Review: #915
Title: Sword Art Online 16: Alicization Exploding
Series: Sword Art Online – 16th volume
Author: Reki Kawahara
Comments: The battle for the Underworld continues with no signs of an end. Kirito remains out of action and the story focuses mostly upon Alice. As the human realm and the dark realm clash against each other, it just feels like a big fantasy wish fulfillment of the author. One melodramatic scene comes after another. The author tries to build some motivation and backstory to the most powerful characters, being the Integrity Knights, but it all feels amateurish. The tendency for the author to pull things out of nowhere as well as weak logic and amateur usage of “technical” terms makes it hard to take seriously. It takes the cake in the last quarter of the novel where we have a bunch of female characters all vying for Kirito, and obvious developments into banding all the supporting characters together, common sense be damned. Alicization Exploding feels like it gathers together all the flaws of the series: ultimately insignificant events dragged out to the length of a novel, you feel as if it doesn’t achieve much. This is a weak volume set in a story arc that should have ended two volumes ago.
Rating: 5.5/10