Review of Sword Art Online: Alicization - War of Underworld Part 2

The fact that it took about an entire year to get the Alicization arc to be adapted in animated form, and we're still not getting the full story because apparently there're additional volumes to detail what happened, is a testament to the kind of story that SAO has become. Now is that a good thing? Not necessarily, but I just thought that's something to consider now that we're almost at a decade's worth of SAO adaptations and still counting. Story: Alright, so where we were again? Oh yeah: Kazuto's a vegetable, mercs are invading the peace of the Underworld, and the only way toensure the safety of everyone is to eject the Holy Grail of AI, Alice, from the Underworld since if her fluctlight cube fell into the hands of nefarious forces, she could be used to create autonomous weapons systems and create an AI-centered war. I think that about sums it up. Now in an awkward eleven episode length, we return back to the War of Underworld to finally, after like four cours of this story, finally finish this up.

Whatever Reki was smoking while he wrote this story, I don't want any of it. While yes, SAO has had an awful, awful history of quite literally pulling god swords or any kind of world-saving Deus Ex Machina out of its ass in order to create a moment of badass powerplay, personally I think what we see here in War of Underworld II is the most egregious example of that in the series thus far. The reason for this I think is because the storytelling doesn't make sense any more. Worldbuilding? Proper stakes that make sense in context to the established laws of the Underworld? Nah, throw all that shit out of the window. Obviously you're gonna snag about a hundred thousand players to follow and fully support a claim that seems suspicious at best. And that's the most plausible thing that's shown here. By the show's climax, the show is so focused on building up hype for itself that basically nothing makes sense anymore. The spectacle of watching the series break its own established rules for the sake of making Kazuto look like the coolest fucking person in existence and save EVERYONE is so astounding that I sat in awe at how little sense it made.

As a result, War of Underworld II feels cumbersome and sometimes just difficult to watch. Because its attempts to get the audience to care about certain characters or events is kind of impossible when you wake the black swordsman from his slumber and give him back both the black sword and a blue sword. The series's heavy reliance on Kazuto is such a crutch that it makes whatever established stakes or characters feel not impactful at all because what's the point in tension if we all know that once Kazuto's on his feet, our problems are all solved?

That being said, it's not all bad, somehow. Compared to the previous arcs, Alicization's questions on AI technology and the ramifications of creating autonomous artificial beings is legitimately interesting and actually quite terrifying once certain things get revealed at the tail end of the series. I'm still of the opinion that SAO thinks its a smarter series than it actually is, but the fact that the series went out of its way to pose some more interesting questions and 'bring it back down to earth' as you will, is definitely a breath of fresh air compared to what occurs in the middle areas of the season. Which are undoubtedly are the most fun to watch if you're either 10-12 or are super fucking drunk. That being said, it still doesn't feel all that worth it, especially since this meager payoff only happens to push for something else interesting to happen in the future. Which will undoubtedly end up being just as dumb as Alicization regressed into because we can't just have a proper arc to anything now can we?

Characters:

I think the only interesting part about Kazuto comes with the internal strife and other affairs that he has to come to terms with as a result of his time in the Underworld. His bonds with Eugeo and his regrets of what has happened as a result of the Aincrad incident and his struggles with both the virtual and the real world play a surprisingly gruesome part to his character that seems to have lasting effects. And then it doesn't. While I'm inclined to say that this is definitely a positive addition to his character because he actually seems human instead of just some overpowered Beater that gets bitches and fights the big bad, it actually feels more like a plot point than a folded part of his character. I think it's because a majority of his time in War of Underworld II is spent on making him look cool as fuck instead of humanizing him like what the first two cours of Alicization did. There is some stuff at the end that expands more on the intrigue of his character, but there's so little of that that it makes it feel like more of a hook for something in the future instead of a part of Kazuto as a whole. So I'm mixed on Kazuto this time around, though leaning more on the opinion that it still could've been done better.

Normally this is the part where I would talk about any other interesting characters or secondary protagonists, but because of the series's treatment of everyone else, we're instead switching gears to the villains! Fuck them. Give me back the Administrator; she was way more interesting. Gabriel Miller and Vassago were already really shaky characters when they were first introduced, and the shit that these two pull off feel so arbitrarily thrown in that I honestly couldn't believe that these were the villains that we're subjected to in a show that's this high budget. As with the rest of War of Underworld II, these two feel like they're just going along with the flow of the story, which includes adding motives like ridiculous racial prejudice and turning into your namesake because your name is 'Gabriel'. Which, seriously, what sense does THAT make? (Someone please, for the love of god explain why that fucking happened.) And I honestly couldn't care less for these two or their motivations.

