Shangri-La Frontier

Episode 19

When I thought Shangri-La Frontier was cooling down after an intense battle, it immediately got back into action. The first half of the episode after taking out the boss was predictable. I'm sure our cast got some sick item drops that the story will reveal later, but the party defeated Weatherman, and his soul can finally move on to be with his love. I wasn't expecting the holographic ghost of his love, Setsuna, to be an AI copy.

It seemed likely that she was trapped in the game with Weatherman, but it turns out he was trapped all along. In the real world, Setsuna created the AI copy of herself and the quest to guide people to free Weatherman. This revelation gives more credence to the theory that many of the NPCs in this game are either actual people from the real world or copies of them, which would explain why they're so sophisticated. I was expecting a bit more of a reaction from our cast since this is probably one of the first times it was explicitly stated, "Yeah, I'm sort of from the real world. " The story's build-up to this ball-drop reveal warranted a bigger reaction.

Regardless, this marks a definitive turning point for a couple of reasons. It is the first defeat of one of the world's unique monsters, and now the in-game story can actually progress. Where the story could go from here is up in the air, and I'm curious what the next major event will be to close out the series. It was hilarious to see the announcement of the boss' defeat broadcasted across the entire virtual world because all I could think of was, "Damn, these idiots are going to have such a big target on their back." I wonder if that's why Arthur challenged Psyger so readily. I know she wants a clean slate and to escape her previous life as a player killer. Still, it would also be interesting if this was a clever way for her to avoid all the unwanted attention our cast will get moving forward.

Still, the final clash was pretty intense, and I'm looking forward to how Psyger will fit into all of this.

Rating:

Shangri-La Frontier is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.