(L) Re:Creators

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

The funny thing here is, wasn't it Mamika who told to Altair to break away from the bind of creation? Yet her death & dying-words are still tropey as heck .

[magnuskn]

Well, that is true.

[Magewolf]

I thought the cafe coincidence was bad but hoped it was a one time thing. However this episode says the writer either does not care to or is unable to come up with some way to advance the plot that makes sense. And since I know the writer can do better from his past works that means he does not care to which gives me a bad feeling about the future of the show.

Honestly in many ways this reminds me of a light novel series adaption where they are trying to cram half a dozen books into 12 episodes even though it is an original work. They used Meteora to give out info on the setting to save time on showing it and now they are relying on coincidence to advance the plot to wherever they want it.

[Blueknight78]

to be honest, while alice know which magane is evil she don't know which she is a speciallist lier and deceiving is part of her power, also the fact which magana actually said the truth in twisted way make even worst, she didn't lied she just changed the order, to make meteora the murder and alice help altair, she is manipulative as hell.

about lucky well while indeed this is forced it's not like this can't never happen remember the worl id big and i already saw a lot of crazy almost impossible things to happen like in a case of a chinese guy or was a japanese which was struck to a lighting bolt 2 times in a row and survived and others thing this is a very forced cliche but still possible.

[Tenzen12]

It would help if Magane was know for high luck or something.

As for Souta it's good he decide refuse her, until now keeping quiet or not was just his thing, but if he hurt someone to cover it there would be really no excuse even considering his PTSD. I guess he won his battle and now he can more actively involving himself in battles of others. Or not moons would blame him if bailed out completely, but I would guess he is better then that.

All that said I greatly enjoyed Magane manipulations and even more Mirokuji shutting her up. Also wow our lier can be potentially strongest contestant.

[AC-Phoenix]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

On Altair. Who knows how Mamika would have done?

And the point remains: just because she didn't use something in her short fight against Aliceteria doesn't mean she's completely unable to use it in any circumstance.

It actually says a lot.
Even if Alice probably doesn't know how much 1+1 is Metoera was obviously helpless there.
Meteora is literally unable to defend herself there while Mamika can destroy entire concrete buildings on her own with ease. Its also not the first time Alice was allowed to see how helpless Meteora actully is in a fight.

Alice was obviously observing the scene in EP 1 and 2 and only came to help when Mirokuji appeared.

Originally Posted by Obelisk ze Tormentor

Doesn't matter. My evidence nullifed your points that I quoted. Also, what Anh Minh said above.

No, not really. Your evidence actually even strengthens my point.

Not only does it underline what Metoera herself said, namely that she sucks at attack magic, but it also shows that Meteora wasn't just throwing the ammunition but had to use their firing mechanisms in order to use them, wwhich is a huge difference to just manipulating them at will like Altair does.


And even if you ignore all this, Altair is still a known sword thrower and Ms Knight should at least know how a sword wound looks like.

[Cosmic Eagle]

Originally Posted by shmaster

This episode is so predictable to the point of being offensive.
I was screaming in front of the TV asking can someone summon Hitoyoshi Senkichi into this show.

Not bad writing per se so much as stupid characters. Alice being an idiot is in character (and technically, no one lied to her or even influenced her to do anything...she just leapt to conclusions). Sota is Sota...... The biggest asspull apart from why Magane is where she was at the start (because plot....which is still somewhat acceptable beacuse hey, someone has to initiate the next stage right?) is why Meteora and Mirokuji just appear like that.

Better to have let Sota stew and then leave with the seeds of future events implanted with him...like following Magane's plot or something.... such wasted potential there

Originally Posted by Zefyris

Are you kidding me, what's with the awful writing? Even a middle schooler wouldn't dare to write something as bad as that.
Until now we kind of only got fights+initial settings, and now that the plot kind of moves forward we get that horrible, horrible writing right away? That show just got down from "potentially good" to "awfully written " in a few minutes.
The fact that they killed the only character that they managed in 9 episodes to develop past the cardboard cut characters, I can go along with it. it's sad for the overall quality, but there's still plenty of episodes for the others to receive better treatment, so the loss can always be temporary.

But the rest.... the rest, omg.
Are you kidding me. The whole episode's happening, as well as probably at least next episode if not more, will be heavily influenced by WHAT? a completely unbelievable happening that blood felt on miss liar's ice cream. There wasn't a chance in a trillion of it happening. And that's not stopping here. Because if that was stopping here, the knight would never believe miss liar. So the knight had to arrive when Mamika was still alive. But after she transmitted the message to miss liar. Once again completely random event that has very low chance of happening. Combine the two of them together, we're into the one out of quadrillion chance right now I guess? But let's not stop here. That would be a waste after such a nice series of coincidences, right?
Mamika had perfectly the time to repeat her message to the knight. But instead she goes on "alice chan, alice chan" blablabla for a while and die without telling it, leaving to a highly suspicious individual the task of transmitting her most important message.
And of course, the knight believe her words even though she never trusted her before. Without doubting. Even though miss liar had a very very obvious way of twisting the truth without lying, anyone would have guessed that she was twisting the order of things with that way of retransmitting. But hey, after doing so much effort writing the plot that led here, that would be a waste to let it end for nothing right.

