Just finished watching the show. It's what I would call an "interesting" case, as it has a crapload of both good and bad, and manage to also both excel and completely miss some entire themes.
First, I, like so many people, found the AOL part to be FAR below the SAO one. The show would have been MUCH better if they just removed the entire post-SAO plot and instead first added a few episodes to explain things in SAO itself in more depth, and second focused more on the aftereffect once people went out of SAO (see the latter part of the post about this point).
AOL in itself was not THAT bad per se, but it just clashed a lot with SAO, and for the most part added only totally unnecessary things - I particularly loathed the whole Sugu-pseudo-romance garbage, which added probably more shit to the show than everything else together : cliché ("imouto" crap is common enough that we make jokes with friends about it) and even cliché up to eleven "well, we're not REALLY brother and sister", sidetracking the story (Kirito should be running for Asuna, but leisurely waste time with Leafa, which added a lot of "WTF ?" to the anime) and lacking a lot in tension after the "die for real" deal of SAO. When it comes to character, Yui was one that I never liked and which felt really unrealistic (even in the context of a VR game, a real AI able to think and feel ? It's groundbreaking enough to be the SUBJECT of a serie, not a side character...) and tacked-on, so I didn't like her expanded role.
The ambiance was also a very stark contrast, and though I welcomed a much ligther tone than the very depressive SAO, it didn't went well with the continuing "action" and would have been better as simply a "conclusion".
Not to add, the entire idea of having a VRMMO launched and running nearly concurrently with the "10 000 persons locked into VR and many of them having their brain fried by their toys" is just hilariously unrealistic - the 25th episode shows much better what should have logically happened.
Now that AOL has been dealt with, let's go for the real meat : SAO.
The idea of a VR game that becomes "too real" is rather interesting and exciting. The fact that it's treated rather in-depth is very appreciable. It's also pretty good how the scenario explore many aspects of MMO, and is rather thorough about that.
The atmosphere, as said above, is also very oppressive and depressing, which is very much logical considering the settings. I particularly liked the Moonlit Black Cat ep, as unsurprising as it was, to show the bleak face of such a world.
I also appreciated the non-cliché parts. Having a hero rather classy and not the usual "headstrong but stupid" was a welcomed change from so many shônen. Having the romance actually not only go somewhere, but even happening right in the middle of the story, and continuing, is nearly a feat of strength considering how it's 99 % of the time "nothing happens despite the main couple being in love at first sight, until 3 mn before the end". It gave a lot of realism and freshness to the story, and the emotion was always here and left me often with teary eyes.
The twist at the end was also rather original - skipping the last 25 levels is certainly not what I would have guessed that would happen
So, lots of satisfying surprises and a story that flew rather well.
The action/aventure part was rather good. As common as it is, the cavalry coming to save the day is still very satisfying when it's pulled off well (and this show made a specialty of doing just that). The fights were very reminiscent of real game, and for someone who is a very enthusiast gamer like me, it just constantly gave me the desire to jump back in time and play some The Burning Crusade with the guild's pals.
That said, half of the flaws and qualities of the show go hand to hand together. Most of the bad things comes from the fact that I found the scenario stopping half-way in most aspect and not going as far as it should have, and "forgetting" lots of stuff that could have added a lot of depth.
At the same time, it means that the scenario
at least went half-way, which is better than nothing.
So I'm a bit on the fence if it's actually a bad thing or a good thing.
The main problem I had was that, despite the horror of being captive of a virtual world that can kill you being the very point of the plot, and despite the ambiance conveying this feeling of hopelessness and despair quite well, the show paradoxally downplayed very much the psychological traumas that should have arisen.
It also missed an opportunity to raise very thoughtful questions and become much deeper, by mostly handwaving the consequences for people after being liberated. Imagine the consequence of living two years not only under constant possibility of death, but MEANINGLESS death, all "for a game". How spending basically two years where killing is the only answer to everything (be it monsters, NPC or even other players), where respect and potential and possibilities come only from waving a sword in a computer-assisted way, would make for people in even far worse situation than most veterans from real war. How they would have basically lost many normal social skills, probably also lots of real skills, to be replaced only with "game mechanics" mentality.
There was a gold mine for social, ethical and metaphysical questions here. Sadly, it was not really explored in depth.
In the same way, it felt very weird to see the vilainy of Akihito nearly shrugged off, and people living such a traumatic experience ready to plunge again in VR just a few days/weeks later with a good laugh.
I could never shake the feeling that the author was always torn between understanding that it would be a horrible situation, but somehow wishing it was true.
It was a show full of flaws, but still interesting enough that I felt I had a wall of text worth of comment about it.
I regret a lot it didn't delve more deeply in the psychological impact over the players, and that it didn't seem to be able to make up its mind about VR.
It was a nice show that I enjoyed watching, but which only barely scratched the surface of its potential, and missed countless opportunity of exploring more the questions it was able to raise. It suffered from a very weak second part, that would have been better used to flesh out the first.
In the end, it missed the occasion to be a great show, by not going deep enough, but still managed to be a nice show, with lots of flaws but lots of good points.
I'll give it an upper 7.
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With the last 4 episodes left to go... yea...
Administrator
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