Not exactly going to blow socks off here but I have seen more than enough asking about it that I will give myself up as a resource for this show as well.
Hands down, no question or doubt in my mind, if you have a desire to see the best Anime can do, WATCH THIS SERIES! I have to try really really hard to find people that dislike this series at all.
If you have heard of dotHack or Accel, you know a version of this idea, but I assure you SAO stands alone!
We start with our MC, a young boy who puts on a helmet after watching the release of a hyped VMMORPG Sword Art Online on his computer. It all seems near future and it does give the year up as 2023. The helmet still plugs in with an ethernet jack so we know this is the VR Nerve gear.
After a fairly decent log in procedure, we are into the gaming world of SAO, a place where there is no magic but Sword Arts. As explained by the MC, Kirito, add a pause to your move and feel the skill charge to unleash it.
For anyone that has wanted to play MMOs this series has done a masterful job of creating a level based game that would interest us without question VR or not I am thinking. For an introduction we meet Klein and Kirito walks him through his first lessons on how to play SAO.
The above image is right after the dark twist of SAO is revealed to the 10,000 players logged in. There is no logout button, in fact there is no way out safely except to clear the game. The creator gathers all the players at the Town of Beginnings where he as a giant hooded wizard tells them the grisly fate they are in.
If you die in the game, you die in real life. If the helmet is removed, you die, and any PvP combat can also kill you outside of the Towns. At first no one wants to believe, but Kirito reveals that the how of the Nerve Gear could in fact do exactly as outlined. If the safety was removed the helmet could fry a human brain to death!
Right after that Kayaba Akihiko tells them to look at their inventories and an item changes the avatars into their real selves. This has the double effect of confusion and trauma for many players but cements for Kirito that SAO is now real. He can die here and he refuses to give in.
After this start time begins to move a bit more fluidly. The Beta Testers, over 1000 of them, are generally disliked or distrusted because they left the 9000 new players on the first day to level up and get stronger faster. Kirito is one of them and has survived the first 2 months when the first boss fight is revealed to happen. He has played alone and thus when told to form a group by Diabel, he snags the nearest cloaked player also alone.
Despite good team work, the first boss fight claims the leader, who was a Beta Tester as well and had attempted to get a rare item with his edge of knowledge on what happens after defeating a boss. However SAO is not done with its lethal twists, despite fighting this creature in the Beta, apparently that means little. Only Kirito sees the danger and too late warns the others. Together with Asuna and the rest of the party they finally defeat the first boss.
Revealed for what he is, Kirito faces accusers by claiming he knows far more than any mere Beta Tester and gains the title Beater. Up to that point 2000 people have died but now there is hope that the game can be cleared to floor 100.
Also up to this point it is much how any MMO would be, players finding their way, some learning they have powerful skills like Asuna and ones like Kirito who help the other players with advice and his skill from the Beta. In any other game this would be fun and enjoyable, but in this game their lives are on the line and nerves taut always.
As this part of the story progresses we follow Kirito almost exclusively and we see him fight alone and with others against the nightmare of reality in a video game. By making death mean the same as in reality, all of these players are forced to make literally life and death choices they never prepared to make.
For a time Kirito even joins a small guild, despite being far more powerful, he yearns for the personal contact they all share. We see the chance at smiles even in the depths of worry. However we also see how quickly tragedy can destroy players in this new world. Kirito is forced to watch helpless as people he swore to protect are killed before him in a trap.
Driven by grief to the first Christmas season in Aincrad, he learns of a boss that may drop a resurrection item and acting nearly suicidal he goes to face it. In this moment we see Klein again trying to reason with his friend but support him when less generous Guilds follow them to the boss.
Just when we think Kirito may follow other players to suicide, one of the Guildmates he lost, Sachi, has a message delivered to him. She had accepted the likely possibility she would die in SAO and that Kirito would blame himself for it. In a supremely human moment she sings a song to him via a recording and Kirito finds a will to live again.
Now known as the solo player Black Swordsman of the Front Lines, Kirito throws his all into defeating SAO and freeing other players. However unlike many of the other FL players, he seems to still take a very human interest in others. He lives in Aincrad, not just surviving in it.
