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This Week in Anime - The Best and Worst Moments of Re:Creators


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Merxamers



Joined: 09 Dec 2013
Posts: 720
PostPosted: Thu Sep 21, 2017 12:35 pm Reply with quote
Just this once, i agree with the party-pooper Jacob, and i absolutely sympathize with comparisons to "Dieicide". At the end, it felt like none of the characters i'd grown to love mattered. It didn't really matter who lived and who died- the only important ones at the end were spoiler[Sota, Altair, and Magane]. That, and spoiler[Selesia's death] had no emotional buildup at all, just to stop a character we know nothing about and we had only met 10 minutes earlier. At least spoiler[Aliceteria's death] got a nice emotional moment from spoiler[her creator], but you can't say spoiler[her death] mattered either.

I don't like villains as overpowered as Altair, because the author can never think of a creative way to defeat them, so they basically have to pull something unsatisfying out of their butts, and we have to sit through way too many episodes of pointless action until they decide to do it. But i could forgive that; i thought the stuff at the end with Altair was sweet (even if i don't think Altair's character was explored enough for it to affect me much). I just wish the characters we grew to like MATTERED more by the end.
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Angel M Cazares



Joined: 23 Sep 2010
Posts: 5406
Location: Iscandar
PostPosted: Thu Sep 21, 2017 12:53 pm Reply with quote
I definitely appreciate Re:CREATORS' ambition, but the execution could have been better. It is still a good quality show that had some nice moments, and it could become a hit in R1 because it has the elements needed: explosive action, nice visuals and some imaginative concepts. Hopefully it is dubbed in English and released on BD.

I am neither disappointed nor mad with Re:C because I tried to like this show more, but I never could connect with it in a deeper level. I supposed it bugged me that Selesia spoiler[died] because I liked her personality and character design.
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zztop



Joined: 28 Aug 2014
Posts: 642
PostPosted: Thu Sep 21, 2017 1:14 pm Reply with quote
I've heard comments from viewers who work in the creative/audiovisual industry that they really enjoyed Re Creators, as the themes and philosophies resonated with what they do for a living.

On the failure to stop Altair's OPness, Aoki Ei remarked in an interview that this was meant to symbolise the harshness of reality; that one can still fail despite all the effort put into an endeavour. He also says that as a Creator it can be very disappointing when the audience doesn't want to accept what you felt was interesting or cool, although they can't blame the audience for that.

In a way I think writing Creators was a cathartic experience for both Aoki and Hiroe; to express their philosophies and concerns on the creative process and how it affects its consumers. Funnily, Hiroe said the plot was inspired by the 1993 Arnold Schwartzenegger movie, Last Action Hero, which had action movie characters discovering the real world.
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Videogamep



Joined: 10 Jun 2014
Posts: 564
Location: CA
PostPosted: Thu Sep 21, 2017 1:20 pm Reply with quote
The plotting was kind of messy sometimes, but I still loved Re:Creators for the ideas it had. I'm really passionate about storytelling, and Re:Creators' themes about what makes stories important really spoke to me. The action was also awesomely silly in the best way possible. I'll probably end up putting Re:Creators as my anime of the year.
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yuna49



Joined: 27 Aug 2008
Posts: 3804
PostPosted: Thu Sep 21, 2017 1:28 pm Reply with quote
My biggest complaint about Re:Creators is how useless and irrelevant much of the cast turned out to be. Blitz, Hikayu, Sho, Yuya, and Rui could all have been left out of the script, and little would have been lost. Mamika's death warranted her inclusion, and Meteora was required to manage all the loose ends. I liked Selesia as a character and would probably keep her. Aliceteria was just too bone-headedly stupid at times to get much sympathy from me.

I think this show would have worked much better in a single-cour format which would have forced Hiroe to focus his writing and cut down on the irrelevant characters. It might have also made the story less pretentious.
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John Thacker



Joined: 28 Oct 2013
Posts: 1006
PostPosted: Thu Sep 21, 2017 3:04 pm Reply with quote
Altair being overpowered and born of fanservice was a theme, so I think it is inaccurate to call those deus ex machina moves of hers something betraying the themes of the show, even if it made it less exciting to some viewers. It is something that she ironically (or perhaps knowingly) commented on with respect to Hikayu's unbalanced powers.

