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REVIEW: Sword Art Online II Blu-Ray 2


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maoyen



Joined: 11 Dec 2007
Posts: 170
PostPosted: Mon Sep 28, 2015 10:51 am Reply with quote
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Story B


This crap was C at best. The conclusion horrible.


That's my opinion, though.
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Videogamep



Joined: 10 Jun 2014
Posts: 564
Location: CA
PostPosted: Mon Sep 28, 2015 11:37 am Reply with quote
I'd give it about a B too. It seems like Kawahara's writing got better as he got more experience since Sinon's character was handled fairly well (spoiler[although the not-rape scene was a bit tasteless]). Some of the later arcs also had better character writing than I expected from SAO. I hope that means the inevitable season 3 will be even better.
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SaitoHajime101



Joined: 31 Mar 2013
Posts: 280
PostPosted: Mon Sep 28, 2015 2:31 pm Reply with quote
The second half of SAO 2 where it centers on Asuna is definitely a step up from here. Overall I like the progression in SAO and the characters in 2, just hoping there's enough drive to make a third one.
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chito895



Joined: 22 Jan 2015
Posts: 512
Location: Lima, Peru
PostPosted: Mon Sep 28, 2015 2:40 pm Reply with quote
Sorry for asking this, but what happened at the end of ep 13 and the beginning of the 14th? The part where spoiler[Kirito goes to Sinon's house to save her from the maniatic attacks of her friend?]

Anyway, this arc was very good at the beginning: it was entertaining at first, like the first season, with Kirito being awesome as always (a thing that I only bear for one arc), but then it dragged a lot during two or three episodes and the finale was really underwhelming. I expected a lot of action between Kirito and Death Gun, but a few acrobatics and evasions in slow motion are not the same as Kirito vs Blue Demon, which may be the best thing SAO ever did regarding animation and action.

Oh, and Sinon is best girl and best character of SAO. Seriously, though, she got more development in 10 episodes than what the rest of the cast got in 48. How's that even possible?
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Key
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Joined: 03 Nov 2003
Posts: 18135
Location: Indianapolis, IN (formerly Mimiho Valley)
PostPosted: Mon Sep 28, 2015 3:26 pm Reply with quote
chito895 wrote:
Oh, and Sinon is best girl and best character of SAO. Seriously, though, she got more development in 10 episodes than what the rest of the cast got in 48. How's that even possible?

It's very simple: Aside from Kirito, she got more "front and center" screen time than any other character in the franchise; in fact, if you add up the minutes then it's probably not even close. Prior to the Mother's Rosario arc, think about how often Asuna is shown except as a complement to Kirito: a couple of group scenes in Extra Edition and this arc, the scenes where she's a prisoner in the Fairy Dance arc, and that's about it. The only scenes in the first 41 episodes of the franchise where she's shown on her own are the scene in Fairy Dance where she temporarily escapes and the scenes where she's despairing for Kirito to rescue her. Even Lizbeth, who had only one featured episode and barely appeared in the rest of the first series, had as much or more time as the focal point. (And yes, you'd better believe that I will be getting into that when the time to review Mother's Rosario comes around.) Suguha fares better but is still second-tier on focus and has considerably less room to grow and develop as a character.

And yes, you are correct about the scene I was talking about.
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jr240483



Joined: 24 Dec 2005
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Location: New York City,New York,USA
PostPosted: Mon Sep 28, 2015 4:15 pm Reply with quote
Key wrote:
chito895 wrote:
Oh, and Sinon is best girl and best character of SAO. Seriously, though, she got more development in 10 episodes than what the rest of the cast got in 48. How's that even possible?

It's very simple: Aside from Kirito, she got more "front and center" screen time than any other character in the franchise; in fact, if you add up the minutes then it's probably not even close. Prior to the Mother's Rosario arc, think about how often Asuna is shown except as a complement to Kirito: a couple of group scenes in Extra Edition and this arc, the scenes where she's a prisoner in the Fairy Dance arc, and that's about it. The only scenes in the first 41 episodes of the franchise where she's shown on her own are the scene in Fairy Dance where she temporarily escapes and the scenes where she's despairing for Kirito to rescue her. Even Lizbeth, who had only one featured episode and barely appeared in the rest of the first series, had as much or more time as the focal point. (And yes, you'd better believe that I will be getting into that when the time to review Mother's Rosario comes around.) Suguha fares better but is still second-tier on focus and has considerably less room to grow and develop as a character.