This is exemplified by meeting an animal tamer who needs a little help. Silica is a young girl who has been made into a mascot many times but took for granted her dragon Pina's abilities to protect her. Kirito helps her while hunting Titan's Hand, an orange guild of player hunters. The whole thread shows how the players behind the FL continue to live and strive despite players that live in denial of the reality of Aincrad.
After this we come back to Kirito on the FL with Asuna who is now a famous player in the Guild Knights of the Bloodoath. The most powerful guild drives the FL forward but Kirito finds some of their tactics inhuman and while he understands it, often walks his own path.
He and Asuna renew their contact in a rather humorous way, Kirito convinces her to actually enjoy the good weather and take a nap! Of course this leads to even more revelations during an investigation that showed the darker side after more than a year in the game, sleep PKs now occur and Murder Guilds exist like Laughing Coffin.
Kirito and Asuna face a murder conspiracy and she learns a great deal about how to actually have time to enjoy being alive no matter she is trapped inside the game thanks to Kirito. In fact we begin to see Kirito being something of an inspiration to other players, where he is still quite dour most of the time, he still helps them and connects with them.
Even as things seem to be settling for Kirito, he commissions a new sword from a blacksmith that is as strong as the best magic drop sword in the game. This small side adventure shows how much growth Kirito has been through since the dark tragedy of his lost guild, where once he might have been oblivious or allowed others to be in emotional pain, now he seeks them out to help as best he can.
The last few episodes have some of the best action and the most heart rending moments for this part of the story. It has been nearly 2 years since the game began, 4000 people have died and they are just now closing in on the 74th floor boss.
Kirito finds a rare ingredient that only Asuna can cook and we see them have a rather nice dinner and the first non-battle moment we have truly seen in SAO...minus a small knife threat to get Kirito to party up with Asuna. It is clear Asuna is questioning the direction her guild is going in now to clear the game, much as Kirito once voiced concerns.
After a confrontation with her bodyguard, the two head to the 74th dungeon where neither seems terribly taxed but Kirito appreciates having a competent partner along. Of course for him the best moment is more of Asuna's cooking!
We finally get Klein and Asuna to meet as well in this dungeon by fluke. Where the light hearted gathering of friends might have been enough, we instead see the ultimate test of Kirito. A group of the Liberation Army appear and demand the map data to the boss room Kirito and Asuna have just seen.
Though they are warned to not face it, the Army heads towards their goal anyway. Kirito surprises his friends by saying they should keep an eye on them and we see that Klein already knows Asuna has her heart set on him.
Despite working quickly the group hear the screams of the Army and rush to see what has happened. The boss room is like the fateful trap that killed Kirito's one time guild, no teleport stones work here!
Once more we see how the characters have changed. Once, Asuna would have coldly accepted the loss of the Army because of their foolishness, but Kirito has shown her what it means to be alive again and she rushes in to save the dying men. Kirito of course does not even pause to follow and Klein resignedly follows as well.
While Kirito and Asuna desperately buy time to get the Army out, they are easily being over powered by the boss. Kirito thinks he may have a way out for them all but wonders if he has to make that step and commit what may be near suicide after wanting to live.
He sees all the players about to die around him and accepts it is no time to be timid. After Klein and Asuna buy him time, the solo Beater reveals his unique skill he alone possesses, Dual-Wield. Rather than a shield and sword user as is typical for one hand blades, Kirito has the ability to wield two swords. With his newly crafted sword and his usual black one he takes on the boss alone.
For any action lovers this moment is flat out awesome! For those looking for that emotional punch to the gut, you are not disappointed. The desperation is palpable, the shock of the others is spine tingling, and the feeling of powerful attacks shakes your bones!
Just barely does Kirito pull off a miracle, and a slim margin of HP to spare, he defeats the 74th boss. After this things begin to fly forward.
Asuna declares her feelings in as much she wishes to leave the guild, but Kirito has to face Commander Heathcliff to allow that. The unexpected PvP fight ends with Kirito as a member of KoB but that is short lived as the bodyguard he humiliated tries to kill him.
While it is unclear if had been hunting Asuna to begin with, Kuradeel definitely wants Kirito dead. Instead he is slain by a wounded Kirito bare handed after losing the other hand to his sword.
