Pursuer of Death

Key Events

It was Kirito’s gun shot that went off and momentarily chases Death Gun away so that they could make their escape. Though from the trauma, Sinon’s unable to pull the trigger on her gun. Kirito gets her onto a buggy and they race away with Death Gun chasing on a horse.

Sinon manages to fire a shot with Kirito’s help to explode a fuel tank just as Death Gun passes by it giving them enough time to escape to the desert.

Apparently Gunner X was a girl and Kirito had quickly dispatched with her before seeing Sinon on the ground. He borrowed Gunner X’s rifle and smoke grenades to help get Sinon out of there.

They hide in a cave in the desert somewhere and Sinon decides to tell Kirito her story and vice versa.

Thoughts

A half action packed episode with a character developing interlude. One that I was expecting but this certainly wasn’t the place I thought they’d put it. However they molded the story so that it seemed to fit perfectly, I wasn’t too excited about how it came about though. I guess they weren’t in the best position to try a fight and the need to escape to somewhere safe was real.

I will say that the action scenes were quite nice, especially the flying buggy shot, as ‘short’ as it was, though that second seemed like it’d never end… What I don’t understand is how a horse matches a buggy’s speed. Slightly unrealistic I’d say, but it was a machine, so I’ll just assume it steps out of the realms of what a normal horse is capable of.

Whilst the action was nice, when it happened, the chase was hardly exhilarating. Going down a one way road with very few maneuvers and also minimal action there.

I found the character development quite cliche though, nothing less than expected from an anime like this, but still, I was hoping that Sinon would find her own way taking inspiration from Kirito’s strength rather than relying on him. It was an expected conclusion to Sinon’s frustration for Kiritio, the hints were there. And with her breakdown the only person to rely on was him, at least we’re moving forwards and after the tournament she’ll hopefully be able to move on properly. Though with how closely their history’s match, I was hoping they could be more on an ‘equal’ level.

Gunner X went down too quickly, after showing us her face, we should’ve at least got to see a short scene with her fighting.

After targeting Sinon, I feel Death Gun’s obviously gone into a lot of trouble to find out about her history. Otherwise the usage of that particular gun would be too much of a coincidence, plus the scene at the start made it seem as though Death Gun was purposely showing Sinon his weapon. Though I was hoping that knowing this detail would give us some clue on who Death Gun may be, or at least his background but he could just be an amazing hacker that got into police files. Was thinking it could mean he was related to the police, but nevermind.

I also had a thought that Kirito and Sinon could ‘camp out’ for the night, but then I remembered they were in a video game… where I don’t believe the setting gets dark.

I find it funny that you still have to pay for things whilst in the tournament. You expect everyone who’s made it here to have money on them, but what if they’re broke from getting all the gear here, then that’s a disadvantage. Though that said, there’ll always be advantages and disadvantages arising from money differences in anything…