And yes, you are correct about the scene I was talking about.


you also forgot that sugu/lefa was the most hated character in the series which is why after fairy dance she became second tier compared to asuna and sinon,and having her fall in love with her brother kirito during the fairy dance arc was the nail in the coffin for her future character development outside of filler eps like the Extra movie. Kawahara is no Mashimaro (Aki Sora's author)

Quote:
Those irritated by Kirito's seeming-Gary Stu nature will also find more fodder here, especially as he comes to the rescue of yet another female character on more than one occasion.
and is one reason why people liked Mother's Rosario cause he became an afterthought while asuna became a main. also his gary stuness actually came in full force during the excalibur arc when sinon became another girl in his list that have romantic feelings for him & he's completely oblivious, completing the "pseudo harem" aspect.

however the only good thing about his take (at least for log horizon fans) is that it makes shiro a more likeable gary stu character than kirito. at least when it comes to males that are stuck in a "pseudo harem" situation, he's not completely clueless unlike emyia from FSN and touma from the index series. and shiro have zero romantic feelings for any of the 4 girls in his corner (excluding Nureha).
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chito895



Joined: 22 Jan 2015
Posts: 512
Location: Lima, Peru
PostPosted: Mon Sep 28, 2015 4:35 pm Reply with quote
jr0904 wrote:
... and is one reason why people liked Mother's Rosario cause he became an afterthought while asuna became a main.


Yeah, you're right. Mother's Rosario saved SAO II from being boring and repetitive. Although Asuna's development was hit or miss for me, it was nice to see her being as badass as she was in the first episodes of Aincrad.
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jr240483



Joined: 24 Dec 2005
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Location: New York City,New York,USA
PostPosted: Mon Sep 28, 2015 6:53 pm Reply with quote
chito895 wrote:
jr0904 wrote:
... and is one reason why people liked Mother's Rosario cause he became an afterthought while asuna became a main.


Yeah, you're right. Mother's Rosario saved SAO II from being boring and repetitive. Although Asuna's development was hit or miss for me, it was nice to see her being as badass as she was in the first episodes of Aincrad.


and its also because why asuna have a massive fanbase during the aincrad arc was why poor sugu became the most hated in fairy dance and people were screaming bloody murder of that possibility of kirito replacing asuna for his sister/cousin.

would highly doubt this kinda hate for a female character wouldnt have happen if it was sachi.
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SquadmemberRitsu



Joined: 26 Jan 2012
Posts: 1391
PostPosted: Mon Sep 28, 2015 8:08 pm Reply with quote
The reason why Asuna didn't fight back when she was captured by Oberon is because he took away her ability to do so. It says nothing about her strength as a character.

Anyway, they brought in Keiichi Sigsawa for one of the commentary tracks? Wow, I really need to get this when the Blu-ray comes out over here. I love Kino's Journey.

I like what I've seen of the dub too. The first season's dub was great in the first place but SAO II seems to be a slight improvement from the episodes I've watched.

Bryce Papenbrook's girl Kirito is surprisingly... cute.
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Videogamep



Joined: 10 Jun 2014
Posts: 564
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 28, 2015 10:07 pm Reply with quote
jr0904 wrote:


and its also because why asuna have a massive fanbase during the aincrad arc was why poor sugu became the most hated in fairy dance and people were screaming bloody murder of that possibility of kirito replacing asuna for his sister/cousin.


Also because her character consisted of "I'm in love with my onii-chan". I like SAO but I still admit there's a lot to make fun of in it.
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jr240483



Joined: 24 Dec 2005
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Location: New York City,New York,USA
PostPosted: Tue Sep 29, 2015 3:13 am Reply with quote
Videogamep wrote:
jr0904 wrote:


and its also because why asuna have a massive fanbase during the aincrad arc was why poor sugu became the most hated in fairy dance and people were screaming bloody murder of that possibility of kirito replacing asuna for his sister/cousin.


Also because her character consisted of "I'm in love with my onii-chan". I like SAO but I still admit there's a lot to make fun of in it.


True,also i am positive that if those dumbass laws the extreme far left gov't plastered years ago which undermined the creative thinking of the manga industry , i would bet you that the author would have had kazuto and sugu as blood related siblings instead of cousins.

at least the author didn't go the oreimo route and have them as step siblings. and fans got what they wanted which is kazuto and asuna as a couple, though fans should be more lucky that the director for the movie is the same one for the series and not from WIXOSS,otherwise their worst fears might have happened. Laughing Laughing Laughing
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Shiroi Hane
Encyclopedia Editor


Joined: 25 Oct 2003
Posts: 7578
Location: Wales
PostPosted: Tue Sep 29, 2015 7:42 am Reply with quote
Quote:
Keiichi Sigsawa, who is probably better-known as the original creator of Allison & Lillia and Kino's Journey but who here served as the “gun consultant” for the series. (He is a self-professed “gun nut.”)

"SIG Sauer". I see what he did there.

