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Subaru Natsuki: The Best and Worst Thing About Re:Zero

I kind of agree and disagree both. Subaru is definitely the best thing this show has, not because he's particularly good (I do find him okay, nowhere near bad), but because the show has absolutely nothing without him. As much as I've seen people complain about the worldbuilding, usually because there's too much of it, to me it's stuck in that awkward part where there's not enough to make the world any interesting. Apart from the character-study the show's doing (rather well) it has very little going for it. Emilia being replaced as the motherly-all-forgiving figure by Rem, the villains that keep somehow getting worse despite the second being literally just a hungry dog, and this new "yeah I can totally be the hero" approach Subaru's getting aren't making me very excited about the rest going forward.

I do, however, like a lot how the show goes exactly the opposite way of your usual death-then-return story like All You Need is Kill. But even then, it's entirely centered on how Subaru acts about it.

It's all about that dude. He's an alright dude, don't get me wrong. Interesting. Would be nice if there was more to it though.

I like this column a lot. It says a lot about what I like about the show. However, I have to disagree with Jacob Hope Chapman on what was necessary in ep 18. Subaru's problem was not that he believed he was the hero of the story and needed to be disabused of that notion so that "He would just be one complex person in a world full of complex people: not the best or worst of anything. "

Subaru actually is the hero of the story. The problem is that he believed that the entire world already knew that and that all he needed to do was show up and everyone would accept his hero status and do what he wanted and he would be showered with great powers and rewards. As a result he didn't need to consider the situations of other people or negotiate with anyone. After all he was the hero.

What he realized in ep18 is that while he is the hero, nobody else (except Rem) sees him like that and so he will have to work at it and earn that status from others. If he wants someone to be his love interest he can't just save them and expect they will fall into his arms. (Rem excepted)

JesuOtaku wrote:

I know the in-universe excuse, it just doesn't matter to me personally as a critic. It's a textual justification for a metatextual problem. "Subaru has a disorienting response to witch miasma" is a potentially interesting plot point, but it doesn't have to be demonstrated by having him take almost an hour of anime runtime to figure out what's happening (while the story around him grinds to a halt and starts indulging in redundancy), and it really shouldn't.

Thanks for the elaborate answer!

You're correct.
I guess it felt shorter and better paced in the novels and with the knowledge of around 30 volumes worth of content you kinda loose the sense of time for some scenes. It simply feels so small and insignificant if you don't look at it separately. Guess my reader bias shone through, sorry :/!

This article sums up my feelings about the show really well. I think arguments against this perspective on episode 18, stuff along the lines of "but that's how Rem really felt so you can't blame her for it," ignores a basic premise of fiction in general: this is a story, and its elements are created to make you feel certain ways and think certain things. Rem's motivations for loving Subaru so much that she would do this are not compelling enough to make me believe she represents anything but a comforting pillow for the audience who would feel intimate discomfort with how the arc treated Subaru's worldview up to that point. It doesn't really matter that the story said that this is how Rem feels. What matters is that how her written feelings were used.

she shouldn't just be humoring this hypothetical as if her own feelings don't matter.

This article sums up my feelings about the show really well. I think arguments against this perspective on episode 18, stuff along the lines of "but that's how Rem really felt so you can't blame her for it," ignores a basic premise of fiction in general: this is a story, and its elements are created to make you feel certain ways and think certain things. Rem's motivations for loving Subaru so much that she would do this are not compelling enough to make me believe she represents anything but a comforting pillow for the audience who would feel intimate discomfort with how the arc treated Subaru's worldview up to that point. It doesn't really matter that the story said that this is how Rem feels. What matters is that how her written feelings were used.

And @#860645 Rem specifically says in episode 18 that he rejected her so on that point you are wrong.

Rem's motivations for loving Subaru so much that she would do this are not compelling enough to make me believe she represents anything but a comforting pillow for the audience who would feel intimate discomfort with how the arc treated Subaru's worldview up to that point.

ep 20 skipped scene
spoiler[rem doesn't mind to become the 2nd wife and subaru wants a pologamy realtionship with her and emilia ]

I wonder if he will ever realize he actually has a lot of physical strength.

I remember him beating up those 3 thugs in one of the earlier episodes.