With the way this episode didn’t have the usual opening theme song, and instead ran the credits during the opening scene, I assumed that this was going to be the final episode. But nope, it turns out that this is the penultimate episode.

The theme of this episode is: sacrifice. Both Cardinal and Eugeo make sacrifices in order to move the story along. While I was glad to finally see Eugeo do something important to try to save the day, it was a little disappointing that he became a martyr by doing so.

Another theme of this episode: Administrator is a psychotic bitch. Yes, we knew she was psychotic and that she could be a bitch, but this episode showed just how much of a combination she has of both of these traits. Yikes!

Near the end of the episode, Kirito has an epiphany, when he once again has someone jump in front of him while he’s kneeling on the ground so they can try to save his life. At least Kirito finally realized that he could get up and fight, and was able to save Alice from becoming yet another sacrifice.

This episode ends with Kirito preparing to fight against Administrator one-on-one. So I hope this means that the next episode will be action-packed.

It’s too bad that Sword Art Online: Alicization finally found its pacing with the last couple of episodes of the series. After the slow start for most of the series, and then the overly fast paced episode a couple of weeks ago, it’s been very uneven in its pacing. But I wonder if I’ll be satisfied with how this story ends, and I assume that ending will take place in the next episode. I can’t see Kirito and Administrator’s fight taking more than one episode.