English Dub Review: Re:ZERO ~Starting Life in Another World~ “Friend”

Overview (Spoilers Below):

Subaru now in Beatrice’s library demands why she saved him even to the point of healing him with magic. He tries to take his life to go back, but Beatrice stops him. Upon seeing the gospel on the floor, Subaru asks Beatrice why it’s there, and why she is holding it like it’s something precious to her. Beatrice can’t answer those questions because she hasn’t been commanded to by the book. The book is her life essentially and she admits that everything she’s done is because of the book and doesn’t expect him to understand. Then the door opens and Elsa comes in to kill Subaru and Beatrice.

After being killed again, Subaru returns to the ruins and comforts Emilia once more. The scene of the group discussing ways to get out of the Sanctuary gets shortened. Then Subaru and Otto talk about his all too calm behavior when Garfiel goes over to discuss something with Subaru and brings him to where Ryuzu is in private. Upon revealing that he passed the trial, Subaru gets imprisoned by Garfiel who refuses to let him near the graveyard because of the Witch’s scent on him. Meanwhile, everyone is searching for him and Garfiel pays Otto to keep quiet about him being the last person to see Subaru. Just when Subaru considers killing himself Otto appears and helps Subaru escape as his friend. They meet up with Ram in the forest to escape outside of the barrier.

Our Take:

Re:ZERO does well in tearing down Subaru’s belief in his friends and then building it back up with its structure. First off, Beatrice hits hard as everything she’s done was according to a book and it appears that all her actions so far weren’t her choice. It’s like realizing that a long-time friend doesn’t really care about you. Her denial to him is similar to that of a child’s and the fact that she’s doing everything for her “mother” shows how dependent Beatrice is on the gospel and her lack of will to step out of the bounds of the gospel. When Subaru admits to being happy about the past despite hearing that, it really shows how much those days meant to him and how much he considered her a friend which makes her words even cut deeper. Even when Elsa comes in, Subaru struggles to make sure that Elsa doesn’t touch Beatrice in his last moments before dying.

Then there’s back at Sanctuary where Subaru gets imprisoned by Garfiel who doesn’t trust him because of the Witch’s scent. Admittedly that gave me a bit of whiplash because Garfiel made no indication that he could even smell it on Subaru like Rem, but it does make sense since he’s a beast-man. Plus, he’s only known Subaru for two to three days considering where Subaru’s reset point is on the timeline. The episode does bring into question how Frederica could pass through the barrier being a quarter beast-man with a half beast-man father and human mother, and why the sibling’s surnames are different.

In contrast to Beatrice’s actions, there’s Otto the resident merchant, who is often at the butt end of jokes in the group. Subaru was about to try and return by death again upon recalling his multiple experiences from his former time loops. However, Otto rescues Subaru from his imprisonment because he considers Subaru as a friend despite how he was treated as cannon fodder for jokes. That moment was good because Subaru can see that he’s not alone in his quest to save everyone. He can have people he can trust like Otto. Furthermore, Otto was given a bribe to keep quiet about Garfiel being the last person to be with Subaru. By all means, Otto could have just done nothing, but he risked the danger of getting caught by Garfiel to save Subaru.

Now hopefully they get out of the barrier safely, but that last moment with Garfiel finding the empty cell raises a flag. Especially with Frederica’s words on Garfiel imitating her. The episode has answered some questions, but more questions do keep cropping up. For example, the identity of Beatrice’s “mother” and the oath that Margrave gave to Emilia during Subaru’s absence. Re:ZERO just keeps people hooked on what’s going to happen next.