Talking about the Asuna focus in Mothers Rosario makes me realise something though (End of SAO II spoilers:)
spoiler[While I'm glad she did, it actually doesn't make a lot of sense that Asuna took the lead; Yuuki passed on Kirito as a party member because she knew he know her secret.
In other words she passed on someone who would enter the relationship knowing she is seriously if not terminally ill, and chooses someone blissfully unaware instead. Isn't that a bit cruel?]
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SillyPerson



Joined: 30 Aug 2015
Posts: 39
Location: Vatican City
PostPosted: Tue Sep 29, 2015 11:14 am Reply with quote
jr0904 wrote:
you also forgot that sugu/lefa was the most hated character in the series which is why after fairy dance she became second tier compared to asuna and sinon,and having her fall in love with her brother kirito during the fairy dance arc was the nail in the coffin for her future character development outside of filler eps like the Extra movie. Kawahara is no Mashimaro (Aki Sora's author)


I like the Sugu/Leafa character and in fact like her better than Sinon, although neither of them as much as Asuna. I had no idea people hated Sugu/Leafa. That is so silly. The only characters I really hate are the creepy guy who tries to marry Asuna and pretends he is the Fairy King Oberon, and the equally creepy guy from SAO II spoiler[who was Sinon's best friend until it turned out he is one of the guys playing Death Gun who kills people...] and also Asuna's mother, I can't stand Asuna's motherspoiler[, she is so nasty and controlling to Asuna and meddlesome regarding which school Asuna can attend, who she can go out with, whether or not she can play VRMMORPGs, etc].

All in all it's an excellent series but I'd say the pacing for the first half of SAO II, the arc that features Sinon in Gun Gale Online, is too slow, and I wish they had packed in more action, more people shooting at each other from inside Gun Gale Online, and so on, the way that the first season of SAO was full of action. So much of this story arc about Gun Gale Online involved standoffs with people staying in one place and talking and looking through the scopes of their guns just waiting around, rather than action-packed showdowns and people spraying each other with bullets like I would expect from a gun game. Other than that this arc was solid and had very good character development and plot. But nothing can really top the first half of the first season of Sword Art Online where they were in Sword Art Online's world, prior to the other worlds like ALfheim Online which the second half of the first season was about. I don't see how the series can ever top what was achieved in the original world of Sword Art Online, it seems that with the NerveGear replaced by a safer model, there cannot be as much dramatic tension or as much at stake anymore. It can be attempted, like with Asuna being held hostage in ALfheim Online or with Death Gun killing other players somehow in Gun Gale Online, but the villains in both cases are rather over-the-top to make up for the fact that much less is at stake.
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Key
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 29, 2015 12:14 pm Reply with quote
SillyPerson wrote:
I don't see how the series can ever top what was achieved in the original world of Sword Art Online. . .

Mother's Rosario tops it.

(Admittedly, though, that may not hold true if you are primarily focusing on the action component of the franchise.)
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GrayArchon



Joined: 28 Feb 2011
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 29, 2015 1:32 pm Reply with quote
SquadmemberRitsu wrote:
Anyway, they brought in Keiichi Sigsawa for one of the commentary tracks? Wow, I really need to get this when the Blu-ray comes out over here. I love Kino's Journey.
As mentioned, he was the gun consultant for the series. He's the reason you can identify nearly any gun seen in the series as a real gun. He also liked the GGO setting enough that he's writing a spin off series set in it.

jr0904 wrote:
you also forgot that sugu/lefa was the most hated character in the series which is why after fairy dance she became second tier compared to asuna and sinon,and having her fall in love with her brother kirito during the fairy dance arc was the nail in the coffin for her future character development outside of filler eps like the Extra movie. Kawahara is no Mashimaro (Aki Sora's author)
Color me skeptical that there was any widespread hatred of Suguha when the author was originally writing the series as a webnovel a decade or so ago. I certainly haven't seen any sign of it.

Suguha's shortage of further development isn't much isn't much different than Lisbeth's and Silica's. Early on in his writing, the author tended to default to Kirito meeting a new girl and interacting with them exclusive of anyone else he knew; with no longer term plans or development for the new character. It was simply the easiest thing for the author to write at the time. Over time he got better at writing more complex characters, writing stories that involved multiple characters, and at writing story conflicts that were more over arcing. But in the meantime, he moved from character to character, leaving behind the old ones. It probably doesn't help Suguha that besides her relationship with her brother, she's pretty much a normal school girl with a normal life. Makes it difficult to come up with story ideas where she's the one that drives it.

Though all told I'd say that Lisbeth is the one that had it the worst of the girls in that regard. The author never really came up with much of anything else to do with her.
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