Having looked at the Steins;Gate anime series, it’s time to finish this run with the ninety minute movie. Steins;Gate: The Movie – Load Region of Deja Vu (also translated as The Burden of Deja Vu) was created from the anime, not the visual novel series. This means that, like the OVA, it is not technically canon.
The movie premiered in Japanese theatres in April 2013. An English version was released in 2017. It heavily spoils the anime, so you should watch/read up on that first.
STEIN BACK
We open with narration about memory, then see Kurisu Makise asleep on an airplane. New opening theme music cuts in.
It’s August 3rd, 2011, 11:44am. Rintarou Okabe is addressing the camera (much as the series did) which introduces himself, Mayuri and Daru. Also, we get Future Gadget #10, “Cool Visitor”, an air conditioner that overheats. It also shuts down power in the building, upsetting “Mr Braun” (badly subtitled as “Mr Brown”) downstairs.
Okabe now has a voiceover about being in the Steins Gate world line, free from entanglements. Time machines and D-mails do not exist here, and never did exist. But he experiences a flashback to when the satellite crashed into the radio building in the Alpha world line a year ago, and holds his head.
Mayuri and Ruka meet Makise at the airport. Returning to the lab, we learn that Daru’s met a cosplayer online named Yuki Amane. Makise quizzes Daru, bickers with Okabe, and has a present for Mayuri.
When Faris and Moeka arrive, Faris claims there was going to be a big barbecue in honour of Makise visiting. Okabe pretends that they hallucinated the announcement, but they will have dinner on the roof, including Nae and “Mr Braun”. Okabe has another flashback there, to Mayuri dying in front of the train.
Makise – somewhat drunk – soon accosts Okabe, complaining about what he told her when he came to America. About world lines and alternate selves and time machines. Since then, he never sent her another email. Okabe takes her into the stairwell to avoid a scene, hijinks ensue, and we cut to him helping her with a hangover headache.
Makise articulates things better: She’s a scientist who dislikes the notion of fate. It’s now that Okabe accidentally reveals that he got her a monogrammed fork and spoon, reinforcing the problem, since she never said she wanted them in the Steins Gate world line.
Mayuri comes in. After talking to her, Okabe has another flashback. He sees Moeka pointing her gun, blood running by the pocket watch… and he throws Mayuri behind him, pulls a knife on “Mr Braun” and tells Makise to fire up the time leap machine. Everyone effectively asks, ‘what the hell’.
Okabe regains his senses and apologizes. Later, he reflects. It had felt real, like he was on another world line. Clearly impossible. Except it happens again as he talks to Suzuha, followed by a shot of Nae killing Moeka (from the video game world line only!), and Okabe worries his delusions are lasting longer.
The next day, August 4th, we get shots of everyone from the lab in their daily lives. Makise is taking a shower, when an electronic voice talks to her from outside the bathroom. It’s vital she remember three things: “cell phone”, “microwave” and “SERN”.
Makise then runs into Okabe at the laundromat. She notices the sleeve of his lab coat is torn, and offers to sew it. While he waits, she reveals she did bring a gift for him too, an American lab coat. He puts it on.
Okabe talks to her again about the world lines, how he was drifting through them, and we see a number of images from the anime series. What gives it all meaning for him, he reveals, is that Makise and Mayuri are both okay.
Makise admits the main concept she has trouble with isn’t the world lines, but the memory retention. Even now, sewing Okabe’s lab coat, it gives her a strange feeling of deja vu. Scientifically, that’s when short term and long term memory overlap. Or in Okabe’s case, it’s when world line memories overlap. Either way, memory malfunctions of the brain.
Perhaps Reading Steiner is like deja vu?
Makise’s American lab coat unexpectedly flutters to the floor. She finds she’s talking to nobody.
BIER STEIN
Cut to the Future Gadget Laboratory. Makise runs in as Daru finishes upgrades to “Cool Visitor”. She wonders: Is he here? The guy? The founder of the lab? Daru says he founded the lab. Makise insists, member 001? Mayuri reminds her, they left that designation open.
Makise narrates, this was the first time that things felt “off”. Something was missing. It was as if someone was messing with her mind.
