Crusch Karsten – Thorough Watch

Re:Zero Episode 60 (Season 3 Episode 10) – Analysis + Important Details

Posted on February 15, 2025 | by anicritic | 2 Comments

We start off this episode with Capella back the government office. Apparently, Felix and Anastasia prepared a ruse for Capella with Felix’s hope that Capella would tell her how to cure Crusch, but Capella herself doesn’t know how to heal a body that has given in to dragon blood as she wishes she knew the answer herself. Capella also remarked that Crusch’s blood couldn’t overcome her blood even though it’s noble herself, which suggests that some bloodlines may have special properties. We know there was an Emerada Lugunica that existed 50 years ago was beautiful, intelligent, and feared by all. Could Capella be Emerada who was resurrected by black dragon blood? Or did she see herself in Emerada’s story and took on her name? After it is clear that Capella doesn’t have the answer to what they want, Anastasia gets out of bed and hits Capella with yang magic (Season 2 revealed that yin and yang are the two other elements aside from the four primary ones with shadow from Season 1 appearing to be a mistranslation) and activated her trap, which broke part of the floor, revealing that they had already dug a tunnel down to a lower floor as part of their prep for this encounter. Anastasia had worn a wig and wore bandages to mimic Crusch’s condition, which was very well-played, and then used the same magic from before to knock Capella to that lower floor, where she encountered Al, who warned Capella to get out of there before he dies. This indicates that just like for Subaru, death is likely not the end for Al, which was something Elsa hated about Subaru’s eyes since he clearly didn’t see death as the end of the road.

Theory crafting the specifics about Al’s powers outside of it involving time seems to be an impossible endeavor given how many things it could possibly, so I won’t bother doing that. Instead I will reiterate that I believe Subaru was summoned to bring the world to a free future and stop the cycle of the world being destroyed/reconstructed. I propose the key is to have Subaru be born weak and improve Subaru’s self-esteem so that he isn’t conceited like past heroes I believe existed in the world. Al and especially Subaru were perhaps both born weaker compared to previous heroes to give the world a chance to end the cycle of the world being destroyed and reconstructed by making it so that their lived experiences were different from that of the previous very strong and conceited heroes I believe existed in the past with both of them probably having been summoned by Satella. For more on my main theory, read one of my previous posts here: https://thoroughwatch.org/?p=36

Afterwards, after Reinhard tries to follow one of Subaru’s plans, which ends in failure with Reinhard being knocked probably across the whole town, Regulus says that he is a perfect, complete human and that he’s entirely fulfilled with there not being such a thing as more or less for him. Emilia has a great moment where she calls him out by saying that has been coming out of his mouth has been “I want this” and “I want that”, citing that he’s an incredibly selfish person. She says that if he’s fulfilled then he should take better care of his wives. Sounding very hurt, she mentioned how Regulus tied his wives down and made them give up, and then she realized that she absolutely hates Regulus on every level, which pissed Regulus off so much he started picking up huge portions of water into cubes and accelerating the water once he stops having them stay in place.

After that, an ice chase ensues as Emilia freezes water as they try to escape Regulus with Regulus in hot pursuit of them since he can walk normally on ice and doesn’t need to skate like Emilia and Subaru do. Emilia then suggests handing Subaru one of her lesser spirits and asks if he can hang on by himself, to which Subaru replies that as a kid he was called the “Ice Princess”, which suggests he either cross-dressed or cosplayed as a girl frequently in his youth while skating for whatever reason, possibly as a way to avoid being compared to his dad due to him being desperate to get out of his dad’s shadow. Subaru having an inferiority complex was a plot point in Episode 29 (Season 2 Episode 4), and I thought it was the best episode in the series for the subject matter it touched upon, which explained Subaru’s behaviour throughout the first season and up to that point. There is no filler in Re:Zero, so whether it was cross-dressing or cosplay, perhaps Subaru will be forced to pull out a trick from his youth.

I’ll stray from the scene order now to focus on Priscilla. Sirius again does something to make herself the center of attention. If you recall from Episode 51, Sirius’s antics at the clock tower in Episode 51 and 52 were meant to get people’s attention on her specifically given her power allows her to nudge people’s emotional states to what she desires after first getting their attention. In this recent episode, Sirius makes a fuss about how she brightened up the place since it was so dark, and this led to Liliana falling under her control. Priscilla, being the scene-stealer she is, decided to give Liliana a passionate French kiss to free her from Sirius’s control, which was not a bad idea since she already knew Liliana had some level of attraction to her. After that, Sirius directs a whole bunch of people from the city who had fallen under her control towards Priscilla and Liliana, which led to Priscilla using her Yang Sword to create a line of fire on the bridge leading to them, which stopped those under Sirius’s mind control from advancing. She then tasked Liliana with breaking those people from Sirius’s control, putting extra stress on Liliana by emphasizing that all of their lives are depending on her voice. This reminds of earlier this season in Episode 58 (I didn’t include that in my analysis, which was an oversight, I guess) when Priscilla said something that appeared to demean Liliana which motivated Liliana to do her best to live up to her family name. Perhaps Priscilla has the habit of saying something that is demeaning or stressful to the recipient of her words so that she can draw out a person’s best qualities. This was again shown in a more extreme fashion when Priscilla tested Subaru’s strength of character with her proposal that Subaru lick her foot in Episode 16. Priscilla had intended for Subaru to reject that offer, but Subaru was in very poor shape mentally to consider that was what she was gunning for.

Priscilla then engages Sirius and is definitely a match for her in combat, but Sirius appeared to taunt Priscilla with the mentioning “Iris and the Thorn King”, “Teleos’s Rose Knight”, and “Magritzer’s Gibbet”, which provoked Priscilla into becoming enraged. Whatever these three terms are, they clearly have a personal significance to Priscilla. I have an idea of why Priscilla had such a strong reaction based on previous content. Clearly from Episode 12, Priscilla must’ve come from a very high-class background given she had no idea that appas have red skin. Given “Iris and the Thorn King” and “Teleos’s Rose Knight”, whatever they are, involve a king and a knight, Priscilla may not be your average noble and might be royalty, and given it’s clear that Priscilla is not from Lugunica’s Royal Family since everyone would recognize her and ’cause Lugunica’s Royal Family perished, she might be royalty from a different nation. When Priscilla remarked in Episode 13 that Felt must’ve remained a slum dweller ’cause she can only manage tedious conversation, that might not have been a random insult but a hint that Priscilla went through hardship and lost her status as royalty at some point. I always thought the way Priscilla spoke to Subaru in Episode 16 at points made it seem like she was a queen or empress given the sort of inflections the voice actress used, and perhaps that was intentional and just phenomenal voice-acting.

Also of note and relates to the stuff with Priscilla is that I missed something for last week’s write-up. I had noticed that Julius looked surprised after Roy said something to him, but I was unsure of what to make of it, so I rewatched Episode 59, and Roy addressed Julius by “Nii-sama”, meaning Crunchyroll botched the translation, showing that Roy knew Julius is an older brother, and that is why Julius seemed taken aback. We know that Sirius did not know Priscilla personally yet said the perfect things to unnerve her, so it seems the reason Julius didn’t stick with the original plan to not use your real name if you encounter the Sin Archbishop of Gluttony is ’cause Roy probably said things that made Julius believe Roy knew info about him. We know Sirius didn’t actually seem to know Priscilla at the start of their encounter, so either the Gospel gave her instructions, or there was some other tell we’re not aware of. Perhaps Sirius and Roy both had instructions from their Gospels to say what they did or had good info from the Witch Cult’s spy network, and that’s the main reason Julius abandoned their well-thought out plan.

After many failures regarding penetrating Regulus’s seeming invincibility, Subaru asks Emilia for a hint by asking what happened to her after she was taken prisoner. Emilia responded by saying that he asked her if she’s a virgin, that he calls his wives by numbers, and when she said that that makes him seem like an evil king, one of them (Wife #184) called him “Little King”, which Subaru knew as the Latin name for Regulus, and he stated that it has another name, which is implied later in the episode to be “Lion Heart”, and I will get back to that at the end of my post, but I first I have to leave it out there that the Memory Snow OVA hinted that Subaru is a star nerd since he knew his own name was referring to a star cluster in that animation project that happened in the off years between Season 1 and Season of Re:Zero. Subaru then asked Emilia what Regulus’s hand felt like when he was strangling her, and she said it felt like nothing, which prompted Subaru to ask Reinhard to find out whether his heart is beating, which Reinhard confirmed it wasn’t to Subaru as he was being sent flying into the moon. This leads to Subaru beating Regulus at his own game at yapping by saying that Regulus has a right to hear about how he’ll lose since he’s all about his rights. Regulus, who says he is merciful, will allow Subaru to talk, and Subaru first says that Regulus’s power is the ability press the start button in the middle of the game, maybe ’cause when you start a game there’s a rush of momentum with all the animations starting up and everything, and that’s how he can launch dirt, air, and even water as we see in this episode at very high speed. Subaru says his ability is Lion Heart, the ability to stop time for his own body, and Regulus’s face shows that Subaru nailed it.

As I have noted in a previous post of mine, I have been looking up Re:Zero names ever since Episode 22 of Re:Zero, “A Flash of Sloth”, in which there were several instances of sloth that impacted the story. I had already looked up the names of the Sin Archbishops before, but it appeared my initial search was not enough with how Subaru was able to draw conclusions about Regulus’s ability when I couldn’t, so I expanded my search to more star facts and even mythology.

Betelgeuse, the name Petelgeuse is based off, is a star, in particular, in the constellation of Orion and the ninth-brightest star of the night sky. It’s called “Orion’s hand” in Arabic, which is almost certainly why Petelgeuse’s Authority was the “Unseen Hand”.

Baten Kaitos meant “belly of the sea monster” in Arabic, and I reasoned after Season 2 that that must be about Lye’s eating ability, but after seeing that Alphard is referred to in Arabic as the “backbone of the Serpent”, Baten Kaitos is most likely hinting at the White Whale while Alphard refers to the Black Serpent, the last of the Three Great Mabeasts. Lye Batenkaitos had called the White Whale “our pet” when he and Regulus attacked the White Whale extermination force on its way back to the capital. At the time, I thought it may have just been a pet in general of the Witch Cult, but since Season 3 shows that the Sin Archbishops of Gluttony have a speech quirk in which they speak as if they are more than one person despite being individuals themselves, Lye probably had direct control over the White Whale, and that’s why he personally came to avenge it. Interestingly enough, on names.org a user-submitted meaning indicates that Lye means “fog” in a Native American language, and this may be how Tappei decided to have the White Whale emit a dense fog.

