Let me start off by saying, I absolutely love this show and I Cant wait for season 3. However, after rewatching the show for the 4th time and seeing this episode again, I had to make a review.
Realism goes out the window with this episode. When I first watched it, I was shocked and I thought they'd gone game of thrones and gone scorched earth with the cast like they did in episode 3 of season 1. However, that is not the case.
The choreography was second to none and the fight scene was epic but how do all these people survive?
Firstly Niragi, This man has been through the ringer already with his injuries and it's implied he's already slowly dying from his previous injuries then he takes a SHOTGUN blast to the stomach and still manages to lay around for what feels like about 2 hours until the games are complete and survives?! He should've been dead within minutes of that shotgun blast. There was no real reason to keep him alive either. He served his purpose as one of the series main antagonists, he's far beyond redemption and his arc feels complete. It feels like there's no real need to bring him back for season 3. It'll feel boring and tired if he's brought back as one of the main antagonists again and his character is far too unlikeable to join the group as a future protagonist, not to mention the bridges he's burnt with arisu & usagi. Even if they have him just as a bit part character in Season 3 or they don't decide to bring him back at all, this all just feels a bit pointless. They may as well and should have just killed him off instead of having a character that doesn't need to survive, survive an unrealistic death.
Secondly, Kuina. As season 3 is looming, I'm glad they kept her alive cos I love her character and I can kinda buy that she could survive multiple stab wounds at least for a short period of time. People have survived similar in real life I guess. The only slight issue I have is the fact she was just laying around like the others for ages bleeding out, waiting for arisu to finish the games but I'll go against my better judgement and give them the benefit of the doubt for her.
Thirdly Chishiya, Probably my favorite character, very happy he survived. One gunshot wound to the chest, I could buy him surviving. Keeping him alive is a must for season 3. So I'm happy with the way the show went for him. If they were that desperate to keep him out the finale tho they could've thought of another way why he wasn't at the king of spades fight or the queen of hearts. Just shoot him in the leg or something. However, he is a doctor so again I'll give the show the benefit of the doubt and buy that he could keep himself alive till the games are complete.
Next, Usagi. Again, Great character and had to survive. Stabbed in the thighs, she can survive that. Especially with the fact, we see she has a tourniquet to slow the bleeding and we see her getting visibly weaker and slowly dying. No problem with her surviving the injury and think this is realistic.
Next, Aguni. At first thought I was thinking this is crazy. He's seemingly shot in the head, however the show kind of implies that the bullet may have just grazed his head and whether he's playing dead or he's knocked out. If I'm really stretching, I can get on board with the logic that it was maybe just a graze. I mean we didn't see the bullet go into his head so again I'll give them the benefit of the doubt although the hardest benefit I've had to give yet.
Akane. This was the one that did it for me, she is absolutely lit up like a Christmas tree. Multiple point blank AR15 shots in every part of the torso, there is absolutely no way she could've survived this. There's no way none of those bullets hit any of the vital organs in her body, and even if on the off chance they did. She'd of bled out in minutes. She wouldn't have had time to lay and wait for 2 hours for arisu to finish his tea and crumpets. This is a character I like, but one you could've killed off. She was a new character so wasn't super important yet and I didn't expect her to make the end anyway when she was introduced. Even if you wanted to keep her alive, which I'm fine with. Why make her 'death' scene so brutal and unrealistic? Just tone it down or at least provide some explanation afterwards, I mean she seems a bit of a survivalist. Just show her wearing a bit of homemade forest armor or something. Just make some attempt to explain or imply how she possibly could've survived this.
Finally, Ann. She literally died! However, Shockingly, I'm fine with this. They explain that the time in the borderlands doesn't work the same as time in the real world, so even though she's dead for what feels like hours in the borderlands, she was probably only dead for a minute or two in real life before she received medical help. People have been brought back after being dead for longer.
I know this is based off a manga, and having not read it I don't know how faithful the show was to the manga. So if all these characters had to survive because they did in the manga then that's fine, but they could've toned the death scenes down a bit to make it a tad more realistic. I am fairly new to Asian cinema, I am well down the rabbit hole when it comes to Korean cinema but only just scratched the surface with Japanese. So I don't know if Japanese shows tend to do this often especially with shows based off manga/anime where realism tends to take a back seat and the Japanese public are accepting of it due to the fact that manga and anime which are huge in the culture don't tend to be very realistic themselves.
It feels like the show wanted that game of thrones shock factor of 'killing' off their main characters in brutal and shocking scenes for the OMG moments but then didn't have the nerve to go through with it. Feels like they wanted best of both worlds and to a degree it can leave your audience feeling cheated. In my opinion without changing the show and toning down the death scenes, they should have killed off Niragi and Akane at the bare minimum to at least keep a semblance of realism. Maybe even Ann too as that emotional death scene between her and kuina is ultimately mitigated when you see she's survived. I mean come on, Tatta has a crushed hand and bleeds out in 5 minutes in the king of clubs game yet half of these characters have mortal gunshot or stab wounds and can wait about for an hour or two without bleeding out. Make it make sense.
Despite my gripes with this episode tho it was an exhilarating one and I really love the show and I'm very excited for season 3. I'm really hoping season 3 attempts to make some good explanations of how some of these characters survived this though. Whether going into depth about some special logic with something to do with the borderlands or whether a character or 2 had a couple tricks up their sleeve. Anything will do. I just hope they don't gloss over it and are just like everyone's alive now, doesn't matter how, let's crack on with season 3.
I know this has been an excruciatingly long essay and I'm sure no one will read this nor do I expect them to due to the sheer length but I just had to get it all out. Anyone who got this far, congratulations, I hope you enjoyed my rant.
1 out of 3 found this helpful.
Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink