English Dub Review: Steins;Gate 0 “Rinascimento of Image Formation -Return of Phoenix-“

At long last, Hououin Kyouma has returned. El. Psy. Congroo.

Overview (Spoilers Below)

Okabe needs to get back to the year 2011, and to accomplish this titanic task, they’ll be using Amadeus as Okabe’s partner to assist him in his travels. Since Amadeus is a computer and doesn’t care about the passage of time, its no problem for her. This is a tricky operation, however, as it will take approximately 3,000 leaps for him to make it back to 2011. Okabe declares that he won’t run away this time, and determines himself to fix the past once and for all, motivated by the sacrifices of his friends. With Maho and Daru at the controls, Okabe takes the plunge.

He’s sent back two weeks prior, and with Amadeus and the other Future Gadget Lab Members’ help, leaps back again and again and again. Along the way, Okabe becomes acquainted with the strain of time leaping this much, and the potential destruction of his timelines and his life that might occur along the way.

As he continues to time leap, he ends up in the shoes of himself as a resistance leader. Surprisingly, his friends are always there for him, with each leap, always jumping to his aid when they find out he’s time leaping to the past. With his faith in his friends, Okabe rushes to the past one leap at a time, finally making it back to the year 2011.

When he reunites with Dare and Maho in 2011, he demands Daru give him a good punch, a request which he gladly makes good on. With that mighty blow, a change sparks inside Okarin, who, in a flash of inspiration, begins cackling in the voice of the mighty Hououin Kyouma.

Back in his right evil genius mind, Kyouma summons the other lab members to begin Operation Vega, their mission to stop the collapse of the modern world. He rallies Braun and deploys each of them to their jobs. At the radio building, Okabe arrives just as Alexis is about to kill Suzuha and Mayuri. In a turn of fate, it’s revealed that the masked figure Alexis thought was Kagari is actually Moeka in disguise. She disables Alexis and all seems well, but before Mayuri and Suzuha can flee with the time machine, the helicopter somehow arrives early and blows the time machine to bits.

Our Take:

Finally, finally, finally, Steins;Gate 0 has reached for the stars and brought itself back to the glorious enterprise it should have been from the beginning. There is so much right about this episode it feels as if I’m watching the original series once again, and that is exactly the sense of magic and thrill one looks for when watching this series. Everything hits exactly what it’s supposed to. The tension, the pacing, the soundtrack, and of course the brilliant and passionate voice acting from John Michael Tatum as he dons the mad tones of Hououin Kyouma once again.

Okabe’s character has needed to undergo an evolution for some time since his depressed self-came off as too whiny and damaged to serve as the emotional heart of this series. This meant that, as an audience, we were left waiting for quite some time to get to this point where Okabe shifts the tides of fate and time in his favor once again. It could be said, perhaps, that waiting this long is what makes this particular episode so rewarding to watch. While I think many other episodes in the series could have been done better, there’s no doubt that this particular moment hits so hard because we’ve become so familiar with Okabe’s suffering, and are happy to see it remedied at long last.

I particularly enjoyed that Okabe getting “Better” and recovering from his shattered past demands him to literally time jump 3,000 times back to his home time. This feat can be called nothing less than mythic in scope and serves to demonstrate the determination that has taken over his soul.

What really cinches this episode though is its ending. Steins;Gate is a series where, even when things go right, they can still go wrong; its a show that demands so much of its characters, and thus captures a sense of reality. The story spares no one, and so every victory feels earned. By having the last moment of the episode be on a down note, it not only preps the audience on a cliffhanger to be ready for next week’s resolution, but it also shows that Okabe isn’t quite done yet. It’s not enough to just put on a fresh smile and a lab coat; Okabe and his friends face powerful enemies, and the show makes it clear that this is far from over, yet.