Shaula the Sage – Thorough Watch

Re:Zero Episode 69 (Season 4 Ep. 3) and Break Time Season 4 Ep. 3 Analysis + Important Details

Posted on April 24, 2026 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

The episode starts with Ram waking up Subaru at an underground location and Subaru remarking why it’s just him and Ram around, and Ram turns back the question onto him since she’s very worried about Rem given Subaru had told her the reason he was bringing Rem with them is so that he wants to save her with his entire being and that he wants to be the one she sees first when she wakes. Judging from Subaru’s memory, the group was falling, and he was closest to Beatrice, but he still deliberately reached for Ram, and there’s a clear reason for this in that Subaru reached for the person he had the best access to who most needed it given that Rem was in a carriage, making her inaccessible even though he’s the one he wants to save most. Also of note that is that Ram drained a lot of her mana using her Clairvoyance repeatedly and was even bleeding from her eyes when she tapped into the their attacker’s field of vision, so Subaru, who is considerate of the situation of his friends, chose to grab hold of the one who’d need help the most since Ram cannot naturally replenish her mana since she lost her horn and can only fight for a short time, making her the next most vulnerable aside from Rem.

Subaru then gets frantic thinking how horrible the situation is for Rem since she’s effectively a vegetable right now, and after he asks whether Ram even cares about Rem being in danger ’cause Ram told him to calm down, Ram forces him to come back to his senses after grabbing onto what he’s wearing and letting him get a good look at her eyes, which showed the distress she was feeling. Ram then let him know that ’cause of her link with Rem she knows Rem’s still alive regardless of what her actual situation is like. Crunchyroll’s AI translator again spits out gibberish with the talk of the “synesthesia” that Rem and Ram have when “twin link” or “twin telepathy” would be by orders of magnitude much more more accurate. Foxidna and Patrasche then return to the area, and Ram remarks that she never confirmed with Subaru that it was just the two of them when he looked toward her, seemingly putting it out that that he deceived her. They are nowhere near an exit, and none of the others are around, but they must move forward.

After they’ve walked for a while, Ram asks Subaru whether he can call lesser spirits, and he says that his link with Beatrice is so strong it scares lesser spirits, which seems very strange given Emilia had such a strong contract with Puck and could still call lesser spirits, so this begs the question of why this difference between Emilia and Subaru exists. Maybe Echidna made Beatrice in such a manner such that Beatrice’s very essence/being deters lesser spirits from engaging with Subaru. As for a reason why Echidna would craft Beatrice to be like this, I’ve stated before in the past that in my main theory the prototypical ancient hero who lost to the final boss of that era may have fit the mold of a selfish, conceited, and overpowered hero that is typical of many fantasy stories, particular those of the isekai genre, and if that final boss activated his/her Authority or cursed the world to be biased toward repeating that general story path that hero tread upon, then a myriad of iterations of the world came by with the Hero of the story for each individual iteration fitting that mold of the conceited overpowered hero since they failed to overcome their character flaws, leading to each of those heroes choosing his lover over the world, dooming it to destruction.

Thus, Subaru being pushed onto a path in which he has a gate that doesn’t listen to his directive (the mana from his body rushed out uncontrollably in Season 1) and in which his gate had to be destroyed irreparably unless Minerva heals it so that he could win over Garfiel in Season 2, thereby forcing him to solely rely on Beatrice, hindering both his combat and support abilities, may be completely intentional to keep Subaru honest and humble, making his being unable to call lesser spirits when contracted with Beatrice a feature rather than a bug. As I’ve stated in my main theory, I believe Subaru used to be a part of his father, Kenichi, sharing the same body as him, and given how badass Kenichi was when viewers saw him in Episode 29, he could’ve fit the mold of a conceited but overpowered hero, and he split Subaru from himself to fashion a future Hero of Re:Zero’s story who wouldn’t fit the exact mold the previous Heroes of the story did since this would force Subaru to rely on his friends and be a team player instead of being the guy who is able to resolve most of the situations with minimal help.

Of course Ram then makes a jab at Subaru’s usefulness, which he is angry about given he still has insecurities about his self-worth, and he even audibly said, “Grr…” if it wasn’t clear how that made him feel, and Foxidna let him know that before he woke up, Ram was actually completely distraught about Rem and that the dynamic they have together keeps her emotionally stable, which reassures Subaru. It’s at this point that the path they were on splits into two separate tunnels. And based on Subaru’s “knowledge” about behavioural studies showing that people tend to choose left in these types of situations, citing Freud, who never said such a thing, I believe he was joking, but there’s potentially also more to it than that, which I will eventually get into in that I believe this is crucial foreshadowing.

As the group keeps walking, they come across what appears to be a completely sealed off stone slab obstructing any potential progress, but oddly enough, Subaru thinks it’s a door, and when he places his hand on it, it sparks a reaction, including a coloured, hand-shape mark growing outward from his hand, which leads to the slab dematerializing, indicating it was a construct of magic but not just any magic since only he could see it and only he could dematerialize it, which is very particular. Patrasche didn’t want to continue on though since she could smell the miasma, but she relented. They have no idea why what they witnessed just happened, but eventually they come across a second stone slab which meets the same fate as the first, and the whole group seems exhausted for some reason. Subaru is then at a fourth door with the third door vanishing offscreen with him not being able to get past this fourth one, leading to the group getting more and more irritated before they start killing each other with Foxidna and Anastasia being killed by Ram’s wind magic, and Ram being decapitated by Patrasche with Subaru suffering that very same fate shortly afterward after Patrasche appeared to laugh like an evil maniac. Ram’s wind magic actually destroyed the fox muffler that is Foxidna’s real body, and that would be when Anastasia regained control of her body and clung to Subaru with pure terror in her eyes, desperately crying out that she doesn’t want to die. The night filter which depicted the insanity was very effective and gave the chaos depicted a powerful cinematic feel, amplifying how the situation kept on escalating. Subaru then loops back and asks about what miasma really is, and it’s tainted mana that drives people insane if exposed to too much of it, which is why the best way to handle it is to avoid being where the miasma is thickest.

