Dr. Stone Episode 11

Dr. Stone Episode 11

Clear World

This week’s episode of Dr. Stone is all about making and crafting glass. While I know that fans of this series are going to think it was a great episode, I’m here to tell you it wasn’t. It was actually one of the worse episodes the series has had so far.

For starters, in order to make up for the startling lack of the phrase “10 billion” in last week’s episode, it was said at least four times this week. And if that wasn’t bad enough, Senku also used the word “drooltastic” to describe glassblowing. I’m starting to think Tsukasa has the right idea with his purge.

But as Senku explains, glass is actually pretty important for the continued evolution of science due to some of its more unique properties. For example, being clear is a big plus because it means you can see what’s happening inside of containers.

However, that’s more of a quality of life improvement. A more concrete benefit of using glass is that it isn’t affected by, and doesn’t react with, many chemicals. But, it’s not as if glass is the ultimate scientific material. If he ever plans to work with acids, which he surely will at some point, glass isn’t of any use.

That’s right, sooner or later Senku will have to introduce plastics to the stone world. It’s only a matter of time before he creates single-use plastics and begins polluting the oceans again after they’ve finally been decontaminated.

Fuzzy Sickness

This week we also learn about the “fuzzy sickness,” also known as nearsightedness. In the stone world, this is a debilitating condition (sort of). It’s definitely not the worst condition to have, but when being able to see things clearly can literally mean the difference between life and death, it’s kind of a big deal.

So far we know of two characters who are nearsighted: Suika and Ginro. Also Suika’s nearsightedness was revealed when Senku pulled the watermelon husk off her head against her will. It turns out that she wore the watermelon because the pinhole effect from the eye holes cut in it helped her to see better.

Senku then decides to show off the power of glass by creating glass lenses to put in the eye holes of Suika’s watermelon mask. As a bonus effect, Suika is now more productive since she can actually see.

Senku making Suika glasses from the anime series Dr. Stone
Senku making Suika glasses

But here’s one of my problems with this episode. We got Suika’s face reveal and the conclusion to her “arc” all within half an episode. She can now see and her dream of being able to see the world has been realized within about 10 minutes of us learning of it.

That’s a problem because I’m still not invested in Suika. She barely qualifies as a character. Before this point she had no development and we had no reason to care about her. So why would we care about her dream suddenly being realized?

She’s basically indistinguishable from the dog that follows her around as far as character development and impact on the story are concerned.

Kaseki the Craftsman

The second issue I have with this episode comes when Senku and Chrome try their hands at glassblowing. Well, actually, the results they achieve are fine. I wouldn’t have expected them to be any good at glassblowing right away, and Senku even mentions that it could take months for them to get the hang of it.

The issue is really with Kaseki, the craftsman whom Chrome kidnaps to blow glass for them. Despite never having seen glass before he makes a perfect vessel on his first attempt. He then proceeds to create all the modern scientific glassware Senku needs for his laboratory.

I don’t care if Kaseki has been a craftsman for 50 years, that’s not something that’s going to happen. Also, as far as we know he’s a craftsman who specializes in making wooden shields. I’m not sure if you know this, but that has absolutely nothing in common with glassblowing.

Kaseki breaking free from his bindings from the anime series Dr. Stone
Kaseki breaking free from his bindings

It’s also unclear exactly how much of a role Kaseki is going to play from here on out. Sure, a craftsman could definitely be useful to have around, but how many of the things Senku plans to create are really going to require one? I guess once they get to metalworking he’ll be helpful.

But, again, it’s not like a single craftsman is going to be much use even for the metalworking Senku would be doing. It would mainly stick to melting things down and pouring them into casts. Even Senku can do that at a basic level.

Honestly I don’t see Kaseki sticking around in any major role. Like Suika, he’ll probably just be another character who exists but doesn’t really matter most of the time.

Conclusion

Anyway, what did you think of this week’s episode of Dr. Stone? Did you think it was good, unlike me? Was Suika’s face reveal all you ever dreamed of and more? And what are your thoughts on Kaseki? Will he play a major role going forward? Let me know in the comments.

Also, maybe I just never paid much attention to the ED before, but was it different this time around? I mean, the song was the same as far as I know, but the visuals seemed to be different. I didn’t think Suika and Kaseki were featured in the ED previously, but maybe I’m wrong.

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My review of the next episode is available here.

2 Replies to “Dr. Stone Episode 11”

  1. I am not convinced by the direction that this anime has, really senku and its scientific knowledge is exaggerated not only knows about every scientific thing also about medicine I could practically do a brain operation if I had the right elements, I do not understand how he lived normally in the modern world with thousands of resources available, I could have dominated the world as a cartoon megalomaniac scientist, of course if you see shows like Jimmy Neutron work because is comedy and because the boy’s inventions always failed in some way, but Senku is too much perfect (trial and error is something important in the world of science), also they have told me that later it does even more exaggerated things.

    1. I completely agree. I hate Senku’s character and the fact that he knows everything (except often forgets more basic things like when he claimed all metal on Earth rusted away). But, I also never really thought this series was going to be anything special in the first place so at least I wasn’t disappointed I guess.

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