2 out of 5

Directed by: Tomohiko Itō

Essentially a clip-show recap of the first season’s Aincrad / Fairy Dance, Extra Edition is respectable, at least, for not completely phoning that setup in: Kazuto is called to recount his SAO and ALO experiences to a government agent in order to further suss out SAO creator Akihiko Kayaba’s motivation; all the real-life girls (Sugu, Asuna, Keiko, and Rika) meet up to teach Sugu how to swim and get distracted musing over their gaming experiences not directly involving Kazuto, effectively giving us all of the necessary beat-by-beats to catch up for season two.

Fine.  And there’s essentially a twenty minute episode of new material at the end, as everyone regroups in ALO for a new adventure so Yui can see a whale.

Effectiveness aside, from a top-down perspective the recaps serve to underline how much better the Aincrad arc was over Fairy Dance, given the perma-death aspect, the mystery of the Why – as opposed to Fairy Dance’s gross, sex-driven, rapey, one-dimensional bad guy – and the relatively patient relationship buildup between Kazuto and Asuna.  Fairy Dance, meanwhile, not only gave us the above-mentioned eye-rolling villain, but also doubled down with some brother love fantasy, a perpetual will-they / won’t-they that winked at possibility because Kazuto and Sugu aren’t blood relations, oooh, so that gives us an excuse for shower scenes with Sugu.  Fairy Dance eventually showed some maturity with how ‘brother’ and ‘sister’ would emotionally respond in the direct aftermath, so it’s great that Extra Edition ditches that and doubles down on the double down with more cheesecake – lots of swimsuit, boob porn – and more brother love fantasy.  No thanks.

Recap: good.  Extra episode: fun enough.  Sugu / Kazuto shipping: give me a break.