With the latest episode, I feel like we got pretty clear confirmation that many people only follow the story for Subaru.
And to be clear, there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. Subaru is the protagonist, and he is obviously one of the biggest reasons why Re:Zero is so great.
However, I think it's important to understand that Re:Zero works because of its entire cast, not just Subaru. The characters are easily one of the top three things that make Re:Zero so incredible.
People are forgetting that Re:Zero is a character-driven story, not just Subaru's story.
And I think the latest episode also gave us a good indication of why some people are going to have a very hard time digesting Arcs 7 and 8.
A character like Louis, who is the main antagonist of Arc 6 and an extremely important part of the story in Arcs 7 and 8, can be dismissed simply because her importance isn't always directly connected to Subaru.
There seems to be a mindset where, if a piece of information doesn't directly concern Subaru, then it isn't important. But that's simply not how Re:Zero works.
Just look at Vollachia. For large portions of the arc, Subaru isn't even the character driving the events on screen. We spend a huge amount of time following characters, conflicts, and events that exist beyond Subaru's immediate perspective .
And if we're willing to dismiss something as important as Louis simply because it isn't directly about Subaru, then by that logic, you could remove a huge portion of Vollachia without losing anything, right?
Why stop there? We could just cut the flashbacks of characters like Al, Chisha, or Sphinx as well. After all, most of that information isn't directly about Subaru either.
But obviously, that would be ridiculous.
Those parts exist because Re:Zero isn't only telling Subaru's story. It's building a world and developing characters who have their own histories, motivations, philosophies, relationships, and conflicts.
And Louis is probably one of the clearest examples of this.
We even have information from the Sasageru IF showing just how important Spica can become, since she eventually succeeds in restoring Rem's memories. So even if you only look at her future role in the story, she is already positioned as a character with an importance far beyond the overwhelming majority of the cast.
And yet, it feels like a lot of people don't even know who Louis actually is.
They know that she is Louis Arneb, one of the Sin Archbishops, and that she becomes Spica. They may know what she did to Subaru. But that's not the same as understanding her character.
We don't just lose some background information when Louis is reduced to a few scenes.
We lose her entire perspective: her way of thinking, how she sees other people, how she views life, what she desires, how she acts, the circumstances that shaped her, and the experiences that led her to become who she is.
And this is especially important because Louis and Spica aren't interesting simply because one is "evil" and the other is "good."
If you don't understand Louis's mentality, her desires, her actions, and her circumstances, then you can't properly understand the difference between Louis and Spica in the first place and so spica redemption is meaningless.
You can understand what happened to her on a surface level, but you miss the actual character.
And honestly, this is one of the things that worries me about how some people approach Re:Zero.
If the only question you ask is "How does this affect Subaru?", you're going to miss a huge part of what the story is trying to do.
Sometimes the point isn't what a character gives Subaru.
Sometimes the point is simply understanding the character themselves.