Review of Sword Art Online the Movie: Ordinal Scale
I have kind of stopped writing reviews as of late for a few reasons, but I went to see this film last night and it really made me want to say a few words about it. The art was just spectacular and it was nothing less from the mega franchise of SAO. The way that the world would transform around them and become the fantasy-esq world is one of the coolest ways that they could make the real world exciting and enjoyable to look at. I would actually enjoy watching the different areas change into something dark and evil that was once just a normaloffice building. It gave depth to the style of art by allowing it to have a seamless transform right before your eyes. The colors and the costumes were also a nice change of pace from the anime TV series, but the fan-service near the end was a much appreciated nod to those who fell in love with the anime from the start.
The music direction was pretty important I would say throughout the whole film. With music being the primary goal of Yuna and all of that going for her, they actually had great in-movie songs as well as a fantastic soundtrack. I loved hearing those piano melodies behind an emotional scene (and there were a lot of them) but there was also a lot of room for growth and a lot of impact music. it made each scene feel alive and real rather than just a screen, it was able to fully immerse me in the film.
The story was pretty good i would say, kind of falling short at some points, and the main antagonists motives were not readily clear (which could be a good thing but to me it was just annoying). The use of Augmented reality video games is not a super new concept, especially with Pokemon GO breaking out on the scene last summer, but the way they used it in this sense makes me long for it in real life. Don't get me wrong i wish i could still go Full Dive but if AR is the best i can get? SIGN ME UP. either way the AR game starts to seemingly affect people in strange ways and when Asuna and others are in danger, Kirito has to step up and do his best to save them. Pretty standard SAO plot structure I'd say.
My personal enjoyment was through the roof. I loved this film and it made me so happy to actually go see it in the theater. I througholy enjoyed every bit of the emotional story that focused on Kirito and Asuna's relationship and by the end i was tearing up just because of how happy I was. There was a lot of fan-service (as in they gave the fans what they wanted, not just ecchi type stuff) and to be honest it fit really well. I enjoyed seeing the characters in certain environments and the final battle was really something that i think a lot of fans were hoping for. This film is a great film to watch if you've never seen SAO, but you will appreciate it so much more if you have.
Overall Rating - 9.5/10