Recall back in Episode 14, when Makise said that excessive time leaps might cause Okabe to cease existing? Seems that plot thread was picked up here.
A week later, Makise is watching a TV show with personalized utensils – and she realizes she owns some herself. How? Then on a pad of paper she finds she’s written “cell phone”, “microwave oven” and “SERN”. She calls Daru, only to learn he hacked SERN. For some reason.
It’s August 13th, 2pm, and Mayuri finishes sewing even as Makise and Daru complete a “time leap machine”. It’s capable of sending a person’s memories to any point in their past, thanks to use of SERN’s Large Hadron Collider. When Daru presses Makise for how she came up with it, she admits she somehow “remembered it”.
Incidentally, Mayuri’s been buying Doktor Pepper for the lab, even though no one drinks it.
Makise plans to jump back to August 3rd, the day before the laundromat. Daru protests, isn’t there a 48 hour limit? Then he has no idea why he assumed that. Makise reassures him, she won’t be changing anything, this is only to find out why things feel wrong. With that…
Makise is back at the barbecue. She sees Okabe. Except he grabs his head and disappears, only to reappear again seconds later.
While trying to come to grips with this, Makise gets a phone call. Someone congratulates her on her time leap. It’s Suzuha.
When they meet, Suzuha explains: She came to 2011 in a time machine that Makise will build. She sees now that Makise can perceive Okabe’s brief disappearances, meaning Makise has experienced a time when he will never have existed. The issue is Okabe’s existence on the Steins Gate world line is unstable.
He’s begun travelling to the R world line. It’s 0.000001% off of Steins Gate. Apparently, with neither of Mayuri’s or Makise’s deaths to help fix this world line in place, it’s prone to temporal fluctuations. And Okabe’s Reading Steiner memories make him susceptible to them.
Okabe, eavesdropping, says this is plausible. He again vanishes momentarily.
Back in the lab, Makise explains to Okabe how he’ll disappear for good the next day, with history rewriting itself. Why now? Likely because everyone’s back together, amplifying his traumatic memories. And as there’s no way to control memory, this outcome is inevitable.
Okabe simply tells Suzuha to return to the future, and to destroy the time machine. Write him off as lost.
Makise protests. Okabe counters with: What if they try to alter the past for him, and it doesn’t work? She’ll end up in the same endless time loops where he found himself, trying to get it right. Except, you can’t anticipate what will change, what the consequences will be. You’ll be haunted by more than guilt.
Time abhors a rerun. We have to accept the things we cannot change.
Makise still argues, saying his existence being taken away is worse than death. But Okabe doesn’t care. Again, what gives it all meaning for him is that Makise and Mayuri are both okay.
And Makise starts to understand what it’s been like for Okabe, being the only one who remembers things. She soon breaks down. He kisses her. She says this isn’t fair. They go their separate ways.
Speaking of deja vu, we now get a clever reversal of Episode 22. Makise has a change of heart and returns to the lab, out of breath, to finally tell Okabe she feels…
An open Dk Pepper unexpectedly falls to the floor.
EIN STEIN
Makise is in the lab, trying to remember who was standing just there. The founder of the lab? Daru says he founded the lab. Makise disagrees – Okabe Rintaro is his name, and she falls to her knees crying.
She doesn’t care what Okabe said. She can’t accept this, Daru needs to hack into SERN.
Mayuri talks Makise down, worrying that if she persists, it will only bring more pain. Flash forward to August 13th, as Makise admits that as Okabe had gone through hell to give them Steins Gate, she would continue to respect his wishes.
Alas, this is the day when Moeka tells Mayuri that “Mr Braun” is in financial trouble if he doesn’t raise the rent. Now they can’t afford to keep the lab there. Cut to Makise sending an email to ‘mail address error’ about the lab troubles. (Even electronically, Okabe is forgotten.)
Suzuha approaches, saying she’s returning to the future. Makise reiterates Okabe’s wishes – and Suzuha points out that, unless there’s a change, a time machine will exist in the future. He didn’t want that either.
Makise will invent it, then seal it away, conflicted, unable to be honest with herself. Makise fires back that this is science, it can’t be about feelings, and Suzuha slaps her. Truly, what does Makise have to live for? Mere logic?