The ancient Greeks observed that the appearance of Sirius as the morning star heralded the hot and dry summer and feared that the star caused plants to wilt, men to weaken, and women to become aroused. Owing to its brightness, Sirius would have been seen to twinkle more in the unsettled weather conditions of early summer. To Greek observers, this signified emanations that caused its malignant influence. All people perceived to be suffering from its effects were said to be “star-struck”, which may be how Tappei decided to make Sirius’s Authority involve people falling under her control and feeling a sense of closeness to Sirius. Sirius means “glowing” or “scorching”, and the glowing part could be referring to how she makes herself the center of attention while the scorching part could be how Tappei decided to make her a fire-magic user.

Capella means “little goat” in Latin. In Greek mythology, the star represented the goat Amalthea that suckled Zeus. It was this goat whose horn, after accidentally being broken off by Zeus, was transformed into the cornucopia, or “horn of plenty”, which would be filled with whatever its owner desired. Perhaps this is how Tappei decided to allow Capella to transform into anything she desired. Since she took the Royal Family’s name, “Emerada” could be a perversion of “Emeralda” much like “Satella” is a perversion of Satellite. “Emeralda” is a variant of “Emerald” with emeralds symbolizing rebirth and wisdom, which may be why Capella is good at reading people and why she might have been resurrected by that black dragon blood in her body.

The Arabic meaning of Regulus is Lion Heart, and that should be part of how Subaru figured out Regulus’s power. Regulus is a fixed star, and fixed stars are luminary points, mainly stars, that appear not to move relative to one another against the darkness of the night sky in the background. Due to their immense distance from Earth, fixed stars appear to move so slowly in the sky that the change in their relative positions is nearly imperceptible on human timescales, except under careful examination with modern instruments, such as telescopes, that can reveal their proper motions. Hence, they can be considered to be “fixed” for many purposes, such as navigation, charting of stars, and timekeeping even though they do move but not to an extent that the naked eye can detect such movements. This should be how Subaru concluded that Regulus’s Authority freezes time for his own body since a fixed star seems frozen in time. As for how Subaru concluded that’s what makes him invincible, the Nemean lion in Greek mythology had impenetrable fur, and that should be how he figured that Lion Heart had something to do with Regulus’s actual heart.

Re:Zero Breaktime Season 3 Episode 5 is a must-watch since its shows unequivocally that Al was summoned to Earth much like Subaru was: https://x.com/LoremIpsumVerb/status/1851218364317761852?mx=2

Now I will explain how Al factors into this and why I believe he is Subaru’s brother and a previous iteration of the hero of the story. Although I posted the link to my main theory, you might not have time to read it, so I’ll post mainly the Al portion of my main theory. Subaru means Pleiades in Japanese, and Pleiades is referring to a star cluster in the Taurus constellation. Al’s true name, Aldebaran, is a star in the Taurus constellation that follows the Pleiades star cluster in the night sky. In Arabic, Aldebaran means the follower for that reason. While some of the Arabic meanings for Sin Archbishops hint at their powers, perhaps it would be better to consider Al’s name in relation to Subaru since Al isn’t a Sin Archbishop.

Since Aldebaran follows the Pleiades star cluster, perhaps he was given that name because he was Naoko and Kenichi’s next son after Subaru, which showed a fixation from at least one of his parents on their first son who disappeared. Al told Priscilla not to call him Aldebaran in Episode 16 of Re:zero, and that might be because that name is a constant reminder that his parents loved Subaru more than they loved him.

Since names have power in Re:zero, Aldebaran as a name could very possibly mean that Aldebaran would be the next person to be summoned after Subaru was. Aldebaran is pretty much guaranteed to have been summoned to Re:zero’s fantasy world since at least one of the carriage driver, Priscilla, or Al recognized Subaru’s attempt at hitchhiking when hitchhiking shouldn’t exist in a medieval society, meaning Subaru’s attempt to catch a ride should’ve fallen flat on his face, since Al literally knew what Subaru meant by the Kansai dialect when he was exasperated about hearing it in Episode 12, since Priscilla used the English word “chance” knowing Subaru knew the word (and given that Priscilla doesn’t know what apples are, she probably isn’t from Earth since pretty much every grown adult on Earth has at least seen an unpeeled apple before), which shows that she did so knowing Subaru was from the same world as Al, and since Mimi was eating cheeseburgers, which shouldn’t exist in a medieval society, meaning someone from Earth has previously invented them in Re:Zero’s fantasy world. This means Al is either formerly a Japanese citizen, an immigrant who had not yet become a Japanese citizen, someone whose work brings him to Japan sometimes, or a fan of Japanese culture.

Now, I have to say that Re:zero is a logical series. Unlike tons of poorly made isekai series out there, all characters in Re:zero have their own underlying motivations. Something like the isekai protagonist of other bad isekai stories would be made to look good for being self-righteous against Lugunica’s knights, but Subaru got his shit kicked in ’cause Re:zero is a serious story not meant to solely be wish fulfillment. It’s clear that Re:zero is a story where there are actual consequences ’cause of this.

Where I’m going with this is that there are time travel stories out there that posit that all of time is happening at once, meaning there are no real rules and almost anything can happen with it being a matter of the writer’s discretion. The bootstrap paradox commonly featured in time travel stories is also highly illogical and only exists “just because” rather than there being an actual legitimate reason for being used that can be reasoned through logic aside from the author said so.

‘Cause Re:zero is a highly logical series, I posit that time is linear in Re:zero, and I think the main reason Al was summoned to the fantasy world to a point before Subaru’s arrival at Lugunica’s Capital is that Subaru was transported to somewhere in Re:zero’s world or a place that was a limbo between worlds where his body never aged even the slightest before he suddenly arrived in Lugunica’s Capital in Episode 1 of the series and that this period where that happened was before the time Al was summoned to Re:zero’s fantasy world. This is why I do not believe Al is a future Subaru.

Re:Zero Episode 58 (Season 3 Episode 8) Analysis + Important Details

Posted on November 23, 2024 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

Okay, I ended up being right that Otto may have been in possession of the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom originally used by Roswaal, but I was wrong about the details. I thought it seemed too convenient that he ended up being where Felt, Reinhard, and Heinkel was while having his zodda bugs ready to distract Heinkel, but it seems it really was a coincidence like Otto had said it was. Apparently, the tome was left with a professional trying to restore it to a usable state, which was the reason Otto split up from the group in Episode 51.

And in comes Liliana with her new song that she came up with right on the spot, “Crazy Obsessed With Everything About You”. Given Reinhard revealed that he can wish for any power, and he will gain a Divine Protection for that power, resulting in him gaining his new Divine Protection of Judgement, which allows him to see and understand what Divine Protections other people have and what they do, Reinhard saw that Liliana has the Divine Protection of Telepathy, which may show that Priscilla is into Subaru. It’s possible that Liliana came up with this song ’cause she felt Priscilla’s affection for Subaru during the short time they were together outside and felt Priscilla’s mood improving as she approached the meeting place where Subaru would be. Priscilla notably announced that she is giving Subaru another reward for calming Priestella’s citizens down in allowing herself to be included in the group’s plan. She may have called his broadcast ugly, but ultimately respects results, but I think part of her just wants to be involved with Subaru. Given how Priscilla poked at Liliana later in the episode to get her to agree to accompany her in fighting Sirius, she may have been trying to poke at Subaru in a similar way to assess his manhood or banter with him, but Subaru still has deep insecurities over his self-worth. Priscilla even said after Subaru began to remark about how Priscilla must also be here ’cause of Liliana’s presence that of course she came here in person, most likely ’cause of his broadcast despite on the surface calling it ugly, addressing him as “fool”, much like she did in Episode 56. Maybe she has a thing for fools given Heinkel is a part of her camp.

Liliana’s songs tend to have meaning with her singing a song about a lonely wanderer (herself), age differences in love (regarding Subaru and Beatrice even though they aren’t romantically interested in each other), the Sword Demon’s Love Ballad (when Wilhelm was known to have visited the city), a song about dragon blood, and a song about how awesome life is to ease the mind of the city’s citizens, insulating them from Sirius’s Authority of Wrath, so I find it hard to believe that Liliana randomly decided to sing a love song for no reason but was inspired to do so. That’s what makes me believe the song is about Priscilla being into Subaru. Priscilla also notably gave Subaru two rewards on the same day, clearly showing Subaru favour. Liliana may have noticed how Subaru being around lifted Priscilla’s mood during the short time they were together in addition to whatever effect Subaru’s broadcast had on Priscilla, and that would be her inspirations for the new song.

Priscilla also made a good observation that Al was helping that group instead of accompanying her and forcing her to look for Schult on her own shortly after she made her entrance, calling Al and Schult rude for making her do that, but I believe part of it is show to demonstrate her lording over her power to outsiders due to her possibly carefully crafting her image to be this way. Al certainly has his own agenda, whatever it is, given his independence from his master. When Priscilla declared her intention to join the battle against the Witch Cult, he tried to talk her down from doing it, which is similar to how he wanted Emilia to be coddled and protected by Subaru instead of strong and independent. Given this recurring behaviour of how he wants a woman protected by a man and to tamp down their confidence/strength, it wouldn’t surprise me if he indeed lost to Roswaal if he was the immediate previous Hero of the story as I pose with how Roswaal wanted Emilia to be completely dependent on Subaru. Re:Zero Season 3 Breaktime Episode 4 also showed that Subaru physically needs Beatrice around due to his gate being destroyed making it so that his body can’t regulate its mana levels, and given we know Al does not need to hang around a spirit, Al’s gate most likely didn’t break when he was the hero, possibly ’cause he faced a crushing defeat to Roswaal, which set up his heroic delusions remark to Subaru.

