Warning: This article contains major spoilers for Alice in Borderland season 2Alice in Borderland star Riisa Naka explains how the season 2 finale changed one big aspect of the source material. Returning to Netflix at the end of the year for its second installment, the sci-fi thriller continued to follow Arisu (Kento Yamazaki), Usagi (Tao Tsuchiya), and their uneasy allies as they try to find their way out of deadly survivalist games and return home. Even though Alice in Borderland season 2 concludes on something of an optimistic note, with a tease of more to come, the closing episode provides plenty of twists and turns before arriving at that its endgame.
In the finale, Arisu and Usagi make their way to Mira (Naka), known as the Queen of Hearts. The heroes of Alice in Borderland only have to play three rounds of croquet without quitting in order to ostensibly return home, but, of course, Mira plays a bunch of psychological games with Arisu in order to break him down mentally. Unlike in Haro Aso's manga source material, however, Mira doesn't trick Arisu into drinking tea that causes him to hallucinate. Instead, just her words are enough. Now, Naka speaks to TV Guide about why the change was made, explaining that she felt her character wouldn't resort to those sorts of tricks:
According to the original story in the manga, I believe that in the beginning Arisu takes his medication and then he goes into this world of hallucination. [Shinsuke Sato] the director said that that’s kind of unfair. Mira is the master of all these games, she’s the key figure. Why would she then be borrowing or using the power of science? So we came up with an approach where we would use her words to be more hypnotic and then to drag him from this reality to this hallucinatory stage. But then during that, Usagi is the one who saves him because of their friendship or love. She’s able to do so and then in the end they have this beautiful victory.
Will Alice in Borderland Season 3 Happen?
A full picture of Alice in Borderland season 2 is still emerging, in terms of viewership data, so it's hard to say with certainty what the fate of the show will be. The story manages to end in a way that is open-ended, hinting at a continuation, while also providing definite closure. In the end, it's revealed that Arisu and all the characters in the titular borderland survived a meteorite crash. While they straddled the line between life and death, which was only for a few seconds in actual time, they traveled to the borderlands. It seems that their experiences there, and all those deadly games, were a reflection of their will to live and return from their injuries.
Offering a far sunnier send-off than Squid Game, to which it is often compared, the Alice in Borderland season 2 finale sees the meteorite survivors recovering from their injuries in the hospital. They all seem to have a connection with one another, though they don't know why, having no memory of the dangerous games they've played. Still, the sci-fi thriller does end with a focus on a Joker card. This closing shot has led some viewers to speculate that the characters haven't actually escaped the borderland, and are merely being tricked into thinking they've returned to their world.
Much like Netflix renewals, the reading of Alice in Borderland season 2 could go either way. It could be an uplifting affirmation of life and the need to keep on moving forward when faced with adversity, or a prelude to the next chapter. If the series does return, it will be interesting to see how the balance between the two readings will be achieved.
Source: TV Guide