As Subaru had indicated in Ep. 18, From Zero, the southern nation cannot be entered, which I’m guessing is ’cause its borders are closed. And the most obvious reasons I can think of for a border closure is either a migration crisis or a civil war, the latter of which could involve a military coup given there’s often a correlation between a civil war and a military coup on real-life Earth, and that’s why he wanted to go west to Kararagi since he doesn’t like cold winters, which are common from the northern kingdom.
Given nobody in Kararagi recognized Priscilla, she’s not tied to the leadership there, and Season 4 referred to it as the Kararagi City-States, so there probably are no royals with Priscilla almost certainly having formerly been a royal given she’d never seen an unpeeled appa, which is a stretch even for somebody who’s simply part of the nobility. Lugunica’s Royal Family perished, and Reinhard twitching out over Felt’s physical characteristics suggests that Felt may have been the kidnapped member of the Royal Family from 15 years ago, meaning Priscilla’s not associated with the Lugunican Royal Family, so the only two places left are the Holy Kingdom of Gusteko and the Sacred Empire of Vollachia.
Sirius also mentioned Iris and the Thorn King and Magritzer’s Gibbet, which are either directly or loosely-related to royals, such as the Thorn King directly referencing a king and the gibbet, which is a gallows-like structure that could involve either royals or criminals punished by royals.
Given Season 4 has had two Vollachia name-drops so far, first with the name of person the Book of the Dead that Julius had read belonged to having come from there, and now with Priscilla directly naming the Sacred Empire of Vollachia as being the nation that targeted her mansion in Re:Zero Break Time 82, I expect more on this topic to come up sooner rather than later, whether Priscilla be an enemy royal of Vollachia from Gusteko or an estranged royal from Vollachia.
As shown by Eps. 51 and 67, Subaru has still has major self-image issues with him thinking he’s such a loser for having been the only one to lose his cool and his insecure remarks to Julius lightly throwing a jab his way as someone self-confident wouldn’t have been phased by Julius’s remark. While I can see why somebody would think it was just a casual roasting between friends, I don’t think that was the case.
What backs up my read is that people who have unresolved trauma are more likely to lash out ’cause those with strong memories of past unpleasant situations may have disrupted/irregular emotional regulation if they were impacted by them enough, and that was definitely the case with Subaru’s inferiority complex centered around his dad. Even Naoko’s comments in the 1st Sanctuary trial put pressure on Subaru to become half as cool as his dad, who’s a freaking gigachad, so while that may have alleviated some of the crushing weight he felt being in his dad’s shadow, his feeling of being in Kenichi’s shadow didn’t go away entirely and wouldn’t from a talk like that for somebody with a trauma as complex as his centered around failing to live up to being his dad’s son and also how he was abandoned by those he’d developed surface-level relationships with just to act out in an effort to compensate for his not being as great as his father was.
Thus, given all Subaru has achieved up until this point, the previous Subaru still being stuck in a state of self-loathing necessitated amnesiac Subaru challenging that by saying that Natsuki Subaru is an amazing guy as he’d experienced all of the challenges and all the setbacks that the previous Subaru had gone through to know that he’s objectively achieved a lot even if he needed a lot of support to do so unlike in many of the anime and light novel isekai slop he’d most likely consumed before being summoned to the fantasy world.
This was an excellent use of dissociation in fiction with how amnesiac Subaru reading Subaru’s Books of the Dead and how the two Subaru’s interacting helped the other understand something about himself he hadn’t realized, which any serious take on dissociation needs to get across, and better yet, the two of them merged into one rather than one just absorbing the other, showing that Tappei does his research on the subject matter for his story, and I expect amnesiac Subaru to keep up the good fight in pushing against Subaru’s poor self-image in a corner of his mind in his long journey to achieving self-love. I believe Episode 82’s title being Subaru’s named episode was very appropriate. Once again, this episode demonstrated how much care Tappei put into his story in creating an enjoyable and layered narrative by using an amnesia plotline as an avenue for character development rather than simply as a plot device.
