Anime review: Re:creators

Re:creators used to be the highest rated and most hyped series of the season it aired in, after the obvious three 99% of viewers were watching (Attack on Titan s2, My Hero Academia s2, Dragon Ball Super). Gradually, the interest in the series kept dropping to the point more people were talking about garbage tier light novel adaptations (Akashic Records, Eromanga Sensei) which were nowhere near the catchy premise of Re:creators.

This is extra strange when said premise is basically Fate/Stay Night all over again. No, seriously, they are the exact same story.
A bunch of famous personalities, each one using superpowers, are brought into modern Japan, where they are having a battle royale, with the winner getting a reality warping wish. Most of the plot is short skirmishes, followed by ridiculously long monologues where they are infodumping rules, discuss philosophies, and have cockteasing moments regarding a bland self insert lead being surrounded by pretty chicks.

On paper, Re:creators should have been regarded as a thought provoking masterpiece, just like that porn game adaptation. And yet it wasn’t. In fact, it was being mocked for being exactly that. What happened? The answer is, Re:creators was not tapping into as many layers of pandering as Fate/Stay Night did. It followed the same formula, but didn’t have the same ingredients. And by ingredients, I mean:

1. The pretty colors
   Studio Troyca was nowhere near the level of Ufotable. Without jaw dropping animation, the sakuga audience didn’t care about it, and thus found reasons not to like it. Meaning, Re:creators didn’t have the illusion of making itself seem way better than what it actually was.

2. The source material
   It didn’t have one. Unlike Type Moon which had a huge fanbase of porn gamers overhyping its bullshit for over a decade, Re:creators was an original work. Nobody was blowing out of proportion what it was all about, it had no fanatic fanbase attacking anyone who dares to speak against it, and thus it was open to all forms of criticism. As it should be the case for any title.

3. The archetypes
   The fighters of Re:creators were essentially representations of typical heroes and villains from well known genres. This made them monolithic, dry, predictable, and one dimensional. The heroic spirits of Fate/Stay Night were based on historical figures, which were giving off the illusion of being multilayered and with a rich backdrop story, even if we didn’t see it and it was all implied. Meaning, the fan fiction nerds didn’t care about the cast of Re:creators, because they were just bland archetypes. In Fate/Stay Night, when they were hearing characters talking about ideologies and philosophy, their imagination was having an orgasm by seeing people across history coming together to have a fight with cool superpowers. In Re:creators, when characters talked about ideologies and philosophy, they just saw a typical magical girl talking to a typical medieval knight.

4. The competition
   It came out at the worst possible moment, since the other 3 shows 99% of anime fans were watching, already had everything Re:creators failed to tap into. Pretty colors, a fanbase from the source material, and characters who did not feel like bland archetypes, because of how they were fleshed out from previous seasons.

5. The pacing and the infodumps
   The above reasons explain why Re:creators fell from grace, in comparison to other shows of that time. They don’t explain why as a stand-alone show it was still not a very good watch despite sounding really amazing at first; so lets clarify that as well. Most of the duration was comprised of really long and boring monologues about the concept of the show, instead of its execution. The audience was constantly being told what was going on instead of being allowed to see it. The characters were mostly sitting on a table and talking about what they will do, instead of doing something about it. It was a really big chore to get through the constant talking, and the pacing was snail-slow.

The final episodes were filled with the battle royale action we were promised, but even then it came down to everyone versus one, instead of an actual “all for themselves” type of deal. It was hollow and insignificant, since nobody was actually dying but was rather returning to his fictional world. There was nothing really at stake and all the blame was thrown at the person who initiated the whole fuss. Nothing was grey or thought-provoking as it seemed to be at first, since it demonized an individual and deified everybody else, thus losing the grey morality it was going for.

So yeah, it’s not nearly as good as it sounds and it makes sense why it was quickly dropped by most. Its concept was interesting, but the execution came down to a dull line of endless monologues and tensionless battles.