I'd like to liken the treatment of the entire rest of the cast, including Alice, who is the main prize for all of this happening, to that of being patrons in the bleachers watching all of this shit between Kazuto and the villains happen before them. Which I find the damndest shame because they went through all this effort to do big SSBU "EVERYONE IS HERE" reveals that ultimately meant nothing because if they're not Kazuto, clearly they don't have a chance in hell to beat any of the antagonists or clear any of their mooks without getting battle winded or losing either themselves or at least an arm in the process. It's such a shame because it's the biggest kind of fanservice that could be given to any fan of SAO, only to be spit on within ten minutes by a set of dudes that were introduced at best ten episodes ago. Like come on, really? (Side note, Eugeo, stop ghosting already. Holy shit, dude.)

Aesthetics:

The look of SAO is about the same as what we've seen in Alicization prior. That being a style that follows that of Ordinal Scale with amazing visual effects and animation frames with clashing swords and whatever other effects the animators want to put in to make the spectacle fights that much more interesting to watch. This, for better and for worse, makes the look of SAO that much more exciting and definitely adds to the hype factor that at this point I would say is the thing that makes SAO shine the most. Because very few series these days are given the kind of budget and attention this show does in order to make their fights look this cool. Even if they are very bullshit.

That being said, the power of this art is also used for very unsightly things, and man do they really rear their ugly head when it shows up. (Did you have to do that to Suguha? Seriously? What narrative reason did you have to do that to her? Or anyone else you've done that to for that matter?) While Alicization definitely pushed the angle by having combatants lose their limbs (and one very uncomfortable attempted rape scene), War of Underworld II goes the extra extreme by basically making the fights look more like torture porn, especially in the first half. I get why they did it; it was to add stakes to the whole situation. But it got to the point that the series kind of did it so much that it got really uncomfortable to watch, especially when you add in several scenes that have some rapey undertones to them, and there's just no prior buildup to some of it. Because nothing could prepare me for something like self-mutilation, especially in SAO of all things.

ReoNa's "ANIMA" for me strikes a solid middle in the grand scheme of SAO songs. We have nearly a dozen SAO openings by this point, so standing up to some of the older ones (through virtue of them being much older) is very stiff competition. For ANIMA, (quite literally meaning 'Soul'), we have a more heroic-sounding rock song that's got a good mixture of high and lower points that honestly sounds better the longer I hear it. My only gripe with the song is how repetitive both its lyrics and its track really is. Which is a shame because there're definitely worser songs in SAO's library of ops.

Eir Aoi's "I will..." by contrast is a more yearning song, starting soft and gaining more energy the further the track goes. I definitely think it fits in context to some of the tones that War of Underworld II is trying to hit, but I think it still falls short for me because after the first couple seconds, it's only 'ok' instead of a really memorable track for me.

Final Thoughts:

Whether or not Unital Ring will be good (because we're DEFINITELY getting Unital Ring) is really up for debate. As a whole I feel like Alicization hit some very good highs, and some very, very low lows. Especially in War of Underworld II, the entirety of everything established prior feels like it was thrown out the window for the sake of the 'rule of cool' statement, and the meager bits of interesting (or genuinely scary) parts of the story are only there for setup for whatever comes next, or will get completely glossed over, never to be spoken about again because almost assuredly that's going to happen.

For me, I think I'm just tired of SAO by this point. Alicization gave me hopes that I never thought were possible in this series, but by the end of it, the story ended up being a by the numbers power fantasy (and yes, I know SAO has always been that) that made me feel stupid for feeling invested about the Underworld and the implications of an entire AI society that rivaled that of the real world human society. Kazuto will always be the answer to everything, and I really hate how I keep winning that bet. Especially because the series put a surprisingly significant amount of time to spotlight other characters, only for them to not really matter by the end. And Alice's entire character ends up being kind of shelved since now she's the ultimate prize that everyone is fighting for. Yeah it makes narrative sense, but it feels tacky and like she's just the Holy Grail for everyone to fight over.

And it's hard to say any recommendations for War of Underworld II without mentioning the rest of Alicization for narrative reasons. Personally I still think Mother's Rosario is the best mainline arc this series has ever had, and Alicization as a whole, despite it being fucking massive, sits near Aincrad and GGO in the middle ground of being 'ok' with many glaring problems, especially towards the ends near the climaxes. (Seriously, Reki just doesn't know how to write a good climax.) As a whole, I think there's a genuinely good amount of intrigue, character development, and worldbuilding to be had with Alicization that makes it a decent watch. But on the flipside it fucks itself so much that I feel like it's a detriment to the viewer to watch it because there're sections that're just so, so, so, so, SO bad that a part of me struggles to understand the thought process as to why this story ended up the way it did.