I mean, such a revolutionary way of writing. I wonder why authors around the world even bother writing proper plot, let's just go with improbable coincidences all along, I mean readers/watchers are too dumb to notice, as long as you feed them with edgy bloodbath, flashy combats and cool looking character, they're happy and hyped all along.

MOST. AWFULLY. WRITTEN. EPISODE. OF THE WHOLE ANIME SEASON.

There goes most of the hope of having something decent coming out of that setting. The writer is clearly a complete incompetent. No author with a minimum of self-respect would ever dare to present to anyone such a shameful excuse of a plot.
There goes any sadness I could have had seeing mamika die, I was so disgusted by the poor writing that any remaining suspension of disbelief was shattered beyond repair for the rest of the episode.

Alice did not "believe" anything so much as jump to conclusions. It's not a question of belief or not when you aren't even properly listening to what Magane is saying at all. The asspulls you are looking for are in the latter part of the episode actually.

[magnuskn]

I'm sure people who just have loved it if Sota would have not talked to anyone about his secret for another five episodes. ^^

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by AC-Phoenix

It actually says a lot.
Even if Alice probably doesn't know how much 1+1 is Metoera was obviously helpless there.
Meteora is literally unable to defend herself there while Mamika can destroy entire concrete buildings on her own with ease. Its also not the first time Alice was allowed to see how helpless Meteora actully is in a fight.

Alice was obviously observing the scene in EP 1 and 2 and only came to help when Mirokuji appeared.

And what if Meteora's power depends on the phases of the moon, or the day of the week? What if she needs certain ingredients to cast good combat spells that she didn't have before, but had when she confronted Mamika? What if her skill set is lousy for direct confrontations, but great for ambushes?

All things Aliceteria can't know from what she's seen of Meteora.

[AC-Phoenix]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

And what if Meteora's power depends on the phases of the moon, or the day of the week? What if she needs certain ingredients to cast good combat spells that she didn't have before, but had when she confronted Mamika? What if her skill set is lousy for direct confrontations, but great for ambushes?

All things Aliceteria can't know from what she's seen of Meteora.

You assume they don't know anything about them, while their leader was actually the one who hand picked both sides for this.

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

Originally Posted by AC-Phoenix

No, not really. Your evidence actually even strengthens my point.

Wants to backpedal your own statements? Let me show it to you once again:

Originally Posted by Obelisk ze Tormentor

Looks like somebody forgot how Meteora was able to control and shoot six rocket-launchers and a machine gun back in episode 1:

So it is clear that:

A. Meteora is able to do offense IRL using IRL weapons that she took (and still keep) from JSDF. But now after the meeting with JSDF, she promised to Kikuchirara to ask for permission first before attacking and thus restricting her full capabilities and skills before she got the greenlight. Well, we all know that she can't do her restoration magic IRL and that's it.

B. Her other skills remains to be seen.

Originally Posted by AC-Phoenix

Not only does it underline what Metoera herself said, namely that she sucks at attack magic, but it also shows that Meteora wasn't just throwing the ammunition but had to use their firing mechanisms in order to use them, which is a huge difference to just manipulating them at will like Altair does.

See point B. Plus, Alice still doesn't know all of Meteora's skills. For her, it's safer to assume a magician/wizard/witch is able to do many things with her magic.

Originally Posted by AC-Phoenix

And even if you ignore all this, Altair is still a known sword thrower and Ms Knight should at least know how a sword wound looks like.

I've addressed it all, and I even said that Alice is making stupid thinking & decision this episode in my first reply

Originally Posted by AC-Phoenix

You assume they don't know anything about them, while their leader was actually the one who hand picked both sides for this.

Well, it's clear that Alice either doesn't know what kind of power that Magane has, or she is too stupid to care. Both choices support Alice accusing Meteora in this episode.

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by AC-Phoenix

You assume they don't know anything about them, while their leader was actually the one who hand picked both sides for this.

No, I assume Aliceteria doesn't know. She's not the type.