Otto and Subaru have a 1-on-1 conversation as Al brings Priscilla up to speed, and Otto reveals he picked up the charred remains of the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom a year ago ’cause he wants to check its contents due to him not trusting Roswaal as far as he could throw him. He said that aside from what had engineered at the Sanctuary, Roswaal had all sorts of schemes that others let slide. Subaru then implies that they don’t let him get away with everything but that they need his strength. Otto says that it’s fine and that he’ll be wary enough of Roswaal for both him and Emilia. He said that as Subaru’s internal affairs officer, Roswaal didn’t behave as if he were up to any conspiracies or schemes that would weight on his conscience, but he was worried that Roswaal had set up some plans with a time lag so that they wouldn’t be able to see them coming. Otto wanted to ensure that nobody from their camp could be hurt by Roswaal again, which is very good reasoning that makes him a very good ally to those he believes in, although the Emilia camp probably doesn’t have anything to worry about unless Roswaal loses his desire to live due to the curse on his soul that will incinerate his soul ’cause of him losing his bet to Subaru in Season 2. Otto revealed his intent to retrieve the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom and that he could do it without any help from the group after Subaru remarked about not being able to spare anyone to help him do it since they’d be focused on the control towers, reminding Subaru that he was able to navigate around this danger-filled city and bring them the Sword Saint. Wilhelm then called for Subaru ’cause Crusch requested that he fetch Subaru.

When Subaru is in Crusch’s room, Felix tells him not to push Crusch given she’s in critical condition. Felix has blood on his face and clothes, which shows he probably tried to forcibly take the dragon blood out of Crusch’s body with that intervention failing completely and utterly. Everything below Crusch’s head and even part of her face have completely changed colour and filled with many veins, which shows she got the short end of the stick compared to Subaru with the curse of the black dragon blood. It’s hard seeing someone who was so charismatic and a natural leader end up like this. Subaru upon briefly touching Crusch’s left arm was in pain and transferred some of Capella’s black dragon blood from Crusch’s body into his own. When he saw that this improved Crusch’s condition, he did it again but for a longer portion of time by touching her face, and it resulted in Crusch’s face becoming normal again. As I indicated in Episode 56, it appears Subaru has a resistance to the curse to his dormant Ulgarm curses from Season 1 fighting with the black dragon curse, which weakens the black dragon curse so that Crusch saw more relief than Subaru gained in symptoms of the curse. Subaru intended to do more for Crusch, but Crusch wisely dissauded him as if they both become unable to fight the outcome would be fatal. She tells him to instead to assure that she can leave everything to him, which he does. All throughout that entire interaction, Crusch was looking to Subaru since him being okay had resulted in him being her hope. She not once looked towards Felix, her knight, and that must’ve really hurt Felix, which Felix alluded to with how he was powerless to do anything to help the one he wants most when Subaru said that there still many people who will require Felix’s aid.

When Subaru finally stepped back outside and showed Wilhelm his hand, which Wilhelm was undoubtedly grateful for, Wilhelm shared the identities of the two strong Witch cultist who were with Capella, “Eight-Arms” Kurgan, formerly the Vollachia Empire’s most powerful swordsman, and Theresia van Astrea, the previous Sword Saint. Wilhelm revealed during the demihuman war several decades ago when he was in his youth there was a person who used the forbidden art of corpse manipulation. He revealed that that individual is long gone but that the art still exists and that those resurrected were referred to as corpse soldiers. Wilhelm pleads to Subaru not to tell Reinhard about Theresia. He reveals to Subaru that the Divine Protection of the Sword Saint is a Divine Protection that is inherited, which makes it different from all other Divine Protections. That Divine Protection was passed on to Reinhard when Theresia was fighting the White Whale, and ’cause Wilhelm was adamant that Theresia give up fighting since it was his job as the stronger of the two to protect her, she suddenly became very ordinary on the battlefield, which he clearly regretted since he indirectly caused her to die.

If you recall from Season 1, Wilhelm insisted that ’cause Theresia had a face like hers that she was not suited to the battlefield and that he would take the sword away from her. That flashback always pissed me off and came across as really sexist and was a big yikes despite it taking place in a medieval setting. Theresia also notably said in the flashback when Wilhelm defeated her in a duel that she wants to hear him say he loves her, and Wilhelm promised to do it someday with it being implied that it never happened as he only said it after he killed the White Whale… I’m glad to see that Wilhelm has wised up and realized that him preventing Theresia from fighting in an effort to protect her given his views led to her being mostly helpless after she lost her Divine Protection of the Sword Saint due to Reinhard inheriting it. It shows he has changed with his realization he caused her death. Even if Theresia personally didn’t want to continue fighting, which is probably she constantly asked Wilhelm if he likes flowers and why Wilhelm said she never wanted to pick up a sword, I believe she should have at least trained herself in self-defense instead of fighting. He rebuked Reinhard when he inherited the Divine Protection of the Sword Saint as he could not forgive young Reinhard for being saddled with a fate far too heavy for someone still mourning his grandma. Wilhelm says clearly that Reinhard bears no responsibility for Theresia’s death, which rings true since the rift with Reinhard was one of his three biggest regrets that were alluded to in Episode 51. Wilhelm doesn’t want Reinhard to be burdened with having to deal with Theresia, and it shows the love he has for his grandson. When Subaru says that they don’t know when the corpse soldiers will show up, Wilhelm asserts that Theresia will definitely come find him, most likely ’cause he believes in fate.

Back in the group’s meeting room, Priscilla insists she will take on Sirius from the Fourth District with Liliana’s help. Priscilla believes Liliana’s singing can counter Sirius’s Authority, and when Subaru wondered there was a way to test that, Reinhard received the Divine Protection I mentioned earlier in this episode and saw that Liliana’s ability would indeed be able to stop Sirius’s Authority, so the group finally settles on Priscilla fighting Wrath when they were deadset against it at first. Next Subaru brings up that the Lust faction with the two strong cultists and the demi-beasts are probably where most of the Witch Cult’s forces are concentrated, and he wants Wilhelm and Garfiel to be the ones to take them on. When Garfiel protests, saying that they need to save Emilia, Subaru reminds him that he has his own score to settle as it was due to those two cultists that Mimi is close to death. Wilhelm volunteers himself to fight Capella’s faction, but Reinhard objects ’cause he believes Wilhelm’s mind isn’t clear right now due to what happened to Crusch. Wilhelm says a bunch of things to get the point across that he is not to be underestimated and urges Subaru to choose him for the task, which Subaru was already going to do as he wants Reinhard fighting Regulus since it’ll be a fight with the strongest against the invincible. Garfiel begs Reinhard to help Subaru and Emilia, and Reinhard agrees as long as Garfiel promises that he will see through the mission at all costs and that they will both win. Garfiel probably needed to hear that due to him being low on confidence after letting Mimi get hurt so badly and having his punch be easily blocked by Reinhard, and having Reinhard in addition to Ricardo in Episode 54 put their faith in Garfiel might be just what Garfiel needed. Subaru says he’ll do whatever he can to cover for Reinhard in areas he’s lacking, which has Reinhard shocked, as he has probably never been told that before due to his immense strength ever since he was a young boy and him saying he will have faith that Subaru will fill in in the areas he will fall short might be the first time he has ever placed his faith in another person. Julius then says that he and Ricardo will take on Gluttony, but they still don’t know that there is more than one Sin Archbishop of Gluttony, so I wonder how that will go.

At Regulus and Emilia’s wedding, Regulus is amazed at Emilia’s beauty and remarks that he was right to keep seat number 79 open. He remarks that there was a woman he thought was the perfect fit for that seat when he first met, but he deemed her unsuitable before they married and left it open. I had previously speculated that Regulus chose his wives’ positions subjectively based on who he finds most attractive, but this episode calls that into question with this info likely showing that he chooses wives to fill particular seats based on particular physical characteristics. Regulus says that as a wife of his, Emilia will be forbidden from smiling and having any change of expression ’cause some women become ugly when they smile, and it might be the case that seeing a woman genuinely happy with a man who will treat her right pisses him off since it reminds him of his own failures as a man. This might be why Regulus was so enraged after seeing Fortuna return to fight with Petelgeuse in Season 2. Pandora told Regulus to calm his anger due to beauty of the love Fortuna and Petelgeuse had together, which resulted in him striking Pandora with all his might with the intent of killing her. Emilia then talks about how she believe marriage is supposed to be a happy thing, a ritual embodying the desire two people have for each other to be together. She then asks Regulus why he addresses his wives using numbers, and Regulus retorts by saying that being fixated on what people called is the same as being fixated on looks, the most shallow form of relationship there is, which shows extreme hypocrisy since looks are all that matters to Regulus with him even threatening to erase anyone who moves from the neck down since he doesn’t want to destroy a beautiful face once Emilia repeatedly brings up Subaru, much to Regulus’s chagrain. Regulus’s wives were terrified during the entire exchange as they fear Regulus and his temper deeply. When Emilia finally responds by saying she won’t be Regulus’s woman, Regulus is infuriated and is about to kill her right as Reinhard kicks open the door of the venue and knocking Regulus away. Subaru and Reinhard both had to introduce themselves given Regulus probably doesn’t remember Subaru due to seeing most men as ants who are beneath his attention, and Subaru coolly ends the episode by saying that he objects to the union. It was great that Emilia talked back to Regulus in such a manner as I’m sure none of his other wives were willing to do so out of fear of him. It goes to show how she has such faith that Subaru will save her and that she will eventually fall for him, not wanting to live a life where she is subservient to Regulus.

I guess this is as good of a time as any to take a break before Re:Zero Season 3 returns in February. I wonder whether Subaru will die any more times given the OP of the first part showed him looping after going right at Regulus, but that might have been misdirection since it showed him with Beatrice, who is out of commission due to being low on mana.

