DESCRIPTION

CAST

MOVIE ActionSword Art Online: Ordinal Scale
NOVEL ActionSword Art Online
ANIME ActionSword Art Online: Alicization - War of Underworld
MANGA ActionSword Art Online: Alicization Lycoris
MANGA ActionSword Art Online: Project Alicization

REVIEWS

• 

  Necokeniii

  85/100
  The best installation of sao

  I've never liked sword art online, it doesn't have anything to draw me in. The only thing I liked about the franchise is the memes it spawned. I went into this installment with an open mind. It was worth the watch, I'm really excited for the next arc. Kirito was facing his biggest challenge yet, he's once again in a video game. The difference is the AI think just like real people, except they have no idea they are AI. They established their own land, rules and social norms. The big theme is the influence of a moral compass, even the antagonists were saying they aren't as bad as demons because they are just part of an hierarchy and system. Kirito became tied up into a personal and bigger than life vendetta.
  Now the reason why I wanted to watch was the music and plot for Alicization. I still play the first opening to this DAY. It captures the feeling of adventure and suspense, you have a goal and you are excited yet nervous to achieve it. Kirito wasn't just some OP character destined to save this word just because there happens to be an enemy. He got to experience a whole life in this virtual world all while on the verge of death or being a vegetable. That's all I ever wanted from this series, stakes that actually peak my interests. The researchers are making this world to prove a point, what's the difference between AI and a person? You can give a robot the capacity to learn and feel, but just how far would people go for power and emotions?
  I loved the fights, each character had a reason to fight and was affected by the laws of the land. Royalty believed they were untouchable gods and abused their privileges meanwhile everyone dealt with it. At first I didn't understand why no one tried to revolt or fight against the royal douches, which eventually boiled down to fighting the royalty is no different than fighting the system. Even within the royalty, there's class divisions and rankings.Everyone knew their place and was aware how much wiggle room they had. Despite all this several characters strives to be the change they seek regardless of the law and danger.
  For once it didn't feel like just about kirito, we also had an amazing supporting cast who have their own goals. After finishing this anime, the biggest takeway I got was the fun should be about the journey and moments we have reaching there, not just about a unrelatable, annoying MC. It wasn't the best thing I've ever watched narrative wise, but I looked forward to every episode.

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• 

  Defiant36

  40/100
  Alicization ultimately fails to capitalize on any of its initial setup leading to a boring, half baked conclusion.

  I really wanted to like this. The first season holds a lot of nostalgia for me, as it was my very first anime. But with all the contrived plot devices, bland characters, tropey cop outs, and boring setpieces, the show fails to engage its audience in any meaningful way. Leaving a couple interesting ideas, new and old, by the wayside.

  Art-wise, the characters, particularly Kirito, have been redesigned. It looks fine, I like the old version a bit more (maybe that's nostalgia talking), but after an episode or two, it’s hard to even notice a difference. The scenes are really clean. While the animation isn’t necessarily improved, the character and background art is crisp af. There are plenty of times when you can pause the video and just soak a scene in. The environments are beautiful and full of vibrant colors. The color designer did a fantastic job. I particularly like the use of orange and yellow in sunlight places, or anywhere is the forest. The color design is by far the best in the series.

  Fights are better than SAO’s previous seasons. While Alicization tends to focus on big moments in fights rather than the actual fights themselves, at least they aren't flashes of light in dust clouds anymore. I’m always curious what a studio like Bones or Madhouse would do with this, but A-1 did a pretty good job. The transformers noises are pretty distracting. It's cool that they're trying to showcase huge moments, but it comes off a bit cheeky.

  The first OP is awesome. They got LiSa again, and just like with the first season, she nails it. The OP has lots of cool cuts too. The handshake at the end is always hilarious (in a good way) to watch.

  Thematically, the show is all over the place. It tries to discuss interesting concepts such as humans playing as gods, what separates humans from machines, and power hierarchy in a society. But instead of seriously discussing these topics, it shifts almost all of its focus to saving a girl who the audience has such a tiny sliver of emotional attachment to. Alicization introduces a new girl… once again, establishes a confusing childhood friend trope for 10 minutes, and expects the audience to care about saving her for 20 episodes. The fact that they continually introduce new girls and leave Asuna out of everything is strange. Why was there so much build up the first season? Asuna is just used as a reward at the end of the tunnel at this point. Alicization would work better if it were spun off into its own thing, like the GGO alternative anime, rather than constantly ditching it’s characters for new girls it can put on the cover.

