Alicization was a much needed breath for the Sword Art Online series. During the first two seasons there was a reoccurring pattern of world building, new characters, solving conflict, destroying said world, and repeating it all over again. For 2 seasons this is all the characters did for each arc. It was getting extremely repetitive and quite boring in fact. Sword Art Online lost its charm, that is acquired when it first premiered and needed something new.
That is exactly what Alicization did. Alicization took Kirito, the only character really worth anything, and put him in a completely new isolated environment. There weren't 10+ girls drooling over him, there was no serial stalker trying to kill him, it was just him on his own. And it worked perfectly. We see Kirito start from square one learning alongside Eugeo trying to become better swordsmen. He wasn't a god right at the beginning he had to train and work for everything. War of Underwold took a step back from Kirito and focused more on Alice and the battles with the Imperial Knights which I was actually fine with and thought the story was flowing together nicely. There were end goals in place there were characters I cared about, there was a singular world we were sticking to with a easy to follow story. This was the best SAO we had ever seen and I was so excited for the conclusion to this arc.
This season threw that all away. I was so extremely disappointed by how Part 2 of War of Underworld was handled. Calling this hodgepodge of a plot a story is an insult to the word. There is no clear direction anywhere throughout this season. What was once a straight line of development became a irate circular mess. I have no idea how it derailed into this wreck.
At least with War of Underworld Part 1 we had some sort of end goal to look forward to. Gabriel Miller wanted to basically eat the souls of different people in the Underworld cause they tasted good. It wasn't a very unique or exciting villain, but I thought his design looked cool at least.
What we were left with in War of Underworld Part 2 were unnecessary scenes of sexual assault, painfully cringy dialogue, and insertions of needless characters just for nostalgia sake. It would have been so much cooler to have Kirito save Underworld on his own than bringing back every single character with a minor appearance since episode 1. I mean seriously they even shove in Yuuki during one episode to try and help Asuna, but in all reality in was in very poor taste. They even go as far as literally humanizing the grunt red knights that have been slaughtering the people of Underworld. They have like 3 people take their helmets off and try to shove them down our throats to make them seem live they've changed to being the "good guys".
The "power of friendship" also makes its way into the show a lot too. Whether it's to literally recharge machine energy or to have someone get back up from fighting after they've been knocked down 100 times, the plot armor is extremely sturdy in this season. There's just too many coincidences for anything to seem even somewhat believable. This is suppose to be portrayed in a near future type of setting, but with all the technology they have it seems as though they're hundreds of year ahead of us. Even in the simulated world of Alicization if you die in there, you die in real life. Were we not moving past that after season one? It was never brought back up after the Aincrad arc, why suddenly is it back here now? It also shows that literal dead people can talk to you inside a simulation and fight with you. Thew amount of udder bullshit in this show is laughable.
Having all these characters come back and fight in Underworld wouldn't have been such a bad idea if they could have actually done something. Seriously, the same formula is repeated for each introduction. Character comes back, wipes out some enemies, someone cries, they get hit and are out for the rest of the battle, repeat. Sword Art Online has some sort of Stockholm Syndrome with these overused and mundane patterns, it's like it can never come up with a real idea. Regardless, literally with every human that owns a computer on earth coming to help Underworld they can't do anything and Kirito has to save the day. But before that he has to contemplate suicide for losing his friends in a dungeon 4 YEARS AGO. Somehow he finds the courage through Eugeo's ghost and overpowers the villain and wins.
The story of the season was awful; rarely was I contempt with the the pacing, structure, plot, or really anything going on. Extremely disappointed and upset that this show that was seeing a revival in quality seemingly drop to rock bottom.
Kazuto Kirigaya Kirito is really the only interesting chracter throughout all of SAO. Eugeo was pretty cool during Alicization but that's about the only exception. He doesn't make his appearance until midway through the season. I'll say once he does appear the show's quality increases minutely just because we're finally done with the uninteresting battles and everyone getting beat around. Kirito is the only character that can actually accomplish anything.