After the bloody fights and tumultuous changes, Kirito and Asuna find love for each other and if you do not shed a tear or crack a smile during their moments we get to see, you have no soul! Even as they take a break from the FL to enjoy their newly found relationship, and their honeymoon for their game marriage, SAO continues to throw surprises at them.
They encounter a broken AI, Yui, whom they adopt as their daughter for a short time and reveals the truth about how SAO is being run without human intervention. Just when we seem to have yet another tragedy, we see Kirito in a much more reality based skill, save his newly adopted daughter from deletion by Cardinal, the AI system in charge of Aincrad. He uses a GM console to shard her core program to his Nerve Gear, thus when the game is cleared she will be saved.
The final stretch of this part will rip your heart out and set your teeth on edge. After winning a rather interesting fishing contest, the two warriors are summoned back to the FL to face the 75th boss.
He is a lovely one isn't he?
Before this battle both Asuna and Kirito give extremely emotional revelations and speeches to each other and a neighbor from their cottage by the lake. Once again if you do not cry or feel a massive tug in the region known as the human heart, you seriously have no soul.
Vowing to protect they other, they go into battle with many of their long time friends in SAO and on the FL now. Egil, Klein and his guild, and the rest of KoB. The battle is brutal and over 14 players die.
It is a shock to them because since floor 67 there have only been the 3 deaths from the foolish Army encounter Kirito had for the boss fights.
Suddenly Kirito puts many pieces together as he glances across the exhausted players and sees a barely winded and only half health Commander Heathcliff standing strong.
Kirito charges explosively across the room and just as his sword would scratch the Commander's face, a purple icon appears with shocking words, "Immortal Object."
Kirito reveals that the most powerful player is actually the architect of all their fates, Kayaba Akihiko himself! Despite the dark results of the game, all he does is paralyze everyone but Kirito and himself.
He reveals that if they had gotten to floor 100, he would have been the final boss of the game. Because Kirito deduced his identity, and because the Dual-wielder is the one considered by Heathcliff to be the "hero" of the story, he offers Kirito the chance to end the game now.
Despite ardent begging from Asuna, Egil, and Klein, Kirito goes to face the author of all their fates to this point. While the battle goes similar to the arena fight, it is clear Kayaba had been holding back before.
Just when we think this story will take a very dark twist, Asuna overcomes the paralyzed stated and dies in Kirito's arms. All the fight goes out of him, but he picks up her sword and seems to allow Kayaba to slay him.
Just as all seems lost, something odd happens. Kirito suddenly decides not to let it end just yet, not to let this game dictate anymore how people will die so far from love and family. He runs Kayaba through and we see both die in a sparkle of pixels.
The whole of SAO hears the decry that the game is cleared and we see a flash of every character not at the boss fight looking up at what I presume to be the final pixels of Kirito's life.
That would have been a fine place to leave us hanging, could have ended it there and most would have been wild with emotions but would have known to jump to Lightnovel or manga for answers.
Instead they took a right hook beautifully and delivered an emotional whammy like no other. Kirito opens his eyes in the sky and finds Asuna there with him, looking at the end of Aincrad.
They meet the real Kayaba, no Heathcliff avatar, and discuss the point of 4000 people dying in this game. Instead of parting as bitter enemies, it almost feels like a parting of friends. Kayaba vanishes and leaves the two alone to face the end of the world.
This moment between them, if you do not shed a tear or reach for a loved one, check your pulse and find out when you died! It is a beautiful and well delivered moment and it is believable above all else!
Again they could have left us here and we would have been happy, hell I would have still been clapping, but just when it all seems resolved and things have a sad but sweet end.
Kirito wakes up in the real world! Not only that but he gets his emaciated body up on one single thought. Asuna! Using his IV as a walking stick he rolls into the hospital hall with that goal and rolls the credit song.
That is the end of part 1.....I am not kidding! Go watch it, even with all I have said you WILL find yourself a gibbering wreck of hope, tears, and roaring for Kirito to win every time you watch!
I will do a part 2 on ALO arc because I think it deserves its own and is the harder of the two parts for people to like. Sword Art Online is the best people...go watch it!
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