  Instead of discussing the characters or themes. Alicization wants to focus on the backstory of it’s boring world. Kawahara, author of the SAO light novels, has gotten away with this style of writing for a while. SAO is a wish-fulfillment fantasy in a gamey world. Who wouldn't want to play SAO it if it were real? I would play the shit out of it, and I bet you would too. That’s why the world building worked. What the audience doesn't care about is a generic fantasy, with a million pointless backstories, that is not a game we can't project ourselves onto playing. There’s so much less tension built into the world, as opposed to SAO wherein a simple sword mechanic could be the difference between life and death.

  The way some of the thematic concepts are introduced showcases the incompetent directing of the anime. The rape scene is laughably over the top. It focuses far more on shock value than anything. It brings up interesting themes, but refuses to talk about them. Using rape as a contrived plot device for nothing more than shock value is downright insulting. When Valvrave the Liberator pulls off rape better than you, there is a serious problem.

  Eugeo is the worst part about Alicization. He is a nice boy who doesn't like conflict and loves helping his friends. What an unrealistic, unoriginal, and boring character. We’ve seen this a million times. We two year time skip over any piece of character development we would need to care about him. The ending of his arc is ridiculous and doesn't earn the emotional payoff it thinks it deserves.

  I didn’t even notice this at first until I read a different review on MAL, but he never even talks to Alice after episode 1. Alice is his single motivation in life, the driving force of everything he has spent the last two years preparing for, and he doesn’t even bother to say a word to this girl. This perfectly exemplifies how contrived and plot-devicey these characters are. It doesn’t really matter what the reason is, Kawahara just needs to get Kirito to the top of this tower to kill the bad guy.

  The Aincrad arc is the only interesting arc in the series (kinda bar Mother’s Rosario). It explored the blurry line between reality and VR, and actually accomplished what it set out to achieve. The ideas established in SAO’s two previous seasons are thrown away in favor of new half baked themes, which could blend quite well with Alicization’s if only given a chance.

  Reki Kawahara is his own worst enemy. There are some great moments in Alicization, but they are ruined by another story the author is trying to tell before it can engage its audience in any interesting way.

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• 

  DesolatePsyche

  70/100
  Ironically soulless, but still entertaining enough.

  Sword Art Online: Alicization 5/9/6/7/7

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  Note: I'll use my MAL reviewing format until I tweak it for AL. link Here is how my "review" system works. W.I.P

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  ✦Story
  Funnly enough I really loved SAO and ALO. Hated GGO, loved ordinal scale. And now that I reached GGO alternative and Alicization I got rather mixed feelings.

  For the most part I enjoyed the storytelling in this Anime but for some reason really overreached and somewhat "forced" in comparison to SAO 1. The whole concept and mis-aligment of time and somewhat Kirito essentially being there for "long time" is just odd. Anime offers story'wise some emotional moments, but at the same time they feel oddly weightless.
  Also I found it rather odd that although the whole storytelling of what was happening in "real world" and the concept of "Alicization" world might been "interesting" per sey. Yet still somehow rather questionable and the usual "humans are cu-- ahems".

  World building was okay. I guess as whole it was "okay" but ironically rather "souless".

  Anyhow
  5/10

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  ✦Art & Sound
  Not much to say. Superb as always. Whilst Animation felt somewhat "odd" at times with this overly glowing and saturated Art.. it was great nevertheless. Fight scenes and spells were great.
  OST was superb as always.
  9/10

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  ✦Character
  For some reason once again "evil" characters and power hungry rapey characters. "Boss" character was also rather useless.
  I did love Alice and bunch of side-characters, whilst boy duo was for the most part rather obnoxious. Also I felt somehow that Kirito as "character" got somewhat a "downgrade"
  All things together.. good enough I guess. Was some progression, fair amount of characters. Just there was a lot of "uselessness" in characters.
  6/10

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  ✦Enjoyment & Overall
  What can I say. It felt rather borderline "7". Enjoyed it a bit more than pink loli running with guns. That was was simply for a reason that this universe has swords and magic. Whilst I did get tired of Kirito and lot of story elements that I simply didn't care about, it was still enjoyable.
  Also it was semi-interesting to see activities on both side of worlds.
  7/10

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  ✦✦Final score✦✦: 7/10

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