'Steins;Gate 0' Doesn't Reach the Heights of the Original, but Is Still a Terrific Sequel

Watching Steins;Gate only last year for the first time proved to be beneficial since it was relatively fresh in my mind as I dived into Steins;Gate 0 earlier this year.  As a sequel, Steins;Gate 0 is not set after the events at the end of the original series or the movie, but is set between the happenings in Episode 23 (“Open the Steins Gate”) of the original series – particularly (major SPOILERS for the original Steins;Gate series) between the moment Okabe Rintaro returned from his failed mission to save Kuriso and the moment he received a video message from his future self.

In Episode 23, Rintaro time traveled to the past in order to save Kurisu, but after failing, he fell into despair.  However, he received a video message from his future self, who provided him the instructions to reach the “Steins;Gate” worldline (a reality where both Kurisu and Mayuri survive).  Encouraged by this, as well as a pep talk from Mayuri, he decided to try once more, finally succeeding the second time around in Episode 24 (“Achievement Point”).

Steins;Gate 0 tells the story of that alternate Okabe Rintaro who would send that video message from the future.  This Rintaro didn’t receive a video mail from a future self, and thus, he didn’t gain the hope that would have enabled him to overcome his despair and try once more.  Instead, he gave up, succumbed to misery, and surrendered to live in a reality where Kurisu is dead.

The anime starts off a couple of months after that fateful day (which was shown in the OVA, Episode 23(β): “Open the Missing Link”, an alternate episode of Episode 23 that serves as prologue to Steins;Gate 0).  Okabe Rintaro is no longer the same.  He has buried himself in his college studies, got rid of his “Hououin Kyouma” mad scientist persona, and now has a gloomy, tormented, “normal” personality.  While attending a seminar, he meets Prof. Alexis Leskinen and his assistant Hijayo Maho, who are the late Kurisu’s colleagues.  After learning of his friendship with Kurisu, they ask Rintaro to be the tester of Amadeus, a futuristic artificial intelligence system that they have developed with Kurisu, which also possesses her appearance and memories before her death – basically making it her digital clone.  And thus begins a chain of events that make Rintaro realize that his nightmare with time travel is far from over.

Steins;Gate 0 is not a show that one will grasp, much less love, if he or she hasn’t seen the original series yet.  In order for it to make sense, one is required to have an understanding of various concepts and plot points that was established in Steins;Gate.  Most importantly, the tedious pace and convoluted plot will undoubtedly turn off first-time viewers, while these will prove to be welcome elements for the versed.

Moreover, the show doesn’t spend much time building up the OG characters.  It operates with the assumption that the viewer already cares deeply for these characters.  It simply concerns itself with giving these characters their “moments to shine”, whose magnitude only long-time fans will thoroughly appreciate.

Meanwhile, the treatment for the new characters and the layers they add to the story is mostly effective.  But outside of Kagari, Maho, and Prof. Leskinen, there’s a lack of fleshing out that happened.  Two or three of these new supporting characters haven’t really added anything to the story.  In relation to this, there are plot points attached to these characters that are either under-explored or simply pointless.  Maybe they are looked into more in detail in the visual novel, but in this anime, they only have an unsatisfying presence.

There are also intriguing parts of the story that I wish had been given more focus.  For example, I like how the Future Gadgets Laboratory members eventually become the core of the Valkyrie resistance, and it would have been cool to see more of their operations as well as how they developed into such (maybe have an entire series to show all these, eh?).  Though it can be left to the imagination how they have come to fill their respective roles (e.g. Faris obviously provided the funding), I still would have loved to see the specifics.

In relation to this, going into this show, the thing I was really looking forward to see the most was a meticulous depiction of how Okabe Rintaro successfully formulated the needed steps to reach the Steins;Gate worldline.  Unfortunately, this wasn’t shown at all.  It just fastforwarded from the point he regained his will to save everyone to the point he already knew what to do and was ready to send these instructions to his past self.  I wasn’t greatly disappointed by this, but still, my preference was a thorough account of the planning stage.

Anyway, the plot is already quite complex as it is with the material that it has chosen to explore.  And I’m not going to pretend that everything about the story has been thoroughly clear to me.  It definitely requires to be watched again, and I will eventually do so (heck, I’ve seen the original Steins;Gate series twice – the first time in sub, and the second time in dub – and it’s still possible I missed a couple of things).  Nevertheless, my first viewing experience and what I got to understand from it are already enough to make me see how much of a smart, resonating, distinctive, and well-told sci-fi thriller/drama it is.

In a nutshell, the entire series involves waiting for the dispirited Okabe Rintaro to “resurrect” Hououin Kyouma.  It takes most of the episodes to get there, and it can be sometimes chore-like.  It also results to lesser comedic and light-hearted moments.  The show does have those, but compared to its predecessor, the laughs are minimal.  However, the great anticipation for the endgame and exemplary storytelling amply enable the audience to push through, and once it finally arrives at the eventual return of Hououin Kyouma, it’s such a glorious, spine-tingling, fist-pumping moment that it makes the somewhat tough journey toward it well worth it.

Lastly, it doesn’t reach the same emotional heights of its predecessor – which is partly something of a given since the inherent sense of excitement brought by an unknown ending is already negated by the fact that where the story will end up is already determined (i.e. Episode 24 of the original series).  However, just like the original, it’s still quite splendid in manipulating emotion nonetheless.  And I mean that as a good thing.  With moving music, masterful direction, and well-thought-out placing of cliff-hangers, the narrative emphatically incites all kinds of feels.

In the final analysis, Steins;Gate 0 succeeds in being a terrific sequel to an anime masterpiece.

An OVA is set for release later this year, and if it’s anything like the original series’ OVA, it’s surely going to be a delightful epilogue.  Hopefully, it involves showing how the new characters introduced in this series are faring in the Steins;Gate worldline as well as following up on what happens (SPOILER) with the Rintaro, Mayuri, and Suzuha that got to 18,000 B.C.  Can’t wait!