Kaiji - Ultimate Survivor S01E04-05 Review: Ladder Metagame

Kaiji: Ultimate Survivor, Episode 4: Failure; Episode 5: Deadly Decision

So these two episodes kind of form a little mini-arc in and of itself, which is nice that I had decided to review Kaiji episodes two episodes at once. Basically the big plot running throughout these two episodes is Kaiji and team buying up cards and trying to monopolize the Rock cards. It's a neat little bit of clarification as Kaiji points out how there's a set of hidden rules enforced by the black-shirted guys. Sure, they drag those without stars and cards into the room of doom or whatever, but those with stars remaining and no cards are allowed to mill around.

In addition to that, the fact that they're not bothered at all by the black shirt dudes for essentially moving their stars and cards around means that it's essentially allowed. And Kaiji reaches the conclusion that transfer of cards is okay, but disposal of cards (as noted by someone with 3 stars but too chickenshit to actually use up all his cards, trying to flush them down the toilet) is not. Also, I didn't realize the smaller number counters counted the rock/paper/scissors of the thing. So Kaiji uses his resource -- money -- to buy all the rock cards. There's a clever bit how they basically use the people who're about to leave the floor as their agents to buy the cards to decrease suspicion...

And then disaster! And the way the episode portrays how Kaiji goes from confident to feeling unease to finally realizing shit's going down when he sees that Scissors is going down due to a lot of ties, while Rock and Paper both stay constant... which is because while Team Kaiji is hoarding Rock, someone else is hoarding Paper. And it's a particular problem because even if they do the little tie-off they won't get the stars, they'll just use up the cards. And because Furuhata and Ando are honestly pieces of shit, they panic and gamble away two of the stars they have -- though, again, the episode's flowery description of the 'demon of gambling' urging them on is a pretty great way of showing their irrationality. 

And then episode 4 ends with the Paper Hoarder, one Kitami (his name isn't actually revealed until the narrator says it in the closure section, which is weird), who's a long-haired douchehole with two cronies, and a lot of stars. They are the paper hoarders, and they offer to sell Kaiji some stars (at an over-price) as long as they agree to become their 'last match'.  And Kaiji instead demands a 'death match' -- until they all run out of stars.

Kitami... of course refuses that shit argument, because he's honestly basically almost won anyway, so why bother with taking unnecessary risks? And Kaiji goes between aggressive and begging, pretty intent on having Kitami play him, while the peanuts gallery of Furuhata and Ando are just going 'no Kaiji-san noooo'. And while it's obvious to us, the audience, that Kaiji probably has something up his sleeve to go from the 'wait and see' mentality to 'this is the only moment to JUMP!', it's a bit annoying for them to literally spend half of the episode clueless and bleating about the same thing over and over. 

While it's honestly still a bit of a stretch for me to believe that Kitami would actually give in to Kaiji's taunting and actually bet 3 cards, a combination of greed, Kaiji's insults and peer pressure from his friends -- and the absolutely bombastic way that the show goes through showing Kaiji's goading and boisterous bluster -- it does make it believable that Kitami would give in. And I did like how he realizes at the last minute that, shit, something's wrong for Kaiji to be so persistent despite not really having that much to gain beyond the general desire to gain more cards.

And Kaiji? Kaiji basically reads Kitami's last card accurately through a pretty clever bit of foreshadowing. As Kaiji explains -- the fact that Kitami mentions how Kaiji's team is going to be their 'last game', how Kitami draws out the card from a sleeve without even looking at it, and how he's reminded by Furuhata earlier in episode 4 about 'should we buy more cards', thus alerting Kaiji to the fact that they're going to need to tie off their cards eventually once they have enough cards, Kaiji manages to read Kitami and that's a pretty epic moment as Kaiji goes "OPEN THE CARD, KITAMIIIII!". It's definitely cliched as all hell, but damn if it isn't entertaining. There's a bit of a cheesy bit near the end where 'yeah, our teamwork is built on trust' (even though Kaiji totally duped Furuhata and Ando and not told them of his surefire enemy-reading plan) is better than 'your teamwork is fragile, you're fighting after an argument', which I felt was a wee bit too much... but it's okay. 

So yeah. The tension and all the mind games stuff is definitely really fun to watch, and Kaiji's bombastic voice actor and the pretty amazing art direction and tension direction makes the episode really work, and a thrill to watch. Yes, there may be some... questionable choices made by the characters, but ultimately I find that I don't particularly care that much since the show still manages to deliver on what it's trying to do -- deliver a bombastic story full of tension. And I do like it.