Re:Zero Episode 56 (Season 3 Episode 6) Analysis + Important Details

Posted on November 9, 2024 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

This was a slower-paced episode, but it still had some very engaging content, some of which were likely very important details. The first of which is that while Subaru was unconscious, he saw himself being washed away by an inundation of purple water, and while he was being washed away, he vomited out a dark substance that formed imagery of the Ulgarm mabeasts from Season 1 and the black dragon Capella transformed into, which then clashed, likely to signify that the dormant Ulgarm curses in Subaru weakened the influence of the curse of Capella’s black dragon blood when the two curses mixed, which is why only Subaru’s right leg was affected by the blood’s curse instead of his whole body like it was for many other people. For reference, Beatrice indicated in Season 1 that ’cause Subaru was bitten in so many places, the Ulgarm curses got knotted up, so she couldn’t dispel the curses, so the only way to prevent the curses from activating would be to kill all the Ulgarm that bit him, and that would be why the Ulgarm curses are dormant. Interestingly enough, Subaru not only regrew his leg but also the bandages wrapping it and his shoe, which suggests that there may be something more at play as well. Given Capella could transform herself and make new clothing for herself when she transforms, when Capella drips her blood on you, she may be sharing part of her Authority of Lust with you, and that is how Subaru regrew the bandages and his shoe. As we’ve seen that there are more than one Sin Archbishop of Gluttony, it should theoretically be possible to share an Authority even if it’s not clear why Lye and Roy can both be a Sin Archbishop of Gluttony. One other possibility if the dragon blood is a part of Capella’s Authority is that since Subaru had a resistance to the Sloth (could see the Unseen Hand in Episode 17 after failing to see it the first time) and Gluttony (remembers people erased by Gluttony as shown by Episodes 17 and 26 and the White Whale, which Puck called Gluttony in Episode 18, probably ’cause it’s the White Whale of Gluttony) Authorities that he also has a resistance to Capella’s Authority ’cause he has a resistance to Authorities in general, and that is another reason only his leg was affected and that injuries to his new leg are healed.

Another thing to note is that Priscilla asked Subaru not to scream when she cut open his leg with her fan. Clearly, she did not expect that to do permanent damage to Subaru and knew it would heal. Maybe Al’s right or left leg is in a similar condition, and that is why she did what she did, and it wasn’t out of curiosity. I believe that Al and Subaru both served as the Hero of the story of their times/world in the cycle of the world being destroyed and reconstructed and that Al was born as Subaru’s younger brother and was the immediate previous iteration of the Hero of the story. The reason Al is older than Subaru would be that Subaru’s body was frozen in time for centuries, and Al was re-summoned to Subaru’s world after his world came to an end eighteen years before Subaru arrived in Lugunica. Al knowing Subaru’s nickname for Beatrice, Beako, lends credence to this theory. Or maybe Priscilla just has incredible intuition, which is a point in the relevant Breaktime episode, but I think reading into there being more makes it much more interesting to think about. Subaru then revealed that it was Capella dripping dragon blood on him that led to his leg becoming like that. After this, Priscilla remarked that dragon blood is one of three treasures the Holy Dragon bestowed upon the Royal Family, and I wonder what the other two treasures are.

Priscilla then shares Capella’s new demands, which Subaru was pissed off at and loudly declared that he’d kick the whole Witch Cult out of the city, and that it’s not a matter of whether he can do it when Priscilla prodded him but whether he will do it or not. Showing off some gumption led to her saying she would give him a reward, and she proceeded to knock him down to the ground to prevent him from being targeted by an attack before fighting off a whole crowd of demi-beasts, which may have formed from the purple eggs in Episode 54. After saying that whoever made the demi-beasts had no sense of beauty, she easily cuts all of them in half and burns them to a crisp with her Yang Sword, which she pulled out of a fiery void, and declares that Subaru’s reward is seeing the shine of her Yang Sword and the knowledge of the Demi-Beasts. Even if Priscilla has good intuition, it’s clear she’s not infallible as I believe it’s the case that Capella deliberately wants her creations to not be beautiful due to her insecurity rather than her having no sense of beauty. Priscilla was also massively wrong about Subaru in Season 1 Episode 16 such that when she posed the foot licking test to him which she thought he would pass she was enraged due to how badly Subaru defied her expectations.

Priscilla then leads Subaru to one of the shelters, saying it is her objective, and the people there are being affected by Sirius’s Authority. Priscilla then casually remarked “Not here either…” which shows she was looking for someone, which she revealed to be Schult, the little boy who serves her, after Liliana calmed the civilians, who Priscilla noted were easy to rile up with the smallest of things, with her singing.

I understand Priscilla on the surface confirming Al saying Priscilla likes seeing vicious beasts torment weak creatures in Episode 13 followed by Priscilla beating the shit out of Subaru for complying with a request she made to him made her seem very cruel in Episode 16, but as I have argued in the past, that is likely the wrong read of things one might come to based only a surface-level reading of the content.

This recent episode shows Priscilla going out of her way to search for Schult by going to as many shelters as possible, showing motherly qualities for her vassal. She also called the situation in the shelters an ugly, meaningless reality, which directly contradicts how Al indicated that she loves seeing vicious beasts torment weak creatures, as if that were the case, she’d be cheering on Sirius for her Authority causing the discord it did.

Then when Subaru revealed to Priscilla that the Authority of Wrath throws people’s emotions into chaos and that a shelter full of unrest is the perfect prey for her, Priscilla narrowed her eyebrows in anger. She may have said that she was just looking for Schult, but I don’t fully buy it. I believe she really wanted to help the citizens in addition to finding Schult. Does this look like someone who likes seeing the weak be preyed on as Al suggested?

Much like I had thought after watching Re:Zero in Season 1, I do proclaim once again that Priscilla is kinder than she lets on, and even Subaru himself might’ve started realizing that given how he reacted in the shelter before he shared his intent to go back to the Muse Company. It is simply wrong to say she only cares about what sort of entertainment you can give her. I believe I have long been on the right track about her, and Tappei often plays with viewers’ expectations of a player by introducing them one way and showing that there was more to them, much like with Crusch, Julius, Otto, and Anastasia.

After Regulus’s Wife Number 184 changed Emilia into new clothes, Regulus noted how unhappy Emilia was and asked what’s wrong, and when Emilia didn’t respond, he prodded Wife Number 184 for an answer, and she remarked that it was probably the broadcast that upset her. After Regulus asks Emilia whether she’s still not better, Emilia looks really uncomfortable, prompting him to say she has a really bitter expression on her face and sternly asking why she has no answer, to which Emilia said she thinks she’s a bit tired. Regulus then reveals after saying it was negligence on his part to not notice that that he and his wives are preparing a temple for them to get married at and that he has had 291 wives total with many of them sadly having perished with 54 of them when including Emilia remaining. He says he will love them all equally, and he launces an attack that would’ve killed Wife Number 184 after he remarks that the one closest to Emilia should’ve noticed her exhaustion. Regulus forcing Wife Number 184 not to smile and deciding to her on a whim shows that his wives are all disposable dolls to him even if he’s not so evil as to seek out child brides and that he doesn’t understand what love actually is. Emilia says it’s wrong for that wife to start cleaning up after Regulus’s mess after he tried to kill her, but that wife says it’s not within her right to ask for anything further, which Emilia protests, asking if all of the wives shrink in fear of Regulus and accept when it when he tries to kill them, and Wife Number 184 responds by saying that is the nature of some spousal relationships and that Emilia will get used to it in time. Emilia believes that marriage should be the happiest picture of happiness, and Wife Number 184 says that marriage can exist without happiness and to do as their husband commands, which Emilia says isn’t right. It shows what a disgusting pig Regulus is for oppressing so many women.

Julius then saves Subaru after he was being hunted by a demi-beast and brings him back to the government office after informing him that the Muse Company was attacked and that everyone who went to take back the government office made it back alive and that it now serves as their base of operations. Inside, Felix slapped Wilhelm for not protecting Crusch, and it was made implicit that she implored multiple people to at least make an excuse why the situation couldn’t be avoided, but no one did so and accepted the responsibility of their actions as they believed there was no other approach they could have tried. If you recall from Season 2 with Episode 26, Felix wanted to abandon the alliance with the Emilia camp since the Witch Cult had attacked and eaten Crusch’s memories as Felix’s #1 priority is keeping Crusch safe even if Crusch herself feels a strong sense of duty in honouring her commitments as shown by when she agreed to have Felix heal Subaru’s gate in Season 1 and also deciding to stick with the alliance ’cause Crusch didn’t want to go on with her life knowing nothing, preferring to make that choice for herself rather than simply do as someone else says. Ricardo handed back Subaru his whip and indicated it was used to restrain Crusch and the black dragon that is most likely Garfiel’s mom’s husband. Julius indicated that a foreign substance, which Subaru knows to be Capella’s dragon blood, had entered Crusch’s body, which causes her suffering, and urged Subaru not to see her, which Ricardo agreed with since since she was such a beauty, making it painful to see her in her current state.

Emilia then does something proactive which is make an ice sculpture figure and place it under the covers so that Wife Number 184 wouldn’t notice that she wasn’t in bed. She makes ice platforms attached to the building so that she can move around freely outside. She saw that all of the 4 towers were taken at once, and that’s why nobody can move freely. She realized that she’s in the Third District and believes if she can find out which Sin Archbishop is in each tower, it’d be helpful info for Subaru and the others. Emilia is not content with being a damsel in distress, and I commend Tappei for writing her to be this way. Regulus was apparently having a conversation with Capella through his metia and was threatening to blow her tower to pieces for distressing Emilia, and Capella revealed that it wasn’t her who opened the watergate, which Regulus didn’t buy at all. Then, the conversation was cut short as one of Regulus’s wives indicated that preparation for the interior of the temple had begun, and he told her he’d be there right away. Emilia then said that the tower she can see straight ahead must be the First District tower since she’s at the Third District, which she wants to let Subaru know eventually.

Back at the government office, Anastasia asks Subaru whether Beatrice is an artificial spirit, and he confirmed it right away since hiding the info would only benefit their enemy. This lines up with what Seasons 1 and 2 presented since Echidna and Beatrice herself had indicated her artificial origins as there’s no way a spirit would call a human her mother unless she was artificially made. Subaru then told Anastasia that the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom is the prototype of the Witch Cult Gospels, and that it is more complete than the Gospels, which I swear was not shown in Season 2, so it must have been cut content that happened during one of Echidna’s tea parties. Subaru insists that the 2 copies of the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom were burned to ashes, and they think that the Witch Cult must’ve not realized it, but as I said in my write-up of Episode 55, Roswaal may not have confirmed that it had burnt to a crisp due to him believing that that must have been the case, meaning Otto saved Felt by using it, or the Tome of Wisdom could be referring to the true Tome of Wisdom from Echidna. The group indicated that they won’t cave to any of the Witch Cult’s demands.

