Animisery – A Blog About Living Miserably with Anime (Among Other Things)

Tuturu~ Mattie desu~

Steins;Gate is one of the most important anime to me and, according to the users MyAnimeList.net, it’s probably one of the most important anime in general seeing as how it holds a whopping 2.5 million users with it on their list with a 9.09 score. By the statistics that you might see on a website like IGN which hands out good scores like you can just buy them, that may not seem impressive. You then realize that people who engage with anime enough to make a MAL are more than likely going to be a little bit more discerning when it comes to scoring and that number actually starts to hold significance. To put it in perspective, the three anime above it are Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End, Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, and a One Piece OVA so we can assume that Steins;Gate has some severe credentials to have those as its primary adversaries in the leaderboards of weeaboos on the internets and their scoring systems. My point being here is simple: Steins;Gate is outstanding; please agree with me.

I hate to go all blogger on you and not get to the freaking point and instead just dance around the point with the gracelessness of a legless gazelle on methamphetamines but it’s my party and I’ll cry if I want to (and I will). Steins;Gate will forever hold the high honor of being the anime that got me back into anime after a long hiatus of two years and some change of thinking I was too cool for anime as I played drums in absolute cringe cover bands and spent my waking hours dedicated to being the best at Halo. I had given up the ghost with Bleach and chose to focus on my previously mentioned hobbies that were clearly better in everyway (according to past Matt, yeah just seriously screw that guy) and never gave anime a thought. That all changed in 2011 as I went to my friend John’s house to play some split screen Halo and barged into his room, as was the style of the time, to find him watching episode 17 of Steins;Gate which had newly aired. John was, in my eyes, hugely into anime and I respected that for the most part. I knew what it was and I had formerly enjoyed it but I wasn’t watching it any more. Seeing the highlight of Okabe trying to solve the mysteries of Moeka in that episode changed me. Steins;Gate was seemingly a dark turn of a show to my inexperienced mind with a real human who wasn’t fighting evil with his powered up final form but just a weirdo in a lab coat who was getting his tongue bit by a large breasted anime woman who was obsessed with her cell phone. It was entrancing to me who thought most anime really was fighting or moe stuff (my other buddy Cam made me think that) so, with some relenting on John’s part, we binged the show on NWanine (which is still around! wow!) and then it became a weekly habit to watch the new episode. Great times were had in his horrendously disgusting abode!

Alright, I’m dropping the charade now and getting to the actual point. I just wanted to have that out in the air beforehand and inform you that if you normally take a grain of salt with my opinions… well the grain of salt is a whole freaking mine at this point. I’m an absolute simp for Steins;Gate and there’s a tiny metal upa replica wobbling on my desk near my replica lab mem badges and my Steins;Gate Elite special edition box set. I want to talk about Steins;Gate episodes as I rewatch them with my girlfriend so I’m going to start that now.

Episode One: Prologue to the Beginning and End

It’s been maybe two or so years since I last rewatched Steins;Gate in full or really experienced it in any form so maybe I’m not that big of a fan but my god does that intro deliver on foreshadowing you what the themes of this show are going to deliver. The sight of the powerlines and the interweaving aspects of their nature in Akihabara where Steins;Gate takes place provide seemingly do a lot to give a little sample taste of the world of the show… if only slightly and you read too much into it like I am. I really love how this first episode seemingly provides you with so many mysteries and entrancing plot threads for the viewer. There are constant little pieces of secrets dropped throughout this first episode that a first time viewer has no way of piecing together the actual meaning to in any capacity. Why is there a satellite on the roof of the Radio Kaikan building? What was that horrific scream that sounded like the death shrieks of a tortured Okabe? What does Makise Kurisu mean by “she saw Okabe fifteen minutes ago”? Why is our main character wearing a lab coat? Is he stupid? Just so many questions that Steins;Gate is not privy to give away. Steins;Gate is fully aware that it’s going to force you through about 10 episodes of lead in and they need you to know lest risk you dropping the show and depriving yourself of excellence.