I don't think that the length of final battle was too long; I would rather have cut one of the two consecutive talking episodes in exchange for more development before Selesia's confrontation with her beau. That part was too abrupt, as mentioned.

I thought that the show illustrated the themes that I expected from the start. It wouldn't have made sense for it to end up with themes that were a total rejection of duty.

People who like Magane are still very disturbing people.
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AsuraTheDestructor



Joined: 24 Dec 2013
Posts: 466
PostPosted: Thu Sep 21, 2017 3:14 pm Reply with quote
A review about this series that speaks to me, and I don't even find Jacob that interesting or likable most of the time.

Not expected, really.
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Key
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Joined: 03 Nov 2003
Posts: 18135
Location: Indianapolis, IN (formerly Mimiho Valley)
PostPosted: Thu Sep 21, 2017 3:20 pm Reply with quote
yuna49 wrote:
My biggest complaint about Re:Creators is how useless and irrelevant much of the cast turned out to be. Blitz, Hikayu, Sho, Yuya, and Rui could all have been left out of the script, and little would have been lost.

Have to entirely disagree with that. Each of Blitz, Hikayu, Yuya, and Rui represented different aspects of the creation for anime/manga/games, and being short any one of them would have left the series feeling incomplete.

Blitz represents the older character, the jaded character, and the villain who becomes a hero.

Rui represents the young mecha pilot, and that he was fed up with the role he was locked into in his series was a great bit of "meta."

Yuya is the attitude-laden rogue, the one who functions as a bad guy but isn't really bad. He's the aggressive point-man for Meteora's group.

Hikayu is the fan service character and represents the way characters can get altered by fan-pandering updates. Not including a character like her would have been ignoring the existence of a significant chunk of anime/manga out there.

While none of them ultimately directly impact the outcome, they all served their purposes as the series progressed and helped round out the story.

Quote:
I think this show would have worked much better in a single-cour format which would have forced Hiroe to focus his writing and cut down on the irrelevant characters. It might have also made the story less pretentious.

It would have been too rushed that way.
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Grendel8
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Joined: 06 Jun 2015
Posts: 59
Location: 41°51'0.11" N -87°39'0.18" W
PostPosted: Thu Sep 21, 2017 3:51 pm Reply with quote
I think you all have some great points. As someone who works in the industry, I found a number of the creative ideas presented to be refreshing and interesting. Yes, the show was messy and far from perfect, but, I felt it had a lot more pluses than minuses. For the scenes that made me smile, I appreciate the work that went into this. (I wish Selesia's death especially would have played out differently, and Alicetaria's scene also, among others.) I still feel it is one of the better offerings that has come out recently. It could use some refinement, but I look forward to more work such as this one.

Last edited by Grendel8 on Fri Sep 22, 2017 4:13 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Mojave



Joined: 07 May 2017
Posts: 178
PostPosted: Thu Sep 21, 2017 6:14 pm Reply with quote
I enjoyed the show, and thought it was pretty good. It could have been great though, and I think that's where most of the disappointment comes from. Personally, I feel like the biggest misstep was Altair. There's nothing wrong with having a massively OP villain, especially since the writers made it clear they wanted to use that to explore some themes about effort and failure, but they took her the wrong direction. Massively OP characters who are just as egotistical and throw temper tantrums like spoiled brats are inherently commentaries on the dangers of selfishness and ego, and yet the show let her off the hook at the end. Altair got her happy ending, which just ruins the themes characters like her inherently represent.