Julius indicates that there are numerous shelters throughout the city and that that there is also unrest, which Subaru knew of, and that they’re trying to minimize the harm down, and that results in Anastasia saying that some are too far gone and that people will die, meaning it’s cowardly to mince words like that. Anastasia plans on making sacrifices to save the majority, which Subaru objects to, and Anastasia in return says that it’s silly for him to say that and it’d be like his outburst at the castle and reminded him there were casualties during the White Whale hunt. She was going to say something about Subaru being a knight now means he needs to act differently, but Subaru cut her off to say that the people who died fighting in the Whale Whale hunt were prepared for that but questioning the resolve of people who’ve had their city turned into a battleground is wrong. He indicated that people who’ve made up their minds about the situation need to met by people with the same resolve and that being aware of that at all times and being prepared for what it means is what being a knight is, and he believes that Julius feels the same and goes on a long diatribe about how knights want to look cool as much as possible, even on the brink of death, declaring that he’ll save everyone, which is the lesson he learned in the Sanctuary arc, which I believe Echidna deliberately pushed him to make by saying something so evil about why she had Beatrice wait in the Forbidden Library for 400 years. Although it’s nice to have that mindset, I wonder for how long Subaru will be able to keep it up. Given Re:Zero’s story is often much more realistic than most isekai stories, I do not expect Subaru to be able save everybody for the rest of the story and that he will eventually learn that Return by Death is not infallible, whether that happens now or in some future arc.

The post-credits scene has Emilia sneak into Regulus’s office and pick up his metia, and when there was a connection, she hid her face, only to hear Al say, “What’s this? I got a response.” showing that Al was likely not expecting to get a response since Regulus had just left the building. I always thought it was suspicious that Al left the group that attacked the government office just as they were rearing themselves up for a fight in Episode 54, and it might be ’cause he can’t be seen fighting the Witch Cult since he’s a Witch cultist. That would be why he has access to Capella’s metia. But if Capella wasn’t the one who opened the watergate, which ended up saving Subaru since he would fallen to his death since he probably would have fallen onto concrete, than perhaps it was Al. As I’ve been speculating for years that Witch Cult Gospels are not true forecasters of the future but merely texts connected to Echidna’s mind, Al was perhaps pushed to save Subaru by opening the watergate. Alternatively, if Al was summoned as the immediate previous iteration of the Hero of the story as I’ve been speculating, he might’ve also been summoned by Satella, meaning he also has the scent of the Witch, and that’s how he was able to pose as a Witch cultist, not that he actually is one since Witch cultists can physically see the amount of Witch miasma emanating from you as shown by Episode 22 from Season 1.

Here’s the link to Re:Zero Season 3 Breaktime Episode 6:

KakoeiSbi provides an English translation in the comments section.

Continuing off from last week’s Breaktime episode, Al says that Subaru saved him from going crazy with the knowledge that he exists. Beatrice indicated that the Great Waterfall was probably what Subaru meant when he would say he was from a very far away place when he first arrived in the world, which Al also would say back when he was a newcomer to the world. The Great Waterfall apparently sits at the edge of the world with the world being flat considering Emilia said there is no nation east of Lugunica in Episode 1, and no one has seen what’s beyond the Great Waterfall. Al indicated that Priscilla’s good intuition allowed to realize that Al was from beyond the Great Waterfall as opposed to the hipsters who pretended that that was the case for them even though Al didn’t exactly say that when Subaru asked if Priscilla fell for the excuse they use. It’s nice to get some good lore out of this, and this week had some nice info to chew on despite being slower.

Re:Zero Episode 55 (Season 3 Episode 5) Analysis + Important Details

Posted on November 4, 2024 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

I found this to be quite a powerful episode with potentially lasting consequences.

Continuing on with Regulus and Emilia, Regulus said that Emilia has shown him a new way of thinking when she responded to his question by asking what is a virgin since she had never heard the term before as it shows she has a virgin soul, which he thought made Emilia the very picture of his ideal woman as he probably prefers sheltered women since they are easier to dominate, and dominating is something he very much enjoys doing given he told Wife Number 184 she is a good girl for no longer smiling when she carried out her tasks at his instruction. Given Emilia is considered Wife Number 79 even though he has someone in the 184th position, he probably numbers his wives based on how physically attracted to them he is, which may have been hinted at in Episode 53 when Regulus responded that having a pretty face is all that matters when it comes to love. He likely has many placeholders for how attracted he is to a certain person based on all the wives he’s ever had, and Emilia’s beauty may have matched whoever used to be in the 79th position. Wife Number 184 made it clear that Regulus merely sees those he deems his wives as objects given she indicated whether they want to be his wife is irrelevant, so he’s some nasty piece of work. Emilia remarked that Regulus reminds her of some evil king she read about in a book, to which Wife Number 184 said that that it is a fitting description and that he’s a king in his own right, specifically worthy of the title, “Little King”, which almost certainly has some significance since Re:Zero has no filler. As an aside, Regulus indicating that Emilia having a virgin soul showed him a new way of thinking in that it’s possible to live life up until that point without knowing what a virgin is suggests to me, although I could be mistaken, that he doesn’t take child brides and may only come for women who are of age since it shows he has never encountered a woman who didn’t know what the term virgin means. I believe everything in Re:Zero is intentional to the point that that line may have been included to let viewers know Regulus is undoubtedly evil but not SO evil as to seek out kids.

Back on the roof, Julius reminds Subaru what he set out to do when he was extremely angry after meeting the Sin Archbishop of Gluttony, Roy Alphard, for thinking he had eaten Rem’s name and memories, which resulted in her ending up in suspended animation, and it wasn’t even Roy that did it but Lye. Rem was his strongest emotional support, so it’s no surprise he reacted the way he did. Julius refers to Subaru as “Little Girl User” and Crusch as “The Valkyrie” to avoid having their names be eaten by Roy. I didn’t get it in Episode 54, but after a second episode of Crusch being afraid of being in the air, I see that she is afraid of heights, which is why she was screaming in fear when Subaru carried her through the updraft, when he jumped over to the window of the office where the broadcast metia was, and why Julius told Subaru to take care of Crusch in Episode 54 and to look after her in Episode 55.

When Subaru and Crusch are in the building, they see a dragon that is not happy with them when they motion to get closer. Crusch downs the dragon and they rescue a small girl they believe is a hostage who they don’t realize is actually the Sin Archbishop of Lust, Capella, who has the power to shapeshift at will. Capella points Subaru to the room where the hostages are, and the hostages have all become giant flies as a result of Capella’s dragon blood which transforms those who succumb to its curse. Capella knocked Crusch unconscious while Subaru was checking in on the hostages, and 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. This is the second time Capella has tried to fish for a compliment, so there may be something more underneath the surface here with an insecurity.

Subaru asks her if she’s a dragon that takes human form, and Capella says Subaru displays irrationality that makes him a moron for coming to the conclusion, and she proceeded to beat the shit out of him, which shows she is likely a human who somehow has dragon blood in her body, and she incidentally said that she’d transform into the kind of girl he likes just for him during that exchange. She then 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.

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 doesn’t he want to stroke Crusch’s hair or kiss her 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. This is likely given she was able to read into what Subaru thought of his relationship of Emilia and then belittle him by suggesting he couldn’t possibly love Emilia if she were a fly. With all of this content, I am confident I can make a preliminary Capella character analysis that I will save for another post.

Capella then rips off Subaru’s leg and notes that Subaru and Crusch are both dying, and she started injecting her dragon blood into her and then Subaru, which the dragon Crusch had defeated reacted strongly to as seeing Capella do that probably reminded the dragon of how most of the hostages had become flies, clearly having gained sympathy for Crusch and Subaru. Given Garfiel’s mom’s husband was the only character introduced so far that works in this government office, he probably became this blue-eyed black dragon since their eye colours match. The dragon then blasted a hole through the office as Julius, Garfiel, and Wilhelm’s fight against the strong Witch cultists continued.

Back at the Muse office, Kiritaka reveals that he has learned that no one can get in contact with any members of the Council of Ten aside from himself. He believes it must be the work of the Witch Cult. He tells Anastasia to prepare to evacuate, but she tells him not to throw his life away, which surprises him ’cause he thought Anastasia would say something more self-serving, to which Anastasia says that she does business under the motto, “Your friendly neighbourhood shop.” And this brings me back to Season 1 when Anastasia directly gave Subaru a lesson in negotiating for business when she publicly humiliated him in exchange for a dragon carriage. While Subaru’s behaviour at the time had been clearly self-destructive, she personally helped Subaru get something he needed, all while squeezing the last bit of useful info from him with the knowledge that he had left the Crusch camp on a sour note, only giving him what he wanted after he revealed that Russell Fellow had been to Crusch’s mansion. Sure on the outside it may have seemed like Anastasia was being sadistic, deriving from pleasure from Subaru’s humiliation, but Subaru was pretty much a lost cause at that point, and I believe Anastasia gave him some tough love ’cause it was sad seeing someone walk the path that he was on, and this episode confirms that was what had happened.

Sirius then smashes right through a building, which would have killed Anastasia had Kiritaka not caught her by acting quickly. After remembering Sirius taking a direct blow from Reinhard and be all right, I guess she has to be pretty damn strong after all. Sirius then applauds them for working together to stay alive. When Anastasia reveals that she knows it’s the Sin Archbishop of Wrath, Sirius says she’s embarrassed. Sirius approaches the pair with the intent to kill and Hetaro and Tivey come in to save them even though they’re wounded ’cause of Mimi’s wound from the strong female regular Witch cultist due to their Divine Protection of Trisection causing them to share the wound, which is likely why Mimi hasn’t already died. Hetaro and Mimi springing into action made Anastasia believe that Mimi had perished, but Felix indicated that he used a forbidden method to prevent the wound from getting even worse, which she had also done for Subaru’s leg in Episode 53 after Regulus had attacked him. Anastasia tells Hetaro and Tivey she’ll buy them 2 minutes of time, and Hetaro and Tivey should theoretically be safe from Sirius’s Authority since Sirius isn’t within Mimi’s line of sight, and since you have to see Sirius to fall under her control, Mimi being holed up somewhere should shield Hetaro and Tivey from the effects of Sirius’s Authority. Anastasia then tells Felix to get Mimi and the others who were wounded out and says that she’ll meet him outside. When Anastasia and Kiritaka run into his guards, he says to leave the rest to them while she leaves. He says he is entrusting the city to her, which she says isn’t fair.

