Nothing overarching this time. I’m just gonna dive straight into the events of the episode.

• Didn’t it seem obvious that Daru would be Suzuha’s father as soon as he started cracking perverted jokes about her?

Sure, Daru jokes with all of the female characters, but the recent focus on Suzuha was simply too obvious in a “Wouldn’t it be absolutely delicious if our rotund friend happened to be Suzuha’s father?” At least Suzuha didn’t turn out to be her own mother. That would have made no sense, but I know some of you entertained the thought.

• Still, didn’t it seem as though everyone accepted Mayuri’s theory a little too easily? It wasn’t as if she had ironclad proof; the naming convention on the time machine, for instance, could have been a mere coincidence.

I’m not saying that Mayuri’s wrong or that Daru isn’t Suzuha’s father, but wouldn’t someone in Suzuha’s shoes be extra cautious of jumping to conclusions? “I’ve been looking for my dad all this time, but I guess it’s you! *hug* Okay, gotta go!” Yeah, that was a little too convenient.

• Daru was unable to fix his daughter’s time machine after all, but Okabe deserved the brunt of the blame. After all, he was the one who prevented Suzuha from leaving in the first place, allowing a storm to damage her time machine.

Okabe quickly realized, however, that he could simply undo the D-mail that had prevented Suzuha’s original departure. He did just that and — well, what do you know — the divergence meter changed. Does that mean Mayuri will survive? This seems rather unlikely as the meter didn’t go above one, but I guess we’ll find out next week.

• So assuming that Mayuri won’t survive in the following episode, Okabe will probably have to undo all of the D-mails. I specifically recall the exact moment back in the tenth episode when Okabe decided to prevent Suzuha from leaving. Okabe was hesitant at first; he wasn’t sure if he should tamper with the past anymore than he already had. He then reassured himself: “I am the great mad scientist, Hououin Kyouma! What do I have to fear?”

This seems to be the crux of Okabe’s problem: he’s simply too confident within his own abilities. He thought he could save Mayuri alone, but he quickly learned that he couldn’t. Okabe, then, does have plenty to fear; simply being the self-proclaimed mad scientist isn’t enough to effect change.

• When people discuss this anime, they like to toss around the concept of fatalism, and I can’t say I haven’t been guilty of doing this either, but after thinking it over, fatalism in Steins;Gate makes no sense. A time-traveling story with fate is ultimately self-defeating. What, then, explains Okabe’s inability to save Mayuri? Ah, we might’ve ruled out fate, but we haven’t ruled out fait accompli. Mayuri’s death is simply fait accompli due to some event or some series of events.

Since the divergence meter went up when Okabe reversed his latest D-mail, we may as well hypothesize that the series of D-mails sent out by the lab members are the true cause behind Mayuri’s death. Essentially, Okabe will have to close Pandora’s box. But how?

• By extension, SERN taking over the world must be fait accompli as well. Well, gosh, seems like the characters aren’t screwed after all.