Holy smokes, this turned out to be so much darker than I expected, especially the friends' past. But I loved that the message - if you can call it that - here was that nobody was irredeemable, that everyone could find their way back to the light and be forgiven. And this group? They came out of it so much stronger because after all the betrayals and lies, not one of them was innocent and so no one dared to judge. And that made their bonds and trust so much deeper and real.

I loved that the movie focused mainly on Yuichi and Tenji, on how they repaired their friendship and trust. That was simply amazing. But also, Yuichi was really, really, REALLY scary. The lengths he was willing to go win the game - when he broke his own fingers, I was honestly left gaping! - but at the same time, I was touched by how deeply he cared for Tenji, how worried he was about him when he realized that Tenji really was worthy of his trust and that it might actually kill him. And then the other way around, when Tenji found out the truth about Yuichi, that Yuichi was sold to child traffickers and abused as a kid, that he murdered 3 people in a cold blood and also let his stepmother die, and yet, Tenji did not abandon him, no, just the opposite, he stood up for Yuichi and defended him... GAH!

So many twists and turns! And so unexpected! Just when I thought I knew what was going on, the movie laughed in my face! Gosh.

One thing that bothered me a bit was that they did not manage to take down the Friendship Game, after all. But I guess, they had to choose between the data and friendship and they chose friendship. And since it was left open-ended...