Back to the situation with Felt as a hostage, Felt sees a bunch of zodda bugs which come to distract Heinkel, letting Reinhard pin his father to a wall, and with his reluctance to do anything, Felt smashed Heinkel’s head with a bottle of booze, knocking him out so that Reinhard could tie him up. Otto reveals his presence and that he had been looking for a place to hide ’cause of his encounter with Lye, the Sin Archbishop of Gluttony. Apparently, white dragon scales saved him somehow. After that, I’m guessing Lye probably wasn’t too focused on pursuing Otto to eat him given he said Otto won’t even amount to an appetizer, so Otto most likely didn’t have to do all that much hiding. I have to more to say about this after a later reveal towards the end of the episode. Felt then tells Reinhard to go help Subaru and that she’ll take Heinkel to the nearest shelter, which Reinhard reluctantly agreed to. Felt doesn’t know what to about Heinkel, but then two of the thugs from Season 1 who attacked Subaru show up, and Felt commented on their great timing.

The Witch cultists then toll the bell and start flooding the city, and the black dragon/Garfiel’s mom’s husband attempted to carry away Crusch and Subaru, but after Capella latched onto the dragon, Subaru fell off the dragon as the dragon attempted to get away. Emilia is horrified seeing the destruction, and Capella makes three more demands in addition to Typhon’s remains, the Tome of Wisdom that’s been brought into the city, the artificial spirit that’s been chilling in the city, and that the wedding with the silver-haired girl that’s to be held in the city won’t be interrupted although she doesn’t really care about that last demand.

Regarding the Tome of Wisdom, Echidna’s Authority of Greed is the Tome of Wisdom as was revealed in Season 2. Echidna made two “imitations” of her Tome of Wisdom, and Roswaal colloquially called his copy the Tome of Wisdom given they had no actual name. I personally call it the not-quite-Tome of Wisdom. If you recall towards the end of Season 2, Echidna spoke in her own voice through Ryuzu Shima’s body in a moment she was disgusted with Emilia’s selflessness, and I believe this shows that Echidna was successful in her immortality experiment. Given Beatrice can use teleportation and portal spells, she most likely learned it from Echidna, the one who created her, meaning when Ryuzu Shima’s body disappeared with the original Ryuzu Meyer, Echidna had faked her own death although Emilia had not realized it

I believe that neither Roswaal’s not-quite Tome of Wisdom nor Witch Cult Gospels are true future-telling texts but texts connected to Echidna’s mind through magic that she has been using to control the world’s events. Regulus saying in Episode 51 that fate would bring him and the Emilia camp together again despite that not happening again until the 4th loops suggests that Gospels don’t actually tell the future but are meant to keep the world on a specific path that Echidna, Satella, Pandora, and likely others as well all desire.

So based on Capella’s demand, either Echidna herself is in the city with her actual Authority, or someone from the Emilia camp picked up Roswaal’s not-quite Tome of Wisdom ’cause it wasn’t burned to a crisp after all as viewers were led to believe. I had thought it was very peculiar that Otto was hiding out where Felt, Heinkel, and Reinhard were given Episode 51 showed that none of the other camps (aside from Priscilla’s) knew that Anastasia had invited them to Priestella, so he shouldn’t have had any idea where they were staying, so after that reveal at the end about the Tome of Wisdom, Otto is likely the one in possession of what they’re looking for if it’s not Echidna herself with the genuine article in her Tome of Wisdom. Perhaps one might think that Roswaal would’ve checked to see if his Tome had truly been burned, but I believe the events of Season 2 show otherwise. Roswaal, after seeing Ram drop his not-quite-Tome of Wisdom in flames, launched a powerful attack at her, likely ’cause of the intense frustration and anger he felt over Ram doing that since he had been do dependent on the Tome and ’cause Ram was his loyal servant, which made her betrayal feel even more overbearing. After that, he was so intently focused on Ram that I can see him having overlooked checking to see whether his Tome was actually burned since he wouldn’t have been so mad as to launch such a powerful attack at her if he hadn’t thought it was a done deal.

The artificial spirit Capella is demanding is most likely Beatrice given Echidna indicated that she was highly involved in her birth in Season 2. More to support this is that Puck was revealed to have been sent by Echidna to find Emilia in the past in The Frozen Bond OVA with a woman’s speech being denoted by a special font when a woman forced Puck into a contract by which he would lose his memories if he entered into a contract with Emilia with that special font having been revealed to be denoting Echidna’s speech in Season 2, making it likely that both Puck and Beatrice were created by Echidna, which makes Puck calling Beatrice her little sister make sense and gives context and meaning to Beatrice referring to Echidna as mother.

As for that bit about Regulus and Emilia’s wedding, as I’ve previously posted that I believe Witch Cult Gospels are meant to keep the world on a particular path that a group of characters from 400 years ago desires rather than be true forecasters of the future, I believe all three additional demands Capella made were likely due to instruction from her Gospel, and that bit with the wedding was meant to let Subaru know that the wedding is happening soon so that he can stop it even though he had made securing the government office with its powerful metia as his first priority.

Introduction + Re:Zero Episode 51 (Season 3 Episode 1) Analysis + Important details

Posted on October 5, 2024 | by anicritic | 1 Comment

I’m anicritic, and Re:zero was the first anime that got me feeling passionate enough to write about on other bloggers’ comment sections. I like thinking about how scenes connect with previous ones and enjoy diving into characters’ minds to interpret what scenes actually mean and whether there is more underneath the surface of what is immediately presented, and since Re:zero is a series with tons of small details (There is not a single filler moment in this series), hints of future events, and callbacks to previous character and plot moments, that makes it the perfect show for me to cover. As such, I won’t be covering everything in this premiere but just what interests me most and details I believe will need to be remembered. I’ll also be sharing my perspective on a number of things with a trauma-informed perspective since I forgot about the woman I wanted to marry for most of my life for a sustained period of time due to my trauma, which I believe is heavily relevant to this episode and perhaps the season in general.

After Joshua delivered his message to the Emilia camp, Subaru makes a good point that he’d hate to owe a debt to Anastasia knowing she’s a very shrewd businesswoman. Emilia mentions that Priestella would be underwater when it rains without the tall walls and watergates that control the water level, prompting Subaru to think of it more as a water prison. I can tell at this point that Crunchyroll’s translation is really bad at this point despite not knowing Japanese since the conversation there was mangled with Emilia saying that the city would be underwater when it rains, which cannot be true once you’ve seen how the city is set up. Given that once they arrive at Priestella Subaru again complains that he gets the sense that it’s a prison and Beatrice notes that the city was designed to be a trap, it’s clear that the setup of this arc involves Priestella being used as a trap as otherwise they wouldn’t be so heavy-handed about it.

Although Sirius’s whole introduction was the highlight of the episode for most fans of Re:zero, what most interested me was how Garfiel was written this episode. As we know from the Sanctuary Arc, Garfiel was proud to be the strongest person there and the defender of the Sanctuary. Here he saw just how much weaker he was compared to Reinhard, not to mention Reinhard unintentionally pissing Garf off by calling him impressive for his age, which rubbed more salt in the wound. Later on in the episode, Garfiel informs Subaru that he’s taking a step outside since he’s unhappy about not being the strongest. When outside, he has hallucinations of Elsa due to having killed her and also ’cause he came close to dying against her. And it is fantastic writing for Garfiel to be written like this since he clearly demonstrated a fear of death in his first season. I have to hand it to Tappei for being a master of writing his characters to be consistent with what came before. Given Garfiel originally stayed in the Sanctuary ’cause he became scared of the outside world due to seeing that his mother’s carriage had been caught in a landslide, it was clear he had a huge fear of death. This is further backed by how Garfiel backed off after Subaru said that he knows hell and looked at Subaru’s eyes, which shows Garfiel believed that that is indeed the case, a callback to Season 1 Episode 12 when Wilhelm said that Subaru’s eyes indicate that Subaru is well-versed with death. So it is very fitting that Garfiel, who fears death, is struggling with seeing hallucinations of Elsa when she is long dead since it was probably his first kill, which was traumatizing for him. If you’re confused about Garfiel showing no visible signs of being bothered by his killing of Elsa or his stoic behaviour in the Breaktime episode following that in Season 2 telling Maylie that it’s okay to cry, trauma does not always happen close to instantly and can take months to manifest.

In Episode 48 (Episode 24 of Season 2) Garfiel, while fighting Elsa, eventually got a lucky break when the ceiling fell down on Maylie, which distracted Elsa, allowing him to savagely bite into Elsa’s neck repeatedly and do enough damage to stop her regeneration, allowing him to deal the finishing blow. Garfiel who took pride in being the strongest of the Sanctuary, likely had some trauma over defeating Elsa in this way since it took Elsa being distracted rather than him winning a pure man to woman fight. The reality likely dawned on him that he wouldn’t have won a fair fight, leading to him thinking he isn’t the strongest, and hence, weak as the hallucination of Elsa said. If Garfiel only had these hallucinations rarely, he will likely have them more often now that Reinhard has shown how much he outclasses him. Garfiel wants to be the strongest ’cause he fears death and ’cause he’s a young teenager and who hasn’t developed a healthy self-esteem yet. Clearly from Subaru’s struggles with RBD and now Garfiel, Tappei has shown he has a very nuanced view of death with Garfiel in having both have trauma for killing Elsa and also being reminded of his mortality due to the circumstances of his victory over her, and this should be applauded.

I have also long believed that Episodes 12 and 13 contrasted Crusch and Priscilla’s approach to acquiring power with the context gleaned from Episode 16, and Episode 51 has given what I believe is more ammunition to support this thought. Before I bring up the relevant contrasts, I first need to state outright that I believe Priscilla is a lot less whimsical than she lets on. Every bit of Priscilla’s interaction with Subaru in Episode 16 was well thought out and cannot be simplified to Priscilla being a creature of her emotions or that she was looking for entertainment. On a lot of occasions Priscilla says that it’s for her entertainment or that it’s amusing, I suspect she just doesn’t want the people involved to know what she’s really thinking. You can’t always trust what a character says at face value.

