Anime

Re:CREATORS Episode 4: The Coefficient of Elasticity and a Very Unusual Sense of Sincerity

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Quick Summary of Re:CREATORS Episode 4

In Re:Creators episode 4, “If so, I want to protect what he loved,” Meteora Österreich’s attempt to meet her creator ends in tragedy. Later, her confession shocks Selesia Upitiria and Souta Mizushino — but not as much as her insights into Military Uniform Girl’s plans. Meanwhile, Military Uniform Girl blatantly manipulates Alicetelia February, and Mamika Kirameki may have plans of her own.

Note: This post may include spoilers, so be cautious!

What’s In This Post

Quick Episode Summary
What Happened in this Episode
What I Liked in this Episode
What I Liked Not so Much in this Episode
Thoughts about the Episode
Related Posts

What Happened in Re:CREATORS Episode 4

Meteora’s Creator

Re:CREATORS Episode 4: Alicetelia doesn't seem evil...
After rescuing the Magical Slayer at the end of the previous episode, Alicetelia introduces herself. Capture from the Amazon Prime stream.

After having rescued Mamika from Selesia and Yuuya Mirokuji, Alicetelia asks the Magical Slayer how to get to Okikubo. She has business there. At about the same time, Marine takes Meteora to the company that produced the Created’s game. She’s stricken to learn that her creator recently died in an accident.

Meteora asks to be alone to organize her thoughts. Marine tells Selesia, Mizushino, and Takashi Matsubara the news. When Meteora rejoins them the next day, in her usually formal way, she apologizes for withholding information from them. When she first met Selesia, Meteora hadn’t decided what to do. She wanted to meet and judge her creator first, and if he had created her world for irresponsible or bad reasons, she was planning to stand by and watch as this world died. That admission was enough to shock Selesia, Marina, and Mizushino. Matsubara, though, asked the obvious question: what’s this about the destruction of the world?

Re:CREATORS Episode 4: Meteora's confession shocks everyone
Meteora’s story shocks Marine and Matsubara. Capture from the Amazon Prime stream.

Meteora explains that if character from other worlds, each with conflicting physics systems, continue to pour into our world, nature will be unable to adjust, and reality will fail. However, she had spent her time alone playing the game in which she starred and she had come to appreciate the care and love her creator had obviously poured into it. She found she could believe in a creator and a world like that. She’s decided she wants to protect what he created. She’s determined to return the characters to their worlds. Selesia welcomes her back. They throw a party to celebrate.

Selesia Loves Sushi

Re:CREATORS Episode 4: Selesia loves sushi
Selesia discovers that she loves sushi — as long as it doesn’t have any wasabi! Capture from the Amazon Prime stream.

While Selesia and Meteora try all sorts of different food (and Selesia discovers she doesn’t like spicy), they speculate on Military Uniform Girl’s motivations. Destroying the root world would obviously destroy all of the story worlds, too — was Military Uniform Girl suicidal? Saying that her aspects of her attitude are probably an exaggeration like all characters, their enemy is clearly intelligent and dangerous. They begin to plan their counter-attack: find all the Creations they can, even though they still have no idea how they get from the story world to the root world. In the meantime, they vow to preserve normalcy as much as they can. Meteora also says they want to find Military Uniform Girl’s creator.

Re:CREATORS Episode 4: Mamika is too kind for this world
Mamika loves sharing food with Alicetelia. In fact, she wants to share food with everyone. Even their enemies. Capture from the Amazon Prime stream.

Alicetelia, having failed in her attempt to force her creator to change her world (for the same reasons that Matsubara and Marine couldn’t change Selesia), throws her creator at Military Uniform Girl’s feet. She demands why it appears that she’s been lied to. Blitz Tokar, another character recruit, suggests she relax and enjoy herself. Military Uniform Girl has to intercede to maintain the peace. She convinces Alicetelia that the warrior’s best course, if she wants to get back to her world, is to assault the order in this world. In other words, to push this world closer to destruction. Later, Mamika, having overheard the conversation, thanks Alicetelia and shares some food with her. Explaining how food always tastes better when eaten together, she tells Alicetelia that she’d like to eat with everyone. Including the people they had recently fought. Mamika doesn’t want to fight anymore.

One of Matsubara’s friends calls and sounds embarrassed. The friend is hugely relieved when Matsubara comes out and asks which character had come to visit! Rui Kanoya, a mech pilot, quietly eats lunch. But he wasn’t alone. He had brought his Gigas Machina (Mech) with him.

Re:CREATORS Episode 4: Rui Kanoya's mech is too heavy to park
Rui Kanoya joins the team. He brought his mech. Which doesn’t play well with pavement. Capture from the Amazon Prime stream.

What I Liked about Re:CREATORS Episode 4

Matsubara Is Right

Upon hearing the news of Meteora’s creator’s death, Matsubara observed that things like that start happening after one hits 30 years old. While the thought’s a bit of a downer, I have to admit that the farther 30 recedes into the past, the more often I hear of people I knew in high school and college passing away. That little detail, tied to the rest of the emotionally weighty revelations in this episode, give the show a welcome gravitas.

Marine was so upset! She thought her attempt to help Meteora met her creator just made things worse. She’s such a compassionate character; it’s hard not to like her. I don’t think that’s accidental, either. I can’t help but compare the lively joy she showed while she was drawing in the previous episode. Matsubara, too, though less obviously so, doesn’t seem to have been capacious or cruel as he crafted Selesia’s world — at least not in the same way that we discover Alicetelia’s creator was. It seems like the creator’s attitude and compassion are part of a characters’ decision about which side to join.