Much like for Ep. 72 when my write-up almost entirely centered around Julius, I believe any write-up that doesn’t do Subaru justice this episode is grossly lacking. I believe this is an episode that distinguishes between casual watchers of Re:Zero who’re just there for the ride and watchers who are there to engage with what the story is telling, who I call the core fans of Re:Zero, regardless of their degree of understanding of the details given Re:Zero is a highly complex story that’s not always easy to follow, but those who try are whom I qualify as being core fans. While I personally think this episode isn’t as strong as some of the absolute best episodes of this season, those who merely think the episode was fine fall into the casual watcher category while those who have greater appreciation for Subaru’s character arc across four seasons, the groundwork laid from Season 1 up until now, and/or the setup from previous episodes of this season are the core fans. While some people had heard from novel readers about this episode, Natsuki Subaru, being amazing and how it’d be the best episode of all time before even knowing what was in it, I stay off social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok, so I had no preconceived notion of the episode’s quality going into it, and that helps me approach gauging this episode better than most others would in my opinion.
As one could tell when amnesiac Subaru was reading Natsuki Subaru’s many Books of the Dead, amnesiac Subaru was looking for what made the previous Subaru special since he believed he fundamentally lacked something the previous Subaru did, which is why he’s been struggling so hard. I’ll get back to this after a bit of a detour.
I ended up being right about that there being one Book of the Dead for each death in Ep. 71, although that doesn’t clear up whether new timelines are being created when Subaru dies, a straight up time rewind every time, or it’s a re-creation of the world from a particular point, but Melakuera’s words about the Witch’s return, the world imbalance, and how he’d faced world-ending crises countless times suggest that it’s more likely a straight up time rewind or a re-creation of the world given it appeared to be a clear cut adaptation and involved no creative liberties. Ep. 15, which had Puck cut off Subaru’s head as after he was crying and shouting aloud Petelgeuse’s name due to what Petelgeuse had done to those he cared about, especially Rem, followed by ending credits with the scene continuing was likely not in the source material as Tappei almost certainly hadn’t written those ending credits into his story, meaning the continuation of the world we’d seen in that episode was perhaps not canon to the source but a creative liberty much like when Ep. 36 had the dark mist/clouds in Emilia’s eyes which were meant to show that Emilia had gone insane, and that’s why she hadn’t realized how heavily injured Subaru was with him being on the verge of death. For Subaru’s 2nd Sanctuary trial, Echidna also said that it wasn’t possible to know whether the “unthinkable presents” he saw truly happened unless you’re Satella herself, but I potentially call bullshit on that, and the reason is that my speculation on Ep. 71 posited that in addition to the alternate timelines possibility, the other possibility is that Subaru is partially a product of Echidna’s Authority with the world being re-created from a certain point with Subaru’s soul having been sent back to his body since his entire body resets with his soul, which is the seat of memories in Re:Zero, being why he just doesn’t outright forget everything. Melakuera’s words about how he’d faced world-ending crises countless times in the Frozen Bonda OVA also lend to it being a straight up time rewind or the world being re-created due to implying he’s either being repeatedly sent back into time or re-summoned into the re-created world after its destruction. I do believe there’s very much something that suggests that Return by Death is a power that re-creates the world though, which I’ll get into next.
Someone who follows Tcrow on Crow’s World of Anime would know of most of what I’m planning to post next given I used to post theories there before I started my blog, but it won’t be a full rehash as I’m now including more content in light of Ep. 70 and Ep. 79. My entire theory here hinges on giving White Fox the benefit of the doubt and not assuming it screwed up in animating Re:zero, and I’m confident that everything was intentional. I believe that, in addition to reloading at a save point, reality is sometimes warped so that Subaru and his surroundings within a TBD radius or select objects/people/buildings in that radius (trying to cover all my bases here in case the Authority) somehow arrived at that point somewhere between a minute and a few minutes earlier each time he dies and that reality is warped to account for this discrepancy much like how the White Whale’s Fog of Elimination can erase a person entirely and adjust people’s memories that involved a person that was erased as well as erasing that person’s material possessions, and that is what is actually Return by Death. Why do I believe this to be the case? The primary reason is because of the difference between Subaru’s first loop and his third loop in Arc 1 and because of what happened with Subaru’s ringtone for the White Whale hunt in Arc 3 although I have evidence from Arc 2 as well.
A stone statue of the insignia was shown right after Subaru’s realization that he was summoned into another world, which then cut to a scene at 2:30 in Episode 1 showing Felt running on rooftops and jumping across them with Emilia’s insignia in hand long before Subaru had even met the appa guy at the 3:30 mark, which is where his first save point would be. At 5:02, Felt is again being shown running and jumping across rooftops, which shows she had the insignia before meeting Subaru in the alley. This suggests that RBD not only resets time when he dies but that there’s a spacetime displacement on top of the reset or else he wouldn’t have ever been able to see the the theft in the first place in the third loop given that he had time to pass out in front of the appa guy’s shop and see Emila pass the appa guy’s shop and have a brief conversation with her during that third loop.