One of the things that, on this rewatch, I’m surprised didn’t prove to be the bane for this show and my entertainment value is the sheer otaku leanings of the story. It leans into old l33t speak and a multitude of hardcore otaku elements like the main characters going to a maid cafe while they reference memes popularized on 2channel. I’ve seen Steins;Gate subbed and dubbed and, while I’m watching Steins;Gate subbed this go around, I think there’s a lot to help bridge some understanding on the part of Funimation, may you rest in peace. The show itself doesn’t linger too long on these elements like the visual novel does (though the visual novel does have a handy dandy guide for the terms in case you aren’t aware) but it’s still a little bit necessary to know about Akihabara for minor plot points.

This episode does manage to fully introduce us to three of our main characters with mild fanfare including the mad scientist Hououin Kyouma/Okabe Rintaro, the delightfully airheaded Shiina Mayuri/Mayushi, and the SUPER HACKA Daru. We get a small glimpse into their chemistry as Okabe and Daru tease and mock ridicule each other, we see that Okabe acts playfully callous towards Mayushii while providing her with caring support in the form on an upa, and we also get a peek in to Okabe’s relationship to the world around him. He’s a college student who seems well adept at his studies but he also appears somewhat cynical and prone to reckless outbursts like a child who has no reading on what behavior is acceptable. Some may even read Okabe as possessing a spot on the autism spectrum but I’ve never really seen him as such but rather acting with outlandish bravado in a way to preserve his ego and have fun. He’s a mad scientist and all that. He’s allowed a few outbursts.

This episode also gives us a lot of what Steins;Gate is going to coast on in future episodes until the gel-nanas hit the fan: blind intrigue. Why did Okabe suddenly find himself in an empty Akihabara? Keep watching. Why did Okabe’s mail get broken into three pieces and sent into the past? Keep watching. Why was Kurisu lying in a pool of her own blood but suddenly alive at the end of the episode? Keep watching. What do the visuals like the tube clock mean to the story? Steins;Gate sighs a way too deep burst of air, pinches the bridge of its nose in severe annoyance, and then stares you down as it says: “KEEP. WATCHING.“

That’s basically what the first episode hopes enough to accomplish to the average viewer. It could almost appear that Steins;Gate attempts to overload the viewer with questions if you’re not accustomed to how some anime storytelling tends to be. In the metaphorical soup bowl of anime, answers are like saltines crackers (this analogy only works if you put crackers in your soup so, for the sake of this working, you put crackers in your soup, I don’t care if you don’t like them). You may not get them every time you get some soup and they may sometimes be really soggy and not even worth putting them in. Regardless, there are crackers but mostly there is soup.

Episode one of Steins;Gate is a solid start to get the engines revved up for a sci-fi adventure (OR SHOULD I JUST SAY A SCIENCE ADVENTURE BECAUSE THAT’S THE NAME OF THE SERIES OF VISUAL NOVELS THAT STEINS;GATE IS IN HAHAHAHAHA I’M SO INTOLERABLE) and I absolutely kept giving my girlfriend nervous glances throughout the episode. Is this show working? Can it keep her invested? As a fearful fan who cannot handle IRL rejection in any capacity, I could only hope.

I have to watch it regardless for the Anime Brothers Podcast so she’ll be there regardless, I suppose.

Episode Two: Time Travel Paranoia

As I was looking into the names of the episodes for this post, I saw certain YouTube reaction vloggers calling Okabe a loser. Firstly, if any of you lot are reading this, you call him Okabe. You don’t get to call him by his first name. Secondly, you would love to be able to take credit for the inventio- I mean invent Future Gadgets like he does. Lastly, I’m glad you watched the show anyways thank you so much C:

This episode introduces more intrigue! We all applaud and squeal with delight. There’s a microwave! It turns bananas into gel-nanas! Why? Keep watching! Okabe is really defensive about the existence of of time machines! Why? Keep watching! Kurisu is alive and, as the kids say, absolutely serving looks despite being very dead in the last episode! Why? Keep watching!

One of the things I’m reminded of as I watch Steins;Gate is just how seemingly muted the colors can be. It helps to juxtapose against some of the colors that actually do possess some sort of bright tint to give a little bit more contrast to scenes. It may just be my memory fading in age but the colors felt more vivid on previous rewatches but one of those rewatches was done on a website that attempted to tell me that there are hot MILFs in my area when I clearly know there are not.

