Drawing on Time - Steins;Gate: Meltdown

Here we are, the last chapter of the Steins;Gate visual novel. It’s called “Stardust Sky” if we’re locked into the Mayuri ending, and “Paradox Meltdown” if we have the option of Kurisu. Let’s see how the anime handles these in Episodes 21 and 22… after quickly catching you up on the twenty previous episodes.

Okabe sent Daru a message about Makise being murdered, which travelled through time. This “D-Mail” alerted SERN, who changed the past via their experimenting, inadvertently preventing Makise’s death with the shift to an alpha world line. Okabe’s lab then obtained an IBN 5100 to hack SERN and learn more about time travel, but all it did was attract attention. Worse, Mayuri seems fated to die in every alpha world line. Only by deleting their D-Mails and not inventing time travel can Okabe save his friend… and doom Makise.

PARADOX MELTDOWN

Daru is in SERN and prepares to delete the D-mails, but Okabe stops him. After the opening theme, we see Okabe thinking on the roof, as Daru heads out for the last day of Comima (meaning we’ve had a time skip). When Mayuri brings Okabe some water, he decides to go too.

It’s Tuesday, August 17th – will Mayuri die today? Does Okabe have to choose between her and Makise? At the convention, Okabe wonders about this, even as he banters with Mayuri about his mystery Organization, and calls Makise to explain that they need to prevent Mayuri from dying without the hack. He doesn’t explain why.

As Okabe and Mayuri head out after 7pm, Mayuri says she’s glad her friend came along – it’s the first time they’d been to Comima together. Okabe’s quip about Luka cosplaying soon turns into a discussion of the whole lab getting involved… then a vehicle guns towards them. Mayuri’s pocket watch stops working.

Okabe’s had enough. He tries to kill himself, thinking that will change something.

Mayuri pushes him out of the way of the car. To twist the knife, her dying words are about how she’s glad she was helpful for once, and she gives Okabe her Stardust Handshake.

Okabe mind leaps back to August 13th, the start of the episode. He slumps, defeated, and Makise asks what’s wrong.

It’s now August 15th. This time it’s Makise who finds Okabe on the roof. She knows he’s upset, and references his mad scientist routine. Okabe shoots back that Hououin Kyouma was just fiction. In reality, he’s upset he had the other lab members sacrifice their dreams, only to reach his own stalemate. Finally admitting to Makise that she will have been murdered if they continue to the beta worldline.

Mayuri phones Okabe. She’s worried, was she too caught up in Comima to help? She misses his stories. (Incidentally, the Organization apparently has four leaders: Genbu, Suzaku, Seiryuu and Byakko. It’s the four constellation Gods, well known in Eastern Asia.)

After Mayuri hangs up, Makise tells Okabe to go to his childhood friend. To stop worrying about her own fate.

We next see Mayuri at her grandmother’s grave. She explains that she’s been having some scary dreams, where she gets shot, or is in a car accident, or worse, and they feel so real… and at the end of them, Okarin jumps in to save her. But he can’t hear her say thanks.

Mayuri then changes the subject to the lab members, commenting on how Okabe has “met his match” in Makise. But Mayuri misses the old days. How it was snowing the first time she visited the lab, and how the two of them used to both sit there in silence. A comfortable silence. Whereas now, she can’t figure out what Okabe’s thinking, only that he’s in pain.

Okabe has overheard everything. He approaches Mayuri now, remarking on how he always knows where his hostage is, and to not doubt his resolve.

Cut to Makise, at the radio station building, looking at the place where she died in the other world line. Credits.

BEING MELTDOWN

The simple voiceover of Okabe telling Makise she’ll be murdered is what takes us into the opening. Okabe then finds Makise, on the roof of the radio building, which is still damaged by the satellite (which we now know was Suzuha’s time machine).

We establish that Okabe came here after leaving Mayuri. It starts to rain.

The two hurry inside, but it’s too late – there’s a quick cheesecake shot of Makise in a wet blouse. Which gets Okabe and Makise arguing in their usual way. During their banter, Makise notices a rip in Okabe’s lab coat, which she offers to repair.

As Makise sews, Okabe admits he was looking for her, and that he’s worried. And Makise admits to having hazy memories, telling her this is where she would have died.

But more than that, Makise also has memories of Okabe trying to save Mayuri, being so alone and hurt in the process. Yet she knows Okabe keeps trying. Because Mayuri is irreplaceable to him. (As Makise speaks, we briefly see the hourglass shards around her, and the lighting makes her hair seem purple, like in the ending sequence.)

It’s Okabe’s determination that makes Makise want to help him. And so she wants him to save Mayuri.

Okabe protests, since Makise will die. But she insists she’s willing to make that sacrifice for him. She’s been trying to think of an alternative, and hasn’t come up with anything. (In another symbolism shot, we see a construction sign with arrows pointing only one way.)

