February 1st, 2016
My Love-Hate Relationship with Sword Art Online Rant
Anime Relations: Sword Art Online, Sword Art Online II
In this rant, keep in mind I have a very angry opinion towards Sword Art Online. I have my opinion of it, and I understand that people love it. People have different tastes, and I respect that. So please don't get mad at me for my opinion against SAO. Thanks.
Last year, before I got my laptop, the only anime I was watching was the anime on Netflix. I had watched Death Note and Fairy Tail and stuff like that, but that was because my brother had started watching them, and when I came home from the school, I would sit down and watch it with him. After that, I tried searching for an anime to watch on my own, and multiple times I would stop searching and just stare at Sword Art Online, seriously considering it every time. The art was fantastic, and loving video games, the concept sounded great. From the picture, there even looked like there was a hint of romance. Little did I know. Now keep in mind that I hadn't heard of Log Horizon or .Hack yet.
One day, I decided to be brave and watch episode one. To my pleasure, I was seriously intrigued. I ended up binge watching the entire season within a week, and this was a SCHOOL week, which means this anime is good. I loved it, and for the next four months, Sword Art Online was my obsession. I would come home every day and rewatch the episodes over and over again. I didn't notice all the problems with the plot.
But at the beginning of summer vacation, my sister gave me her old laptop. I watched SAO II, but when I began watching it, my obsession with the first season was seriously beginning to diminish. I watched the second season, and had mixed feelings about it. I didn't mind the Gun Gale Online arc, but it kind of bothered me how Kirito was super OP. Then there were the fun episodes in the middle of the season with the whole crew, which was nice to see them playing a game for fun and getting to see more setting.
What really turned me off from the SAO series was the Mother Rosario arc. I knew this was the make it or break it arc for me. I never cared much for Asuna in the first season. She was okay, but I found her kind of annoying and needy in the first season, ESPECIALLY the second arc. So, I was already on shaky terms with her. This arc totally ruined everything. I despised it so much, and felt no emotion at the end. I hated how it suddenly became all about Asuna and her sick friend (I forget her name). I hated how she wanted to ditch her friends to join this new guild of experienced players. The only hope I had for season two was seeing how Kirito and Asuna grew as a couple. But they barely spent any time with each other, and Kirito had to save her again within the arc. It also bugged me how she wouldn't leave her new guild alone even though they asked her to not talk to them anymore. But, she and Kirito had to pry. If you can't tell, I absolutely hate Asuna now, and she could very well be my least favorite anime character ever.
Now let me talk about season one. First off, let's start with the pacing. I haven't read the light novels for this series, I am basing all of this off of the anime. This show could have easily been over 100 episodes, maybe even as long as Fairy Tail. We could've seen all the settings for every floor and seen all the boss fights and meet lots of characters, but NO. It's almost like Reki Kawahara got bored with his series and decided to move it along by skipping huge chunks of time to speed up the process. Even from the first to second episode, it skipped a whole month. I want to know what happened in that whole month! See the towns and observe how people were dealing with the fact that they are stuck in a video game until 100 floors are cleared. If you were lucky, one episode to the next would've only jumped a few months. All of a sudden, Kirito has new gear and Asuna is somehow second in command of the Knights of the Blood Oath. They have all these skills and weapons and we have almost no background information on top of that. All in all, the pacing for this series was absolutely horrible. They could've done so much with it, but that didn't happen.
Next is Kirito and his harem. I was in Hot Topic looking at shirts recently and saw one of them had all of Kirito's expressions. I laughed because Kirito doesn't show any emotions. Kirito is the most boring, serious, OP character ever. Sure he isn't ugly, but he isn't amazing either. The only good thing about him is his ridiculous fighting skills and knowledge of MMOs. He's a depressing loner. I understand that he doesn't want to join guilds because of what happened to Sachi and her friends, but he's so boring. And suddenly, all the girls fall for him because he helps them with a measly task. I personally don't like harem shows because I know that the first girl introduced is usually the one that wins over the guy, and then there two or three other girls fawning over him, although it's pointless. This series had so much potential, and they wasted two episodes on pointless side adventures. I.e. Episodes 4 and 7. I get that they wanted to introduce more characters, but they could've had a huge mission that the front line goes on and introduce them then. It's just so frustrating! This series wasted some of it's potential on this factor. At least, Kirito chooses a girl. But of course, they need a time skip or two before they get married.
Now this is where it gets weird. Kirito and Asuna go on this weird date and they find a girl who collapsed. First thought? Kidnap her and take her back to their house. Not shake her to try and wake her or go and get help. Since they are experienced players, they should know what they're doing, right? So, she wakes up, and she doesn't remember anything. Then, they decide to make a makeshift family when Yui could have easily had siblings or even parents looking for her. But it's okay, she doesn't remember anything. They try and search for her family in the Town on Beginnings, but she has a malfunction. So what do they do? Bring her back home. Geniuses. They're all geniuses. Then they go back the next day and go on a dangerous dungeon mission. They try to get Yui to stay back where it's safe, but being the brat she is, she whines her way into going with them. What great parents.
