{"id":514,"date":"2012-09-25T01:28:26","date_gmt":"2012-09-25T07:28:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/animationrevelation.com\/readables\/?p=514"},"modified":"2026-07-17T10:03:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T16:03:08","slug":"episodic-review-sword-art-online-04-daemoncorps","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/animationrevelation.com\/readables\/?p=514","title":{"rendered":"Episodic Review: Sword Art Online 04"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nAfter some CBS Survivor<\/em> level drama, it looks like the focus of the episode this time around is Silica\u2014a beast tamer that doesn\u2019t prove to be one of the more mentally stable characters we\u2019ve met so far. She doesn\u2019t seem crazy in a \u201cbeg for fingernails on the subway\u201d sense, but if you cried virtual tears over what essentially serves the purpose of those Teddie Bears in Earthbound<\/em> then that has to count for some level of crazy. It\u2019s been a couple months since being stuck in SAO but c\u2019mon.<\/p>\n

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So in no time Kirito pops up and mentions that her partner beast can be reborn in what I can only describe as that giant nursery in the first season of Digimon<\/em> with all the digi-eggs waiting to be hatched. And even then, only if the owner makes it there within three days of their beast\u2019s death. I get that time constraints have been a part of MMOs and the like, but geez… da\u2019s tough.<\/p>\n

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Hm… pervy fans that want you in their guild as the cutesy mascot member, or mysterious dude in a trench coat that flat-out said he\u2019s being helpful to you because you remind him of her sister… #JapaneseGirlProblems.<\/p>\n

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… and only in Japan would the situation be turned completely on its head to have the guy character completely not in the know while the underage girl character begins to develop some completely inappropriate tension with him.<\/p>\n

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The number of gizmos and doodads this episode is reaching Doraemon-level heights. The fact that such items exist and just happen to suit the interests of the characters for the sake of the plot isn\u2019t all that big of a problem, and it makes perfect sense considering they\u2019re in an MMO, so I guess it\u2019s not all that problematic for now.<\/p>\n

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Insert Kirito\u2019s incredibly out of left field backstory set to a walking\/level grinding montage. I get that having Silica remind Kirito of his \u201csister\u201d is enough to trigger going into the story of his family, but it still seemed a bit out of place since the focus up until now leaned more towards Silica, which I would usually be fine with…<\/p>\n

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…if it weren\u2019t for the fact that nearly all the monsters that have attacked her have some sort of tentacles. Friggin why, SAO? I’d show a screencap of this scene a couple more seconds in to show what the monster looks like, but I’m pretty sure this isn’t that kind of website.<\/p>\n

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And finally the actual drama of the episode kicks in. I will say that it\u2019s an interesting twist to have some players still act dickish and want to kill off other players even though they\u2019ve been told that means actual death in the real world. Still, did they have to make their dramatic appearance after hiding behind trees? I get that they\u2019re in a videogame, but to appear in such a Hanna-Barbera fashion kinda killed the mood.<\/p>\n

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The Battousai the Manslayer<\/em> talk on top of the cop show-level twist to end the fight did bring things back up a bit, though. Geez, these sentences are just getting more and more dense with references and unlikely comparisons.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After some CBS Survivor level drama, it looks like the focus of the episode this time around is Silica\u2014a beast tamer that doesn\u2019t prove to be one of the more mentally stable characters we\u2019ve met so far. She doesn\u2019t seem crazy in a \u201cbeg for fingernails on the subway\u201d sense, but if you cried virtual tears over what essentially serves the purpose of those Teddie Bears in Earthbound then that has to count for some level of crazy. It\u2019s been…<\/p>\n

Read More Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[16,21,19,22,17],"class_list":["post-514","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-anime","tag-light-novel","tag-mmo","tag-sao","tag-sword-art-online"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/animationrevelation.com\/readables\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/animationrevelation.com\/readables\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/animationrevelation.com\/readables\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/animationrevelation.com\/readables\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/animationrevelation.com\/readables\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=514"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/animationrevelation.com\/readables\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7741,"href":"https:\/\/animationrevelation.com\/readables\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514\/revisions\/7741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/animationrevelation.com\/readables\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/animationrevelation.com\/readables\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/animationrevelation.com\/readables\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}