[Ultragunner]

well, now that was "easy",

Ehem...Alice-chan, if you really believed in Magane's words, then perhaps it ain't a coincidence when your world was in such bad shape

[DemonneoPT]

I agree with the ones saying that the over the top coincidences are real bad for the plot tho. I love Magane, i think the way she talks and acts is amazing. But the poorly way the authors are using her to advance the story is just plain bad. Sure, coincidences are part of the story telling for every single show/book out there, but the scale in which it's currently being used in Re:Creators is just off the charts. Also, it wasn't just this episode since it already happened before. Honestly, blood falling from the sky directly to Magane's food (in a city with millions of people) so she can find Mamika is just insanely bad. It would be fun if this was a comedy tho..lol

Regarding Alice being stupid, i'm ok with it since it's part of her character. I mean, i dislike that trait of hers but it's not bad writing creating stupid characters. Having a mix of intelligent, average and stupid people in the main cast is good for diversity issues imo. Some fantasy chars are just dumb and ignore every sign the world is directly flashing into their faces. It's frustrating and maybe a bit too much but Mamika did told Alice it wasn't Magane's fault before she enters in shock and finally dies. Alice can still confront Meteora first before attacking so let's wait and see.

[SeaDoor]

I'll have to agree that Magane seems to be being used by the series writers as a plot device rather than an integrated character much in the same way that Sota's not telling what he knew about Altair. It's unfortunate because I think Magane is an interesting character.
On the other hand, I do accept that Alice's single-mindedness is from how well her creator wrote her character. She is just one-dimensional and we are seeing the implications of a poorly developed character.

[GMT]

Originally Posted by magnuskn

Again, I agree that it is a flaw in the series. However, not to the magnitude that I'd call the writer essentially a hack. That is a personal attack against him which is not warranted, unlike for example calling two certain persons hacks for ruining the most seminal science fiction game series of the last two decades in 15 minutes with some of the worst writing ever in fiction.

The problem is that the writing in this show really isn't that good. It's cute. It uses cute little tricks to make itself look clever. The problem is that it doesn't really seem interested in exploring the premise of "anime characters get transported to the real world and have to deal with it."

Its creators stated that they were trying to pitch an anime battle-royale for years along the vein of what would happen if some franchise got matched up against some other franchise. Except thanks to copyright laws, this is the show they gave us instead.

The whole "anime characters go IRL" thing seems to be window dressing for the fights. It's mostly handled by dry info-dumping, where the show flagrantly violates "show, don't tell." Lots of info-dumping that says "look how clever we are! We came up with this neat premise! Do you see how much thought we put into it?" Yes, they did put a lot of thought into it ... but the thinking apparently gets suspended when it comes time to fight.

The Tokyo of Re:Creators seems curiously empty ... there's always huge empty spaces for anime characters to get into fights without the pandemonium and collateral casualties having overpowered brawls in mega-metropolises ought to have. It's also amazingly claustrophobic ... characters always seem to be running into each other when it's convenient for the plot. The world of Re:Creators is just a battle stage for the obvious expy of some well known anime franchise to go up against the obvious expy of some other well known anime franchise. The consequences are relatively minimal, and only come up when the show feels like it's obligated to pay lip service to its premise.

This last episode was a really clear example of how poor the writing is. Mamika's death was handled in the most ham-handed way possible. When she was introduced, it was obvious that she was going to get killed off. She kept popping off death flags in virtually every episode she was in. She fit into the cliche of the bad guy with a heart of gold, who questions what side they're really working for, has a face-heel turn, and then sacrifices themselves heroically. Only they had to cram in the other cliche of the tragic romance, where one person magically lives long enough after a mortal wound to die in the arms of the one they love (or who knows them best.)

Since Mamika represents what passes for character development in this show, and her development is as cliche as can be, nobody else gets any real character development that doesn't fit the well-worn trope they represent. One might argue Sota is getting character development, but he's ticking off the boxes of the traumatized, reluctant hero; who spends time gazing at his navel, struggling with the ghosts of his past, before he emerges to be the hero his position in the story would suggest that he is. Nobody else progresses beyond their initial motivations and character archetypes.

I think that's why the writing is starting to piss people off. They were seduced by the premise, and the promise that the show would try to do that premise justice. But the show's writing is starting to show that the writers haven't really put more than initial effort into fleshing out the consequences of the premise they sold at the start. The premise is showing hints of only being there to enable anime characters that wouldn't otherwise meet to get into fights. Mamika died for honor ... and our amusement.

[Router25]

A magical girl died in an episode divisible by three.
Magane only wants to watch the world burn.
Alice, blinded by rage , would believe a known liar in order to seek vengance on Mamika.
I'm having doubts if Sota is the one who posted the KYS post, or it's just because he kept quiet about it and didn't confront Setsuna.

Next episode, let's hope it doesn't end in a lot more talking.

[VTHokiePride]

So Mamika didn't die in the nuke she set off? I would've preferred her to go like that instead of flying off wounded. Sad to see her go but she had flags all over the place.

I'm still waiting for my slice of life beach episode shown in the ED.

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

Originally Posted by GMT

The problem is that the writing in this show really isn't that good.....

