“Alice in Borderland” knows that in the end, what fools we mortals be

Expecting a definitive answer may have been a foolish expectation to have for “Alice in Borderland,” a series that revels in the in-between.

Characters engaged in the show’s death games are neither entirely heroic nor villainous as they make decisions out of self-preservation that spell doom for their fellow players. And of course the very name of Borderland points to the purgatory-like nature of the realm, not existing in the real world nor in the afterlife. Therefore, when the series began teasing its third season with the promise of meeting the Joker – the presumed final boss running the show in Borderland – the person who showed up was not the Joker after all . . . or was he?

After Arisu (Kento Yamazaki) wins the games and refuses to join Borderland as a citizen – for the second time – he’s met by a mysterious gentleman (Ken Watanabe), dressed in head to toe in gray: from his bowler hat and salt-and-pepper beard to the long, charcoal coat. Arisu, of course, asks if he’s the Joker.

“Who is the Joker? Who could it be? Is it God? Or is it me?” is the cryptic reply. Later, the man adds, “The Joker is not a person. Neither is it an entity that controls this world. Nor an entity that oversees the games we play. The Joker is just a card.”

He also gives a lengthy explanation involving the playing cards and days of the year to essentially say that the Joker represents gaps in time, whatever that means. Thanks, that was as clear as your dark suit, not-Joker.

This character was only teased lightly in Haro Aso’s “Alice in Borderland” manga on which the show is based. In the original story, Arisu meets a shadowy figure with no discernible features briefly after he defeats the Queen of Hearts, Mira (Riisa Naka), at the end of Season 2. The figure drops a Joker card on the table, and answers Arisu’s questions with only more questions . . . and then Arisu returns to the real world without any answers.

Because the first two seasons of the series exhausted the bulk of Arisu’s arc in the manga, director and co-writer Shinsuke Sato felt that this tiny, baffling scene could be saved to create a bigger impact in the third season. Sato spoke to Salon about fleshing out the role.

“In the manga, it is a very elusive character in that we don’t know if it’s a human being, if it’s alive, if it has any substance,” said Sato. “Maybe it’s just kind of a shadow or something like a cloud or a yokai; we’re not quite sure. We don’t know if it was something that had lived in the real world, that came to this realm that is a spirit as Mira was.”

Ken Watanabe, the watery watchman

The physical embodiment of this character comes courtesy of none other than Ken Watanabe, the acclaimed actor known in Hollywood for films ranging from “The Last Samurai” and “Memoirs of a Geisha” to “Letters from Iwo Jima” and “Godzilla: King of Monsters.” While the actor carries himself with an air of authority, the inscrutable nature of this role is destabilizing for those in his presence.

Below the cliff where Arisu and this gentleman converse lies a vast body of churning water with a foreboding whirlpool at its heart. With one long, deep intonation, the man has stopped all time around them – freezing the water in place – a demonstration of unfathomable power.

“Well, it’s Ken Watanabe; he has that aura, that presence that was overwhelming,” star Kento Yamazaki told Salon about his costar in the pivotal scene. “I had a little bit of healthy nervousness as well. But when you think of the character, Arisu is just trying to get [his wife] Usagi back, and so I felt that I, as Arisu, should just be direct in my interaction with this character, the elderly gentleman. And [Arisu] was smiling, because just as with the character, I also have a little bit of confidence from having overcome the challenges of Season 1 and Season 2. So that also helped.

“In addition to that, even when we were not filming, he’s such a gentle person, and he would often talk to me or approach me even when the camera is not rolling,” Yamazaki continued. “So I was able to feel very relaxed and film the scenes. He had a lot of ideas as well, including how he would kind of murmur or roar to stop the time. So that all became something that was very educational for me.”

Besides being able to stop time temporarily, the shadowy character also serves another function in Borderland. After pointing out that the whirlpool is the entryway to death, he says, “I am the Watchman. My purpose, you see, is solely to watch the space between life and death. Everybody dies. I serve as the Watchman at the gates of death, and for my services, death passes me by.”