This is backed by Priscilla calling Subaru her appa handler to Marcos and then following through with that by calling Subaru her manservant to Emilia. This sequence of actions shows that Priscilla saw significant value in Subaru after he dared to defy her and try to protect her anyway despite her needing no such assistance and how he taught her that appas have red skin, even considering him in some extent part of her camp due to some possessiveness.

Priscilla was notably the only Royal Selection candidate in Arc 3 to give Subaru help in the way of pointers after his outburst at the castle without asking for anything of monetary or strategic value in return. When she said that she appreciates Subaru’s desperation but that Subaru had not thought things through with how his actions amounted to cornering his ally, benefiting his enemy, and losing all control in the process, she basically straight up told Subaru that his actions weren’t helping Emilia and were unbecoming.

She specifically said that Subaru was better off dying for using the sort of approach he was using. Contrast this with Crusch wanting Emilia to withdraw from the Royal Selection as compensation for helping out and Anastasia wanting to see what sort of information she could learn from Subaru in his vulnerable state, Priscilla was basically being somewhat selfless and acting out of the goodness of her heart, however shocking that may be.

Priscilla basically gave Subaru a chance to redeem himself in her eyes after his outburst at the castle in Episode 16. That’s why she told him that his desperation wasn’t helping Emilia and then immediately posed a situation to him that would require for him to be disgustingly desperate with her asking for him to lick her foot. She was basically hoping for him to pass a test in which she had already clearly given him pointers, and Subaru still failed miserably, which Priscilla most likely saw as being extremely disgraceful after all the effort she put in to make the interaction favourable for him with her hinting at what she actually wanted to see from him.

I believe the reason Priscilla decided that SHE would strike down any camp Subaru was a part of, not that she would have any camp he was a part of be struck down, is that he did something that insulted her to the core, and for someone as extremely proud and confident in herself to the extreme as Priscilla is, it would be to show that she was wrong about her womanly instincts in some way, and that would be that Subaru showed that he was pathetic and not worth her time after she would go as far as to try and make Emilia jealous by grabbing his arm and suggesting that Subaru was her (Priscilla’s) manservant at the Royal Palace. Showing that she was wrong to think more of Subaru was shameful to her, so much that she beat the hell out of him, lectured him, and threatened him to strike down any camp he was a part of.

Her wanting to strike down any camp he is a part of shows she wants Subaru to be humiliated to the extreme because it was a personal humiliation for her that she misjudged Subaru, and for a guy who is struggling through his way in the world and acts as a white knight, what greater shame could he face than to have his ambitions be thwarted by Priscilla, the one who had him on his knees and asked him to savour the humiliation of licking her foot, every time he tried to make something of himself? It would be the ultimate humiliation.

This interpretation is backed by Priscilla saying, “Your careless behavior and attitude have lead me to that decision!” It shows that she thought that Subaru would think over the reason for that particular interaction leading to the way it did and that she expected a better response from him. I do note that Priscilla was likely also angry because Subaru abandoned his pride, and for someone who values her pride so much, seeing Subaru lower himself to that level probably disgusted her, but I believe the main source of her anger that bordered on rage was a sense of humiliation due to her pride being wounded, leading to her feeling significant shame.

If Subaru was just a little ant or clown to her, she would not have reacted the way she did in as deciding to strike down any camp he is a part of is far too punishing for just being disgusted at Subaru’s actions. Priscilla decided to personally see to Subaru’s attempts at achieving manhood in the future be denied, castrating him at every turn, most likely as a reminder to herself not to make the same mistake again in misjudging a man to avoid a similarly shameful moment from happening again.

In personally striking down any camp Subaru is a part of, Priscilla also gives Subaru a chance to redeem himself by defeating her, which would prove she was right that he is a man of significant worth. Any way the future goes if she carries out this threat to strike down any camp Subaru is a part of is thus a win for her no matter what the outcomes is, which shows Priscilla had very carefully thought out the entire interaction with Subaru, from her using her fan to hide her lips to hurling Subaru to the door so that Al could take him away, so it had nothing to do with entertainment but was meant to be a test for Subaru, and she had already thought about what she’d say if he failed it.

Given Priscilla had planned out the entire interaction with Subaru in Episode 16, it goes to show that is possibly the case in other scenarios too, not just that one moment. I’ll get back to this point later.

Crusch notably indicated in Episode 12 that she thought that the Royal Selection candidates for there at the castle for a drinking party where they get to know each other before they face each other as rivals. Although she was mistaken ’cause Felix knows how to get around her Divine Protection, I believe it still shows that Crusch is the type to value camaraderie due to how hyped up she sounded about it.

In contrast, Priscilla, if I am right about her being a lot less whimsical than she lets on, specifically is used to or grew up using a divide-and-conquer strategy. Emilia faces tons of discrimination for her half-elf heritage, so taking a shot at her by asking Emilia if she is sorry for being born would play well with a lot of the nobles and even much of Lugunica’s Imperial Knights since kids are raised on folktales of the horrifying Witch of Envy even if Priscilla does not necessarily have a hatred for demihumans and specifically half-elves herself. I’m not saying that Priscilla does or doesn’t fear half-elves since I genuinely don’t know but that there may have been a point to her hurtful words to Emilia.

Even with Priscilla’s interaction with Felt when the former moved to ‘strike’ the latter might not have been ’cause Priscilla lost control of her emotions. Priscilla heard very well that the nobles thought it was an insult that the knights brought a girl from the slums to participate in the Royal Selection with all the talk of her lack of grace and education. Priscilla knew full well that with Reinhard around that she would be unable to commit actual violence, especially towards Felt, and I believe she did what she did to look better in front of the nobles since many of them would like to strike Felt as well for daring to be there even though it wasn’t her own choice to be present. Thus, I believe Episodes 12 and 13 demonstrated two contrasting styles for attaining power, Crusch’s camaraderie and Priscilla’s divide-and-conquer strategy.

As for Episode 51, Season 3’s premiere, Priscilla brought out Heinkel to spoil a family reunion. She may have said that it’s amusing to do so, but I again put it out there that she just doesn’t want people to know what she’s really thinking. In all likelihood, Priscilla brought Heinkel to the gathering ’cause she knows that if the Astrea house were to be united in favour of one candidate that that candidate would be the favourite to win the Royal Selection. That would be why she sought to prevent Reinhard and Wilhelm from making up by allowing Heinkel to take a piss and ruin things for Reinhard and Wilhelm, which is continuing her divide-and-conquer strategy. I don’t believe that she was really going to strike Heinkel with the Yang sword, and that it was performative to prevent people from realizing what sort of person she actually is.

As for Crusch’s side of things, she implied in the premiere of Season 3 that the reason the Emilia camp was even invited to Priestella by Anastasia was ’cause Crusch knew how much Subaru cares about Rem and personally ensured that Anastasia invited the Emilia camp to the Watergate City. Crusch cares very much about camaraderie and building good will, and that is one of the reasons she’s my favourite character in Re:zero. I fully believe Episode 51 also contrasted Crusch and Priscilla’s approaches, much like I propose was the case for Episodes 12 and 13. Earlier on in the episode before Subaru left the mansion, we saw him talk to Rem even though she couldn’t hear a thing he said due to her being in suspended animation, so the episode did well to remind viewers how much Rem means to Subaru.

I have more to say about Priscilla, but now I’m going to bring up some of my own background. When I was in 6th grade, the girl who was a few years younger than me I had wanted to marry since I first met her at my school’s open house said that her family was moving away to a different province. The conversation eventually went to her discussing her university plans since she had planned it out from a young age with help from her mom. She suggested that we meet up again at a specific university, which led to me asking her if we’d get married in university. It’s unbelievable that I would say something like that now, and I wonder how I ever had the courage to do that as a young boy. Anyway, long story short, I forgot that girl’s face over the years even though she was so dear to me. I decided to go to university, not ’cause I had a strong desire for a particular career but ’cause I wanted to meet her again even though I’m not sure how that’d even happen since I no longer remembered her face. I followed a friend into Engineering even though I didn’t have an interest in it, and of course I didn’t do well since I was unmotivated and hadn’t picked up good study habits since school had come easy to me up until that point. At the first sign of struggle when it was clear I was not going to pass the second semester, I decided to drop out since I didn’t want to impact my GPA too badly. As I had it relatively easy up until then, my first schooling failure led to me feeling shame, and I felt I didn’t want that girl I fancied to know about that failure since it’d be ugly. Before I dropped out, I reasoned that I would never see her again since I couldn’t even remember her face, so it made it easier for me to do so. I wanted to think about this failure as little as possible instead of processing it like a normal healthy person, so I thought to myself that I’d forget as much of this incident and that university as possible and even transfer to a different university. As a result, I had some self-afflicted trauma about my worth as a person, and that trauma led to me repressing my memories of that girl since that university was the last tie to her in my memories since I could no longer remember her face, meaning that forgetting about as much as of that experience possible cut away the last connection to her in my mind.

At that different university I took a number of psychology courses, and I learned that shame is one of the most common emotions that can lead to memories being repressed although I didn’t come to realize that my own memories had been repressed until years later. Years later, I met that woman again at my workplace where I was a star employee. I didn’t recognize her since I had 0 recollection of her face even before I had repressed my memories. I was immediately drawn to her although after years of social isolation I couldn’t even have a proper conversation with her. Due to pent up unaddressed emotions I felt regarding her in my subconscious and my conscious mind, I eventually had a mental health crisis and ended up in the psych ward. After spending time there, one of the student nurses made me think back to my grade school days, and I was able to unlock my repressed memories of that woman, realizing that she was the same person from my youth. My point is that deep shame can cause one to repress your memories, and I will now get back to writing about Priscilla.

I know it might be a tough sell since Episode 16 is just one scene from a character that has only showed up in 3 episodes prior to Season 3, but Priscilla’s outrage along with her body language during the scene which included her playing with her hair as well as uncrossing and crossing her legs before she approached Subaru says to me that she thought of Subaru as being more than just a clown or jester and as someone she will make herself presentable for by showing off her feminine features. If that’s the case, perhaps her approaching Subaru with her fan actually doubled as a romantic overture alongside a test of Subaru’s dignity, and that scenario would mean that Subaru’s best response would be to say something along the lines of “Wait a minute. You really want me to lick your feet? I’d say somebody has a foot fetish.” It would be a clever way to turn the tables on Priscilla and take away the inordinate power she had over Subaru during this interaction by reframing the situation as being something Priscilla so desperately wants.

