Pito's breakdown was kinda disturbing.
Pito went full retard. My interest in this show was already waning, but now it has hit the negatives.
Ah well, I've already paid for my Crunchyroll subscription, so I might as well see how it ends.
I didn't even bother to watch the latest episode. This series is mostly just action and some jokes after the first few episodes. I prefer something with a bit more depth to it, like actual meaningful character development.
Plus, it's hard for me to care about anything when the endgoal is to stop some maniac from killing themself. Pito has some weird obsession with death, actually wanting to be in a death game. Not to mention she's actually a famous idol in RL. The only way a wacko like her could keep up such an act is if she was a fullblown sociopath. And I'm supposed to care about LLENN's attempt to save such a shitty person? Yeah, fuck no to that.
A rose by any other name would smell as sweet Unless I grew it. In that case, throw it in the trash.
Red Lagoon
Except LLENN wouldn't be much of a good person if she let Puto kill herself.
One usually wants the hero to have something called empathy.
Red Lagoon
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
Well the problem here is that the audience understands how much of a nutjob Pito is, due to knowing more about her than LLENN does. For me, this just leads to an emotional disconnect where I can't really get invested in what LLENN is trying to do. Basically, I the audience, is going What Does She See in Him?.
Cortez, let me ask you this. You called Pito's breakdown, disturbing. If you were put in LLENN's shoes, while knowing of such an event, would you be willing to go to such lengths as LLENN has to save such a person?
edited 16th Jun '18 10:27:12 PM by RedRob
A rose by any other name would smell as sweet Unless I grew it. In that case, throw it in the trash.
I'm with Red Rob on this one (though I don't agree with his last point, since it would probably convince LLENN even more that Pito needs help).
However, Pito's craziness isn't my real problem with her. I mean, I can kind of relate to wishing to experience the thrill of life of death struggle. I can totally understand someone considering doing something truly stupid to feel it. Not actually do it, mind, but consider it. For, like, a second or so. And you'd think an idol singer would have enough thrills in her life already, but whatever. So if it was just this, Pito could have been a pretty interesting character, but is completely ruined by the fact that she's also a massive dick.
Seriously, whenever she's shown on screen, she acts mean-spirited, selfish and annoying. In the previous episode, she actually took time out of her day to torture those two guys, which goes a bit beyond the usual internet dickishness since pain does register in these VR games. And that's not even getting into the fact that she dragged M along with her suicide plot.
(I'm not talking about how she shot those hunters in the back. Matthew has taught me to never turn your back on an enemy, but she sure got over that "don't shoot people with no weapons in their hands" bit real quick, huh?)
I don't mind LLENN wanting to help her friend (though I do have an opinion on the way she chose to go about it
and maybe she could choose her friends more carefully in the future), but because Ptio is such a dick, I'm not feeling particularly invested in her plight. Once I get bored with the main conflict, all the other flaws this show become more noticeable.
If this show had continued in the same way as it had in the first five episodes, with the main plot being Karen applying herself to the videogame and gaining friends and growing as a person because of it, Pito would have made a decent heel for her to go up against and eventually overcome. But since the main plot is about saving a crazy dick from her own stupidity, I find myself actively rooting against the main characters, which is a death sentence for pretty much any show.
edited 17th Jun '18 12:54:02 AM by Kayeka
Wow! So many people taking M at his word about Pito committing suicide.
I have and continue to maintain that M/Goushi should be taken as an Unreliable Narrator. Because when it comes to Pito, he's an idiot.
Actually, that isn't all that surprising. Idol singers, especially mainstream ones, have no private lives and suffer from severe cases of Contractual Purity. Just go look up what happened to an AKB48 member when it was found out she had been dating the member of a boy band. It was pretty horrific and the industry just feeds the worst of the fanbase. If anything her success probably made Pito worse than she used to be.
And while I don't disagree with your analysis, I think it does overlook one key point. Yes, Pito is a massive asshole... to everyone but LLEN. She's coarse and boisterous but from LLEN's perspective the worst she's ever been is a bit pushy about her joining SJ1.