Arisu notes that even the Watchman may fear death since he can safely avoid that inevitability while others can’t. This paradox seems fitting for a season built on ambiguity.

“We wanted this man-like figure to be the gatekeeper of death, and we wanted him to talk of death or the afterworld,” added Sato. “However, since he is but a gatekeeper, he also doesn’t really grasp the entirety of what death or the afterworld actually is. Even he has questions and ponders about it. So I wanted to leave that kind of open ending in that we don’t entirely arrive at an answer.”

The whirlpool gateway to death

Water as the final pathway to death is baked into Japanese folklore, which tells of the Sanzu River where a soul must pay money to cross into the afterlife. Souls of children who die before their parents are not able to traverse the river on their own, and instead stack stones on the river bank. In Aso’s manga, just after the Joker figure appears, Arisu envisions a scene of a large, humanoid creature poling a boat full of figures across a body of water toward a distant shore. On the nearby shore, other figures are seen stacking stones. A sign reading “Sanzu River” juts out from piled skulls.

“To talk about that whirlpool, the uzumaki, there is in the original manga series, a scene where there’s copious amounts of water,” said Sato. “We decided to put it at the end of Season 3 because it’s very visually fitting for the notion that this is the gateway to death.

“At one point when we we’re talking about the gates to heaven or hell, that maybe there should be a doorway, but it seemed the water and a vortex – and it sucking us towards death – seemed just more appropriate. In the Japanese mind, we always talk about a river that we have to cross as we go over into that other world. We often talk about being on this side of the river or that side of the river. So I think it is part of our consciousness, this idea of water and river, and that being the borderline between life and death.”

The afterlife

The mystery of what death brings is a central focus for the season, especially for new character Ryuji (Kento Kaku), a professor obsessed with the afterlife following a heartbreaking incident with a student. This promise of finally discovering the truth about death is what leads him to return to Borderland, luring Arisu’s wife Usagi (Tao Tsuchiya) along with him.

However, this gateway is where “Alice in Borderland” stops . . . at least for now.

“I had this kind of visual image in my mind of copious amounts of water just swallowing the entire world,” Sato said. “And underneath that uzumaki, there’s nothing, there’s blackness. It’s like a black hole, so it’s something that envelops or swallows everything. But I really can’t give you an answer as to what is beyond that black, black hole. So we have that gatekeeper there talking of the world of death, but I myself really don’t have a concrete answer as to what goes beyond that.”

Someone who could possibly answer that question would be Ryuji, who in the end decides to satisfy his curiosity and give himself over to the whirlpool. This is in stark contrast to Arisu, who has cheated death multiple times in the games and ultimately refuses the Watchman’s suggestion. “Just throw yourself into the vortex,” he says, trying to coax Arisu. “It’s quite . . . empty, emptier than you can imagine. There’s no more pain, no more suffering.”

But Arisu points out, “. . . and no happiness, either.”

Arisu and Usagi make it back to the real world, postponing their final whirlpool voyage to someday in the future, and instead choosing life. The two have come a long way from the beginning of the series when Usagi was distraught over her father’s untimely death, and when Arisu had no direction in life. Now, she’s fully present and focused on preparing for the birth of their child, and he’s mentally stronger, becoming a counselor who helps various other survivors that have returned from Borderland.

Yamazaki can’t help but feel similarly optimistic when reflecting on Arisu’s and his own journey.

“What Arisu experiences is something that I could apply to my own way of living,” said the actor. “There’s so much to learn. I had those thoughts in how in my real life, this thought will be translated with the character of Arisu. We were able to overcome so many challenges and games. I feel like I really grew with Arisu, and it’s been quite some time since we started Season 1. All the experience, I think, simply has made my heart stronger. And of course, this being such an epic show, there are challenges that come with filming, but again, having overcome that has given me confidence I feel. And also to be able to be part of a show that’s beloved, not just by Japanese audiences, but global audiences, just is such an amazing feeling.”