So this is a new show that dropped last week, apparently based on a manga. I watched it in Japanese with English subtitles. The setup is 3 slacker-ish 20-something Japanese guys walk out of Shibuya station in Tokyo to… empty streets. The great metropolis is empty. Then they start seeing signs directing them to a “game arena” where they are faced to play game with deadly consequences. Other characters come along and things get… complicated. It’s a mix of some game concepts with some of the violence and moral quandaries of The Walking Dead, and I enjoyed it overall.
It’s not for everyone as it is very dark and quite violent. I just finished the full 8 episodes and I’m still digesting it. I won’t say it’s perfect or even great but I have to say it came out of nowhere and I got a lot of good viewing out of it.
Was hoping for something a little Gantz but instead got Saw. It’s crazy how the anime tropes made it to live action. Anyways, after the first episode, I’m probably going to drop this, it’s not my thing at all.
The show does vary somewhat - the second episode is a bit more along the lines you suggest and the third episode goes in yet a different direction.
To expand on this a bit, in episode 1 you’ll notice the game was based on a playing card of the suit Clubs. We learn in episode 2 that each suit denotes a different type of game: clubs for team challenge, spades for physical challenge, diamonds for mental challenge, and hearts for emotional challenge. There’s also a certain perversity in the game design that applies to all game types.
It was around EP03 that my wife mentioned that this series was renewed for a second season. At the time I thought the concept would get stale and that i would stop watching once this season is done. Boy was i wrong. I’m now ready for season 2 and 3!
I feel that the narrative and pacing is spot-on for this type of show. We ended up finishing it over three nights.
The voice acting helped me call it quits about ten minutes in. On a related note, it sounded like all the guys were voice by only one dude, who really can’t act.
Worth bumping because I think some of you guys are selling this short. First of all, you have to at least watch three episodes to appreciate what it’s doing. And any moron who complains about the quality of dubbing because he couldn’t be arsed to read subtitles deserves to be summarily ignored. The actors in this are very good, despite being the sorts of young good-looking folks you’d see on CW. The writing is good enough that I almost never minded that it was adapted from manga. I have no idea if the manga is well-written, but the teleplay is. What’s more, it’s written and directed by the same guy throughout, and he’s a guy who has plenty of movie-making experience. Shinsuke Sato has a very cinematic style, and Alice in Borderland never feels like a cheaply made TV series. It feels like a movie. Dude was given some serious resources for this thing.
Unfortunately for the payoff, its format is still a TV show. And not a British once-and-done season of TV but an American “I sure hope we get renewed!” season of TV. But it’s still a really solid puzzle-box horror story with a great cast and a surprising amount of meaningful character development, considering that it’s about three guys playing escape rooms.
I liked this a lot and wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it. You’ll know if it’s your thing after one episode. And you’re in good hands if you decided to stick with it.
I had some thoughts in discourse that I forgot to post but Tom’s bump raised my biggest issue, and that was episode 3.
I will just add you have to watch all of 3. I thought 3 was dragging, because I did not trust the show. Afterwards I did and was glad I watched to the end of the season.
I watched the trailer for this (I know, I don’t usually watch trailers either), and then some time later I started watching it. It was not at all what I expected from the trailer, but interesting. Then, as everyone mentioned, it turned a corner in episode 3 in a way I appreciated. I’m in the midst of episode 5 now, and it’s already subverted my expectations twice, which is a pretty good score.
I think I might be the resident Saw apologist, and this has some themes in common – what would you do to survive – not to mention the puzzle rooms/traps. Also, the thing I thought I was getting from the trailer was more of a Matrix kind of deal
Just finished this and mostly enjoyed it. It’s like a mashup of Lost, The Walking Dead and the Saw movies. It is quite violent tho!
My biggest problem were the English subtitles because sometimes they just didn’t make sense. I ended up watching the last three episodes with the (not great) English dubbing using the subtitles for some context. Although the quality of the dubbing wasn’t that good, the actual spoken words made more sense to me than the subtitles.
So I started watching Season 2, 3 episodes in. The first episode was a bit slow, relatively speaking, in terms of what makes the show tick, but also served as setup. Things picked up nicely in E2 and E3. The character Kyuma had a whole “zen rock star” thing going which I enjoyed and the character Chishiya gets more time on screen. He’s enigmatic in an interesting way.
I like the show best when it mixes the game elements and the social/teamwork aspects. I find the social deduction and social engineering in a life or death struggle captivating. (Although perhaps that speaks ill of me.)
Anyhow, shaping up to be a worthy season 2 so far if you enjoyed the first season.
I am only like 3 episodes in because my wife wants me to watch with her and she can only stomach 1 episode a day.
I wish there was a season 1 recap as I didn’t remember all the details or characters that carryover. I also wish they started and concluded each game in a single episode instead of cliff hanging it in half between episodes since I can’t binge the show.
Yeah the structure of the third season is less digestible than the first. I wonder how the show was aired in Japan? These episodes don’t really seem to track with distinct story blocks. I’m still enjoying it, but then I am watching it as I like, not locked into an episode per day system. I’m about halfway through. It still has plenty of room to screw up sadly, so we’ll see.