Spoiler for saving space:

It's cute. It uses cute little tricks to make itself look clever. The problem is that it doesn't really seem interested in exploring the premise of "anime characters get transported to the real world and have to deal with it."

Its creators stated that they were trying to pitch an anime battle-royale for years along the vein of what would happen if some franchise got matched up against some other franchise. Except thanks to copyright laws, this is the show they gave us instead.

The whole "anime characters go IRL" thing seems to be window dressing for the fights. It's mostly handled by dry info-dumping, where the show flagrantly violates "show, don't tell." Lots of info-dumping that says "look how clever we are! We came up with this neat premise! Do you see how much thought we put into it?" Yes, they did put a lot of thought into it ... but the thinking apparently gets suspended when it comes time to fight.

The Tokyo of Re:Creators seems curiously empty ... there's always huge empty spaces for anime characters to get into fights without the pandemonium and collateral casualties having overpowered brawls in mega-metropolises ought to have. It's also amazingly claustrophobic ... characters always seem to be running into each other when it's convenient for the plot. The world of Re:Creators is just a battle stage for the obvious expy of some well known anime franchise to go up against the obvious expy of some other well known anime franchise. The consequences are relatively minimal, and only come up when the show feels like it's obligated to pay lip service to its premise.

This last episode was a really clear example of how poor the writing is. Mamika's death was handled in the most ham-handed way possible. When she was introduced, it was obvious that she was going to get killed off. She kept popping off death flags in virtually every episode she was in. She fit into the cliche of the bad guy with a heart of gold, who questions what side they're really working for, has a face-heel turn, and then sacrifices themselves heroically. Only they had to cram in the other cliche of the tragic romance, where one person magically lives long enough after a mortal wound to die in the arms of the one they love (or who knows them best.)

Since Mamika represents what passes for character development in this show, and her development is as cliche as can be, nobody else gets any real character development that doesn't fit the well-worn trope they represent. One might argue Sota is getting character development, but he's ticking off the boxes of the traumatized, reluctant hero; who spends time gazing at his navel, struggling with the ghosts of his past, before he emerges to be the hero his position in the story would suggest that he is. Nobody else progresses beyond their initial motivations and character archetypes.

I think that's why the writing is starting to piss people off. They were seduced by the premise, and the promise that the show would try to do that premise justice. But the show's writing is starting to show that the writers haven't really put more than initial effort into fleshing out the consequences of the premise they sold at the start. The premise is showing hints of only being there to enable anime characters that wouldn't otherwise meet to get into fights. Mamika died for honor ... and our amusement.

I’m actually experiencing the opposite of that. The first time I read the premise, I kinda expected a mindless brawl show between various animangames characters brought to life IRL. I expected the show not to touch various serious themes that can be brought up when you bring fictional characters to life in favor of the battles. In short, knowing the premise, my expectation was quite low (unlike many people, I do not worship the similarly-premised Fate anime series nor put them on my top 5-10 of my all-time greatest anime). But to my pleasant surprise, R:C actually took the more cerebral path and actually addressed various interesting issues that I myself will question when fictional characters come to life. So far, I think the show have addressed around 50-60% of IRL issues that I can come up with (still addressed though, not all of them are solved). I consider that an achievement for a show with an arguably nonsense premise which caters to tweens and teenagers (yes, don’t forget the main target audience of this show). The show is not perfect in addressing the IRL issues but considering the alternative (aka. mindless brawls), I actually feel that I got myself a good deal when I watch R:C. I can’t remember other anime shows with this premise treated its subject matter to R:C’s level of seriousness.

In short, instead of treating R:C like a “glass half empty”, I treated it like a “glass half full”. I guess those who are furious and severely disappointed by the show so far are those “glass half empty”-people or those who expected so much more. For the latter, I seriously gotta ask: what is your basis for such high expectation? The premise & synopsis certainly didn’t promise something highbrow; The previous work of the studio is Aldnoah which is quite bad when it comes to writing; The previous work of the writer is Black Lagoon which is a fun ride with enough level of seriousness but was never on Monster or Death Note-level; The previous work of the director is a mixed bag (F/Z is pretty good while Girls Bravo is quite bad). All of them combined should only produce a moderate expectation at best.

Note: I already understand the disappointment of those who expected R:C to be nothing more than brainless wall-to-wall action as Harry Dresden’s post in past pages already represented them well (for better or worse).

Originally Posted by VTHokiePride

I'm still waiting for my slice of life beach episode shown in the ED.

Maybe, just maybe....those happy events are in that ED because it will never happen?

[Mr. DJ]

The blood falling on Magane's food was a special kind of dumb. Mamika was bleeding out pretty hardcore that I would have preferred Magane reacting to people getting blood dropping on them real quick before she would notice where it was coming from.

Alice being so naive is rather infuriating.

Meanwhile, I'm still waiting for some giant robot action *sigh*