October 31st, 2019
.hack//sign revaluation (draft)
Anime Relations: .hack//Sign
.hack//sign contains many bad qualities.
It's boring, slow, barely animated, badly paced, and above all it leaves a lot to be desired from its inconclusive ending. It feels like a 24 episode prelude to the games, which are the main attractions of the .hack franchise.
And honestly, I don't think many people who like .hack//sign will disagree with me.
So why do I and many other people like it?
For them, it's because of the densely written characterization and the numerous amount of dialogue that explores the question of why people play MMORPG and who plays them. Either that or the immaculate soundtrack composed by Yuki Kajiura helps them sleep at night. Who knows.
For me? I honestly believe .hack//sign a deconstruction of the isekai genre.
You see, as an anime fan who is in the midst of an isekai boom for the last half of the 2010s, those shows all follow a simple cookie cutter formula that they rarely strays from one another. The formula goes like this: A guy gets gets transported into another world where they become overpowered and eventually gains a harem that religiously follows him until he defeats the final boss. Simple video game-esque storytelling (obviously).
.hack//sign is not one of those stories. .hack//sign follows Tsukasa, a player is trapped within the game and cannot log out. However, Tsukasa differs from the modern isekai protagonist. There is a cloud of mystery that surrounds his character and suggests that something paranormal is happening to him. His character is as foreign to us as he is to the other characters in the show that are trying to help him in his perils.
The way Tsukasa was portrayed could almost be seen as a deconstruction of Sword Art Online and other isekai stories that have gotten so popular in the past couple years. Tsukasa is stuck in the biggest MMORPG ever. Cool, right? Oh wait he can feel pain and cold and fighting sucks. So he gets a special monster to level up for him. Cool, right? Oh wait other players hate him for being a cheating bastard. He's aloof and standoffish and frequently accuses anyone who tries to get to know him of ulterior motives, and instead of girls flinging themselves at him everyone thinks he's a big jerk.
Even the supporting characters are rather interesting, and we see how they use The World as various forms of escapism from the real world. Escapism can be healthy, but too much of it is unhealthy. We also see how The World lets people of all ages and walks of life come together when in the real world they would probably never get to speak to one another. It also discusses the philosophy of consciousness, whether a person's memories make up a person, and whether solely existing in a virtual world also means a person is virtual.
.hack//sign is a diamond in the rough, and seeing how the show is rarely brought up in the isekai discussion is extremely disappointing.
It's boring, slow, barely animated, badly paced, and above all it leaves a lot to be desired from its inconclusive ending. It feels like a 24 episode prelude to the games, which are the main attractions of the .hack franchise.
And honestly, I don't think many people who like .hack//sign will disagree with me.
So why do I and many other people like it?
For them, it's because of the densely written characterization and the numerous amount of dialogue that explores the question of why people play MMORPG and who plays them. Either that or the immaculate soundtrack composed by Yuki Kajiura helps them sleep at night. Who knows.
For me? I honestly believe .hack//sign a deconstruction of the isekai genre.
You see, as an anime fan who is in the midst of an isekai boom for the last half of the 2010s, those shows all follow a simple cookie cutter formula that they rarely strays from one another. The formula goes like this: A guy gets gets transported into another world where they become overpowered and eventually gains a harem that religiously follows him until he defeats the final boss. Simple video game-esque storytelling (obviously).
.hack//sign is not one of those stories. .hack//sign follows Tsukasa, a player is trapped within the game and cannot log out. However, Tsukasa differs from the modern isekai protagonist. There is a cloud of mystery that surrounds his character and suggests that something paranormal is happening to him. His character is as foreign to us as he is to the other characters in the show that are trying to help him in his perils.
The way Tsukasa was portrayed could almost be seen as a deconstruction of Sword Art Online and other isekai stories that have gotten so popular in the past couple years. Tsukasa is stuck in the biggest MMORPG ever. Cool, right? Oh wait he can feel pain and cold and fighting sucks. So he gets a special monster to level up for him. Cool, right? Oh wait other players hate him for being a cheating bastard. He's aloof and standoffish and frequently accuses anyone who tries to get to know him of ulterior motives, and instead of girls flinging themselves at him everyone thinks he's a big jerk.
Even the supporting characters are rather interesting, and we see how they use The World as various forms of escapism from the real world. Escapism can be healthy, but too much of it is unhealthy. We also see how The World lets people of all ages and walks of life come together when in the real world they would probably never get to speak to one another. It also discusses the philosophy of consciousness, whether a person's memories make up a person, and whether solely existing in a virtual world also means a person is virtual.
.hack//sign is a diamond in the rough, and seeing how the show is rarely brought up in the isekai discussion is extremely disappointing.
Posted by LightQuill | Oct 31, 2019 11:40 AM | 1 comments