Log Horizon 2 Ep. 12: That’s that, I guess…

That was, uh… anticlimactic. Look, it’s not like I was expecting Shiroe to fight both Kinjou and Uru all by his lonesome. After all, he’s just an enchanter, and he’s not exactly the hero of the story because he’s a great warrior. But if we weren’t going to have a test of strength, then at least give me a test of wits or something. Give me some sort of conflict, y’know? But other than Kinjou looking somewhat frightened to see Shiroe, the two men basically just stood there and talked to each other. For such a pivotal moment in the arc, there was no tension here whatsoever. Naturally, my reaction as a viewer is like, “Oh, that’s neat, I guess…” I suppose there’s nothing particularly egregious about what we have here, but are we seriously content with that? Is “neat” honestly enough to placate us? It sure as hell doesn’t placate me.

Long story short, Elder Tale continues to feel less like a game and more like the real thing. Shiroe uses the gold in the room to buy up all of the purchasable land. He then relinquishes those property rights back to the server. This way, he levels the playing field. Since the People of the Land can’t actually own any land, his little trick gets around this rather blatant inequality. Basically, contracts between people will more than suffice. As for the minor details, I don’t want to get too bogged down by them, Honestly, they’re just not terribly important. I’ll admit that I am somewhat impressed to see that Shiroe had considered the People of the Land in coming up with his plan. Nevertheless, this arc feels a little incomplete. I kept waiting for some big moment to rear its head, but the arc suddenly came to and end. It was like, “Uh, okay…”

It’s the same with the rest of the raid group. They just kind of win. They have one boss left, then the next time you see them, they’ve already won. Again, my reaction is only, “Uh, okay…” Then bam, the latter half of the episode is devoted to the denouement. The remaining plot threads are neatly resolved. Silver Spoon will stay in Susukino to protect the city and prepare themselves for future raids. Demikas is no longer angry as he happily tells his wife all about his exploits with the raid. Shiroe even sits on a griffon and reflects on his relationship with the big oaf. Last but not least, Tetra officially joins Log Horizon. Oh by the way, Tetra is really a he, which is something we had expected for quite some time anyway. Anyway, having a denouement is great. Every story needs a denouement! But where was the climax?

Anyway, Plant Hwyaden people sit in a dimly-lit room and speak ominously about Shiroe and stuff. As cliche as that sounds, this scene was sadly the most intriguing thing to come out of this episode. Immediately afterwards, Shiroe has his big reunion with his guild, but like I was saying with Amagi Brilliant Park, when there isn’t any tension or struggle, you won’t get any payoff either. The highs aren’t high when the lows aren’t very low. Oh well… Log Horizon‘s just gotta Log Horizon. Maybe now that we’ve gotten this out of the way, we can find out what happened to Krusty. Or maybe Plant Hwyaden will finally decide to stop sitting around in a room and look menacing. In any case, just anything but more of this. Ugh. And yeah, this is one of the shortest posts I’ve written all year, but man, the anime just isn’t doing much to help on that front.