Fate/EXTRA Last Encore 06

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

Hakuno says goodbye to a sad little girl and prepares to ascend to Tier 4, vowing to return for her after he wins the Holy Grail War.

Rin, Hakuno, and Saber-Nero arrive on Tier 3, which turns out to be a very surreal place. Rin provides exposition on cyber-ghosts and how they are considered bugs in the system. As such, SE.RA.PH usually attempts to delete them when they are discovered. The group makes it to a castle with small doors. After exploring for a bit, despite Saber holding Hakuno’s hand so he won’t get lost, he finds himself separated from the girls. He sees a little girl in the distance, so he goes after her.

Eventually, he finds the girl, who’s delighted that someone can actually see her. She’s been alone for very long time because she’s a ghost. He agrees to play with her. After a while, they rest and chat, then have tea. There, Alice explains that she doesn’t understand the Holy Grail War. She explains that in the past, she was injured during a war. She was apparently used by doctors in the hospital and eventually died from extreme pain. Then she found herself in this place. Her wish is to cure her illness and come back to life.

After Alice warns him about monsters in the place and says farewell, Hakuno finds himself with Saber and Rin, who’ve been looking for him. The trio continue on, where Rin finds herself separated and finds Shinji’s girlfriend MISAO Amari, who has become bitter. After they chat a bit, Rin finds herself back with Saber and Hakuno. Hakuno then finds himself with Amari, who is very depressed. He finds himself back with Rin and Saber, where they realize they’ve had visions. A monster attacks, which Saber defeats. However, this causes them to return back where they started to apparently repeat the day.

Thoughts/Review:

Well, Fate/EXTRA Last Encore 06 clearly is doing a take on Alice in Wonderland, only more surreal.

Reading the Last Page First

Initially, I was a bit confused when the episode started. Hakuno says his farewell to the sad Alice on Tier 3 before ascending to the next tier. It seemed like the writers were just going to skip the events of Tier 3 since it was likely to be more lather-rinse-repeat stuff. However, after the OP, we have our merry trio arriving on Tier 3 for the first time. That left me scratching my head.

Once Hakuno met Alice and she told her tragic tale, I was really glad to know that when Hakuno wins, Alice will be OK, except that she’ll be alone again. But hopefully, when Hakuno wins the Holy Grail War, he can save Alice and she can have a happy life. No wonder some people read the last page of a book first. 😉

Convenient Exposition is Convenient

Throughout the Fate/EXTRA Last Encore series, there has been a ton of exposition, some of it confusing as all get out. However, when Rin immediately started blathering exposition about cyber-ghosts and such, my first thoughts were of Alice, who seemed to have a doll body when we saw her in the intro. As such, it didn’t surprise me when Alice casually revealed that she was a ghost.

I really with the writers did a better job with exposition in general. I understand there’s a ton of stuff they need to convey, but the way they put out the information is often confusing, not to mention tedious or boring.  For all the junk that has been spewed out about SE.RA.PH and such, most of it is still a confusing mess to me. Part of me suspects that the writers are expecting players of Fate/EXTRA to already have some level of understanding. The problem there is that I never played the game.

Shinji’s Girlfried

Amari’s return to Fate/EXTRA Last Encore 06 was a surprise to me. I figured Shinji had killed her in the first episode, thus I never expected to see her again. However, she shows up in Rin’s apparent vision as a bitter, resentful person. Then she shows up again in Hakuno’s vision as a depressed but determined person. Rin and Hakuno seemed to think they were were having visions.

So assuming she’s not really there, what does her appearance to Rin and later Hakuno mean? If she is real, then maybe she’s the actual Master they have to defeat and Alice is just another Master. However, since Rin determined that they are dealing with the Caster Servant named Nursery Rhyme, I tend to believe that Alice is the actual Floor Master, since Nursery Rhyme looks a lot like Alice in Fate/Grand Order.

Conclusion

Fate/EXTRA Last Encore 06 continues to be bizarre, confusing, and full of dialog that may or may not be meaningful. The episode manages to pull on heart strings with the introduction of Alice.  I just hope that when the series is done, Alice can be saved.