Re:Zero’s Director’s Cut is Now Streaming on Crunchyroll

Re:Zero -Starting Life in Another World- made a huge impact when it debuted its anime adaptation a few years ago, and luckily a second season has been confirmed to be on the way sometime this Summer. But it has been quite a while since that first season came to an end, so you might need a refresher as to the events of the first season before jumping right into the second. Thankfully there’s now a cool and experimental way to re:watch the first season, or jump into it for the first time, as Re:Zero will be airing a special director’s cut that re-edits the first season into hour long episodes.

While it initially seemed like this special director’s cut was only going to be broadcast in Japan, Crunchyroll is now streaming this special Director’s Cut alongside its debut on Wednesdays in Japan. The first episode of this new edit has been released, and while there have yet to be any major changes this is expected to change soon.

The long awaited second season of Re:Zero -Starting Life in Another World- is currently slated to debut in April as part of the Spring 2020 anime season, and this director’s cut of the first season will lead directly into the premiere of the new episodes. Editing the 25 episode long first season into 12 or 13 hour long episodes (the new episode count has yet to be officially confirmed), this director’s cut will reportedly have a few new scenes.

The nature of these additional scenes are still unclear as to whether or not they will be as fleshed out as some fans are hoping, but at least fully new episodes will be released in just a few months from now. Still, a director’s cut release of the series is certainly going to be fun to see evolve over the next few weeks as fans begin to break down notable additions or absences.

Originally conceived as a series of light novels written by Tappei Nagatsuki with illustrations by Shinichirou Otsuka in 2014, Re:Zero – Starting Life in Another World follows Subaru Natsuki, a homebody who wakes up in a fantasy world on his way home from the convenience store. Meeting a silver haired elf named Satella, he decides to help her on her journey to recover a stolen item. After the two are mysteriously killed, Subaru wakes up to realize that he has gone back in time to the point when he first entered the world. Realizing he has a new power called “Return by Death,” which sends him back in time every time he dies, Subaru decides to use this new power to try and make a better life for himself in this world with the mysterious silver haired elf.