After watching Digibro's controversial youtube series that went into intimate detail on his take on the spin-off of Stein's Gate, I am left with mixed feelings.
When I first finished the series, watching as it aired, I found it quite engaging and it was incredibly nice to revisit the world of this show and see the characters that inhabited it again. There were some issues, and parts of the story didn't really click, but the show was a lot of fun for what it was. A spin off to add to the original story and do it's own thing.
But after hearing Digibro's searing critical review of the series, I am left in two minds. I loved seeing these characters again, and the addition of Maho Hiyajo was seamless. Her role as someone who knew and loved Kurisu as someone before Okabe was amazingly well done. The way the show deals with big ideas like trauma, PTSD, and the loss of will to live is also phenomenal.
But on the other hand, certain characters act utterly bizarrely (Mayuri and Suzuha for example) and the addition of Kagari felt incredibly forced and unnecessary. The way several side characters who felt integral to the original's plot end up becoming background decorations is extremely disappointing too. The home-made science aspect of the show falls to the wayside as the science lab can suddenly start doing amazingly complicated things with time travel. The "villain" revealed at the end was also really badly done. It's lot of details like these that start chipping away at the show's foundation.
So what is Stein's Gate 0 to fellow fans? Does it's issues detract from the original show? Or is it self contained enough to not really bother you either way?
Hey! New to the site so I'm not sure if I'm doing this right (adding a note that is) but I liked reading one of you articles that came up when I first logged in and saw this and found it interesting/relatable. Unlike you I watched Digibro's video without having gotten around to watching the show and for me, it pretty much convinced me not to watch it even to this day despite having loved the original season. Despite how that sounds I don't let critics think for me but I feel like he proved his point well enough for me to find Stein's Gate 0 as passable for the time being (keep in mind, I don't have a lot of free time so I usually only watch a show based on recommendation of some sort, whether that's a friend or an internet personality I trust).
Even though everyone is probably done talking about this case in particular, I still think this topic remains important for the fact that I always get mixed feelings when I agree with a critic as they point something out as objectively dumb or bad when I actually "fell for it" when I watched the show myself. Many times I can explain to myself why I like the dumb thing but lately I've been wondering if that's even worth the effort.
The term, "trash taste" is used so often in the anime community that you have to wonder why any of us are even watching these "Chinese Cartoons" in the first place. I say that despite being something I would never watch with my parents or siblings, the original Stein's Gate is its own little masterpiece that touched me personally. In that same vein, if Stein's Gate 0 helped you get a little more of that feeling, years after the first show came out, you shouldn't feel conflicted about liking that part of it; even if you can laugh along with someone trashing it and agreeing with them the whole way through. – pastelnon5 years ago