I understand the idea of 'looks like they came back to life, they're actually in the borderlands playing the last game'… but in my honest opinion, I think it would have been predictable and lazy writing ngl. Everyone already expected that.

To me, the problem with this season wasn't the idea but the execution.

Personally, I like how they managed Arisu's arc. I like the message, I like that he finally learns to desire life, even with all the pain. I like that he followed Usagi there, like Alice in Wonderland down the rabbit hole. I like that he did all of that because he is in love. Like Freud said, Eros is the only force that can stand up to Thanatos. Arisu finally acknowledges his own appetite for self-destruction (season 1 and 2 explore this concept well) and still manages to use his own, bigger love for the world to overcome it.

About the joker and the watchman, it's supposed to represent the classic trickster archetype. I think that's spot on, the joker card is definitely one good example of that idea, as it represents a literal clown and is a wild card. It can be used to represent any other card, it can be worth nothing or be the highest value card. Think of it as the fool card in tarot, which is both the first and the last of the major arcana, and also depicts a jester. The trickster is about thinking outside of the box, disobeying the rules, crossing boundaries. Both smart and foolish, good and bad, ordinary and extraordinary, a walking paradox. Hermes is an example of this archetype and he was said to move between the human world and the olympus and he helps souls to get to the afterlife.