Asuna Yuuki If there were a definition for a female simp, it'd be Asuna. She snuck in to a secret military base just to see her bf, and when that wasn't enough she went inside a virtual reality just so she could make out with him. I wish I had a girlfriend as dedicated as Asuna. Granted just about every girl in this show would do the exact same thing for Kirito, but Asuna did it first so I guess she's the best? I don't know. All she really does in this season is cry to be honest. Yeah she swings her sword a little, but she just cries every time she sees someone she knows. It gets kind of annoying. She does decide to save Alice instead of herself which is kind of cool, but other than that, not much of a personality seen.
Alice Zuberg Alice basically just a blonde Asuna clone that cries just a little bit less and doesn't get wrecked in one move. She also may or may not have done some questionable things in bed with Kirito while he was in his vegetable state, but we'll look past that. Besides Kirito she's the only one to get things done in the show, granted the're not huge accomplishments, but at least she goes to try and fight Gabriel Miller which is more than most of the other characters can say.
Vassago Casals Why is this guy still in the show. More importantly why is he even in Underworld. Literally no one cares about him to be a main antagonist for this season, he shouldn't even be that powerful. We learn that he hates Kirito cause he's Japanese. His whole motivation for his evilness is cause he's racist... great. Legitimately an awful villain. Complete waste of time.
Gabriel Miller His villain idea is kinda cool. A lot more compelling than Vassago that's for sure. He just wants to like eat and taste human souls which is a little creepy but none the less somewhat original. His transformation during episode 8 was also pretty cool, I thought that was a cool design. He's the "real" antagonist throughout the Alicization arc, I don't think they implemented him in that well however.
Sword Art Online continues to be a the pinnacle of Art and Animation in the anime industry. Each year they continue to impress with how crisp and clean everything looks. Everything is so fluid and natural it looks amazing. I was extremely impressed with how well the fight between Kirito and Gabriel Miller looked. There was so much going on but A-1 Pictures delivered on not only that, but the rest of the season as well. Everything from the explosions to the powerful spells and moves everyone did looked incredible. I honestly wasn't expecting to enjoy the animation as much as I did going into this. If you want to watch SAO solely for the visuals, you won't be disappointed.
The music and Sound design again is another area where War of Underworld Part 2 impressed me more than I was expecting. The opening theme ANIMA by ReoNa is the best theme SAO has ever seen. I know the show has an iconic first season opening, but this beats it by a landslide. ReoNa has such a unique and angelic voice that moves with authority and comfort it's incredible how talented she is. The ending I will... by Eir Aoi is great as well. It's about as cliche as you can get with a typical ending theme, but it still sounds amazing. No complaints in the the music department from me.
The sound design within the show was exceptional. The clanging of sounds will never get old. It just sounds and feels so satisfying. I was always looking forwards to hearing the different sounds within the show. The explosions were also a highlight. Something about theme had this futuristic type of feel that blared right into your ear drums. There really isn't too much else to say other than it's great. Sound effects and music all around get my seal of approval.
If you've read this far you can definitely tell I was disgruntled with how this arc ended. It fell flat on just about everything. I really though we were entering into a Sword Art Online renaissance but it was a dream short lived. The visual and audio elements exceeded expectations, but when those are the only highlights of a season, it doesn't sit well once the ride is over. I explained in detail only some of my grievances with the show, because trust me, I have more but I can spare it for this review. I never expect the characters in Sword Art Online to be ground breaking, but I would have liked to see something more than the surface level we were treated to in the first few seasons. Overall, this season was a bust through and through. I'm hoping they can learn from their mistakes for the next arc, wherever it takes Kirito and Co. I believe SAO has the potential of being great, it has shown us, but it hasn't been able to keep its consistency.
Favorite Episodes
Episode 2 "The War of Underworld"
Episode 8 "The Night-Sky Blade"
Official Scores
Story: (3/10)
Characters: (4/10)
Art: (9/10)
Music: (8/10)
Personal Enjoyment: (5/10)
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