Okabe refuses to give up and runs off. He won’t throw Makise away, not even for Mayuri. He makes it to the lab, but before he can engage the mind leap machine, Makise stops him.

It’s time to stop running.

Okabe says this is fine, he’ll keep looping until he finds a way, it won’t break him, he’s seen Mayuri’s death so many times already… and Makise slaps him. Because if losing Mayuri stops hurting, then Okabe’s heart is already broken. And Okabe realizes she’s right.

Okabe hugs Makise, mentally thinking back on how they’ve fought together so many times over these past twenty days. Makise was the one who listened to him, the one whom he could rely on. He apologizes for not being able to save her, and she thanks him for caring about her.

Makise tries to find hope, suggesting that Okabe is trading places with himself in other world lines, so maybe she’ll continue on in this one. In fact maybe there are doubles of her on countless world lines, their minds all connected. And so, as long as he remembers her, she’ll always be there with him

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCMmic2nbd4?rel=0

At this, Okabe confesses his love to Makise. He asks for a reply. She tells him to close his eyes, and then gives him a kiss. But she can’t bring herself to say anything more than how “memories like one’s first kiss are hard to forget”. To which Okabe admits that wasn’t his first kiss, although it was more romantic than his first. (TIL)

Okabe then kisses her in return, and we get some thoughts from Makise about the perception of time and relativity. But she still can’t admit her feelings out loud.

Cut to Makise with a suitcase, leaving for America. Okabe gives her Future Gadget #2, the “Bamboo-copter Camera” she looked at in episode fifteen/sixteen. In return she tosses him a Dk Pepper. As he retrieves it, Makise mouths something, and she is gone by the time he looks up. He looks at the pink stitching on his lab coat.

During another Makise voiceover, she remarks that she’ll always be there, just beyond the 1% barrier.

Back in the lab, Daru is ready to delete the first D-Mail. Okabe narrates aloud, it’s the final phase of Operation Verdandi, and they have survived the battle of Ragnarok! Okabe adds that he will never forget about the sacrifices that were required, to reach the world chosen by Steins Gate! (He touches the stitching on his coat again.)

Yet as Okabe deletes the message, Makise returns, out of breath, to finally tell him that she feels…

Divergence 1.130205%.

Okabe is in the lab, seeing a flyer about Dr. Nakabachi’s Successful Time Machine Press Conference. And Mayuri doesn’t know what he means about there being a Lab Member 004.

So Okabe rants about defeating both the Organization and SERN, the future of chaos being the choice of Steins Gate – and Mayuri interrupts. She can sense he’s upset, but bad stuff isn’t going to happen to her, and it’s okay to cry.

Time skip ahead, an Okabe voiceover explaining they took apart the Phone Microwave. Hououin Kyouma has died, and “life isn’t about doing things over”. Which takes us into the closing credits, and along with the spiralling shards, we see images of spinning clocks (which I believe is Mayuri’s pocket watch).

Which ends the Steins;Gate series.

No, really, both the Mayuri and Makise endings play out almost the same here. Okabe loses his “lab assistant” either way, which in the “Stardust” ending is sad as Mayuri consoles him, and in the “Meltdown” ending is even more depressing. (Makise only returns in that one.) It makes Okabe’s nickname of “The Zombie” even more poignant in retrospect.

So, what did you think? In particular, do you have an opinion about this fake out, where partway through the closing of episode 22, the spiralling hourglass shards suddenly reverse direction, and we hear typing followed by a phone ringing?

Daru answers, and we hear him pass the phone to Okabe saying it’s “a crazy girl” (who in the Japanese referred to Daru as “Dad”).

The credit roll now gives up completely, and we see Okabe on the phone. There’s the voice of Suzuha Amane on the other end, explaining to him that she’s come from the year 2036. She needs Okabe and the others to come to the Radio Building. They have to stop World War III.

THAT ends the episode.

Of course, I wasn’t lying about this being in the last chapter of the visual novel. Everything from Suzuha’s return onwards, the so-called “True Ending”, will only play out if you have six specific “flags” activated. Meaning six of the decisions during gameplay were critical. Isn’t it nice that the anime simply shows the result to us?

Now, as far as this pair of episodes go, it felt slower paced relative to the others, a bit like episode eighteen (Luka’s episode). Which makes sense, both for a breather after what happened with Moeka, and to build up the emotions as Okabe faces his impossible decision. There were some interesting revelations too, like the fact that Mayuri has dreams about her alternate futures.

The pacing is about to pick up again. And trust me when I say the time travel is going to get even more interesting in the beta world line. You may want to watch the first episode again, to catch yourself up, before reading my next column.

In the meantime, what did you think of the emotional arc? Did you think that someone would find an alternative to Okabe’s decision? Was it even a decision, given the dystopia in the future? And is the new World War III a bit of overkill, or just enough to keep you interested? Thanks for reading, and as always, please do let me know your opinion, if you have the time.