Episode 8

I'm going to assume you're going to watch this knowing that it's a Japanese modern-set fantasy production. You may or may not know that it's based on Japanese manga; I am not familiar with the source material at all, I just happened to see that it was based on some when doing basic research on whether to bother watching it.

If these kinds of things aren't your cup of tea, don't watch it. It's science-fiction-ish but really it's done kind of a minimal science fiction plot to explore some character and human nature themes.

For being within that genre, I thought it was quite decent. The English dub was OK; the main issue I have was a lot like a problem I have with many anime titles, the closed-captioning subtitles and the English dub were not in sync. But that's maybe OK since you can get more information about the source material to see two different translations. (OK, it's really just annoying but I'm trying to make lemonade here.)

The games / puzzles that the characters end up having to go through are slightly obvious, our hero should have figured out a few of them in an instant. But whatever, plot rulez. I still recommend it. 8 might be overly strong but I think it's a good series and being an adaptation of existing IP, doesn't seem to cut many corners.

Maybe followers of the original manga have tons of problems with it, they usually do, but on its own, I liked it, I'm very glad I watched it, and I am looking forward to the next season or whatever we call them nowadays.

Wow. This series had such a promising start, and such a bad ending. The three first episodes are the only ones worth watching. So many irritating mistakes, and and impossible things happening.

I started "Alice in Borderland" knowing nothing at all about the premise or origins of the show and with only the trailer and previous good experiences with other South East Asian shows to go on. What I found was a promising and enjoyable series, that though perhaps not going in exactly the way I wanted it too, I burned through really quickly and am looking forward to a second season.

Three listless young men, Arisu (Kento Yamazaki), Chota (Yuki Morinaga) and Karube (Keith Machinda) are staggered to find themselves seemingly entirely alone in the whole city of Tokyo, when everyone else seemingly disappears. Their confusion gives way to moments of joy, as they experience total freedom, but this stops abruptly when an unseen force compels them, and some other people in various states of confusion, into playing a game of literal life and death.

Technical standpoints first. I went for subtitles and the original dialogue, as I have a real disconnect with anything that's dubbed. That worked really well for me throughout the series, as I never felt I missed anything key by having to read most of the time - and anything I might have missed is made up for by the genuine performances. It's a great looking show. The visual effect of the empty cities is flawless and the CGI work, when it arrives, is pretty solid.

I liked the setup, particularly in the first half to two thirds of the series. I liked how the games had a logic to them, rather than a more "saw"-esque endurance aspect. The consequences for failure were laid out in quite visceral way but there's intrigue from the get-go in what proves to be the bigger story. I was less impressed with the Beach aspect of the finale few episodes though despite the shockingly ballsy twist in the 3rd episode that points us in that direction. The internal logic starts to drift a bit here, particularly in the game that takes place there, but more than that, I think I wanted more time seeing our characters cope on their own and what they might do in an empty city, before heading into what's actually going on.

Promising then that the second season looks like it might be more in that direction, though we'll have to wait and see. Until then, this first run is largely great and if you can stick with it through a few "that's not what I would have done" moments, rewards viewers with a darkly comic and interesting experience.

On the third down the QB throws a long shot... The WR caught it and run. He almost does it but a defender reach him from the back. The defender gets the tackle but the WR stretch out and reaches the touchdown area. It was close.

Well, I really like how they do everything in an unexpected way and the explanation of a lot of things is really pleasing. Mayeb not everyone would like it, but I really thing that this show is above of a lot of others that are more famous.

I liked the show, but they should really make the solutions to the games less obvious. It is painful to watch characters spending 10 minutes slowly explaining everything, with big pauses between every sentence, when the answer was obvious to the viewer half an hour ago. Just makes all the characters look like idiots, even the ones, which are supposed to be smart.