Recap Japanese Drama "Alice In Borderland season 2" Episode 2

Dec 22, 2022

Episode 2 of Alice in Borderland Season 2 starts with the King of Clubs, Kyuma, admitting that they themselves came up with the idea for this game. A game called Osmosis. The rules are simple. There are 2 hours and both teams need to collect points. Each begin with 10,000, with those points divided between the teams. However, some can choose to have more points than others. Distribution of these points is crucial to winning.

There are three ways to earn points. Collecting item boxes dotted around the battlefield, touching the opposing player’s base (netting a cool 10,000 points in the process)or by battling another player. Battling is done with different contestants touching hands, and whoever has the highest point tally at that time takes 500 while the other is deduced the same amount. Neither know what the other’s points are before fighting. The two bases basically work like a modified version of Capture The Flag. It’s a high stakes game, and one that has a myriad of different ways to gain points – and even more dangers. One of the biggest dangers comes from the base rules.

When a member of your own team touches the pole, they end up with Infinity points, allowing them to nab 10,000 from the opposing player, forfeiting them from the game. In other words, killing them.

Our group decide to give the fastest runners the fewest points. Slower runners will get more. The guard at the base will have the least (that being Tatta). They also decide to pair up, with Usagi and Niragi alongside Kuina and Arisu. The latter decide to go for the items. After collecting the first, they’re approached by Kyuma who decides they should battle. He encourages Arisu to take a chance and gamble. He lets go of Kuina’s hand and decides to face him alone. Only, it turns out everyone has an equal amount of points.

As a result, the group manage to work together and manage to take a healthy lead, winning a fair amount of points. As they head back to their base, Niragu starts to cough up blood.

However, they’re not prepared for what Kyuma has up his sleeve, as the entire team descend on their base from all directions. They do so while Tatta is on his own and all charge at the pole. Unfortunately, while 3 of the 4 hit the pole at the base, one ends up tagged – Shitara – and he’s killed.

The group bring him back to their base while Arisu gathers the troops and decides they should split up and find the items. However, Kyuga already has that idea. And given everyone is separate, the group pick them apart easily.

The King of Clubs team end up taking a significant lead, and gambled that Arisu wouldn’t have the guts to attack their base – and they were right. After tagging Arisu and taking 500 points, Kyuma encourages him to have some courage and do what they need to do, given this is a game of life and death.

Now, as Arisu is inactive, he has an idea to turn the tide. He decides they should all attack the base together. He decides to push the fear out and Niragi is all-in on that idea. They all want to win and decide to attack the base simultaneously. Except for Tatta, he’s to stay behind and protect their own base.

Usagi distracts Goken, the crazy parkour guy from before, driving him away from the base. Kuina , Arisu and Niragi come from different angles. Kyuma’s goons touch their own base while Niragu, Arisu and Kuina all charge at once. Arisu stays inactive and touches Kyuma, knocking him back, while Niragu does the same thing. Kuina can’t touch the base, and the plan goes awry. They’ve failed… or have they? Usagi finds an item, leaving them 500 points to gain but with all the team holding onto their base and seemingly no way out, Arisu starts to lose faith.

Niragi’s true colours come out with only 10 minutes to go, and he decides to go for Usagi alone, intent on sexually abusing her. As for the rest, there’s less than 10 minutes left and things look incredibly bleak.

The Episode Review

Your true character comes out in times of extreme stress and that much is especially true here. We’ve seen that across previous episodes of Alice in Borderland too to be fair, but here it’s especially prevalent. With Niragi coughing up blood and sensing the end is nigh, he ends up turning dark and twisted.

As for the game itself, it’s a simple enough version of Capture The Flag but the way these rules have been turned into a life or death game is nicely structured, with the setting on the harbour with all these shipping containers feeling both eerily similar and wholly alien given the way they’re laid out like a videogame. With very little time to try and come up with a plan, will Arisu and the others manage to get out of this alive? We’ll have to wait and see but that was a brilliant episode.