to deliver high-caliber acting, and in that moment, Aqua in a way stepped into the role Kana’s mother was in as the one who’d give Kana the feeling of validation she needed as she perceived him to be the one who saw her true talent, not Kaburagi Masaya, who only used Kana’s name recognition as a draw to promote male models. People with trauma often gravitate to people who will reactivate their trauma, and given Aqua is an emotionally distant person, the odds of him doing something similar to what her mother did to Kana was possible, and Aqua himself was drawn to Kana in a sense ’cause his self-conscious was also trying to recreate a familar situation with Kana becoming an idol much like his mother was, so the dynamic Kana and Aqua had was in a way toxic even despite what they feel for the other, so I’m glad there’s a bit of decoupling here regardless of whether it lasts.
This is why Aqua ghosting Kana for a year led to Kana being in such a poor headspace since she had a strong irrational emotional attachment to him and could only see that Aqua must hate her given he told her to shut up and struck her, not being able to see Aqua’s distress since her internal image of Aqua was the one who’d validate her for her talent like her mother used to, and seeing him act that way reactivated all of her trauma, leading to her asking whether he hates her even if Aqua was in poor shape himself. It’s not ’cause Kana’s a bad person who’s incapable of seeing that Aqua was not well as she likely concluded he was unwell, and that’s why she got out of the vehicle, but when someone’s trauma is reactivated, their mind shuts down, which much of the time leads to them being unable to think about anything else aside from their trauma. I know this as someone who’s had trauma and ’cause I know someone who gets triggered so often by his trauma. Kana still has a fierce desire to stay in the industry after all this time even after living by herself all these years, and that’s why she was so easily fooled by Mako, who gave a tip to the reporter about Kana being at Shima’s place, which is how the reporter knew there was nobody else at Shima’s place aside from Kana, and it was ’cause she was so desperate at the time ’cause of her source of validation was gone.
As a disclaimer, I am in no way saying that Kana is over Aqua now as I’m sure we’ll find out, maybe even in the coming weeks, that she isn’t, but Kana deciding not to rely on Aqua in her time of despair shows that she’s in the beginning stages of overcoming her trauma. I had to include that since I’m sure some Kana haters or Akasaka haters might say that this pivotal scene had no bearing on Kana’s development as a character at all, and they’d be wrong of course. Kana deciding not to rely on Aqua at this moment is most definitely a sign of growth from Kana as to recover from trauma a big step is to focus on self-validation rather than relying on external validation. It’s so important that Kana decided that she very much chose to become an idol for herself to stay in the industry since her acting career was going nowhere, not ’cause she was merely doing it as a favour to Aqua, who she saw as her knight in shining armour. She’s shown that her surviving for years in the industry without her mom wasn’t a fluke and that she can survive without Aqua either even if it’ll hurt her if he’s not around. I was so happy for Kana in that moment and do believe she’ll truly make it in the industry even if it’s not until long after the series ends.
Akasaka’s doing a great job writing such a realistic character in Kana, and it shows a deep understanding of people who have trauma for him to have chosen to write Kana this way with all of the highs and the lows, and it shows that he probably knows at least one person in the industry who has had issues such as Kana’s or has read a lot of credible works informed on trauma that he was able to include a character in his story that could conceivably have come straight from the real world, and the higher-ups at Doga Kobo obviously also see Kana’s character as a compelling one, which is why Doga Kobo nailed all of her scenes with all the care that’s put into adapting Kana’s content. I’ll say it if nobody else has: Episode 30 of Oshi no Ko was absolute cinema as the way it displayed Kana’s mental processes throughout the episode before having her defiantly scream that she’d be all right is just peak anime content. This is how you write someone who’s getting put through the wringer but still decides to push through anyway. Kana was very courageous in the face of adversity.
I’ve seen a lot of people call Akane a perfect waifu, and I don’t agree with this sentiment. A perfect waifu wouldn’t tell Aqua in Episode 29 that he needs to make his own decision on how he wants to live and that she’ll support whatever his decision is after he has made it. I get the sense that Akane has taken her psychological profiling that she uses to portray the characters she plays when acting too seriously and has read up too much on psychology to her detriment. Although that’s how she was able to step into Ai’s shoes so well for the Dating Reality Show arc and get Aqua curious about her, not everything can be understood just from reading about psychology.
While Akane is right that when one half of the couple leans too heavily upon the other to make decisions it can be a toxic dynamic/relationship, she clearly has no previous relationship experience before dating Aqua, and it shows. She should know that Aqua was doing better mentally when he wasn’t bothered with revenge, but she merely stated this season that she prefers that version of Aqua rather than fully realizing that Aqua was legitimately in a better headspace after giving up on revenge rather than it being a matter of opinion. She should’ve outright told him to continue letting go of what haunted him as it’s not wrong to encourage your partner to do what’s best for his mental health, and the one time Aqua needed Akane’s emotional support more than ever he didn’t get it.
Akane is clearly a kind girl who doesn’t mean any harm, but I see her naivety being horrible for Aqua. She has made it her goal to kill Hikaru in place of Aqua to keep him out of it, but she perhaps let out a freudian slip about that in Episode 29 when she mused about carrying his burdens with him, hinting to Aqua that she knew all along that his father still lived, and Aqua, with him being the intelligent guy he is, most likely caught onto the possible implications of that, making her attempt to safeguard him a failure, not to mention the potential damage to their relationship.
