Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- Season 3

Episode 60

While last week's episode was all about moving our heroes into place for the various fights to come, this episode aims to deliver on the action that was teased. The main action set piece is that of the battle against Regulus. It's big, flashy, and expertly animated.

Our three heroes, Reinhard, Subaru, and Emilia, get a few moments to shine. More than that, we see a lot of Subaru and Emilia working as a pair on the front lines together—sharing the danger and protecting each other rather than being little more than a useless damsel while the other does all the work. It's another example of how the two have grown—Subaru since restarting from zero and Emilia since accepting her past.

With all the action going on, you might have been distracted from the fact that this episode is a mystery story. This fight, which takes up most of the episode, is not a battle to defeat Regulus. After all, at the moment, not even Reinhard, the “big damn hero” of Re:Zero's world, can even scratch Regulus (though, to be fair, it's not like Regulus can beat Reinhard, either).

Instead, our heroes are performing a series of science experiments. Subaru and friends are working to figure out the rules behind Regulus' powers and what exactly his powers are. It's only after having this information they can figure out his weaknesses. Thus, they try different things like hitting him with his attacks, freezing him solid, and giving him a hard shot right to the balls. None of this works, however.

Instead, Regulus' name—and the name of his power—gives Subaru the hint he needs to make a good guess at what is going on. Subaru (like many viewers) has noticed that all the Sin Archbishops are named after stars (himself included). Moreover, each Archbishop's powers seem to relate to that star's name or history somehow. Thus, Subaru deduces that Regulus' powers are centered around stopping time for himself—hence why Regulus is in prime condition despite the beating he's taken.

However, this explanation raises a host of questions. Subaru makes the jump from Regulus being called “the little king” to figuring out his time-stopping powers like it is the most obvious, logical thing in the world. Embarrassingly, I don't get the connection. Perhaps I don't know enough about the constellations—or maybe there is a legend or a play on words I'm not aware of that deals with “timelessness” or something similar. Either way, I could have used a bit more hand-holding in this department.

Even after the reveal, I still don't understand Regulus' powers. I'm left wondering what “stopping your body's time” means. Regulus is still interacting with the world. He can touch and hold things. He can be punched, thrown, and crushed but doesn't take damage.

Moreover, how does “stopping time” make the things he's done possible? We've seen him do things like flick a wrist to blow someone's arm off. In this episode, he lifts a massive amount of still-moving water as if it has an invisible container around it and then makes it rain down as sharp projectiles. I just don't see the connection between the root of his powers and what we've seen him do.

While the episode was fun on the surface level, I'm left feeling like the characters have left me behind. We are no longer on the same page, and I'm expected to play catch up—and I don't know if I can without bingeing the wiki or reading the source material. However, maybe I'm just being hasty. Maybe things will be explained more clearly later—that this episode was only supposed to introduce the “time stop” idea and confirm that it's true. I certainly hope this is the case, but for the moment, the more I think about what's going on, the more I feel lost. I don't think this is what the episode was hoping to portray.

Rating:

Random Thoughts:

• We get some A-grade trash-talking from Subaru this week.

• Priscilla and Anastasia sure seem to think Al can solo Capella… I guess they know something we don't.

• So Priscilla is so emotionally locked down that Sirius' powers can't affect her? That's… worrying.

• We didn't see anything of the fights with Gluttony or the Lust minions this week.

Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

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