If you haven’t seen the latest season of Alice in Borderland, stop. But, if you do want to be spoiled with anything, alright go on.
A lot of time in ‘Alice in Borderland’ is spent talking about different worlds. There’s the one that its characters find themselves in and the one that they want to return to. The first is a largely-abandoned Tokyo, with only a fraction of its citizens left to roam the streets after being mysteriously transported there. One afternoon, Arisu (Kento Yamazaki) and some friends duck into a bathroom to hide and emerge to find their city almost entirely empty.
So, the first season of ‘Alice in Borderland’ was a primal story of survival. There was the discovery of the rules of this purgatorial city, with Arisu and a shifting team of compatriots trying to figure out how see tomorrow, much less get back to the version of life they knew before.
THE PEAK
The greatest merit of Alice in Borderland Season 2 is its structure. It’s full of unending battles like even mind and physical games that’ll make your head go crazy. Chishiya is easily one of the most popular characters on the show, the real MVP—surviving games alone, but that’s a lot to cover and another damn story.
The first season of this hit Netflix series ended with them meeting Mira, the Queen of Hearts, which leads to the gang now working to collected Face cards and take out twisted tyrants they never imagined could be leading this new batch of murder sessions. While some villains, such as Aguni and Niragi from the Beach, attempt to redeem themselves and help the crew, infighting and betrayals occur once more to complicate the mission. It culminates in a bloody war towards the end, with Arisu realizing this place is even more difficult to escape than first assumed.
Arisu and his team hatch an intricate plot to corner the King of Spades in a pharmacy and blow him up. It’s easier said than done, though, as he cuts a Winter Soldier-like figure with his guns, knives and mask.
But sadly, the King stabs up Kuina, shoots Ann, and guns down the schoolgirl in Heiya.
QUEEN OF HEARTS
The final face card game is against Mira or the Queen of Hearts. Initially, the game seems really easy. All Arisu has to do is get through three sets of croquet. He doesn’t even have to beat the games. But after the second round, Mira invites him for tea and promises to answer his questions about what the Borderland really is.
She messes with him by lying about the future, claiming the Borderland is high-tech virtual intelligence and everyone participating is hooked up to a VR machine somewhere to play the game because they’ve grown bored with the future. Another lie involves aliens experimenting on humans via the games. Mira also claims she’s his nurse and tries to convince him to take his “pills” and forfeit the game. Arisu comes very close to succumbing to Mira’s mind games. In the manga, Mira puts a drug in Arisu’s tea to make him more susceptible to her manipulation, but it’s a little unclear if that happened in the show.
Ultimately, Usagi helps pull Arisu out of the false memories and brings him back to the croquet scene, where he does defeat the Queen of Hearts by completing the third and final set of the game.
THE TRUTH ABOUT ANOTHER DIMENSION
The moment Arisu and Usagi won against Queen of Hearts, they’re left with two choices: to either stay in that world or decline it. Majority chooses to decline and they started to be teleported out, at least that’s what it’s like.
A flashback confirms the truth over the transfer of the people. It turns out, while viewers thought the fireworks session in Tokyo somehow caused these individuals to be abducted in Season 1, it wasn’t magic or aliens — this was a meteorite shower that blew the city up. Many ended up clinging to bare life, and as Arisu’s brother tells him when the hero wakes up in a hospital, he was dead for a minute or so.
The brother says he was in a “borderland,” which confirms the realm was purgatory. Some mysterious being linked these minds, had them play games as a form of judgment, and gave them the option of coming back. Sadly, they can’t remember each other, but most of them are alive. Chishiya wakes up in a room with Niragi, as both vow to be better people, not realizing they went at each other’s throats in limbo. Heiya has lost her leg, but spots Aguni recovering in his bed. Kuina’s parents come to see her, affirming they’re no longer upset about her transgender surgery, while Ann’s revived in the operating room.
Arisu and Usagi eventually meet by the vending machine. They sense they know each other, creating a romantic moment where these kindred spirits and star-crossed lovers go on a date, not understanding what they went through prior. The final shot, though, is ominous as the camera shows cards on a table at the facility where patients are recovering.
What’s scary and confusing? The last part. We know there will be Season 3, we just know it. It zooms in as the wind blows them away, leaving the scary, laughing Joker card behind, suggesting the game’s not over yet.
