Ok, so who else wants a spin off season of re:Zero with just Echidna’s happy family doing happy silly stuff in an idyllic countryside cabin? Like a fantasy Slice of Life.
Roswaal could teach Bea to fish and they would prepare what the caught for dinner and invite witchey friends over. Echidna would wear a super frilly apron with an angry cat embroidery and bake a cake for dessert. The other witches would tease her about it and she would get weirdly self conscious but in the end they would all laugh together.
As you can see, it’s super clear in my head. Am I really the only one for who this sounds awesome? I hope not.
And we almost got that at the beginning of this episode. Like for the first third or so. If you want to read all our thoughts about it and find out what actually happened in this week’s re:Zero, please go take a look at our post over on Crow’s blog. And if you wanted to leave a like or comment or something, that wouldn’t be too bad either!
Because sadly, my dream of re:Zero just taking a week to settle didn’t quite happen. Also, I’m starting to get really worried about Rem&Co. Admittedly, I’m not exactly a re:Zero scholar so I’m not sure how Subaru’s power resets. Or rather when and why his rez point changes. But in all of part 1, Emilia couldn’t get through the first trial, now that she did, it seems like a pretty significant event that would move everything forward. Including a rez point. And that’s pretty bad news as Subaru was barely making it to the mansion in time, in the first place!
Oh well, at least we got Ram! I didn’t take a screencap of Ram this week, here’s Ryuzuu instead. Don’t forget to check out the real post over on Crow’s blog.
Given how Satella is described by pretty much everybody as a half-elf, I don’t think becoming a witch changes your genetic makeup. Emilia and Satella should be blood relatives judging by Roswaal’s remark this episode, assuming that he has an idea about their family line from Echidna.
Well there are a lot of half elves that aren’t witches and the other witches aren’t half-elves. No? I always thought that Emilia and Satella are the same person or directly related – they aren’t just half elves, the look identical but there are a lot of other witches, including that guy who looked nothing like any of the other ones.
I forgot to note that Roswaal dropped a bombshell this episode when he said that Emilia and Satella, the Witch of Envy, share the same lineage. This shows they share a common ancestor and hurts speculation about Emilia and Satella being the same person. I think at this point that it’s more likely that Emilia and Satella are sisters by blood.
Was lineage a biological bloodline? Or just a shared magical lineage?
I’ve always been under the impression that lineage refers to having a common ancestor. If there is such a thing as a shared magical lineage, what is magical lineage?
I’ve seen it used as shared affinity, shared traits and shared history.
Oh, I guess I learned something new today. I guess Emilia at least has shared traits with Satella in that she’s a half-elf whose appearance matches Satella’s.
Oh they could also all be blood relations. I don’t in fact know. I just thought that once they became witches they changed on a fundamental level or something like that.
My main takeaways from this episode were that Hector was the reason Echidna built the Sanctuary, that Hector and Echidna were probably a couple, and that Roswaal probably imitates Hector in the present as a reminder of his brutal defeat to him.
Hector notes he didn’t want to end up being the way he is, but Roswaal indicates that Hector definitely chose this path among the limited options he had, which means that Hector likely killed the previous Devil/Warlock/Witch of Melancholy and inherited his/her Witch Factor. Echidna notes that Hector hasn’t changed since they parted ways, and Hector indicates Echidna still doesn’t know how to talk to him properly. He remarks that she was really adorable back then though, and all of this shows that Echidna and Hector likely dated each other in the past. I wonder if it was Hector’s downer personality that caused them to break up with each other, assuming that they were in fact a couple. So Hector is the current Devil/Warlock of Hector, and he appears to be Echidna’s crazy ex-boyfriend who might be the possessive (and vengeful?) type who stalked her so much that Echidna had to create the Sanctuary to keep him away. Thus, Echidna’s experiment with using the Sanctuary to try to obtain immortality, which was revealed in the first cour, was probably developed after she was able to keep Hector away.
I think Roswaal might have chosen to imitate Hector because he was jealous of Hector’s power and also, if I’m right, of Hector once having dated Echidna. A big point of this episode was that Roswaal is fixated on people being weak, so he might dress and talk like Hector because the encounter with Hector showed to Roswaal how powerless he actually was, leading to Roswaal gaining the strength he has in the current day because he reminds himself constantly of that beatdown from Hector long ago.
I am very skeptical of the theory that Roswaal borrowed Hector’s power or that he and Hector combined as Hector has red eyes, and current day Roswaal does not have a red eye. I believe a behavioural explanation potentially makes more sense than any theory of Roswaal somehow having access to Hector’s power/being in some way being behind why Roswaal is the way he is in the present. Roswaal becoming stronger by reminding himself of a moment of weakness is a common trope in anime, so I find this to be a more plausible explanation.
I think I mentioned the Hector borrowed power thing maybe. I’m sure your theory is much more credible. I find the reZero lore a little muddled lately and to be honest I’m mostly waiting for an explanation instead of trying to come up with one. I might be missing too much info from having skipped everything other than episode 1 to make any sort of reasonable guesses.
But this sounds super well thought out.
“The other witches would tease her about it and she would get weirdly self conscious but in the end they would all laugh together.”
Now that you mention it, that would be a huge amount of fun!