Alice in Borderland Episode 2 Summary and Review
Spoilers for episode 2 of Netflix’s Alice in Borderland.
Episode 2 picks up right from where episode 1 left off. We see Usagi (not that we know her name just yet) standing on a building, watching the lasers kill people whose visas expired. She reminisces about mountain climbing with her dad, and swears that she’ll survive.
Back to Arisu and friends. They’ve made themselves comfortable in the empty mall, using furniture stores as a dining room and taking things for weapons and supplies. Karube convinces Arisu to participate in a game, while Shibuki and Chouta are left behind. Chouta’s injured from the last game, while Shibuki’s… just keeping him company, or something. I don’t really get it, nor could I watch as she… “came on” to him.
At the very least, it’s less deadly than the Five of Spades, which is the game Arisu and Karube find themselves in. Usagi is there too, as are some other characters the camera tells us are important but whose names we don’t learn this episode. The game is “A game of tag,” and the win condition is to avoid the tagger and find the safe zone within the apartment building within 20 minutes. The tagger, it turns out, is a horse-mask wearing person with a gun. A lot of no-name characters are killed, and the rest frantically check each door for an open apartment.
Eventually, Karube decides to confront the tagger rather than run. He’s joined by two tough-looking men, armed with fire extinguishers. Arisu keeps checking doors, until he realizes where the safe zone is. He’s joined by Chishiya, who apparently figured it out already but decided to wait until 3 minutes were left to actually do anything. Arisu wonders why the tagger left the safe zone alone, but there’s 3 minutes left, so he opens the door anyway.
They barely avoid being shot by the second tagger, and while Chishiya manages to buy some time with a handmade stun gun, the game needs two people to simultaneously press a button in order to end. Luckily, Usagi climbs her way through the window, and with one second to spare, the game ends. The two taggers die, and it’s revealed they were also players. Karube, wounded from attacking the first tagger, finds a working radio. The only thing coming through is a voice telling people they have the answer and to return to the beach.
I’m just gonna say it: I hate the changes they made to Chouta and Shibuki. The writers don’t really have anything to say about the cult Chouta’s mother is in, nor the way it traumatized him. It’s at least not portrayed as a positive thing, but that’s something of a low bar. Shibuki’s also very disturbing here, pushing Chouta down and kissing him without actually getting his consent. I think shows should just omit these kinds of scenes entirely. The world’s progressed past the need for sex scenes.
The game itself is well done, though. I felt tense the entire time, despite knowing more or less how it would go. The second tagger is a change from the manga, but presumably it’s a change to increase the drama (it is way more cinematic than the More Guns reveal in the manga). It also allows time to focus on Aguni, who I’m guessing is Agni Morizono. It’s a strong intro, from him immediately sacrificing another player for a chance to fight the tagger, and the ensuing fight itself. Aguni’s not here to mess around.
Chishiya’s still a jerk, but a clever one. There’s no explanation at all for how he made a stun gun, which honestly might be a good thing, considering I didn’t really understand Chouta talking about IC chips at the beginning of the episode (something about electromagnetic waves rendering most tech useless). Still, it’s good set-up for him later, and I’m looking forward to what else he’ll do.
I enjoyed Usagi here more than I expected, too. Sato Shinsuke was smart to show her leaping from floor to floor and climbing all the way to the window‒ that movement is hard to depict through still drawings. It adds to the other bits of her character we see throughout the game. It’s not much since it’s only the second game, but she’s the first person we see who’s willing to help the other players, though not at the expense of her own life.
I’m unsure about the way Sato decided to go with Karube, who went from angry at Shibuki’s tactics to hey, maybe she’s got a point within a day and we should copy her. I’m also still hoping for Arisu to have good psychology skills; the most we see is him not letting a terrified newcomer (who I think is Tatta Koudai) die. I’d like to see him think about other people and what he would do in their place, but maybe we need to get through a bonafide Hearts game for that.
I’m also curious to see what direction Sato went with regarding the ‘game master.’ Arisu’s confident that one exists, but if they do I can’t imagine how the whole set-up is going to be explained. Did someone just launch dozens of satellites to shoot lasers at precise locations? How could they know where these people were? Who knows.
Still, this episode was fantastic, using the story’s premise to its full extent. The game was thrilling to watch, and we got to see the desperation to live combined with the tragedy of the games. Unlike the first game, people were going to die here no matter what, and it was heartbreaking to see the second tagger’s face before her collar went off. If the series can continue this momentum, it’ll be one of the best live action adaptations out there. Just… please, no more awkward sex scenes.