The way the protagonists eventually find to counter her at the end is brilliant, but the outcome for her as a character strips her of the themes she represents and turns her into a very shallow, basically unexplored character. Basically, if you choose to make a character as OP, egotistical, and spoiled as Altair, you have to give them a downfall and suffering greater than what they inflicted on others, or it destroys the themes those types of characters inherently represent. The happy ending she received felt like a complete cop-out that totally abandoned her themes and progression as a character.
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Izanagi009



Joined: 20 Oct 2014
Posts: 464
Location: Pittsburgh, PA, USA
PostPosted: Thu Sep 21, 2017 7:10 pm Reply with quote
I summarized all my thoughts in a review i made: https://animechopblock.wordpress.com/2017/09/17/anime-chop-block-recreators/

To sum it up, I felt like the show was too focused on making commentary on the nature of creation and not enough on making an entertaining piece. The characters work well as representations of different modes of creation and I will admit to finding some entertainment value but the feeling of deus ex machina in the last fight, Hikayu's sudden introduction, the lack of real character development outside of maybe the antagonists and Sota and many others made the show feel diminished in entertainment quality.

I have another issue i forgot to mention in the review: how Magane felt less of a character or even a force of nature and more a blatant narrative tool given what happened in the end. That said, episode 21 was a good episode with strong emotional moments and catharsis for Altair
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nechronius



Joined: 23 Nov 2005
Posts: 275
Location: So Cal, USA
PostPosted: Thu Sep 21, 2017 9:20 pm Reply with quote
Magane is now a powerless creation in the real world with two murders (at least) and a world saving to her credit.

Was it too much to ask that they at least mention that someone is looking for her?
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Oby



Joined: 16 Jan 2017
Posts: 108
PostPosted: Fri Sep 22, 2017 12:45 am Reply with quote
nechronius wrote:
Was it too much to ask that they at least mention that someone is looking for her?

Kikuchihara did mention that they're looking for her. But way back then after Magane murdered the bookstore-guy . Laughing
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TasteyCookie



Joined: 19 Jan 2017
Posts: 421
PostPosted: Fri Sep 22, 2017 1:00 am Reply with quote
I find it ironic how they mentioned the character writing as the shows greatest strength when to me it was the exact opposite. The characters interactions were completely unlikable and unnatural (imo of course). Their interactions just were not fun to watch in the slightest. And if you don't enjoy watching the characters talk to each other, the cool concepts and ideas in the underlying conversation become just as unenjoyable. The only interesting character in the entire show was Magane but not because her character was deep or relatable, she was just interesting to watch.

My biggest complaint for the series and why I did not enjoy it: the story was so obsessed with its own premise that it forgot what it was; a story. It plays out like a giant blog post about the process of creation and its challenges. Characters all felt like they were written to make the story work, instead of the story interacting and evolving with the characters organically. I think that's why many felt that some of the creations were meaningless... They kinda were. They were only added to fill specific archetypes or to fill requirements for certain plot points (Aka Mamika.) All in all characters are a big selling point for a lot of people and to me that's the reason why the show never took off nod became popular despite some pretty heavy marketing in Japan.
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Spastic Minnow
Bargain Hunter
Exempt from Grammar Rules


Joined: 02 May 2006
Posts: 4595
Location: Gainesville, FL
PostPosted: Fri Sep 22, 2017 8:55 am Reply with quote
More I read about it the more i figure I was right to drop this at the end of the 1st kour like the bad habit it was. Personally though, it was Magane that did it in. At first I thought it was interesting that they had a character from an apparently "psychological" horror type series. A regular type person except for the power to supernaturally influence people with lies. But past that she's a mess.
1- psycho character. I'm well on record for hating psycho characters, they tend to bore me.
2- she should be the easiest villain to handle. Every single character knows what her power is, everyone should know to beat her all you have to do is not listen to what she says but instead you get every character basically doing the same thing "I can't trust you- all you do is lie, give me a moment while I listen to every word you say and fall into your obvious trap."
3-I thought she was supposed to be a normal person with a supernatural lying ability but when she faces off with the actual super-POWERED characters she too can suddenly jump around ten feet at a time and run across roof-tops to battle (lie at) the guys shooting off spells, rays, and swinging giant weapons.

So you had a show that was obviously going to rely heavily on a character who made no sense to me being central to the story.
Sorry- I leave this mess to the rest of you... and apparently it got even messier.
So... Good Job, Spastic Minnow!
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