Then they find out as their lives almost end that she is an AI. I personally would've been a little sonfused that my daughter was an AI. Now that she's going back to the system, they are all torn up about their "daughter" they knew for three days. It's a good thing she wasn't anyone's kid. Then to wrap it up, Kirito decides he'll find a way for their computer daughter to join them in their real lives. Optimism. Great.
Next is the convenience of the ending of the first arc. They just beat the 75th floor boss, and now Kirito decides to unleash his amazing observation that the commander is Kayaba. Asuna dies saving Kirito, and Kayaba kills Kirito, and Kirito somehow gets a surge of virtual adrenaline and kills Kayaba. All three should've died, but only Kayaba does. I guess because Kirito beat the final boss, it makes sense to keep him around. But Asuna? (That may be slightly biased)
I don't even want to talk about the second arc, but let's try to make this quick. Basically, Kirito meets a girl (Man, didn't see that coming) and she decides to help him get to the World Tree. But surprise surprise, she falls for him. They find out at the end that they are each other's cousins and blah blah blah. They make up and Kirito sees Asuna. Oh, I forgot to mention Asuna becomes an annoying damsel in distress while Suguo has her locked up, and she depends on Kirito to save her even though she doesn't know for half the time that Kirito is still alive. Kirito speaks to Kayaba's mind and uses his information to become the ruler of ALO and defeat Suguo. Man, they could've taken off about five episodes of this arc. The only decent thing about this arc is Kirito and and Asuna finally meet IRL (after Kirito saves her). Then there's an extra episode showing how they are trying to transition back to their lives IRL and it leads into season two. Oh, and all of Kirito's friends conveniently live near him. Impressive.
My last point I'm going to make is the serious let down this show gave many people. Most likely, a lot of video-game anime fans and action anime fans were hoping Sword Art Online to be just as good as Log Horizon. But it let us down with the horrible character development, horrendous pacing and wasting the whole series into a romance. I love romance anime, but even I know that this was a horrible romance. This let a lot of people down, and caused people to drop off the show entirely. Because I know a lot of boys are into action anime, and this wasn't what they were expecting.
From what I've said in this rant, I show that I hate this show, and I will get a lot of hate for my brash opinion. But, I can't call this my least favorite anime ever because of the love I had for it at one point and the amount of time and money I invested into it. I have my opinion, and you guys have yours. Although Sword Art Online is one of the worst anime ever, it will forever hold a spot in my heart. I can't help but remember the memories I had whenever I listen to Crossing Field, which I actually love to listen to often, and remember how much I loved it.
Last year, before I got my laptop, the only anime I was watching was the anime on Netflix. I had watched Death Note and Fairy Tail and stuff like that, but that was because my brother had started watching them, and when I came home from the school, I would sit down and watch it with him. After that, I tried searching for an anime to watch on my own, and multiple times I would stop searching and just stare at Sword Art Online, seriously considering it every time. The art was fantastic, and loving video games, the concept sounded great. From the picture, there even looked like there was a hint of romance. Little did I know. Now keep in mind that I hadn't heard of Log Horizon or .Hack yet.
One day, I decided to be brave and watch episode one. To my pleasure, I was seriously intrigued. I ended up binge watching the entire season within a week, and this was a SCHOOL week, which means this anime is good. I loved it, and for the next four months, Sword Art Online was my obsession. I would come home every day and rewatch the episodes over and over again. I didn't notice all the problems with the plot.
But at the beginning of summer vacation, my sister gave me her old laptop. I watched SAO II, but when I began watching it, my obsession with the first season was seriously beginning to diminish. I watched the second season, and had mixed feelings about it. I didn't mind the Gun Gale Online arc, but it kind of bothered me how Kirito was super OP. Then there were the fun episodes in the middle of the season with the whole crew, which was nice to see them playing a game for fun and getting to see more setting.
What really turned me off from the SAO series was the Mother Rosario arc. I knew this was the make it or break it arc for me. I never cared much for Asuna in the first season. She was okay, but I found her kind of annoying and needy in the first season, ESPECIALLY the second arc. So, I was already on shaky terms with her. This arc totally ruined everything. I despised it so much, and felt no emotion at the end. I hated how it suddenly became all about Asuna and her sick friend (I forget her name). I hated how she wanted to ditch her friends to join this new guild of experienced players. The only hope I had for season two was seeing how Kirito and Asuna grew as a couple. But they barely spent any time with each other, and Kirito had to save her again within the arc. It also bugged me how she wouldn't leave her new guild alone even though they asked her to not talk to them anymore. But, she and Kirito had to pry. If you can't tell, I absolutely hate Asuna now, and she could very well be my least favorite anime character ever.