Now back to the content on Freud, I believe Subaru was fully aware about a lot of his work being discredited, and that’s why he specifically cited the many behavioural studies with his saying that his sense of justice is telling him to choose the path on the right being Subaru being silly and also probably going with a hunch based on the bulk of Freud’s work, but it’s nearly certain there’s powerful foreshadowing in a hidden message in citing Freud’s work, which suggested that acting on impulses or unintended thoughts is a way to access the unconscious mind with Freud believing the truest yet often most inconvenient information comes from the unexpected, suppressed parts of our psyche. Where I’m going with this is that the doors Subaru made vanish could only be perceived by him with everyone else seeing them as insurmountable obstacles, not to mention them responding to the touch of his hand. The miasma also grew stronger as they kept going further through the path, and that suggests there’s a very potent source of miasma at the end of it. Given that Episode 67 revealed that Satella’s sealed at the Auguria Dunes and that Witches of Sin are known to emit a great deal of miasma, it’s highly like that Satella’s sealed body is the source of the miasma. Why this is important is that Satella told Subaru to kill her someday in Episode 38, so given that’s the case, Subaru may be subconsciously trying to go to where Satella is to fulfill his end of the bargain in what may have been a lover’s promise in which Satella made Subaru promise to kill her one day, most likely to save the world, so this Freud content could very well be masterclass foreshadowing.

As for why I believe Subaru and Satella were lovers, Episodes 18, 25, and 38 all point to that likely being the case with Puck indicating in Ep. 18 that if Petelgeuse wants to kill him he’ll need to summon a thousand shadows, half of what Satella could, Subaru saying to Emilia in Ep. 25 that if she lists ten things she hates about herself, he’ll list two thousand things he loves about her (1,000×2=2,000), and Subaru swearing that he’ll save Satella in Ep. 38 after she requested that he kill her, showing a sudden upwelling of positive sentiment for Satella even though he had called her a monster he couldn’t understand not long before that, all of which show that Subaru has dormant memories of Satella that cannot be explained by time travel or reincarnation since they both existed in the same time period. More fodder for them previously being lovers is that in Episode 29, the construct of Subaru’s past showed that he has a penchant for silver-haired heroines, which indicates that he may’ve been lovers with a silver-haired woman in the past. This is the main reason I believe Subaru chose the path to the right since he subconsciously remembered his prime objective that he may have burdened himself with due to being Satella’s lover.

Thus, perhaps the doors even requiring Subaru’s touch in the first place to dissipate could be that they were made specifically for him and even possibly by him given it’s his hand they react to, and nobody else can perceive them as doors. I believe Subaru being able to open three doors that only he could perceive shows that the Pleiades Watchtower was built specifically for him, which would make sense given Subaru’s the Japanese term for Pleiades, and it’s three doors for three Witch Factors (Either Envy or Pride, Sloth, and Greed from having killed Regulus).

However, even if Subaru had all the Witch Factors, he wouldn’t be able to make it to the end of the path ’cause he’d go insane before that. I believe he’d need either Reinhard to help them traverse the tunnel at full throttle and/or at least a powerful Yang magic user to buff his and Patrasche’s body so that they can go much faster than they are able to on their own. That there are doors only Subaru can perceive likely indicates that he is tasked with returning Satella to this world from the group of heroes from four hundred years ago, including Satella, Echidna, and probably Flugel/Kenichi since the doors are likely meant to ensure that nobody makes it there until Subaru is ready.

This would’ve been fully planned given Satella asked Subaru to love himself before someday killing her, showing the intent’s to raise Subaru as the world’s saviour, showing I may’ve been on the money when I predicted after Ep. 24 that Satella’s plan’s to possess Emilia at the end of the story much as Petelgeuse mused was the point of the Ordeals, to test Emilia for compatibility as Satella’s vessel, with this being the intervention against the cycle I believe the world’s stuck on as alluded to by Melakuera’s words about a Witch being a world imbalance and how he’d faced world-ending crises countless times, likely showing the world’s repeatedly destroyed by the Witch of Envy before being reconstructed.

As for a reason why I’ve thought that since Season 1, I can tell you that Subaru’s defining character trait in Season 1 was that he has very low self-esteem, and the thought I had is that if Satella really does “favour” Subaru as Beatrice said, which is likely given Satella indicated that Petelgeuse isn’t the one, and she’s supposedly unkillable in her regular body, then a good way for Satella to show her love for Subaru would be to have him be the one who kills her, making him the greatest hero the world has ever seen, and possess Emilia’s body in the process, which probably is easier to be killed in, which would be an excellent way for her to finally die. I like using macro-level “big picture” thinking. This is what I thought of after Petelgeuse revealed what the Ordeal was for in 2016.

And now back to the events of the episode, I loved Ram helping Subaru vomit due to his feeling nauseous about his previous loop’s events, and then after he was finally okay, Ram even fit in a joke about him being perverted with her saying that she’s glad he’s happy now, as if Subaru getting her fingers going down his throat is an exquisite experience any man would appreciate, a good taste of the sort of roasts Ram often gives Subaru, which is a cute dynamic they have. They then choose the path on the left this time, and Subaru’s extremely considerate this time, cognizant of how the miasma can make things spiral, which of course creeps the girls out since it’s unnatural compared to that behaviour being Julius’s natural inclinations.

They then notice a burning smell, and Subaru volunteers to check it out, leading to him falling to a different area with a faceless centaur mabeast that is killing Oiran Bears with fireballs. There’s excellent action showing just how outclassed the group is. While Ram may have said that they’d use Subaru as bait and such, she clearly cares for him so much in willing to sacrifice herself for him, implying that Rem would be hurt seeing him die, and it just shows that Ram sees Subaru like a brother-in-law already even though he and Rem aren’t actually together. It looks bleak before the great Shaula the Sage saves them by eradicating that mabeast with needles. I say this is Shaula since the title of the episode is “The Keeper of the Watchtower”.