Subaru would not be able to figure out that there is a spacetime displacement by checking out his phone after a death since his phone resets with him and would show the same time reading every time he Returned by Death, but it would be possible to figure this out by checking his phone during an event that consistently happens such as his first meeting with Roswaal and the mansion’s residents in Arc 2. However, Subaru did not check the time during these meetings, so he missed the opportunity to see whether he experiences a spacetime displacement. Subaru asking Rem and Ram what the date and time were in Episode 6 showed that Subaru just did the bare minimum, which is to see what time it was when he started his save point, but he made no effort to discern whether there was anything more to RBD. I will now post some circumstantial evidence involving Arc 2 and some more damning evidence in Arc 3 that I believe supports my theory.
In the first loop of the mansion arc, Puck awoke after Subaru and Emilia had exercised briefly, and he wasn’t tired in the least. They spoke a bit and then Ram and Rem inform that Roswaal has returned. After his first death, Subaru had time to run around the mansion and find Beatrice so that he could mope in the library. He then left the library and met Emilia outside, speaking to her somewhat briefly, and Puck was visibly tired after waking up. They had time to spare since the twins didn’t come to announce Roswaal’s return. In the third loop, Subaru spent an even longer time with Beatrice, got knocked out of the mansion by Beatrice twice, and got cleaned by a visibly tired Puck, yet he still had time for banter with Puck before the Roswaal meeting. So he wastes more and more time in loops two and three but still seemingly started the meeting at the usual time. I speculate that in the second and third loops, Puck is more tired because he is waking up earlier than he did in Loop 1, which shows there is a spacetime displacement on top of the time rewind.
Now, here is the big one. During the loop the alliance between three Royal Selection camps actually fought the White Whale, Subaru’s phone rang for a while before the whale showed up. The sky was also clear. In the loop directly before that in which Otto and Rem were erased by the White Whale, the area was already foggy and the whale had already attacked by that point. This suggests that Subaru’s phone started ringing a bit too early because it had been running for a longer period of time due to a spacetime displacement on top of a reset. If the strike force had been defeated, forcing Subaru to reset once more, everyone might have just deserted him because the Whale would have taken longer to arrive on yet another loop. I also believe that the reason Subaru saw Russell Fellow in Episode 16 is because Subaru died enough times to finally witness Russell leaving Crusch’s mansion, and that would be because of that spacetime displacement. You know what they say. Once is by chance, twice is a coincidence, and three times is a pattern. There’s no way White Fox messed up in animating Re:zero 3 arcs in a row.
However, we never see incidents of Subaru appearing to gain time again after the White Whale hunt, and Russell Fellow took Subaru’s phone as part of the deal made for the White Whale hunt to happen, so even if something like that were to happen, it’d be harder to confirm without that cellphone. Thus, to extrapolate from my newer theory about how Subaru’s Authorities are shaped by the biggest regret of each of those in the dark world, Return by Death may be shaped by Satella’s biggest regret being that her and Subaru’s love for each other wasn’t enough to win four hundred years ago, and I’ll explain why Subaru and Satella were likely lovers in the past.
Eps. 18, 25, and 38 show Subaru has dormant memories of Satella as shown by how Puck indirectly revealed in Ep. 18 the number of shadow hands Satella could generate to Subaru by asking Petelgeuse to summon a thousand if he truly wants to kill him, half of what Satella could (two thousand), how Subaru used a number associated with her (two thousand) to indicate his appreciation for Emilia in Ep. 25 when he said that if Emilia named ten things she hated about herself he’d list two thousand things he loves about her, which Emilia herself commented on why he chose that number, and how Subaru suddenly had an upwelling of positive emotion for Satella in Ep. 38 that led him to say that he’d save her after she asked him to love himself and then some day come kill her, which shows Subaru and Satella likely had a past history together as lovers given just moments ago in that episode Subaru had been calling her an unfathomable monster he could never hope to understand, showing they must’ve had a very positive relationship in the past.
Satella saying in Ep. 38 that Subaru gave her everything supports that the two of them have a past history with each other, and Shaula saying she wouldn’t mind becoming “the half-witch’s apprentice” regarding Emilia in Ep. 73 shows Shaula knew that Satella was a witch as she’s been stuck in a tower for four hundred years, so they came from the same era. Shaula saying what she did showed that she drew a parallel between Satella and Emilia in that both of them may have the affection of Subaru, who she believes is Flügel, and Flügel, who I believe was Kenichi and Subaru in the same body (Kenichi’s body), through their cooking, meaning learning from Emilia, who she likens to Satella, would be a good way of increasing Subaru’s affection for her. Given Shaula specifically singled out Emilia’s cooking rather than Ram’s, I believe there was definitely a point to that, which was probably Emilia’s physical appearance.
