Almost in conjunction with the arrival of the second film in the series at the cinema “Progressive” Dynit has launched the home video edition of SWORD ART ONLINE Progressive: Aria of a Starless Nightthe first feature film that takes us back to the early days of the series by narrating the story from the point of view of Asuna Yuuki instead of from that of Kirito. Based on the novel of the same name by Reki Kawahara, Aria of a Starless Night tells in a more relaxed and in-depth way the events seen in the first two episodes of the original anime series, the first meeting between Kirito and Asuna, introducing a new character. According to what is narrated in the anime destined for cinemas, in fact, it is Misumi Tozawa she said Myth — to push Asuna to wear a NerveGear for the first time, ending up trapped in the deadly game orchestrated by Akihiko Kayaba in the year (fictitious) 2022.
Shortly after logging into the world of Sword Art Online — using, among other things, her real name and the same appearance in real life — Asuna comes to terms with her inexperience in video games, but luckily she manages to reunite with Mito without too many problems, who instead chose a male avatar and a virtual identity wholly divergent from its appearance in the outside world. Just when Asuna decides to log out of the game, reluctantly discovering the absence of a logout optionthe Game Master bursts into the game, transporting everyone to the main square to inform them of the fact that it is not possible to exit the game, that dying in SAO also means dying in real life — thanks to the electrical impulses emitted by the NerveGear directly to the brain — and that the only way to free oneself is to finish the gamea hundred floors of vertical dungeon with increasing difficulty.
The script, the animations, the soundtrack are all at an excellent level and SWORD ART ONLINE Progressive: Aria of a Starless Night it is a product that will satisfy both old and new fans of the series, also resulting in an excellent entry point for those who, until now, had never approached the world of SAO. Having already told you in detail about the film itself in ours Review of Aria of a Starless Night published with the release of the film in Italian cinemas, on this occasion we will spend a few words on the limited edition box set packaged by Dynit for the home video release of the film.
Enclosed in a box with modern and minimal graphics with a predominance of red, the two discs of the film – in DVDs and Blu-raysunfortunately no 4K — are accompanied by a series of extras with a value that is just as high, if not even more exciting than the anime itself. If in the digibook-style case with the two discs we find “only” the three postcards depicting Asuna, Kirito and Mito, as well as a poster with the poster in the film, in the box there are two booklets of a certain thickness. The first of them is a color booklet of about 90 pagespaperback and printed on coated paper, which contains inside a wealth of information about the world of Sword Art Onlinea sort of compendium that tells the story of the franchise starting from the original novels by Reki Kawahara (who is celebrating the first twenty years since the beginning of work on the work) and arriving at the animated transpositions, divided into television series and feature films, accompanied from original covers, synopses and cards of the main protagonists, with the indication of the original seiyuu and the Italian voice actors and, obviously, with an eye to SWORD ART ONLINE Progressive: Aria of a Starless Nightto which a greater number of pages are devoted.
As you progress through the pages, you continue with the “cross talk”, the staff interviews involving Kawahara, the illustrator of the novels abecas well as the director and the anime staff and soundtrack responsible, inclusive Lisa and Ayase, interpreter and composer of the main theme, of which there is also the Italian translation. In the second part of the booklet we find the lineart of the monsters and weapons, the illustrations of the backdrops, the preparatory sketches and the promotional artwork of Progressive films and novels. In the end, the original script of the Voice Drama “Lisbeth” written by Reki Kawahara and released only in Japan on the occasion of the film’s fourth week of release in theaters.
The second book is instead a real original novel written by Kawahara himself, SWORD ART ONLINE Memorable Songan exclusive 65-page story featuring the protagonist Myth and that you can only find in this box set. An enormous added value for all longtime fans and for SAO enthusiasts, an unpublished content translated into our language specifically for the Italian home video edition. All these contents, added to the value of the film, in our opinion make up for every penny spent on this luxurious edition, which we strongly advise you not to miss.
The series of SWORD ART ONLINE Progressive continues with the second film, recently released in Japanese and Italian cinemas and arriving soon on Blu-ray and DVD again under the Dynit banner. By following this link you can find ours review by SWORD ART ONLINE Progressive: Scherzo of Deep Night. You can buy this limited and numbered edition box set on Amazon for just under fifty euros following this link.
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