Shaula’s outfit colours also highly suggest that her purpose involves Subaru in some way given they match his tracksuit’s colours. This would also explain why she has said, “I’ve found you.” once again this episode if there’s something more to their relationship. It would also explain why she has always had Subaru in sights in Episode 68 and only aimed at Subaru ’cause she was testing for someone worthy of the Pleiades Watchtower since it seems disrupting the magic of the distortion was necessary for making it to the next part/phase of conquering the tower, which is shown by how she was very much pleased to save Subaru and Ram.

It was a fantastic episode that had all of that which makes Re:Zero shine, good lore drops, powerful potential foreshadowing, great character interactions, truly unsettling moments, and even some sweet battle animation for good measure. I thought this episode was clearly better than any episode of Season 3 aside from Episode 65, which I consider the best episode of Season 3.

Now that I’ve talked about the entire episode, I’m now highlighting Re:Zero Break Time Season 4 Episode 3. Foxidna refers to herself and Beatrice as kindred souls, and this probably indicates not just that they’re artificial spirits but that they’re also creations of Echidna, potentially backing up my theory from Episode 67, showing that Foxidna lied about not remembering anything about herself since she knows that she and Beatrice have similar origins, and this may back up my previous speculation that Foxidna deliberately put it in Subaru’s head to take Rem with him to Pleiades Watchtower for an unknown (plot?) reason and that she remembers Julius. Here’s the link to the short: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsCoAW9_Kxc

Re:Zero Episode 68 (Season 4 Episode 2) Analysis + Important Details

Posted on April 17, 2026 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

There’s less to talk about regarding just this episode itself compared to Episode 67, but I still have some big things I want to emphasize here, so this will still be a long write-up since I’ll be highlighting how past content may apply heavily to the content of Season 4. The first of which is that names are very important in Re:Zero, which is why I have kept tabs on the names of Re:Zero characters since Episode 22 from Season 1, “A Flash Of Sloth”, since it could’ve referred to multiple things in the episode.

Based on Sin Archbishops having star names (Regulus’s name was a big plot point in Season 3) and Subaru revealing he was named after a star cluster in Memory Snow, it’s clear stellar names have significant importance in Re:Zero. Subaru is the Japanese term for “Pleiades”, a star cluster referred to as the Seven Sisters, the reason why the Seven Deadly Sins are a plot point, with six of the brightest stars in the Pleiades being visible to the naked eye under average conditions being why are there six dead Witches of Sin. Given Aldebaran means “follower of Pleiades”, this begs the question of why Al seemingly arrived in the world sooner than Subaru did given his name suggests he should’ve came after Subaru.

Thus, I theorize that Subaru was in suspended animation, the state Rem currently is in, within Flugel’s tree for hundreds of years, and that’s how Al seemingly arrived in the world sooner than Subaru did despite his name being follower of Pleiades, which should indicate that Subaru was summoned before Al was. This would be why I propose we see Flugel’s tree slowly grow from a sapling into a world tree before transitioning to the shot of Subaru since Subaru’s whereabouts were a mystery of sorts based on the connection between Al’s name and Subaru’s. And this is hardly a novel idea as other animanga have used the plot element of a person or multiple people being either in suspended animation or at least not aging inside a special tree.

Also of note is that in the OP, Subaru’s depicted as a hunk of flesh in clothes before his skin slowly surfaces when there were back-to-back shots of Echidna, Anastasia, Beatrice, and Subaru. This is very peculiar, and two things I can think of is that Subaru is either a homunculus or at least an artificial human, and both of the things I just mentioned merits raising the point about whether he was always a homunculus or artificial human or became one after being summoned, but now it’s time for a detour to remind readers of a previous theory of mine as my previous speculation actually supports Subaru being a homunculus or artificial human.

Al, Priscilla’s knight, in Season 3 also referred to Beatrice as Beako much like Subaru does, and I don’t believe that this means that Subaru and Al are the same person. However, I do believe that he and Subaru both originally came from the same soul. As I have said before, I have been researching the names of Re:Zero characters since Episode 22, and what’s very relevant is that Subaru’s dad is named Kenichi, which means ‘wise man’. Subaru said in Episode 16 that Flugel’s Tree was planted by a wise man centuries ago, and while this wouldn’t mean something in a different show, its presence in a show with Re:Zero’s long-term planning suggests that Kenichi himself might be Flugel. As for the time period in which Flugel existed, Petelgeuse apologized to Flugel-sama in Episode 43 for taking in the Sloth Witch Factor, which shows that Flugel was possibly from the same time period Satella was from since the sama honourific suggests Flugel was deeply respected by Petelgeuse. Liliana also knew of Flugel when she was in a travelling band with her parents, so it’s clear that whoever Flugel is he’s important to the lore of the series.

Episodes, 18, 25, and 38 show that Subaru has dormant memories of Satella as shown by how Puck indirectly revealed in Episode 18 the number of shadow hands Satella could generate to Subaru by asking Petelgeuse summon a thousand shadows if he truly wants to kill him, half of what Satella could (two thousand), how Subaru used a number associated with Satella (two thousand) to indicate his appreciation for Emilia in Episode 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 commenting on why he chose that number, and how Subaru suddenly had an upwelling of positive emotion for Satella in Episode 38 that led him to say that he’d save Satella after she asked him to love himself and then some day come kill her, which shows that Subaru and Satella may have a past history together as lovers.

Given we know Echidna succeeded in creating a soul clone of herself with how Echidna spoke in her own voice in Ryuzu Shima’s body in Episode 49 and how Foxidna herself may also be a soul cone of Echidna’s, it wouldn’t be a surprise if Kenichi, if he is Flugel as I speculate, also did that as well, and Subaru and Al were both split off from Kenichi’s soul, and Kenichi made his sons his soul clones with that explaining why Al and Subaru both call Beatrice ‘Beako’, not ’cause they are the same person but because they were originally from the same soul. It’d also explain why Subaru has dormant memories of Satella despite it not being possible for him to have lived at that time, why Al also likes being rewarded for his efforts much like Subaru does, and why Al didn’t know about Capella’s powers, all of which shows that Al isn’t Subaru but that his origins are likely similar, and that something is up with Subaru and Al that doesn’t involve time travel or straight up reincarnation, so Al and Subaru may be homunculi or artificial humans who were split off from Kenichi’s soul.

