Alice in Borderland Season 2
Episode No 8 Recap
What happens during the final game?
Arisu, Usagi and Croquet Queen Mira are together. The game is simple. Arisu and Usagi must complete three sets of croquet without backing down. If they give up, it's game over. They don't even have to win, they just have to complete the game. There's no simple way, right?
Each team has two balls. To win, they must pass their ball through six hoops in a certain order, then hit the final finishing post. By doing this, he will win the game. The Queen wins the first set with relative ease, but is swept aside in the second. Given that Usagi is bleeding and borrowing, this seems to be part of the Queen's game.
Arisu eventually wins the second round, but before starting the third round, the Queen decides to stop for tea. As they sit together, it hints at knowing more about this world and what's going on. It immediately talks about the future and how humanity has evolved over the past 1,000 years.
Is Arisu really in treatment?
Is the Queen telling the truth or is it all a big game? Arisu notices a camera in the bushes behind and eventually realizes that Mira has taken them for a walk. His stories about aliens, androids and this great virtual reality game are baseless.
With a gun pointed at Mira's head, she reveals that everything she saw was an illusion. Arisu made up something in his head. All these childish games he played were deliberately designed by his psyche, and he always intended to carry them out to this day. Mira is his psychiatrist and they've been doing therapy together all this time, but he's forgotten. The story is incredibly realistic, including Chota and Karube actually getting shot in Shibuya Square and Arisu grieving in the hospital.
When Usagi appears and begs Arisu to wake up, Mira immediately turns around and asks Arisu if she wants to give up. Of course, they're still at the game, and when Usagi begins to bleed out and fall to the ground, he stops her from taking the pills and even slits her own wrists to wake her up. Arisu is forced to face her own demons.
How does Arisu escape?
The hardest battle to fight is the mind, and Usagi's influence, and their love for one another, helps the Queen break free of her mental distress and return to a game of Croquet on the roof. "game on." Arisu says, deciding not to give up.
So we're back at the table with Usagi having Arisu actually cut her wrists. After witnessing this display of love first hand, Mira helps them and they play the final set. Mira wins, but Arisu and Usagi win by default as they complete all 3 sets and end the game without giving up.
Do Arisu and Usagi survive?
Mira promises that Arisu will learn the truth about what happened very soon and will make a choice that will explain everything to them. And with that, Mira is killed and the end game is cleared. The Queen of Hearts' balloon was destroyed and fireworks went off all over Tokyo.
All surviving players are given the aforementioned option that Mira mentioned. They either accept or reject permanent residence in this world. Agune and Akane both refuse. Kuani does the same, while we see players everywhere choose to give up or accept.
What happened in Tokyo?
We then return to Arisu in the real world where Chota and Karube are still alive and well. They encourage Arisu to live life to the fullest and not waste a single second of it. We have all the characters who refused the invitation in Shibuya, but this time we look at the events from a different perspective. As Arisu and the others hide under the train station, a meteor crashes into Tokyo, turning the entire place into ashes.
Arisu somehow survives and wakes up to find medics around. In fact, they are everywhere, trying to help the injured and assess the extent of the damage here.
How does Alice in Borderland Season 2 end?
Two days have passed since the meteorite exploded over Tokyo, and the entire 10 km radius was completely destroyed. Apparently, Arisu's heart had stopped for a full minute during this time. Chishiya is also there with Niragi, Akane and Agune are also alive. Ann also comes back from the dead, although she's gone for a touch and a while considering she's been in surgery for a while.
Kuani is reunited with her mom and dad, while Arisu looks out the window and sees all the characters we've seen throughout the season with their loved ones or recovering in the hospital. And of course, we finally land on Usagi. Now, none of the characters really know each other in this reality, but the bonds they form over time and in the game world are clearly unbreakable and have managed to transcend time.
When Arisu and Usagi touch hands, they feel a sense of deja vu, as if they have seen each other before. The couple decides to go for a walk and go out together. Arisu encourages him to hold on to her as he walks out. The camera pans to a table with a deck of cards. All cards disappear, only one will be the Joker. The camera zooms in and we fade to black.
What does a joker card mean?
While the true meaning of this card may be a coincidence and a way to potentially tease another season, Alice in the Borderlands was never random and everything was placed on purpose.
In the end, the Joker card generally tends to act as a wild card. Of course, this may refer to "The Fool" as it is commonly remembered, for it was a whole fantasy made up in the last act, and it is again part of the same play, but of a different layer than what we have seen. seen before.
Again, there is also the idea that the Joker represents unexpected changes in fortune, which could be a simple meaning that Arisu has now changed his fate and has managed to find happiness in the midst of all this misfortune. The fact that the meaning is so vague certainly leaves a positive or negative outcome on the table - we'll leave it up to you to decide!
What is the game world? Did a meteorite really hit?
There are a few different theories surrounding the final act, and the best one suggests that these boys and girls don't physically move into the game world, but their souls, all these games of life and death essentially represent their struggles. trying to survive in the wake of such brutality. The game world acts as a kind of gate between life and death. The "fireworks" weren't actually fireworks, they were actually sparks from a meteor breaking up and crashing into Earth.
The idea of allowing humans to remain in the game world seems to be a way of giving these souls the choice to either accept death or return to their bodies. Those who remain in the game world and take up permanent residence are likely to either die or remain in a coma. Time in the game world is much clearer than in real life, a kind of Inception and making our dreams feel longer than it is. We know that Arisu's heart stopped for a minute before he woke up, so that moment seems to be the same length as the entire game world.
So, a meteorite hit and those who managed to hit it to the end and survive the game made their choice and found a way to return to their real life. It seems that the game is already over, but of course there may be another twist to tame.
Episode Review
So Alice in Wonderland comes to a great conclusion with some solid answers around what happened and a nice final scene to wrap things up. This Japanese series has been a wild ride over episodes, and this second season is even better than the first, with plenty of solid set pieces, interesting games, and plenty of answers to big questions.
The idea that the bonds these kids form in the game world transcends time and space is a great idea and helps give the show some weight beyond the simple choice of life or death games.
There's a lot to choose from and explore here, and it would be a disservice to see it updated in some way. I appreciate the continuation of the manga with Alice in Borderland: Try Again, but the ending we got here is really solid and this manga doesn't need to be pulled.
The ambiguity it conveys is partly why it works so well, and we've seen a number of ideas played out throughout the season, including humanity, the purpose of life, honor, friendship, and love. Alice in Borderland was a fantastic watch and worth its weight in gold. Surely this has a place in the best TV shows of 2022, right?
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