Re:CREATORS Episode 4: Meteora's conscience weighed on her
Meteora’s conscience seems to weigh heavy as she confesses her plans to everyone. Capture from the Amazon Prime stream.

This is what, the third time Re:Creators has had an exposition-heavy episode? And it’s the third time I loved it. Meteora is seriously thinking through what’s happening and why; she’s also considering the implications. It’s a shame we’ll never meet her creator. He must have been a man of subtle and deep thought.

Again, I have to say how much I’m impressed how seriously this show takes its premise. It’s not a gimmick just to pull cool characters into our world. It’s the foundation concept of this world, and its implications — like what happens when too many incompatible laws of physics colliding — elevates the series to something special.

I just noticed how the outside of Selesia’s hair is red, while its underside is orange. I’m really enjoying the character designs in this show!

Meteora’s World

Re:CREATORS Episode 4: Meteora decided she could love the world her creator made
Meteora seems happy that she can believe in her creator and the world he made. Capture from the Amazon Prime stream.

Meteora was adorable as she blushed and talked about how much she had loved to play the game she was in. Her interpretation that she’ll live on as long as people play the game was more affecting than I expected. Maybe it was the idea that she would continually pass on the secrets of the world to the hero playing the game, or maybe it was the idea that a character like Meteora would appreciate the care of craftsmanship of her creator, but Meteora’s monologue made me think of the worlds I’ve left unfinished.

I wonder how my characters would judge me if they got into this world? Wonder if I should practice wilderness survival techniques…

The montage of characters eating together had a lot of little details that I found hilarious. Selesia learned she doesn’t like wasabi; Meteora has more courage eating pocky than Selesia (much to Marine’s delight); Marine seriously likes the anime-equivalent of Sapporo beer.

Re:CREATORS Episode 4: Marine is a lightweight when it comes to drinking beer
Marine really likes her beer, but she’s a bit of a lightweight. Capture from the Amazon Prime stream.

As they discussed Military Uniform Girl’s motivations, Matsubara mused that it seemed that her actions were “…like killing someone and then killing herself.” I immediately thought of the opening scene, where the girl in a white dress threw herself in front of the train. I wonder if these ideas are related?

Matsubara and Marine Are Very, Very Lucky

Seeing Alicetelia’s creator cringing in fear reminded me how lucky Matsubara and Marine are to have created a character who’s reasonable — and a world that, while having its share of conflict, still has beauty and causes worth living for. Alicetelia even says that she regrets having a creator like him. I wonder if watching this show would make some real-life writers nervous?

So, Gunpuku no Himegimi (Romaji for Military Uniform Princess, which Google Translate rendered as 軍服ユニフォームプリンセス), uses propaganda? She smeared the reputations of those who hadn’t listened to her (like Selesia and Meteora) to convince Alicetelia to continue helping her. That’s underhanded! But, of course, she’s the villain…

Re:CREATORS Episode 4: Mamika bought Mamika-themed food products.
It’s no surprise that Mamika bought Mamika-branded food products! Capture from the Amazon Strike stream.

I literally laughed out loud when I saw that Mamika buy her own branded food. It’s so like her to do something so self-absorbed — but innocently so.

Mechs don’t seem to mix well with modern cities. In the brief shot outside of Kanoya’s creator’s house, we can see how the pavement and fields are torn up. Mechs, apparently, are above the load-limit of a typical Japanese road!

What I Liked Less about Re:CREATORS Episode 4

I’m getting nervous: I’ve lived long enough that I’ve seen many shows — anime and otherwise — that start strong, then wither and die. What am I going to do if that happens to Re:Creators? Its failure would push my cynicism levels into the red! Oh, wait, they’re already there…

Thoughts about Re:CREATORS Episode 4

Tangled and heavy. Those are the feelings I had after listening to Meteora’s explanation not only of her motivations and of her theory of impending world-wide destruction, but of her thoughts on Military Uniform Girl (Princess?)’s motivations. Each character ripped from their worlds will have a specific concerns with their creator; each will express those concerns differently based on the worldview, character, and experiences that their creator gave them or put them through. Bring them all together, and things get even more confusing. Look at Mamika at the end of this episode. I never dreamed she’d try to be the voice of peace!

Re:CREATORS Episode 4: What does the Military Uniform Princess want to destroy everything -- including herself?
What motivates the Military Uniform Princess? Why does she want to destroy everything — including herself? Capture from the Amazon Strike stream.

And heavy? Our heroes have guessed that Military Uniform Girl is setting the world up for a colossal murder/suicide. What could possibly have driven her to that? How’s she related to the girl in the white-dress who threw herself in front of the train? Or is she related at all? This drive to destroy everything, even herself, makes the villain so much more dangerous and horrifying. If she’s not only willing to die but is planning on it, there’s no way to negotiate with her. There’s no way to gain leverage. The only option is conflict — with the world hanging in the balance!

Another heavy? The realization that simply by being in our world, Meteora and Selesia are a danger, especially if they disrupt normalcy. They can’t stick around; they have to go back to their worlds. Their returning to their own worlds should be a happy occasion, but after having met them, won’t Mizushino, Matsubara, and Marine miss them terribly? Because of the revelation that they’re larger than life in some aspects of their character, they can’t help but make an impression. The idea of never being able to talk to them again must be difficult. Plus, knowing how Selesia feels about being on display 24×7, how would Mizushino as a reader be comfortable reading about her — in effect, being a voyeur? How will Matsubara approach writing for Selesia’s world from that point forward?

How would you feel? Let me know in the comments below!

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