I believe Subaru, and previously Al, is being put through the wringer to fulfill the grand plan I believe the heroes from four hundred years ago implemented, which included Satella, Echidna, and probably Flugel, to save the world from being stuck in a cycle of being destroyed by the Witch of Envy and reconstructed as hinted by Melakuera in the Frozen Bond OVA due to the actions of prototypical overpowered generic fantasy Heroes of the Story who encountered and lost to the Final Boss of the story every time due to the story path that began when an ancient hero in a moment of weakness of weakness, chose his lover over the world when the Seal in Elior Forest was opened, resulting in Re:Zero’s fantasy world being inevitably destroyed with the final boss of the time either activating an Authority or cursing the world to be extremely biased toward following the trend of that story path for all time with Satella destroying half the world perhaps being a deliberate intervention that was needed to allow the heroes of that era to deviate from the archetypal story path to pave way for Subaru.

As for how Kenichi could split his soul when he was the Hero of the story in Re:Zero’s fantasy world, I believe that would be impossible. Given Kenichi would have to follow the general story path I propose is happening, the Hero wouldn’t be allowed to split his soul while in Re:Zero’s fantasy world as the Hero of the story would be pushed to make it to the end to repeat the cycle, so dying by having his soul destroyed by an enemy or by himself, accidentally or intentionally, wouldn’t be allowed, so I propose that Kenichi at some point somehow returned to Earth to cut parts of his soul when he no longer had the designation as the Hero of the story, and eventually made Subaru and Aldebaran, who would eventually become his sons, Aldebaran after Subaru was whisked away. I think after all that I’ve finally explained why I believe Subaru being a homunculus or artificial human is line with my main theory.

As for the last part of the OP, it also has audio saying, “Let the magic stitch you back together”, when depicting Subaru’s sense of self seeming fraying with that out-of-character expression he had on his face and all the weird colours as he’s climbing stairs, so there may be something really stressful or traumatizing that causes some sort of identity crisis.

The first important detail is probably that Emilia still considers Subaru to be someone that needs to be protected, which is sort of a reversal of before in Arcs 1 and 2 when Subaru was doing all he could to protect Emilia regardless of whether she wanted him to, which is why she wanted Subaru stay behind in Arc 3 ’cause of his damaged gate, which eventually ended up being destroyed in Season 2 (Arc 4). Even after Arc 5 when Subaru and Emilia fought together against Regulus, Emilia still considers Subaru to be one of those who need protecting, much like Anastasia and Rem, to Subaru’s chagrin. Thus, since Emilia doesn’t consider Subaru an equal, I’m glad that they aren’t yet together especially since Subaru still has serious abandonment issues that flare up when Emilia doesn’t react to him well.

After that, the ground dragons react badly to Meili since those many years of handling mabeasts means she smells of them, which results in Patrasche and Joseph both picking on her with Joseph having Meili’s cape in his mouth. Julius settles things down by revealing that most ground dragons calm down if you stroke their necks. Roswaal then makes an entrance and tells Emilia and Subaru something offscreen that based on content from Seasons 1 and 2 implies that since Ram lost her horn she can’t replenish her mana, examples being after she expended a lot of mana in the mansion arc and after Roswaal nearly killed her in a fit of rage, both scenarios requiring for Roswaal to tend to her since as Beatrice revealed in Episode 1 one’s mana is that organism’s lifeforce itself, which is why the subs talked about regulation, and I’m guessing it should’ve been rendered as mana regulation.

When the group arrives at Mirula, which seems to be a town close to the Auguria Dunes, Subaru and Emilia meet a man at a bar who tells them that nobody has reached the Pleiades Watchtower in four hundred years and that the place is crawling with mabeasts and miasma, urging them to not attempt the trip. Despite hearing that, the pair aren’t at all perturbed, and before they depart, the man calls out to them and tells them about how locals have always seen birds headed toward the tower, so if they get lost they should follow a bird since it may show them the way. Subaru sees his metal leg, and it’s clear why the man told them what he did as he was genuinely concerned for them as Emilia had said earlier and just wants them to live life and be healthy.

Once they’re out there, Subaru prods Julius about his spirits, and Julius replies that the situation is the same as it was since his name was eaten in that his contracted spirits stay by his side but are perplexed by the situation since they do not remember him. The contract he made with them is still intact, but he cannot use them in battle, probably until his name is recovered from Roy Alphard should that be possible. Thus, Julius shares in that moment that he’s weaker in combat now although Subaru’s reaction proves that he’s not great at keeping secrets, which Julius already knew from spending more and more time with him. And of course, Subaru banters with Julius in a somewhat sour way when he says he doesn’t want to have the title of the one who understands him the most in the world after Julius put that out there, showing that Julius considers Subaru, just like in the previous episode, a source of strength since Subaru’s the lone person proving that he exists.

Then the sand time arrives, and it’s just a huge sandstorm with the group continually headed toward the tower yet making no progress whatsoever. Subaru is wearing something over his nose and mouth to pretend him from breathing in the sand, and Anastasia tells Subaru after he opens the window of the carriage that she will keep her promise since they’re in the same boat here, and Subaru obviously is pretty close to Beatrice given he shared that it’s Foxidna rather than Anastasia operating right now in that body even though he said that he didn’t want to tell the others and cause a stir when they least needed it, but it also reinforced Julius’s earlier point that Subaru’s bad at keeping secrets. Subaru then goads Meili into showing that she has been keeping the mabeasts from acting up by commanding a gigantic sandworm into nearly attacking them before harmlessly sinking back into the sand since he didn’t realize that Meili could command mabeasts with her mind, and that’s a very powerful skill.