So to sum it all up, I believe Satella’s biggest regret may have shaped Subaru’s Authority of Envy in that Subaru can loop back to a certain point of her choosing to overcompensate for their love not being enough in the past. I don’t know whether that is an active or passive choice/power from Satella. All I know is that I believe Subaru’s power by himself isn’t what the anime has shown thus far as being Return by Death likely involves Satella to be able to loop that far back, and I believe if Subaru can trigger the Authority of Envy himself, it would only bring him back 3 minutes at most due to what happened in all of Arcs 1, 2, and 3. I also don’t know whether Satella’s involvement in Return by Death can be disabled by an external force, but I believe Subaru when he is in the dark world after death, with situations with him being in the dark world being after death or when he breaks the Taboo, may choose to not activate his expression of Return by Death that manifests in a spacetime displacement of up to three minutes, meaning only Satella looping him back to a savepoint happens, and in that situation there’s no warping of Subaru’s surroundings in a TBD radius or select objects/people/buildings in that radius as if they’d occurred however much time before that (variable?) amount of time he’d gained. If I am right about this being how Subaru’s Authority of Envy, Return by Death, works, it’d support that Return by Death re-creates the world from a certain point, so it’s more than just a time rewind.
Now back to Subaru’s character, there’s very much a point to this GIF. The shots of Ep. 1 and Ep. 3 show that Subaru was drawn toward Emilia’s kindness, and that’s what helped him persevere through all that pain and suffering to save others. The kindness Emilia showed Subaru when no one else had given a damn started Subaru’s trajectory of saving so many people.
When he was on the verge of giving up in Ep. 18, From Zero, due to getting his shit kicked in over and over with him wallowing in despair about how he’d never done anything, Rem reminded Subaru that he is kind, telling him how he saved her in multiple ways, and that moment clearly linked to Ep. 37 when Subaru said that Rem would tell him to stand up instead of telling him to leave everything to her since he knows that she’d want him to persevere, which then connected to Ep. 79, Stand Up, having Rem say those very words.
This is why amnesiac Subaru thanked the previous Subaru for all he’d done, ’cause he literally was kind and ’cause it’s what amnesiac Subaru needed to see to fully accept that he’s Subaru, that the previous Subaru was a kind guy who could do all he did along the way due to the support he got along the way, not ’cause he was a superman, fully destroying Rui’s plan to eat Natsuki Subaru infinitely. Amnesiac Subaru ultimately saw that the previous Subaru is kind and resilient, and that’s how he has so many people he cares about now and objectively saved many people. That’s what led to amnesiac Subaru calling the previous Subaru amazing, pushing back against his low self-esteem, which is ultimately why he said he won’t tell the previous Subaru to do his best since he knows what that Subaru’s capable of and was jealous that it would’ve taken the previous Subaru much less time to solve the problems at the tower before they finally merge into one. And as for why the previous Subaru would even have a manifestation in the Corridor of Memories, it’s just like how amnesiac Subaru mixed with Meili when he read her Book of the Book, only it was only possible in the Corridor of Memories since Rui had eaten his memories, meaning that was the only place that could happen.
The people sending death threats to White Fox and the director of Ep. 82 should be ashamed of themselves. There didn’t need to be some fancy insert song for this scene. The core content of this episode is that amnesiac Subaru needed to see that the previous Subaru was a guy who at his core is drawn to kindness who’d work really hard to save those he cared about due to his being kind and being inspired by their kindness when he struggled.
Re:Zero exists ’cause Tappei genuinely believes in the goodness of people and all this hate directed to the staff who worked on this episode is disgusting given the staff still got the core message of the episode out there. I get that many believe find Subaru extremely relatable to the point of self-inserting into him and living vicariously through Subaru when they watch him, but need I remind you that in a post-Season 1 interview, a White Fox staff member who’d worked on Re:Zero had been told many times that if they drew Subaru to look cool they’d be told to redraw it until it suited Tappei’s fancy ’cause Subaru isn’t mean to be a self-insert outlet with Re:Zero being a real story showing the struggles of how an average Joe with specific, severe self-worth issues sent to a fantasy world would react and behave unlike all those standard isekai power fantasy slop series, so IMO, there was no need for some insert song to give the scene a stronger sense of hype or aura as that was never the point of the scene to begin with.
