Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online II

Episode 4

Generally, there are three kinds of stories: plot-driven, character-driven, and theme-driven. While nearly all narratives mix these three, one generally overshadows the other two. This is also true on an episode-by-episode basis, and what we have this week is most certainly a plot-driven episode with nothing new in terms of theme exploration or character development.

While the last episode showed us the end of all the teams in Llenn's area through the battle between Shirley and Clarence, this episode shows us how the other three teams involved in Squad Jam's conclusion won their respective areas. SHINC brought the battle to the teams around them before the scan and used flares to lay traps and eliminate the other teams. ZEMAL, the machine gun lovers, used shopping carts and metal pipes found in a hardware store to make armored mobile turrets and T-S climbed a skyscraper and got stuck there when the water rose (keeping them safe but basically a non-entity as far as the rest of the teams were concerned).

And that's basically it. We just get caught up with the important teams for what is to come for twenty minutes. It's fun, sometimes exciting, and more than a bit silly but nothing to write home about. Then comes the big twist of the season: that one person from each of the remaining teams (seemingly the strongest of each) will be transported to the dead zone in the middle of the map and make their own new team.

While I'm not against this as a concept, I am more than a bit let down by it. The point of this season was to have all of our heroes working together for the first time, going up against the strongest teams they encountered when they were enemies in the last Squad Jam and (hopefully) coming out on top. Honestly, we haven't gotten that. All our heroes have done to this point is sit in a train car together and shoot anyone who got close. And with this twist, that's all we're going to get.

Then there's what the twist means in a larger, more meta-textual sense. We've already seen Llenn and Fukaziroh take on Pitohui. Seeing it again isn't all that exciting in general, especially as it happened as recently as the previous arc. But the real kick in the teeth is that this time there is nothing in the way of tension regarding their impending confrontation. In the last arc, Pitohui is determined to kill herself in real life if she dies in the game. The only possible way to prevent this was for Llenn to be the one to kill Pitohui and use Pitohui's promise to meet Llenn in real life if the latter was ever able to beat her in the game as a shield against her decision to kill herself.

However, this time, Llenn doesn't even want to be in the tournament, much less fight Pitohui again. The only reason she joined was her promise to fight team SHINC. And now, just like Llenn's own team, SHINC has been broken up. There's literally no reason for Llenn (and, by proxy, us) to care about the tournament at all. Suddenly, rather than a new tale, it feels like we are just going through the motions—following in the shadow of a much more impactful story.

Rating:

Random Thoughts:

• If I were Llenn, I'd put a bullet in M's head right away. Unless Pitohui's next words are “M, I expect you to fight against me with everything you've got,” he's on Pitohui's team no matter what the rules say.

• I love the machine gunners because they just seem to be having so much fun.

• Did we really need the flash forward of Karen watching the replay as a narrative device to see what the other teams have been up to? Her commentary was sparse and didn't really add anything.

• My favorite part of the opening song is the visual of Elsa and Karen both head to foot in the fetal position. They form a yen-yang symbol representing that they are opposites yet part of the same whole.

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Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online II is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

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Disclosure: Kadokawa World Entertainment (KWE), a wholly owned subsidiary of Kadokawa Corporation, is the majority owner of Anime News Network, LLC. One or more of the companies mentioned in this article are part of the Kadokawa Group of Companies.