On another note, was anyone else just very amused by LLEN popping out of the long grass, looking around and then running off at high speed. It just looked like something that needed a voice over by David Attenborough
edited 17th Jun '18 1:55:02 AM by KnightofLsama
A wandering user
Exactly. We just don't know if what M said about Pito is true. It's possible that she's just one huge troll who likes to scare her teammates in killing them in real life but she knows she can't, so she just wants to entertain herself.
Also, did anyone get Rogue One vibes when she activated her Photon Sword?
The only good fanboy, is a redeemed fanboy.
(and to a lesser extend) They made a point this episode out of how Pito is probably using SAO Nervegear. I think that kind of settles the question of her determination and mental state. In addition, if that breakdown of hers after getting shot was acting, she is both a really good actress and even more of a massive dick.
What, you guys expect the show to go "Psych! We just wanted to motivate LLENN a little, and thought this was the best way" and you'd actually be okay with that? When a show gives out information like this, it is generally a good bet to consider it to be 80% true and complete, with the leftover 20% being reserved for any mid-show twists. Because otherwise, the premise of the show would fall through and render the entire thing pointless.
As for the idol bit, yeah okay fair enough. But considering the massive investment of time and effort it takes, it's not like people become idols by accident. She must be getting something out of it if she went through with it.
Pito being a friend to LLENN is irrelevant. Like I said, I don't mind Karen wanting to helping her friend. The problem is that I just don't want her to succeed, because Pito is a dick. On that note, I do like how Pito is one of those very typical online "friends" people occasionally have to deal with. All smiles and helpful advice within the context of the game, but then you grow comfortable around them and start talking about stuff other than DPS or drop rates, at which point they turn out to be, I dunno, genocidal flat earther space spiders or something.
This discovery is usually followed by a period of awkward denial, not wanting to accept the facts regarding a figure you've come to respect and still need to work towards common goals, ending with an optional falling out and breaking contact. I highly doubt that's the route this series is going, though, which is a bit of a shame.
And yes, that shot of the savanna was amusing. I wonder if they did it on purpose?
edited 17th Jun '18 2:55:37 AM by Kayeka
Thing is, while such people do things like skydiving for the adrenaline rush, Pito, from what screenshots I've seen of the this episode, might actually want to die. Heck she fell into a depression just cause she didn't get to participate in SAO. Then there's the whole using Nerve Gear thing. In anycase, she's going pretty far just to get some adrenaline going.
And behavior like this makes Pito look even more suspect. Combined with her obsession, I start to get the idea Pito is a very warped individual with no actual empathy for anyone else.
And considering such a warped individual was able to became an idol, which is quite hard to do, that suggests some kind of acting skill on par with actual serial killers. More and more I'm convinced Pito's a sociopath, or at least something similar.
I've more I want to say in regards to Pito, but I have something coming up, so I'll end with this. Look at the name she's given her avatar. The name of an incredibly poisonous bird, that kills people just through touch. And realize that, Pito quite likely choose to use that name. Meaning Pito might very well be aware of how fucked up she is, but does nothing about it.
EDIT: Okay, turns out the show was exggerating how toxic the birds are. Should've expected that from an anime.
Now to continue. First off, I like to make a clarification about my arguement with Cortez about how Pito acted. Somehow, I gotten confused, and kept thinking we were on episode nine, and that Pito's breakdown was referring to her rampage, probably because of how deranged it was. So yeah, that what I was referring to. In hindsight, I feel like an idiot for that.
And that's another problem. We get to see how much of an ass Pito is, but LLENN doesn't. This dramatic irony just leads to an emotional disconnect, where I can understand why LLENN is trying to help Pito, but my greater knowledge of the situation and Pito, makes me apathetic about LLENN's efforts to do such.
edited 17th Jun '18 8:15:05 AM by RedRob
A rose by any other name would smell as sweet Unless I grew it. In that case, throw it in the trash.
Red Lagoon
To be fair tis GGO, game primary focused on Pv P. LLENN on her own ambushed and assassinet great number of fellow players who just were in wrong time on wrong place. As far gameplay goes they are not that different.