While it may not matter to Subaru whether or not Priscilla was attempting to demonstrate a power move against Emilia when she declared him as her manservant, what matters is Priscilla’s intent. If that was what she intended, Subaru’s loudly declaring himself to be Emilia’s knight at the Royal Selection would be seen as a rejection of her romantic overture. Depending on how badly she was impacted by this perceived rejection, there are 2 ways I suppose she was most likely to respond based on her always behaving as if she’s the most important woman/person in the world:

Priscilla will downplay Subaru’s achievements the next time they meet and possibly in the future as well as a way to make Subaru seem less of a catch so that it doesn’t seem that she missed out on much by being rejected by him since she felt so much shame about misjudging Subaru. This would be her overcompensating for her initial impression of him being soured by the horribly embarrassing outburst at the castle so as to preserve her ego by telling herself that Subaru was not really worth it. An extreme case of this would be pretending that she doesn’t even remember Subaru so as to outwardly project that Subaru isn’t worth remembering as a means of saving face for the perceived rejection regardless of Subaru not caring about or never having perceived that he rejected her in Episode 12.
Priscilla was affected so badly by Subaru’s humiliating display at the castle, which called into question her initial good impression of him as a potential lover, that she completely forgets memories related to that event due to the overwhelming shame she felt over her instincts as a woman leading to her settling on Subaru, meaning she forgets all memories about having met Subaru on that day. This is referred to as repression in psychology. Priscilla unconsciously pushes away thoughts about Subaru because of how much that incident traumatized her since it caused her to see that she had made a horrible mistake in judging Subaru to be a potential lover, which calls into question her absolute faith in her own judgement. Her mind thus represses the thoughts to preserve her ego. She would think about his outburst over and over until she subconsciously represses memories of him to get rid of the negative feelings she felt about how Subaru defied her expectations and turned out to be a complete and total loser. In this scenario, Priscilla was negatively impacted by Subaru’s outburst even moreso than Emilia herself despite how shocking that might be.

And after encountering Subaru again after forgetting him, she could still pretend to not remember him after she has actually recovered her memories to distance herself from him because his horrible outburst at the castle was still weighing on her and lowered his perceived value to her so she has to save face after Subaru so loudly declared himself to be Emilia’s knight after Priscilla introduced Subaru to Marcos as her appa handler and called Subaru her manservant to Emilia, rejecting her (Priscilla) so boldly in the process in favour of a silver-haired half elf who is the spitting image of Satella, which would be considered the ultimate rejection. If Subaru is a complete and utter loser, and he chose someone who looks like the biggest monster that has ever existed in that world over Priscilla, then that makes Priscilla the loser to end all losers by association, and she can’t have that, so she has to cope even harder by saying that she can’t remember Subaru until her perceived value of him is great enough that the perceived rejection is not so bad anymore because Subaru has become just too great of a catch.

I know some people will point to Al saying to Priscilla that she loves watching wicked beasts torment weak creatures and her affirming that she does love that as well as well as Episode 25’s title being “That’s All This Story Is About” and Priscilla’s claim of bringing Subaru along as entertainment as being things that directly refute my analysis, but I cannot believe that she took pleasure in watching Subaru get emasculated and was actually horrified. Her extreme reaction in Episode 16 that had her being outraged that Subaru didn’t think clearly about why she made the request for him to lick her feet and declare that she would strike down any camp he belonged to doesn’t jive with assertions that Priscilla thought of him as some lowly peon. If he was some gnat to her, she would not have been so outraged that she threatened to strike down any camp he was a part of, which is effectively castrating him and denying him in all his efforts to achieve manhood. And what’s more is that she said that SHE would strike down any camp he was a part of, not that she would have any camp he was part of be struck down. She made it clear that it was something she would do personally, which shows how much of an affront Subaru’s behaviour was to her. The purpose of personally striking down any camp Subaru is three-fold, to deliver him the utmost humiliation, to remind herself not to make the same mistake in wrongly choosing a man again, and to give Subaru a chance to defeat her, proving that her initial impression of him was right all along.

I personally lean towards Priscilla having genuinely forgot Subaru due to trauma due to my own experience, and now I’ll share how this is relevant to the Emilia situation. As we know from Season 3’s premiere, Emilia didn’t recognize Regulus even though she thought he seemed familiar. I’ve seen some casual Re:zero watchers say it makes no sense for Emilia to forget Regulus and that it was poor writing since she saw him attack Petelgeuse when she was younger, but given how traumatic that incident was for her, she could also have repressed some of her memories, especially since Regulus was only a small part of young Emilia’s memories with most of what was shown of Regulus being from the 1st Sanctuary trial. And that is before going into the entire context of Season 2. In Season 2, Puck broke his contract with Emilia so that she could regain access to her memories, allowing her to successfully take the trials, and it came with a flood of memories since her memories of her actual past had been sealed away at the time. Emilia notably wondered whether she is even the same person after getting them back, so she was having an identity crisis. The triple whammy of the trauma from her memories, her having an identity crisis, and Regulus’s relative insignificance in her memories since it was Pandora that caused her to lose everything likely all contributed to her not remembering Regulus. It is not poor writing but something that can feasibly happen given I forgot the one most dear to me, so why wouldn’t Emilia forget someone who wasn’t a big part of her life since she only saw him briefly attack Petelgeuse given that a year had passed with probably nothing violent happening during that time that could bring that incident to mind?

As an aside, during the scene when Subaru remarked that one of the canals was flowing in the other direction, and Emilia pointed out that a control tower that controls the flow of water throughout the city (probably not filler since Re:zero has no filler), it was revealed that both Garfiel and Subaru have a fear or perhaps trauma of masses of water although Garfiel was able to overcome that when he saved a group of kids without even thinking about it. This will likely seriously hinder Subaru and perhaps Garfiel as well as Subaru works to try to bring everybody to a good end this arc. One of the kids Garf saved named Fred has an older sister named Rafiel, and their mother is no other than the mother he thought was long dead given her carriage had been caught in a landslide. This should be an interesting development although the aftermath of that was skipped, so we viewers don’t know what happened, but this is surely not the last we’ve seen of this plot point, and it looks like Garfiel is set to get bucketloads of character development this arc.

When the Emilia camp arrives at the Wings on the Water inn, I made a mental note that I believe this is the first building in the anime which had its name focused on. Given that Re:zero has no filler, I believe it may have future relevance although I don’t know what that might be. When inside, Otto reveals that Hoshin, one of the founders of Kararagi, built Priestella, and Subaru reasons that due to the entire building structure and also how they have to take off their shoes that Hoshin must have been summoned from Japan like he was to build a city like this with all these Japanese customs and architecture. This is relevant ’cause I believe the anime in Season 1 danced around with clues of another character having been summoned.

As a refresher, in Episode 12, Subaru had no way of going to the Royal Castle since Emilia left without him. He thus decided to hitchhike, probably ’cause he thought of it as being a universally understood signal back on Earth. However, hitchhiking wasn’t invented until well past the Industrial Revolution when cars were invented, so it probably wouldn’t have been invented in Re:zero’s world despite them having dragons. That means at least one of the carriage driver, Priscilla, or Al knew what hitchhiking was and had come from Earth. Episode 13 had Al indicate he knew what Subaru was referring to when he was exasperated from hearing Anastasia speak in the Kansai dialect, a uniquely Japanese phenomenon, and that suggests that Al was summoned from Earth like Subaru had been since Al outright knew what the Kansai dialect is. This is further hinted at when Priscilla in Episode 16 used the English word “chance”, saying that the opportunity she gave to Subaru is what he would refer to as a chance, which shows she did this knowing that Al and Subaru are from the same world and that she likely learned the word from Al. To top it all off, later in that same episode, Mimi is shown eating cheeseburgers, which were invented from Earth, meaning in no uncertain terms at least one person from Earth had been summoned before Subaru to invent them. All of this along with Subaru’s realization that Hoshin had also been summoned show that Al was without a doubt also summoned from Earth.

I have less to say about this, but I wonder what the point of Liliana singing a song about Wilhelm was given Subaru’s reaction to hearing it. The details about their broadcasts will probably still be relevant later in this arc, but why sing a song about Wilhelm’s love life given his wife had died so many years ago? Clearly Wilhelm and Heinkel don’t believe that Reinhard literally killed Reinhard given she died in a White Whale expedition hunt, but we still don’t know all the details regarding what happened. After night fell, Subaru had a talk with Wilhelm, who had learned about himself through his wife since he was just a knucklehead who only cared about wielding a sword back in the day. He says he is the reason for the rift between him and Reinhard and doesn’t know how to approach Reinhard after all these years since he had neglected him, and Subaru just told him outright that Reinhard wanted to hear the story about the White Whale to reassure him that Reinhard wants to mend fences with him. And given Wilhelm had told Subaru he had three regrets in life and named one of them, his rift with Reinhard, I believe Subaru’s chat with Julius implied that the other two are that Wilhelm failed to find the member of the Royal Family that had been kidnapped and that he was away ’cause of that search, leading to his wife, Theresia, dying. It was interesting all three regrets were revealed in one episode. I’m wondering if there is a point to that.

Sirius Romanee-Conti then introduced herself close to the end of the episode as the Sin Archbishop of Wrath and clapped her hands after 30 seconds had gone by since she started talking, at which she had pointed out herself that they all went silent after 30 seconds, and it seemed the whole crowd, including, Subaru fell under her control. Sirius appears to be able to read the emotional state of the people in her crowd and herds them to one specific emotion so that the damage inflicted on her chosen victim’s body is transferred over to the whole crowd. If Sirius catching people in her spell with her talking is her power, Liliana is probably the counter to this by disrupting Sirius’s emotional manipulation, and that’s probably why Liliana was introduced this arc.

Subaru’s reaction after looping was great. He most likely felt sick to his stomach since it was the first time he had died in over a year and ’cause while he may have been under a trance/spell, he remembered everything that was happening and how absorbed he and the whole crowd was with Sirius’s performance, and how they clapped over Sirius throwing a boy to his death.

All in all this was quite a fun premiere, and I enjoyed writing this despite how much time it took for me to do so since the episode was filled with important connections to make from previous seasons and even from within this episode itself.