Click on the above screenshot. Now, zoom in on Shinji’s face. Do you see how that expression just screams “I am a one-dimensionally evil villain”? Shinji wasn’t exactly the best character on this show in previous episodes, but stupid faces like that made him less tolerable in this episode. It doesn’t help that we found out he decided to kill everyone in the school because Rin refused to ally with him. I really don’t see the big deal. At least she said she wasn’t going to kill him. Even wanting to kill Shirou was silly. Rin picked him over you. Get the fuck over it. Shinji’s not a calm and calculating villain, nor does he have some warped ideologies that fuel his actions. He’s just evil because why the fuck not?
Why did Saber get jealous when Shirou said he was learning from Archer? She struck me as the level-headed, pragmatic type. Who cares who Shirou learns from so long as he’s learning? And besides, it’s not like Saber’s useless. If Shirou didn’t have a competent sparring partner, he couldn’t master what he learned from Archer. Given how out-of-character Saber was acting, it felt like that scene existed to establish that Saber has an over possessive romantic attraction to Shirou.
That scene where everyone gawked at Rin was silly. She’s just standing outside of a classroom. That isn’t that big of a deal, is it? Or are all the men that sad that their crush might already have someone she likes? I might not have been to high school in over three years, but I don’t think I ever saw anyone fawn over a girl that obsessively.
And then Rin got all blushy-blushy because she was inviting Shirou to lunch. Of course, there was more to it than that. Rin was trying to apologize to Shirou… for something that Archer did. Admittedly, it wasn’t the worst moment in the episode. I imagine most masters would feel at least a little responsibility for their servants. But why did the director have to make it seem like it was so hard for Rin to apologize? Yeah, she did give Archer free reign, but Archer hurt Shirou. Rin did not hurt Shirou.
Actually, given the number of harem tropes they used, it’s obvious why: this was more than an apology. Take that moment when Rin told Shirou he’d be in the wind if he didn’t sit next to her. That felt like it was straight out of a harem. And afterwards when she asked him to skip class with her? Painful. There’s no chemistry to this romance. Give me more Shirou x Archer.
Of course, I might be wrong about that. If I was with the person of my dreams, I think I’d talk about something other than the practical nature of magic with them. So it could be the case that Nasu didn’t intend for this to seem like a date. Or it could be the case that Nasu’s never been on a date before, so he has no idea what people talk about on dates.
The rest of this episode was just plain uninteresting. There was some plot stuff, but it all felt predictable and routine. The one-dimensional villain invariably decide to do something evil, then the mysterious person who’s totally not the teacher who was made to seem ominous in previous episodes kicked his ass. Shinji refused to disclose the identity of his attacker because the writer doesn’t think it’s obvious as fuck to us. There was some action, but it was really lacking. It was basically just Rin, Shirou, and Saber mowing down useless skeletons.
I did like that moment where Shirou said he was used to seeing dead bodies. No, not because it made Shirou seem more interesting. So far, he’s just been doing the right thing in any given situation, which is boring. But it was an interesting character moment for Rin. She prides herself on being a hardcore, badass as fuck magus. But in this situation, Shirou performed better than Rin precisely because he was more hardcore than her. It was the realization that she lacks the life experience necessary to be badass as fuck that made the scene noteworthy.
Mo[r]e Anime 
Shinji is pretty much a petulant child throwing a tantrum because he thinks he’s entitled to everything, but in the end his adopted sister is the one learning the magic that as the firstborn son of the family he was supposed to learn, and his alleged friend is the one hanging out with the girl he wants to bend over the nearest table.
Mostly, I just don’t think psychology alone is enough to make a villain compelling. A lot of the best villains have an interesting ideology to go with their psychology. Imagine if Makishima had rebelled against the Sybil system just because he had felt lonely and not because he had philosophical objections to Sybil. That’s basically what I feel like Shinji is – some guy who giggles creepily in the corner without even trying to justify his actions.
Oh, I don’t mean to disagree with you. I was just trying to exemplify how petty and shallow Shinji’s inferiority complex is and how consequently exasparating watching him is.
I dunno maybe he’s supposed to be an example of how even the shallowest villains can still do villainy when you hand them power to be villainous with (Rider), but that may be giving too much credit.
Maybe if they’d bothered to flesh out his character beyond his attempts to inflate his own self importance as an archer and a mage, exploiting Shirou, and hitting on every girl he sees. Maybe if they’d given us some of his actual thought processes he’d be tolerable.
Ah, sorry, it can be hard to tell with the internet and all.
I heard someone saying he was better written in Fate/Extra (also written by Nasu, I believe), so I assume it’s at least POSSIBLE to do something with his character. Really, I just wish he’d been smart, so at the very least, he could be a *dangerous* villain. I wonder if anyone actually thought he was going to accomplish a whole lot with the bounded field.
“Why did Saber get jealous when Shirou said he was learning from Archer? She struck me as the level-headed, pragmatic type. Who cares who Shirou learns from so long as he’s learning? ”
Seriously, if someone asked me personally whether I should teach them something and then the next day they don’t really want to learn from me and copy someone else, I’d be annoyed too. It’s an understandable reaction in my opinion.
“That scene where everyone gawked at Rin was silly. She’s just standing outside of a classroom. That isn’t that big of a deal, is it?”
It doesn’t fit Rin’s image everyone has of her in school. One doesn’t make stereotypes, one just sees them. And this does happen in some schools.
“Of course, I might be wrong about that. If I was with the person of my dreams, I think I’d talk about something other than the practical nature of magic with them. So it could be the case that Nasu didn’t intend for this to seem like a date. Or it could be the case that Nasu’s never been on a date before, so he has no idea what people talk about on dates.”
Or it could be someone cut large portions of the conversation, you know. It’s what happens in an adaptation. If anything, the chemistry and bonding was clearly seen in the source material, so I’d rather blame the limitations of a 23 minutes long episode, than the author.
” Shinji refused to disclose the identity of his attacker because the writer doesn’t think it’s obvious as fuck to us.”
It’s not that obvious to other people. There are actually lots of people who already made their own theories. Some think it was Caster herself, some think it was Berserker, Kirei or someone else. Geez, you sound so mad.
“Or it could be someone cut large portions of the conversation, you know. It’s what happens in an adaptation. If anything, the chemistry and bonding was clearly seen in the source material, so I’d rather blame the limitations of a 23 minutes long episode, than the author.”
I would blame the adaptation for choosing to spend already limited amount of time discussing details of magic that we have already been told (Shirou is only good at strengthening) or that we have already inferred (Rin uses jewels in her magic) above and beyond its relevance to the plot (She converts energy for storage in jewels), instead of spending time fleshing out their characters through conversation.