Ready Player two by Ernest Cline
Ready Player Two by Ernest Cline is a sequel that proves the age-old adage: lightning doesn’t strike twice, but disappointment sure can. If you were hoping for another nostalgic joyride through the pop culture wonderland of the ’80s, this book serves up a lukewarm rerun that makes you question why you ever cared in the first place.
The plot picks up right after the events of Ready Player One, with Wade Watts now in control of the OASIS. You’d think with unlimited power, our protagonist might have evolved into someone more interesting. Instead, Wade is still the same selfish, petulant nerd-king, now abusing his god-like admin privileges to stalk people and act creepy around women. There’s a point where he hacks into the camera feed of a young woman (unconscious in virtual reality) to ogle her body. But don’t worry, he feels bad about it afterwards, so that makes it okay, right? Cline’s attempt to address gender issues and diversity feels like a slapdash apology tour, heavy-handed and, frankly, unconvincing.
As for the plot, it’s a near carbon-copy of the first book, but this time with even more obscure pop culture trivia shoved down your throat at every turn. There’s another quest—because of course there is—involving the collection of “Seven Shards” (who needs originality, anyway?) while the stakes are laughably recycled: die in the game, die in real life. The narrative lurches from one clumsy ‘80s reference to another, like a drunk uncle at a wedding trying to tell a joke he’s forgotten the punchline to. In Ready Player One, this deluge of nostalgia was fun and fresh; in Ready Player Two, it feels like you’re trapped in a trivia night that never ends.
The characters don’t fare much better. Wade’s friends, Aech, Shoto, and Art3mis, are little more than cardboard cutouts with almost no growth since the last book. Aech, in particular, is reduced to a hollow stereotype, suddenly obsessed with her “ancestral homeland” in a way that was never hinted at in the original. And Shoto? He’s apparently swapped out samurais for ninjas because Cline has exactly two ideas about Japanese culture.
If there’s a silver lining to this bloated, nostalgia-crammed disaster, it’s that it finally ends. The resolution feels like a desperate attempt to tie up loose ends, but by the time you get there, you’re too worn down to care. In short, Ready Player Two is an overlong, self-indulgent sequel that should have stayed in the draft folder. For fans of the first book, it’s a bitter reminder that sometimes, sequels just aren’t worth the wait. For everyone else, skip it entirely.