While I acknowledge actual faults of the episode, such as there being too many stills or anything else one didn’t enjoy that is within reason, I believe being mad at there being no insert song when amnesiac Subaru met the previous Subaru is a rather strange thing to get upset about given Tappei having implored the staff to not make Subaru look cool in Season 1, and IMO, the absence of such a song shows that the staff members involved are living up to Tappei’s intended vision even if one personally thought that amnesiac Subaru calling the previous Subaru an amazing guy warranted hype or aura. I can’t say I understand why novel readers are upset about this episode, but from an anime-only perspective, I believe this episode gets across the core message very well.
And why amnesiac Subaru calling the previous Subaru amazing was important is that he still very much as self-esteem issues that needed to be pushed back against by someone who’d seen all he’d done and wasn’t as biased as the previous Subaru was regarding himself. If you thought that Subaru’s issues with poor self-esteem had been solved after Ep. 29, Parent and Child, you are wrong. In Season 2, even after Ep. 29, Subaru saw no value in his life aside from being to able to reset things to solve problems, and that’s likely why Satella and the dead Witches of Sin had their intervention in Ep. 38, which culminated in Patrasche dragging Subaru out of the tomb, and Otto outright telling him, maybe not in these exact words, that there are people who appreciate him and value him. In Season 3, Subaru was very much upset and thought that everybody else could stay calm while he’s the only one unable to do, showing a continuation in his issues with poor self-esteem in Ep. 51, and even in Season 4, Subaru was insecure when Julius made a light jab about his ability in Ep. 67, showing again that his issues with self-esteem weren’t cured just like that, not to mention how his self-esteem issues may be abnormally difficult to overcome if my theory about the main antagonist’s Authority making it difficult for the Hero of the story to overcome his character flaws has any truth to it.
As for my last two pieces of analysis, I’d shared in my write-up of Ep. 79, Rui had split herself in two as part of her plan to infinitely eat Subaru, which is why she was doing crazy things such as kill Meili to make amnesiac Subaru think the previous Subaru was a bad guy, but there was more to it than I had thought. A duplicate had not only eaten Subaru’s memories but also merged with amnesiac Subaru’s being and was experiencing his deaths whenever he died, which I guess is possible due to Rui being a soul that failed to be born, which I had speculated was a possibility in Ep. 79, meaning she’s just a whole bunch of egos as she’d stated in that episode. And her being horrified and despondent about how death wasn’t the delicious experience she’d thought it be backs up my read that Rui’s biggest regret is having eaten so many memories just to experience pain and suffering, only wanting to experience just the highs or a high and none of the lows of life, something Subaru himself noted in this episode, which I believe bodes well for how Subaru’s Authority of Gluttony in the future may be shaped by this regret. And if the other Rui merges with the Rui who’d eaten amnesiac Subaru’s memories, she’d also be in for a rough time. Since the one Rui had fused with was amnesiac Subaru’s ego/personality, when amnesiac Subaru merged with the previous Subaru, possibly by using his Authority (I’m not sure) given Rem had imparted how she felt about Subaru to amnesiac Subaru by touching the center of his chest, and amnesiac Subaru put a fist to the previous Subaru, I guess Rui either was driven off due to amnesiac Subaru fully accepting that he’s Subaru or she willingly relinquished her hold on him since she didn’t want anything more to do with Subaru.
The last bit of analysis I have is that Tappei showed that his having Subaru use the -tan honorific to address Emilia was very much intentional as Subaru would never have thought of doing that without having experienced Emilia’s kindness and saw how consistent she was in being kind in Arc 1 of Re:Zero, which is backed by how the first time he used the honorific, he’d asked Emilia if she’d healed him, showing he believes she’s just intrinsically that kind, and that’s the cherry on top on Emilia being cheerful about hearing Emilia-tan ’cause it was showing that Emilia’s initial kindness to Subaru in Arc 1 had more of an impact on Subaru than Emilia’s confession of being in love with Natsuki Subaru to amnesiac Subaru, showing just how important that Arc 1 content was, and it’s foundational to Subaru falling for Emilia.
All in all, while I can understand some people’s gripes with the direction of the episode, such as there being too much flashback content or there being too many still frames, I nonetheless am adamant that this is an episode of Re:Zero that was very much worthwhile to watch and implicitly tied back to so much of the series.