She just wants to be a supporting girlfriend, but she doesn’t know what’s the best approach of doing that. I’m thinking Akane may not have had a great childhood herself with something clearly missing as her idea of what a girlfriend/loving partner should do is somewhat amiss and moreso along the lines of what a teenage girl would read online about co-dependent relationships instead of following in the example of her parents. I’m glad that Akasaka had the courage to write Akane this way even if will be bad for Aqua’s mental health as he’s showing just what can go wrong as people struggle to grow into adults. She’s relentlessly trying to do what she believes is best for Aqua even if some of her beliefs are misguided, and she’s a well-written and flawed character, not a perfect waifu as some people claim her to be.
This will most likely put Aqua back on the path to revenge against Hikaru, and then they’ll go about it as a couple with Akane supporting him with all her heart. Unfortunately, I believe the direction Episodes 28 and 29 went in point to Oshi no Ko ending in a dark and bleak fashion. And while I can see why fans would be very upset with such an ending, if the first arc with Ai was a criticism of the industry and the last few arcs build up to a dreary ending, I can see Oshi no Ko being a story about the very significant mental health crisis in Japan and how underneath the entertaining aspects of the Japanese entertainment industry lies a message of a country deep in crisis with many of the people who engage with this industry, either directly as a part of it or as fans of it, having major issues.
Watching anime for perfect waifu is in my opinion not the ideal way to watch it. You may get solace from feeling close to such a character when watching anime primarily as an escape, but it will not motivate you to improve your life and meaningfully grow as a person or to diversify your perspectives on life and relationships. I hope anime-onlies such as myself can watch the entire series and not pre-judge the ending as terrible, instead focusing on what message Akasaka was trying to tell. There are big deep-seated issues in Japan that often show up in developed countries later, much like a rapidly aging population, a shrinking workforce, and reduced social interaction/withdrawal. The significant mental health crisis is probably a sleeper issue that will creep up on many countries.
When Capella she stepped on Crusch, which prompted Subaru to tell Capella to get her leg off of her, to which Capella responded whether he’s infatuated with her beautiful legs or just Crusch, who she called female meat, saying she does have quite an erotic figure as she stepped on Crusch’s breasts. Subaru responded by saying Capella is not worthy of holding her Crusch under a foot and launches a piece of the building at Capella with his whip, which she easily started regenerating her wounds from. In the meantime, she sprouted a long tail and knocked Subaru to the side with it before asking if her beauty rendered him speechless. That was the second time Capella has tried to fish for a compliment, so this may point to an insecurity she may have.
She later hinted to Subaru what the passed out dragon and flies really were since he didn’t get it, and when he finally realized the reality of the situation, he questioned why she did that. She prodded him by asking if he found it disgusting, to which Subaru called it blood-curdling. Capella coolly says that it’s so disgusting and repulsive that it makes him hate her. She says seeing what he saw regarding the flies and the dragon made him hate her on a visceral level, and that’s the “right” answer. She said that no one could love creatures like those. Subaru then requests for her to kill him, to which she says she’d never do something so barbaric and throws out that she wants as many people as possible, for as long as possible, as deeply as possible to love her as being the reason she doesn’t kill him ’cause it’s her wish, which is quite odd given she’s been pushing him to hate her, so I take it that she does have an insecurity after all, probably about her own worth/beauty.
My takeaway from these incidents is that Capella very much wants to be loved and that she pushes others to hate her ’cause she fundamentally believes that no one can love her. Capella transformed other human beings into creatures she feels no one can possibly love ’cause that makes them more grotesque than she is, which is reinforced by her saying she wants as many people as possible, for as long as possible, as deeply as possible to love her, so not killing Subaru would mean the possibility is there for Subaru to love her physical form more than the flies as long as she drags the situation out.
Subaru then makes a move to save Crusch, and Capella said that Subaru always ends up drooling over that female meat ’cause he wants her so bad. Subaru notes that there’s already someone he likes, and Capella remarks that can he really swear he hasn’t had lewd thoughts about Crusch for even a second? She asked him if he didn’t think about stroking Crusch’s hair or kissing her supple lips. Capella then raged about how Subaru shouldn’t dare take his carnal desire for the one he fancies he can’t speak of in the open and call it love. She then proceeds to transform into Emilia although without the right outfit and without the hair clip, which shows one of Capella’s powers may be to able to read your psyche and be able to transform into an approximation of your ideal lover without knowing all the exact details. She then belittles Subaru by saying if Emilia were a fly, he wouldn’t still love her ’cause she believes love is not possible without physical attraction.
Wilhelm noted in Episode 54 that the Emerada Lugunica who existed over 50 years ago was beautiful and also ruthless, which matches the description of Capella, so Emerada Lugunica may have somehow been transformed if she had an identity before Capella currently with the dragon blood. But does Capella herself even think much of her beauty herself? Judging from that previous content of Capella, she doesn’t believe that having high sexual desire for someone is the same as having love for that person. When you couple that with her fishing for compliments, I believe Capella may have slept around a lot with tons of men, but none of them loved her or accepted her for who she is, which might be why she calls others meat scraps ’cause she personally feels that she herself is a piece of meat like in the manner she spoke degradingly about Crusch. Capella would call others meat scraps ’cause if everyone else is a meat scrap, then that elevates herself by bringing down everyone to her level. Thus, she still fishes for compliments and does all she does ’cause she still clings to the hope that somebody will love her even if nobody has in all her years of living. Maybe there even was once somebody she genuinely thought she could love, but because she rushed to intimacy, it didn’t work out, and that man treated her like a piece of meat like all the rest.