Finally, Foxidna chimes in that it’s clear that they might be going in circles ’cause the space here is warped with the sand here not connecting to the Pleiades Watchtower, which she calls a distortion, clearing showing Foxidna has at least some of Echidna’s knowledge on magic, and she says that the sand time when the wind picks up is the recoil from space twisting and returning to normal, meaning that the periods between the sand times are when the distortion is weakening, and that’s when they can find the real path to the tower with the one best suited to the job being Ram since she can use her Clairvoyance, which was revealed in Season 1, to guide them to the right path by tracking the mabeasts’ vision. Mabeasts that are still active obviously came from where the real tower is since Meili has already tamed the ones in their vicinity, but Ram is clearly struggling, and then Foxidna remarks that she saw a bird feather, prompting Subaru to look out and tell Ram to see through the birds based on what the man from earlier told them, which is successful.

They then arrive to what seems like an endless field of flowers, which Meili states are the hideout of Oiran Bears, leading her to quickly tell everyone to can it since this is a mabeast that is difficult to control as most mabeasts she can settle down just with her mind, but with this species of mabeast since she needs to also make eye contact with it and command it with verbal gestures and repeating a tch sound to express disapproval. However, Joseph gets unsettled, resulting in them being chased by a horde of Oiran Bears, and once they’ve nearly made it past the flower field, Subaru gets his head blasted straight to pieces by a light from the tower. Upon Returning by Death, Subaru has no idea what happened, and the same sequence happens again except Subaru tells the group they can’t run straight for the tower, leading to Subaru, Beatrice, and Ram being separated from the group. Then that same light is shot at Subaru again, only Patrasche knocks Subaru partially out of the way before being killed, and Beatrice seeing how hurt Subaru is, tells him with tears in her eyes and an expression of great sadness that he can’t die and leave her alone since before Season 2 all she had experienced time after time again was loss with losing Echidna, Roswaal, Ryuzu Meyer, Petelgeuse, and probably others given in Season 2 Beatrice remarked that Petelgeuse left her too, which was one of the reasons she was suicidal and needed to be persuaded by Subaru to leave the Forbidden Library, which was burning to the ground as part of Roswaal’s mansion, since she was waiting for a person who she thought might never come. Then that same light kills Beatrice before a final shot kills Subaru.

During the third loop of this scenario, Subaru, thinking back to Julius calming down Joseph by stroking his neck before they departed, decides to use his Invisible Providence to calm Joseph down so that he doesn’t make a ruckus, leading to the Oiran Bears attack not happening, and he thought back to Beatrice first, so his not wanting Beatrice to cry and be in despair may have given him the inspiration to dig deeper for a solution. He also put his hands over Beatrice’s mouth during that incident, likely ’cause Beatrice would feel the air current from the hand emerging and potentially get startled, so he couldn’t have her crying out in surprise. He then remarks about a hunch of his about a light from the tower, and the group takes him seriously with Ram pointing her Clairvoyance to the tower and seeing a living being looking at Subaru before shooting something at him, which took the combined efforts of Emilia and Julius to stop, and the light ended up being a needle supercharged by magic, probably yang magic since a lot of yin magic involves debuffs like Shamac, making something powered up like up most likely an application of yang magic. Ram then notes that another needle is coming, and Subaru and Beatrice use their combination technique E-M-T, most likely named after Emilia as in “Emilia, my Tenshi (as in angel)”, which nullifies all other magic from the field generated, which protects them from the needle, but E-M-T also resulted in the distortion in space coming undone, resulting in the group falling to who knows where, whether it be back to the disconnected sand or somewhere else entirely.

Now the rest of my post will be about names or tangentially related to them. I have to give Tappei props for coming with the name Oiran Bears. Oiran is a collective term for the highest-ranking courtesans in Japanese history. The highest-ranking oiran, the tayū, had the prestige of being able to refuse clients, and the kanji for oiran consist of two characters, 花, meaning “flower”, and 魁 meaning “leader”.

Thus, this is almost certainly why Oiran Bears hang out under what seems to be an endless field of flowers and why they are hard to control even for Meili, and this is why making moderate- to-loud noises makes oiran bears go berserk, making them the “leaders” among regular mabeasts in the difficulty to control them even for mabeast tamers.

Tappei has often shown that he carefully considers how he names characters, whether it be due to the star lore (Subaru is the Japanese term for Pleiades, which is also referred to as the Seven Sisters, which is why the seven deadly sins is an important part of the story), plot details (Otto refers to attar, which is a fragrant essential oil, and Otto bought a bunch of oil out of season that he desperately needed to sell), personality traits (Petra means ‘stone’, and she is fearless considering she told the others to abandon her when Elsa took hold of her), mabeast species traits (Guiltylowe has “lowe” in it referring to lion, which is why a Guiltylowe has the head of a lion), character roles (Wilhelm means “resolute protector”, and he did devote his life to ensuring Theresia fought as little as possible), character powers (Betelgeuse means Orion’s hand, which is why his power is Unseen Hand), and names in relation to others’ names (Frederica and Garfiel and Fred and Rafiel to show that Liara subconsciously remembers Garfiel and Frederia), so I’m sure this is another instance of that. Well done, Tappei, my man, in giving that species of mabeast an intriguing name that fits the traits it was given.

As for the name of the Sage, Shaula, it’s a name of Arabic origin translating as the raised tail of a scorpion. It’s also a star representing the stinger of the Scorpius constellation, which is likely how Shaula came to have that meaning. Let’s see whether this is referring to a power, lore, or something else. Tappei surely has cooked up something good for Shaula.

As a reminder from Seasons 2 and 3, Baten Kaitos meaning “belly of the whale”, Alphard meaning “the backbone of the serpent, and Arneb meaning “hare”, likely meant that each of them could control one of the Three Great Mabeasts, which is why Lye referred to the White Whale as our pet since the Sin Archbishops of Gluttony speak as if they are a unit. I’d hazard a guess that Meili cannot control any of the Three Great Mabeasts.

And since Subaru itself is the word for Pleiades in Japanese, the Pleaides Watchtower bearing his name is interesting. We’ll see what’s in store. It could indicate that the Pleiades Watchtower itself was planned to be built with Subaru’s arrival hundreds of years later in mind, meaning it may have been part of the plan the heroes from four hundred years ago I propose made to bring the world to a free future as alluded to Melakuera talking about the world imbalance and the Witch as well as him facing world ending crises countless times, suggesting that the world is stuck in a cycle of being destroyed by the Witch of Envy and reconstructed with Subaru being the one they hope will break this cycle.

