Steins;Gate Review

The pacing is a deliberate trap. The first eleven episodes are microwave experiments, chatroom slang and Okabe performing a mad scientist persona for friends who humour him, and the series is quietly assembling every relationship it intends to destroy. Once the first divergence lands the plot converts its own goofy premise into a machine that charges Okabe something real on every attempt, and the repetition is the point rather than a shortcut. Mayuri's loops and the Suzuha reveal work because the earlier tedium made the world worth saving.

Okabe is the best-directed performance in this catalogue, since the persona he adopts in episode one becomes the mask he cannot drop at the moment he needs help. White Fox animates on a budget, with muted Akihabara backgrounds, a great many static two-shots and limited motion, so nothing here is being carried by spectacle. Takeshi Abo's score and the sound design of that microwave do more work than the visuals ever attempt. It is a writing achievement first and a production second, and as a piece of construction it is close to unimprovable.