Quote:
Originally Posted by MrPopo
It seems to me that the problem you and a lot of SAO detractors have is that you refuse to read in between the lines and thus come up with complaints that are very subjective or easily refuted. Did being a beater stop him from joining the Black Cats? No? Then why hasn't he joined another guild?
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Sorry, but there is no reading between the lines
required to understand story at all.
Reading between the lines might give you icing on the cake, but that's all.
eg. Blacks Cats provide
additional reasons to help, not
primary reason, because the episode explains the main motives in itself, hence can be treated self-contained, therefore a side-story.
Ep 5 & 6 is perhaps the start of when where the main plot picks up again since it explains how Asuna and Kirito become true friends, but the revelance of ep 3 & 4 is again unnecessary to understand these episodes, and this PK "exploit" will most likely not hold any revelance to how they get out of the world (and yes, I understand getting out of the world isn't the point of this show anymore. It's been emphasized by the novel readers many, many times already).
Quote:
Originally Posted by MrPopo
He helped Klein in the beginning because things were casual, when things got tough he bolted. He helped the raid group because he obviously wants to clear the game. He helped the Black Cats because it's pretty evident that he doesn't enjoy being a loner. He helped solve the murder mystery because he believes the game is 'fair' so the unfairness of in town PKing piqued his interest. Preventing the Golden Apple guild from being PKed by Laughing Coffin is probably the only thing he's done that can be completely attributed to his niceness. But that only took...about half an hour? You can argue all you want about how going up against LC was dangerous, but the anime didn't portray Kirito as being in any sort of danger.
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You're undermining his intelligence. He
thought and reasoned his decision on Klein, and he made the right decision in the end.
Ep 3 showed he miscalculated his capabilities and got it wrong.
You could stretch an argument that ep 4 shows he adjusts his calculations to make sure he's right this time round by reading between the lines, or disregard it completely showing he's made the right calculation (giving the same end result in either case), since every action he took was explained within the same episode.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MrPopo
On the other hand, hunting down the orange guild required him to stalk the leader and use bait in order to finally bring the guild into the open. Who knows how long that took? What was his reward? Probably nothing of significance since no one else on the front lines deemed it worthy of their time. Is it still safe to say that Kirito did it solely out of niceness?
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Yes, it is. Nice people go out of their way to help another, which is exactly what he did, and is exactly the point Silica was saying.
Additional motive is icing on the cake, but not required for the story to make sense.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MrPopo
Consider also that Kirito didn't really go out of his way for Silica. He gave her mid-level equipment that he probably doesn't need and 1 teleportation crystal. Had he agreed to revive her pet dragon without the ulterior motive of hunting down the orange guild, then yeah, that would be considered a good deed. As is, Silica was a means to an end. Heck, Silica could have been a random dude and it probably wouldn't have mattered as long as she (or in this case, he) could be used as bait.
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His bonus with her was to repay his debt with his sister, he said so himself. If anything, it is the redemption of the guilt with his sister, not the Black Cats guild.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MrPopo
It's also silly to write off the interpretation of episode 4 being a redemption arc just because...well, I'm not entirely sure what your counter argument is. Suffice to say that it's an interpretation that allows viewers to bridge the gap between the broken Kirito in episode 3 and the Kirito who's seen dozing off peacefully in episode 5.
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Because driving his primary motive away from what's explained in the same episode to the redeeming his loss with the Black Cats is stretching it. Note, I emphasize on the word
primary. Your interpretation requires thinking outside the box, my interpretation is the box already gave the explanation.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MrPopo
I don't have any strong feelings towards the whole beater thing, but I do think that you're giving it too much weight.
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Yes, and the how the story panned out agrees with you. The burden of being a beater isn't so heavy, so I guess it wasn't such a hard decision for Kirito to make when he decided to accept it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MrPopo
I agree that this argument is getting old, but I'd rather everyone get it out of their systems now. That way, we won't have to bare with it next episode.
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Yes, I do have it out of my system now. I approached this show with the wrong line of thinking based on the first 2 episodes (which is surprising since 2 episodes usually give me the right impression of the show).
Now I know how this show works, I know that sometimes I will be wrong in thinking some parts are important (or addressed in the next direct episode), and if said elements are to be addressed, they will introduce a new element to address said issue.
If we want to go on topic, we see Kirito has been right all along, because he's a smart guy ("this world is logical, therefore you can't bypass the PK prevention mechanics").
But the end of the episode trolled him by saying "you were right, but here's a ghost to show you're wrong anyway".
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