Re:Zero Episode 67 (Season 4 Episode 1) – Analysis + Important Details + Aside on Crunchyroll’s Horrible Work

Posted on April 10, 2026 | by anicritic | Leave a Comment

For this season, I will not be using the same approach I did with Season 3 in that my posts will be less recap and more interpretation of the scenes along with my heavy focus on theorycrafting as all the recap itself burned me out as I kept taking the same approach with multiple series.

Before I go into that, I deride the current state of Crunchyroll, which based on the translated words at multiple points in this episode, point to machine translation with stuff that makes no sense in the context of what is currently happening or what came before. Muse Asia, which is available in southeast Asia and to those who use VPNs with hosts in that region, is known for having much better translations of Re:Zero than Crunchyroll, and I suspect a higher-up at Crunchyroll knew this, which is why Crunchyroll used its financial and legal might to force Muse Asia to release Re:Zero Season 4 two weeks behind its simulcast, which is a big departure compared to the past. It’s disgusting that instead of trying to do a better job, Crunchyroll, or maybe should I name Sony instead since it owns Crunchyroll, decided to kneecap a competitor that was putting out a far superior product compared to what it was churning out with machine translation and robbed viewers of being able to watch an accurate translation in a timely fashion.

Episode 67 starts out somber with Subaru feeling a mixture of pain and anxiety over him being the only one to remember Julius although Julius is clearly happy that Subaru took this subject as far as he could. Subaru remarks that Julius only had his name eaten, which makes the people in the world forget you, as opposed to having only having your memories eaten, which happened to Crusch, and having both eaten, which makes it so that you functionally never existed in the world even though your body still exists although in suspended animation, with the source of that info being Puck when he spoke with Subaru early in Season 2.

After Julius said that he considered Reinhard and Felix friends following Reinhard saying that they were acquaintances or perhaps more than that, Anastasia according to Crunchyroll says, “Just two friends? I don’t think that’s all there is to it” when the conservation was about the trio of Reinhard, Felix, and Julius, showing a complete failure to understand the conversation, which suggests machine translation that can’t understand context. Using Google Translate, I see that “Tada no tari no tomodachi?” rendered as “Just casual friends?” so I’m assuming a proper translation would be “No more than mere friends?” rather than “just two friends”, which is very wrong based on the context. Subaru notably raised his eyebrows at this point since her suggesting there’s more to it than that shows that Anastasia remembers who Julius is unlike all the others aside from Subaru, which clearly demonstrates that she’s not the genuine article. If you recall from Season 3, Al clearly stated that the one in front of him cannot be Anastasia ’cause of her ability to use magic, and I speculated that either a shapeshifter had taken Anastasia’s place or someone/something had possessed Anastasia’s body.

Anastasia then suggests that even though they captured the Sin Archbishops (which is false since only Sirius, the Sin Archbishop of Wrath, was captured), they should visit Shaula the Sage, who is known as one of the three great heroes of the Dragonfriend Kingdom of Lugunica ’cause Sirius would be unlikely to tell the group what they need to know to either undo the damage to the victims of the Sin Archbishops of Gluttony and change back those who were transformed into different creatures by the Sin Archbishop of Lust. The Sage is supposedly the keeper of knowledge who foresees everything that will ever be, but I wonder how true that is since Echidna’s Tome of Wisdom apparently could see all of the past, the present, and possible futures of Re:Zero’s fantasy world based on Season 2, so it’s a question mark how accurate this info is. Shaula supposedly lives on her own at the Pleiades Watchtower located somewhere in the Auguria Dunes located in the easternmost edge of Lugunica, which was built to prevent invaders from reaching the sealed Witch of Envy, so now we know where Satella’s body is. Reinhard had set out in search of the Pleiades Watchtower two years ago when the Royal Family fell ill and was eventually wiped out, but a barrier prevented him from ever reaching it, similar to how there’s a barrier near the Sanctuary in Season 2 that made it hard for outsiders to find the correct path to get to the Sanctuary. He had been ordered to make this journey by the council, as in the Council of Wise Men, who are ruling in place of the king. He can’t take part since since he has to escort Felt and transport Sirius Romanee-Conti back to the Capital, and there’s probably no one better suited to bringing Sirius back since no one is a match for him in Lugunica.

After they make camp for the night, and everyone aside from Subaru and Anastasia are asleep, Subaru drops the fact that he knows it’s not really Anastasia speaking due to how coldly she talked about Ricardo, a close friend of hers who has a life-changing injury, with him saying something’s been off the whole time, a nod to early on in the episode when she gave a sign that she remembered Julius. Whoever’s in Anastasia’s body reveals that Priscilla also outed her, but surprisingly, she didn’t name Al, Priscilla’s knight for some reason, which I find suspect given the opportunity was 100% there. She reveals that her name is Echidna, identical to that of the Witch of Greed, and that she remembers nothing about herself aside from her name and that she’s an artificial spirit whose true form is the fox muffler that Anastasia wears. However, this artificial spirit speaking in an Echidna-like cadence suggests that she’s lying to an extent. Given Re:Zero has already used a character in the past speaking like that of another character in Season 2 in Roswaal to show that he had been traumatized due to his beatdown from Hector in Season 2, imitating his speech pattern ’cause to him Hector was the embodiment of power itself, it’s clear Tappei is willing to use speech patterns to imply relationships between characters. Now, I’ll be referring her to Foxidna from here on out on due to it being Subaru’s preferred name for her.