One of the personal highlights to me on this go around was Okabe’s scouring of 2channel as he attempts to gather more info on John Titor who is a very real phenomenon that happened IRL. Was John Titor real? That’s up to your interpretation but in Steins;Gate he is seemingly fluctuating. Okabe’s memories of Titor’s previous deed and messages are at odds with how Titor is posting now and the mild mania that Okabe has in the dark room he’s researching in serves as a tiny prelude for what’s to come. Okabe isn’t crumbling like a Nature Valley granola bar right now but I still definitely wouldn’t open him in my bed like the aforementioned snack. This scene isn’t at the same scale as future conflicts for Okabe will be but we see that he has the capacity to easily reach his limit in frustration even early on.

Four characters are introduced in this episode each who would fill in a checklist for a harem in any other show. Is Steins;Gate a harem? I think it probably qualifies in a small capacity.

We’ve got the cat maid Faris NyanNyan (as pictured above) who expertly plays along with Okabe’s chuuni tendencies and is the subject of SUPA HACKA Daru’s 3D affections. There’s Ruka Urushibara who, despite being more feminine than Mayuri with their tall and slender frame, is a dude as Okabe reminds us multiple times. There’s also Amane Suzuha the spunky and sporty part timer who has taken a position at Mister Braun’s CRT shop. I haven’t mentioned Mister Braun yet but he’s Okabe’s landlord and a massively beefy dude who owns a CRT (the big block TVs) shop. I should’ve probably mentioned him before but editing your blog posts is for winners and we don’t keep a winning attitude here. Finally, we’ve got Moeka who is a mysterious woman that absolutely does not games on her phone so NO your kid CANNOT touch it and she’s searching for an old computer. She’s a very relatable character as I too do not want anyone touching my phone and I’m also looking for old things particularly the MILFs in my area that NWanime cruelly lied about.

Now that I’ve typed that up, hey, that’s essentially the entire cast done and introduced. Steins;Gate doesn’t have a very large cast so the characters all serve to advance the plot in some meaningful way and it really ties into future plot revelations later that I thoroughly enjoy.

The Phone Microwave (Name Subject to Change) which makes a proper introduction in this episode greet us to another gripping piece of the story that I love: Okabe and Daru do not know what they’re screwing around with. They’ve seemingly invented a machine to start a microwave in advance via a phone call but it can somehow reduce bananas to green jelly and neither of them are sure at all what the actual capabilities of the machine are. It’s an almost horrifying thought that two college freshman are tinkering with a device that can compromise the atoms of produce and they’re uncapable of understanding why at this juncture. They’re dicking around with technology fearless of the repercussions and it’s going to be like having dog with a donkey chomping problem: it’s going to bite them on their ass. Kurisu commits an act of breaking and entering (but it’s okay because she’s a cute anime girl) and sees what science hath wrought and the episode ends. Cue the applause.

It’s plainly apparent that Steins;Gate starts slow but it isn’t as viciously dragging as some others have leveled criticism at it for… at least not in the first two episode. I’m aware there is a hard push on the brakes in future episodes but we’ll discuss it when it gets there, right? Right.

I love this show and hope to give it a somewhat fair judgement on an episode to episode basis but I pray that I’ll be forgiven when I almost inevitable fail to do so. This anime started my path to ruination but it’s almost a gleeful personal disaster at the end of all things so I can’t hold that against it. I hope you’ll read my future posts and maybe watch a long with me? Maybe? That’d be really lab mem of you if you did.

Thank you for reading my blog! I hope that you saw it as a solid usage of your time and that it reminded you of the brilliance that is Steins;Gate. If you don’t like Steins;Gate then why not? It may be one of my favorite shows but I can acknowledge it’s faults and would love to hear from you! If you think it’s awesome then let me know that in the comments as well! Hearing your thoughts and impressions are meaningful to me and I want to have a conversation! If you like my thoughts and want to hear me yell about anime in audio form then go check out my podcast, the Anime Brothers Podcast, wherever you listen to shows! I’ll see you soon!

EL. PSY. CONGROO.

also here’s my metal upa!