With that, Makise yields to using the time machine of her future self. Suzuha explains that their goal must be to change Okabe’s memories, without actually changing any of the past events. In other words, for Okabe to accept Steins Gate as his fixed world line, instead of one existing among many, they must plant a powerful memory that only exists thanks to Steins Gate.
How? That’s for Makise to figure out.
We see the digital readout of the machine as they travel back to June 30th, 2005. A date of an intense memory. But when Makise calls out to young Okabe, she falls in the street. Okabe jumps in to save her, and is hit by a car. (** 1:10:53. Okabe holding his umbrella, as the car fills the background. Caption: That can’t have been part of the plan.
Back to August 14th, 2011, where Suzuha assures Makise that world lines converge, so Okabe didn’t die. But Makise is freaking out, worried that her mere presence in his past puts his life in danger. Conversely, if him dying isn’t possible, then doesn’t that mean her saving him is equally impossible?
Also, how could Okabe have endured this sense of helplessness, all alone, for so long?
Out of sorts, Makise returns to the lab, where Mayuri says the word “Okarin” can pop into her head. Makise is inspired to check in with Ruka, and he isn’t sure who gave him his katana. Likewise Faris says the lab founder used to play Rai-Net with more physical enthusiasm, and Moeka agrees there was once someone else.
Incidentally, there’s a throwaway line about Daru interviewing for a part time job, as our only resolution to the rent hike subplot.
Makise realizes that feeling Deja Vu is the Reading Steiner ability itself. An ability to remember alternate world lines, which transcends time. And it’s like everyone is telling her not to forget.
Makise does a Hououin Kyouma act that would make Okabe proud, and then on August 15th, she leaves for another attempt with Suzuha. The other lab members see her off.
Once more, it’s June 30th, 2005, 11:20am. This time, Makise doesn’t call out. She follows Okabe, wondering what to do with what little she knows about him, from both her world line and her deja vu memories.
And she wonders about how she never told him her feelings, due to her trust issues.
Makise ends up sitting and waiting for a train, as young Okabe arrives. Okabe comments that Makise seems lost, the same way his childhood friend seems lost. Makise responds by asking if Okabe knows “Hououin Kyouma”. He doesn’t. She describes him as a mad scientist, one who saved everyone dear to him, without receiving recognition.
Okabe thinks that’s sad. Makise says it’s not, and then she gives Okabe his first kiss before he leaves.
We learn that June 30th was the day Okabe told Mayuri she was his hostage. A line a mad scientist had shouted on a TV show they’d seen. And he now has a name for his own mad scientist persona.
Cut to present day Okabe, sitting on a street as his phone comes to life. A voice says she will “outline Operation Norn”, and the screen resolves into Makise. Okabe turns, seeing her there with him. He asks how, to which she says she’s merely the part of his psyche trying to return to Steins Gate.
Because he’s not alone. Wherever he jumps, Makise will follow.
Okabe lifts his phone, commenting on this being the choice of Steins Gate, as pedestrians fade in around him. Also, he asks, could he have his first kiss back? (See Episode 21 for the relevance of first kisses.)
Makise simply says no, as we move into the closing credits.
ROLLING STONES
My final thoughts? The movie works well as a follow-up. The writers understood the source material, dodging the “alpha world line” bullet by never sending any D-Mails, and at minimum addressing the 48 hour mind leap limit (that somehow didn’t apply). The return of Suzuha was particularly creative.
My main criticism would be how the rent change subplot seemed like an afterthought, and without it, the rest of the cast doesn’t have much to do. It could have been tied in to Okabe’s vanishing, rather than feeling like wasted potential.
Of course, the core of the series was always Okabe and Makise, and the voice actors play their roles here exceptionally well. Also clever are the situational reversals, which give Makise a perspective into Okabe that she wouldn’t otherwise have had.
The emotional core remains, which helps to make up for minor shortcomings. Would you like to offer an alternative viewpoint? Might it matter that one wouldn’t understand the movie very well without the context of the series?
Next month, we’ll take a look at the other time travel visual novel that became an anime: Sandglass of Summer Colours. For now, the comments are open. Thanks for reading, and as always, please do let me know your opinion, if you have the time.
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