Where I’m going with this is that the number three is important in Re:Zero. The group who sealed Satella were revealed to be the Sword Saint of the time, the Dragon Lord, and Shaula the Sage, was a trio. The Pearlbaton siblings are triplets. There are three magic attribute pairs in fire and water, earth and wind, and yin and yang. There were the Three Great Mabeasts in the White Whale, the Great Rabbit, and the Black Serpent. The Sin Archbishops of Gluttony are a trio. Liara, Garfiel’s mom, has had children with three fathers since Frederica and Garfiel had different fathers as they’re half-siblings. To refresh one’s memory of previous seasons’ events, Puck called Beatrice his little sister in Season 1 and only in Season 2 did we find out that Beatrice is an artificial spirit made by Echidna. This makes Puck also an artificial spirit of Echidna’s if you’re able to connect the dots from past content. In the Frozen Bond OVA that came out in 2019, it was revealed that Puck had been ordered by a female speaker whose speech had been denoted by a special font to find Emilia, and he had a contract or oath with this female speaker wherein if he got too close to Emilia as in formed a contract with her, he would lose that which makes him himself. This special font was reused in Season 2 in one particular episode that showed that Echidna was the one who had given Puck the task of searching for Emilia and made him take up that contract/oath, and what it did was cause Puck to lose some of his memories. This is why Puck had no idea that Roswaal L. Mathers was the same Roswaal from four hundred years ago, only that he was body-snatching his descendants and why he allowed Roswaal to become Emilia’s sponsor at all, and only after Puck broke his contract with Emilia did he remark that Roswaal is speaking like someone he used to know very well and eventually remark that Roswaal will never be that devil/warlock, referring to Hector, ’cause he had finally recovered his memories. Also of note is that Echidna tasked both Puck and Beatrice with something in searching for Emilia and taking care of her Forbidden Library until she finds “that person”, so it’s established that Echidna has given her artificial spirits orders or suggestions for hazy reasons. Given Foxidna is familiar with Echidna’s speech pattern, she may very well be lying about knowing nothing about herself and at least remembers talking with Echidna four hundred years ago. Given this information, Puck, Beatrice, and Foxidna may be a trio of artificial spirits created by Echidna when one considers how often Tappei makes use of the number three, and since Foxidna had the opportunity to mention Al but didn’t, choosing only to mention Priscilla, the order or suggestion Echidna may have given her is to not say anything about Al with Subaru under any circumstance since she was about to bring up Al to Priscilla in Episode 59 only for Priscilla to answer what she had intended to ask before she said it. Echidna may have plans for Al that she needs Subaru to not know.

My next point will go back to the point I made at the start of the episode in that Foxidna remembers who Julius is. This is a very surprising development ’cause based on previous seasons, Subaru was the only person who remembered victims of Gluttony’s eating Authority, meaning this is breaking new ground. Given Echidna was the Witch of Greed in the past and was seeking immortality, and we know she had successfully created at least one soul clone since Tea Party Echidna spoke in Ryuzu Shima’s body in Episode 49, Foxidna might be another soul clone who was placed into a fox muffler as her body. This would make sense given Foxidna knows Echidna’s speech pattern, and Echidna may have worn the fox muffler that is Foxidna in the past, and that’d be how Foxidna learned how Echidna speaks. If that’s the case, what are the common denominators between Subaru and Echidna that could explain why Foxidna remembers who Julius is? What we know for know for sure is that both of them had Witch Factors, and people with Witch Factors and Witch cultists in general emit miasma, which we visibly saw in Episode 15 from Rem after Subaru looped and had retreated into a shell due to his being unable to bear how so many people died ’cause he wasn’t able to save them given Petelgeuse claimed that the love that hangs upon Subaru is equivalent to that of a Sin Archbishop, showing they emit something that is responsible for what Rem and Beatrice have described as a foul smell, and we know that Subaru can command Witch cultists due to his emitting a lot of miasma, and if Echidna split her soul into Foxidna, she may still have a piece of the Greed Witch Factor. In conclusion, I surmise it is either having at least one Witch Factor itself or emitting a high amount of miasma that allows for Subaru and Foxidna to remember Gluttony victims, and this makes me believe that all Witches of Sin, Sin Archbishops, and people with Witch Factors in general can remember Julius if they cared to even if this is just conjecture for now.

Furthermore, Foxidna says that she had Anastasia’s consent to take control of her body when danger presented itself and only this time was she unable to. I speculated last year with regards to Season 3 that Priscilla may have known what happened to Anastasia in Episode 59 when she Priscilla mused on the unseemly guilt, the vixen, Foxidna, placed on Julius, and it’s very likely ’cause Julius while out to battle the first time against the Witch Cult, he was unable to protect Anastasia, which is what led to her taking over, and Foxidna’s remark backs up my speculation. Foxidna made it seem like Julius doesn’t know about her to Subaru, but he almost certainly does. In Season 3 when the one who appeared to be Anastasia used yang magic, the magic came directly from her whereas when there was an actual metia as used by Beatrice and Felt, we saw the magic emanating from the metia, not Felt or Beatrice, so this should show that Anastasia was not using a metia. And given the White Dragon’s Scale, Kiritaka’s mercenary group, didn’t incur serious setbacks against Sirius aside from Kiritaka’s capture, perhaps Anastasia had a mishap somewhere outside their base since everyone was buying time for her escape. In a big city, there are many potential hazards, so it’s not just the Witch Cult or Demi-Beasts you should worry about. As for Julius showing no discomfort upon returning the first time, Julius has a reputation for being the most knightly of knights, the opposite of Arc 3 Subaru, the self-proclaimed knight, so I believe Julius could remain stoic if Anastasia had really been hurt due to him being away from her when others aren’t capable of that.

