Log Horizon 2

Episode 19

A heavy and tremendous episode of Log Horizon this week. The method and tragedy of the Odyssey Knights was revealed, Minami's doom train made its first move, and the various personal arcs of Tohya, minori, and Isuzu were all highlighted and pushed forward as the wyverns descended on Safil. All the narrative dominoes are beginning to fall now, and the resulting clashes are some of the most poignant moments this show has ever achieved.

We started off this week with minori's team rushing to defend Safil, and noting the Odyssey Knights were doing the same. The most noteworthy scene in these first minutes was definitely the moment shared by Rudy and Isuzu after he came to tell her about the fight. In the wake of last week's breakdown, Rudy seemed hesitant to bother Isuzu, but his rueful smile as she steadied herself for battle and then clear vamping to cheer her up were wonderful to see. Rudy can sometimes seem clumsy in his understanding of people, but he's ultimately a very sensitive person, and it seems that over his time with Isuzu, he's actually gotten significantly better at both reading and respecting her feelings. He's charming, frankly - moments like him showing off his new haste spell to give Isuzu something to smile about clearly show what an empathetic and generally stand-up guy he is.

It's a good thing the episode started with that bright spot, because from there, things got very heavy very quickly. Following the Odyssey Knights onto the battlefield, minori and her team quickly realized their strategy was no strategy. The Knights simply charge into battle laughing at their enemies, slashing and dying and charging again. “They seem quite willing to die. Their life flashing before their eyes, like a drug,” Roe 2 comments. Their reasons for this are soon elaborated, but not before their actions are contrasted against the philosophy of the Person of the Land guiding Minami's train. Apparently Minami has created a device to allow People of the Land to summon nightshades to act as their servants, giving them a kind of immortality. “What do immortals know of war?” the Minami leader asks, before sending her nightshades to attack the Knights' mobile cathedral. It's a good question, as the relative consequences of death have always been an awkward road block between the two races. Her actions force the Odyssey Knights off the field, and as the Knights retreat and take their fight into the heavily populated city, Tohya confronts their leader.

Tohya's arc has been slowly building for a long time now, and that he would be outraged by people taking this world as frivolously as the Knights seem to isn't much of a surprise. But when he confronts the Knights leader on his actions, the answer he receives is equally poignant. “We want to go back. We're going home. When you die, you can see your family - you can see a bit of the old world. If we die and die and die, we can go home.” There's an obvious tragedy to this reasoning, given the fact that you actually slip further and further away from the real world by losing memories with each death. But as the Knights leader continues to explain himself, discussing his plan to get married and leave childish games behind, it's clear we're getting a perspective the show sorely needed. All of the main characters of Log Horizon have accepted this world as valid, and the Knights leader seems to frame that acceptance as reflective of a lack of attachments to the old one. The flashbacks we've seen this season support this - both Shiroe and Akatsuki overcame real-world limitations within Elder Tale, and William Massachusetts is essentially “the beauty and validation of escape into games” incarnate. But the Knights have lost a great deal, and in order to avoid losing more, they both revel in memories and refuse to accept this world as real. That's understandable - the more you accept this world as real, the more you'll slip away from the old one.

Tohya is having none of this. As he angrily denounces the Knights' invalidation of this world, we finally see the full story of his own life in the real world - how a car crash ended his mobility and his dreams, and how his positivity was really a reflection of his helplessness. His attitude was the same false positivity he saw in Nureha last week - he was a prisoner trapped in a world too unfair and powerful for him to do anything but smile and accept it. “There are people here I care about,” Tohya says, and clearly that's true, but even beyond his connections, he can't possibly accept that this place isn't real for his own sake. “Did you ever die in the real world?” he asks, and means it. How dare these Knights obsess over dying, when they could never understand it like he does. William Massachusetts has nothing on Tohya's pain.

Tohya's resolve in fighting for this world sets off a chain reaction across his teammates. We first cut to Isuzu, who is both somewhat shamed by Tohya's old circumstances and validated by his faith in this world. She now feels lucky for what she had in the old world, and determined to bring her songs to this one. And hearing Isuzu's song, minori also comes to something of a career resolution, even if it's just to not doubt herself as Shiroe's apprentice. The last few minutes of this episode gesture at further developments regarding Roe 2's identity (it seems clear now that she's somehow tied to the mechanical underpinnings of the game, given her earlier mention of going to the moon, murmurings about the Knights' behavior “helping Genius,” and clear talk of the game protocols at the end), but this episode belonged to the kids, and they demolished it. Log Horizon is on a roll.

Rating: A