With few exception it can be said GGO player = dick.
edited 17th Jun '18 1:12:19 PM by Tenzen12
Actual. Torture.
While GGO does indeed seem to reward dickish behaviour through its rather bad design (why in the world are monsters not instanced if players can just shoot each other at all times?), Pito still manages to go beyond pragmatic dickishness into cartoon villainy.
Red Lagoon
So did Fuuka actually. And both "victims" pretty much deserved it. And while you say "torture", No people were harmed in proccess and Pito have no problem if same thing was done to her either. In her own way she is good sport, isn't she?
Well it's true, that LLENN isn't into bullying at least, I will give you that.
edited 17th Jun '18 2:46:37 PM by Tenzen12
Wait, Fukaziroh did? Your going to have to remind me, because the closest I can think of would be that one time she bludgeoned that sex offender in justifiable self-defence after she failed to kill him cleanly, and surely you are not talking about that.
Also, they deserved it how? For teaming up on the biggest threat in a battle royale? Sorry, but that's just not how it works.
Also, though no permanent harm was done, pain does register in this game and causing pain to someone who poses no threat to you is torture. There's no two ways about it. Would Pito be okay with it is it were done to her? I think that is the answer is yes (which I doubt), it would only serve as yet another testament to her deeply disturbed mind. "In his own way, he was helping people" is something that comes up awfully often when talking about serial killers.
edited 17th Jun '18 3:31:29 PM by Kayeka
Hard to say. Given the way the NervGear and the Amusphere simulate damage, there's a very good chance that she was at least concussed, or some approximation of if.
It's worth pointing out that the NervGear won't actually do anything without the kill command and that wasn't part of the Seed package but something Kayaba added between the Beta test launch release.
Also, Pito could be doing it as a form of cheating. This is from the original series, but it's pointed out the Amusphere actually has less power than the NervGear. The huge battery that the Gear has to fry the user's brain means that when that functions not being used it can power a more powerful computation system in the helmet as well (in addition to the bigger volume). And it does produce a small but noticeable increase in performance and reaction time.
Ah, okay. Yeah, I never watched SAO, so I just kind of assumed that the "kill user" feature was part of the gear itself. I guess that's one mark fewer for Pito being really that crazy (though I still believe she is), and one more mark for her being a massive dick on account of cheating.
Furthermore, as an SAO beta tester, Pito would know that the kill command was software.
Red Lagoon
Well, let's just say that anime significantly toned down amount of violence Fuuka did to molester... to all five limbs.
As for cheating, I don't believe there is any kind of cheating in having better hardware. I mean no-one use Nerve gear because it used to fry brains and use amusphere because it has tons of safeties, but that is basically personal choice.
Well, maybe it was mentioned in SAO, Nervegear got banned (I don't remember anything like that, but it's possible), but even if it was, being unfairly good certainly wouldn't be reason for such ban in this case.
edited 17th Jun '18 4:38:50 PM by Tenzen12
The government confiscated all Nerve Gears. Kirito only got to keep his because the guy who had him investigate GGO pulled some strings.
I have to agree that people are making Pito out to be worse than she really is. Yes she's a massive, abusive edgelord and obviously has her screws loose, but "cartoon villain" is pushing it. The worst thing she did only really affects herself and by extension, M.
I presume that it was acquired by illicit means. Pito and M throw a lot of money around (considering you can buy in game credits).
I think part of the problem is that you've got a somewhat lopsided player pool. You've got scrubs like the Machine Gun Lovers who get in purely by virtue of being able to lay down More Dakka, you've got mid to high tier players like Team SHINC who get by on their teamwork and co-ordination (and since this is only the second Squad Jam that meta-game is still evolving) but would be less effective in solo play, and then you've got BoB class monsters like LLEN and Pito who's effectiveness is only amplified by having back-up.
I'd say in a few more iterations of competition players like Pito and LLEN will find their high aggressive solo styles less effective as the tight knit teams like SHINC evolve their meta-game while an increase in popularity will draw in a higher class of player such as BoB regulars who start to team up.