Foxidna also had a very interesting thing to say about what she’d do to return Anastasia’s body. She said that she’d make the choice that offers the highest probability of success, and that’s why she wants to visit the Sage, and if that’s the case, it backs up my theory that Tea Party Echidna deliberately steered Subaru into getting Emilia to do the Sanctuary Trials with her saying that even have after three days of trial and error, which imply that she changed up the trial to try to get Emilia to pass it, she was unable to break Emilia out of her shell, lied about her telling Beatrice to wait in the Forbidden Library for “that person” ’cause she was just curious who Beatrice would choose, which was an effort to sound as evil as possible so that Subaru would reject her contract that would involve him doing the Sanctuary Trials, and this is backed by Tea Party Echidna saying after Subaru rejected her contract that he didn’t him to think that she was the only evil one of the Witches of Sin, leading to her taking away Subaru’s qualification for entering the tomb, and this is important since Subaru was using his ability to enter the tomb as a crutch instead of speaking to Emilia and getting to know her, which viewers know to be true since the first thing he did after he composed himself was to try to go back into the tomb. Perhaps choosing the choice that offers the highest probability of success is actually a fundamental part of Echidna’s character, which would explain why she, as I surmise, enacted a grand plan with the heroes from four hundred years ago to bring the world to a good future. She may just say that all she wants is all the knowledge in the world, but the world continuing on instead of staying stuck in a cycle of being destroyed and reconstructed would be the best way to acquire more knowledge, so surely she took to the plan that would offer the highest chance of success. And there are signs that Foxidna may even have the Authority of Greed: Tome of Wisdom just like Tea Party Echidna did based on how she suggested to Subaru that taking Rem with him would be a good plan since he could say that he was the one to save her when she wakes up, which Subaru used a reason to take Rem with him on the journey to Ram when they meet later on in the episode, and Subaru’s notably reacted to that, showing that Foxidna’s words had a strong impact on him and that it dawned on him what a great idea it was in that moment. Foxidna may have shown that she’s just as manipulative as Tea Party Echidna and the original Echidna was. I suspect there is a very important plot reason why Rem has to be at Pleiades Watchtower, and it’s something we viewers won’t be able to see coming, but Foxidna knows why it must happen, and that’s the reason she planted the idea in Subaru’s head.

When they finally made it to Roswaal’s mansion the next day, there was yet another terrible translation by Crunchyroll when Subaru’s words were translated to “I hear the meeting with all the fakes went well.” As stated earlier in my write-up, the Council of Wise Men are currently ruling Lugunica in the absence of a king, meaning “caretakers” or “regents” would be a much better translation. “Fakes” in this scenario is gibberish that no human would come up with, showing that Re:Zero has an AI translator. This shows that just as Reinhard venturing out to try and reach the Pleiades Watchtower was done so by decree of the Council of Wise Men, Roswaal needed to meet with the Council of Wise Men to give Subaru’s group the okay to make the journey, likely ’cause of Satella’s sealed body being at the Pleiades Watchtower, meaning permission is necessary to ensure that the Council of Wise Men approves of their decision and doesn’t get squeamish at the thought of a large group travelling to where the Witch of Envy is sealed. Subaru reveals when they’ve arrived at the mansion that they are there for two reasons, to pick up Rem and Meili, and given that Meili blushed hard when she heard Subaru’s footsteps and that all the stuffed plushies there were made by Subaru since no one would know to make a plushie of a witch from fairytales from Earth given witches from Re:Zero’s fantasy world don’t look like that, this shows Meili has really taken to Subaru, making his title “The Little Girl User” very apt. Meili is only happy to go along since she doesn’t want to be cooped inside all day and going back to a familiar place where there are mabeasts she can control is fine with her even though she swears she isn’t like Beatrice and Petra, which is false given what we saw of her reaction to Subaru coming down to visit her.

In a later scene, Julius also shows some very uncharacteristic vulnerability, diverging from his reputation as the greatest of knights, in wondering which is more painful, being forgotten or forgetting someone else, ’cause he was struggling with being forgotten and not being able to remember his own kid brother. However, Subaru snaps him out of him by reminding him that he remembers how capable Julius due to his humiliation by Julius’s hand, and that immediately improved Julius’s mood, leading to him bantering about Subaru’s weakness and how Subaru is remarkable since he can bounce back from bad situations so easily, and they’ve come a long way since Julius talked smack about him and completely and utterly humiliated him.

After that, Subaru heads to Rem’s room, and Ram asks him why he’s willing to go far for Rem. He remarks that he wants to be the first thing Rem sees when she wakes up, much as Foxidna pushed him into thinking. He says that when you take emotion out of the equation it doesn’t matter who saves her, but he really wants to be the one to do it with all of his being, which elicits a genuine smile from Ram, showing just how much she appreciates Subaru for caring about her sister even though she herself has no memories of her. Given that Subaru is the one that got Roswaal, who Ram loves with all her heart, off his awful path of doing so much evil ’cause of his not-quite-Tome of Wisdom, and Ram attributes Rem’s feats in the mansion arc to Subaru due to her not remembering Rem, it’s very clear Subaru holds a special place in Ram’s heart even if it’s not the same feeling Rem had for Subaru but moreso akin to that of a honourary brother and genuine friend for remembering Rem and all that he’s done for Roswaal’s domain, and that smile from Ram just showed how far the relationship between her and Subaru had come, which I very much enjoyed since Ram is one of my favourite characters in the show. He then enters Rem’s room and shows how he is resolved to bring her back thinking he wasn’t able to get that across properly before, maybe ’cause he had no leads or anything of the sort, but Foxidna gave him the drive and hope he needed.

The last part of the episode shows Garfiel breaking down when his mother asks why he shows so much concern for them with him explaining away that he can tell that they’re kind of losing it, which Liara has no good comeback for, but she knows something is amiss when Garfiel suddenly looks like he wants to cry, and she holds him as if she were his real mother, which she is, as he bawls about missing his mom, and Rafiel and Fred both walk out of their rooms to see what the commotion was before Mimi guides them back. Once Garfiel is at the door and about to leave, Liara says goodbye to him and urges her young kids to as well, and only after he learns of Rafiel’s name and that Liara named both Rafiel and Fred that he gets the sense that somewhere deep down she remembers him and Frederica given the similarity in their names, which very much lifts his spirits, and given Garfiel in Season 2 had a notable arc on thinking that his mother abandoned him, that moment must’ve been very good for his self-esteem since although she may not have remembered him he was still in her heart in a way, which was good for closing a character arc from Season 2, showing that Tappei plans his story for the long haul.

As for the episode itself, I thought it was a great start to the season and had good emotional moments, nice lore drops, and a number of instances of potential foreshadowing, and this was just a setup episode itself, so I’m looking forward to this arc, which is supposed to be the favourite among the fandom although we’ll see whether White Fox delivers on that front, and if it does, whether it is all that it’s hyped up to be. If this season is a success, it’ll be in spite of Crunchyroll’s rancid translations.