Now let me talk about season one. First off, let's start with the pacing. I haven't read the light novels for this series, I am basing all of this off of the anime. This show could have easily been over 100 episodes, maybe even as long as Fairy Tail. We could've seen all the settings for every floor and seen all the boss fights and meet lots of characters, but NO. It's almost like Reki Kawahara got bored with his series and decided to move it along by skipping huge chunks of time to speed up the process. Even from the first to second episode, it skipped a whole month. I want to know what happened in that whole month! See the towns and observe how people were dealing with the fact that they are stuck in a video game until 100 floors are cleared. If you were lucky, one episode to the next would've only jumped a few months. All of a sudden, Kirito has new gear and Asuna is somehow second in command of the Knights of the Blood Oath. They have all these skills and weapons and we have almost no background information on top of that. All in all, the pacing for this series was absolutely horrible. They could've done so much with it, but that didn't happen.
Next is Kirito and his harem. I was in Hot Topic looking at shirts recently and saw one of them had all of Kirito's expressions. I laughed because Kirito doesn't show any emotions. Kirito is the most boring, serious, OP character ever. Sure he isn't ugly, but he isn't amazing either. The only good thing about him is his ridiculous fighting skills and knowledge of MMOs. He's a depressing loner. I understand that he doesn't want to join guilds because of what happened to Sachi and her friends, but he's so boring. And suddenly, all the girls fall for him because he helps them with a measly task. I personally don't like harem shows because I know that the first girl introduced is usually the one that wins over the guy, and then there two or three other girls fawning over him, although it's pointless. This series had so much potential, and they wasted two episodes on pointless side adventures. I.e. Episodes 4 and 7. I get that they wanted to introduce more characters, but they could've had a huge mission that the front line goes on and introduce them then. It's just so frustrating! This series wasted some of it's potential on this factor. At least, Kirito chooses a girl. But of course, they need a time skip or two before they get married.
Now this is where it gets weird. Kirito and Asuna go on this weird date and they find a girl who collapsed. First thought? Kidnap her and take her back to their house. Not shake her to try and wake her or go and get help. Since they are experienced players, they should know what they're doing, right? So, she wakes up, and she doesn't remember anything. Then, they decide to make a makeshift family when Yui could have easily had siblings or even parents looking for her. But it's okay, she doesn't remember anything. They try and search for her family in the Town on Beginnings, but she has a malfunction. So what do they do? Bring her back home. Geniuses. They're all geniuses. Then they go back the next day and go on a dangerous dungeon mission. They try to get Yui to stay back where it's safe, but being the brat she is, she whines her way into going with them. What great parents.
Then they find out as their lives almost end that she is an AI. I personally would've been a little sonfused that my daughter was an AI. Now that she's going back to the system, they are all torn up about their "daughter" they knew for three days. It's a good thing she wasn't anyone's kid. Then to wrap it up, Kirito decides he'll find a way for their computer daughter to join them in their real lives. Optimism. Great.
Next is the convenience of the ending of the first arc. They just beat the 75th floor boss, and now Kirito decides to unleash his amazing observation that the commander is Kayaba. Asuna dies saving Kirito, and Kayaba kills Kirito, and Kirito somehow gets a surge of virtual adrenaline and kills Kayaba. All three should've died, but only Kayaba does. I guess because Kirito beat the final boss, it makes sense to keep him around. But Asuna? (That may be slightly biased)
I don't even want to talk about the second arc, but let's try to make this quick. Basically, Kirito meets a girl (Man, didn't see that coming) and she decides to help him get to the World Tree. But surprise surprise, she falls for him. They find out at the end that they are each other's cousins and blah blah blah. They make up and Kirito sees Asuna. Oh, I forgot to mention Asuna becomes an annoying damsel in distress while Suguo has her locked up, and she depends on Kirito to save her even though she doesn't know for half the time that Kirito is still alive. Kirito speaks to Kayaba's mind and uses his information to become the ruler of ALO and defeat Suguo. Man, they could've taken off about five episodes of this arc. The only decent thing about this arc is Kirito and and Asuna finally meet IRL (after Kirito saves her). Then there's an extra episode showing how they are trying to transition back to their lives IRL and it leads into season two. Oh, and all of Kirito's friends conveniently live near him. Impressive.
My last point I'm going to make is the serious let down this show gave many people. Most likely, a lot of video-game anime fans and action anime fans were hoping Sword Art Online to be just as good as Log Horizon. But it let us down with the horrible character development, horrendous pacing and wasting the whole series into a romance. I love romance anime, but even I know that this was a horrible romance. This let a lot of people down, and caused people to drop off the show entirely. Because I know a lot of boys are into action anime, and this wasn't what they were expecting.
From what I've said in this rant, I show that I hate this show, and I will get a lot of hate for my brash opinion. But, I can't call this my least favorite anime ever because of the love I had for it at one point and the amount of time and money I invested into it. I have my opinion, and you guys have yours. Although Sword Art Online is one of the worst anime ever, it will forever hold a spot in my heart. I can't help but remember the memories I had whenever I listen to Crossing Field, which I actually love to listen to often, and remember how much I loved it.
Posted by SingleEdgedSword | Feb 1, 2016 4:29 PM | 0 comments