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MASKED RIDER AGITO EPISODES 18 - 19
https://kamenriderdie.com/images/kr/agito/agito18.png This is one where I like the idea behind it, a whole story more-or-less devoted to Houjou’s ambition running up against his ideals (he has ideals!), but the execution was a little lacking. Hey, speaking of execution: those Jellyfish Unknown lightning attacks were awesome. Very cool visually, and certainly one of the most horrifying monster attacks yet on Agito. It’s a shame that the monster stuff was so minor to this story, including a final fight with Agito that was maybe four moves long. That Jellyfish dude exploded out from that fight like he had a bus to catch. It was weirdly brief. But, sort-of irrelevant, since this whole story was about Chief Tsukasa, Houjou’s mentor and the new overseer of the G3 Unit. He’s either a complex character, if you’re into his contribution to this story, or a contradictory character, if you’re feeling uncharitable. I’m not 100% sure how I feel, so soon after watching, but I’m probably leaning towards the latter. His introduction is good, his warmth and camaraderie with Houjou, the way Houjou unreservedly respects Tsukasa, it’s a neat change of pace from the cowardly striver we usually get. (Don’t get me wrong, I love that cowardly striver.) All of the Houjou/Tsukasa scenes are great, showing not just where Houjou gets his analytical skills as a detective, but also where he gets his little sarcastic jabs. (That bit at the end where Tsukasa says he used his left hand to stage the murder scene because he took a bullet for Houjou in his right arm, deadly. Merciless.) It’s a very nuanced, layered relationship between two men who share victories and defeats. That part tracks all the way through the story. It’s the rest of it that largely fell apart for me. First, it’s absolutely clear from the first second of the baker’s murder that Tsukasa did it. There’s never a single moment where there’s another suspect. That makes the inevitable reveal of why and how Tsukasa did it take forever to arrive. It’s nearly one-and-a-half episodes until Houjou lays it out for the audience. Which, that’s the second problem. Maybe 70% of the motivation for why Tsukasa killed the baker is stuff the audience is never told until the final scenes of the story. That the baker was engaged to Tsukasa’s sister, that she was murdered (I just assumed she died of non-murder reasons, stupid me), the watch and the cellphone and the remote detonator and just all of it. The story doesn’t spend any time investigating it as anything other than an Unknown attack, so there’s no place to seed in any of the clues the audience would need. We’re just kept in the dark until the very end, where two episodes worth of clues come out in one monologue. It’s a good monologue, though, and no mistake. Houjou and Tsukasa are brilliant in that scene, a mentor proud of his protege, a protege horrified to have to destroy his mentor, the shame and the guilt buried under the need to face these revelations with dignity, to honor their dedication to justice, it’s a great scene. Tsukasa has failed his ideals, and Houjou has to defend them. It’s just, Tsukasa also spends two episodes framing the G3 squad as negligent and misguided, in service of covering up his murder, so it’s a little difficult for me to see him as this, like, paragon of justice who let his need to avenge his sister warp his priorities. He keeps using the fact that the baker was murdered as proof that everything the G3 unit ever thought was wrong, and that they should be reassigned. Holy shit! That’s a monstrous abuse of power, and it’s never shown to be something he regrets or does by accident. He is basically framing them for this crime. He gets away with murder, they’re all dismissed from service. Additionally, the tactics and strategies the entire Task Force has been using are cast into doubt, tactics we know work (to a degree, anway), so expect a ton of innocent people to get hurt while the Task Force has to figure out which way is up. That’s disgusting. I think we’re supposed to see Tsukasa’s choice as a regrettable lapse of judgment, but holy shit did he throw a lot of bodies onto this one. A lot. And while we’re on the topic of bodies, let’s bring it all home and talk about Gills. He’s in the first scene of the story, a recap of when he scurried away after getting incredibly shot by G3, and then he disappears until midway through the second episode, slowly limping through tunnel, then we don’t see him again until the very end of the story. It’s a weird way to squander the momentum of the previous story, but, bright side, Shouichi’s got a new roommate!!!!!!!! !!!!! https://kamenriderdie.com/images/kr/agito/agito19.png |
Oh! Also! This story had the (maybe?) first appearance of my favorite Kamen Rider location:
https://kamenriderdie.com/images/kr/agito/favspot.png I love this location. It's beautiful, it's slightly otherworldly, it's got a bunch of captivating levels and shapes to it (those rotating stone columns in the back, I mean, what even), there's all this stone and water and space... I really love it. It's used multiple times per season for the Phase 2 shows and movies, there're any number of fun scenes that've taken place there, but there's literally only one that I think about when that location appears, and it's the only one I thought of when I saw it tonight: https://kamenriderdie.com/images/kr/agito/favspot2.png "Oh," I thought, "that's the park where the Kamen Riders were crucified." |
And not even the first nor the last time somebody in Rider hell in Tokusatsu in general gotten crucified by the villians.
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MASKED RIDER AGITO EPISODES 20 - 21
https://kamenriderdie.com/images/kr/agito/agito20.png I definitely feel at sea on the overall plot of this season. There's so many weird variables, from the Unknown to the superpowered folks to Spooky Man and Not-Shouichi to however Mana's dad and uncle figure in... it's a whole lot of ideas without a ton of clarity. I get that the Unknown are killing people with superpowers, but beyond that, I can't find much purchase. I am adrift. Luckily, it seems like the meat of a two-parter is shifting away from Random Monster Attack towards People Are Complicated, which is a change I am 1000% in favor of. This one's mostly about Aki, insane with power and slaughtering the cops who shot up Gills. (She's very excited to be killing people, all smiles. It's not work if you love what you do, I guess!) Aki's a tricky character, in that I never really got a sense of what she was about. She wants Agito to protect her, but we never learn how she knew to go to Shouichi. She wants to make a new life with Ryou, despite meeting him the day before while she was running a con trying to convince Shouichi she was his girlfriend. Then she gets powers, kills cops, draws the attention of the Unknown, and instigates what looks to be a truly epic three-way battle between our Riders. (Knowing this show, though, it'll wrap up in about five seconds due to a contrivance. This show don't love long fights these days!) She never felt like a character I understood, she felt like a series of plot complications. She knows way more than she lets on, but leaves things maddeningly cryptic. She also has zero chemistry with Ryou, rendering their tragic, doomed love story more inferred than witnessed. I'm not going to miss her, is I guess what I'm getting at. But, you know, I still think the storytelling was more interesting than a monster attack would've been. While I never got a handle on Aki's character overall, I could understand her motivations in this story. Revenge, fear, hope, freedom, these are all human emotions that are great fuel for action-adventure television. Aki's not an unknowable creature, she's a woman that can be bargained with, threatened, appealed to... I mean, she can actually talk to our heroes, which is a massive step up from the Unknown. She's a far more intriguing antagonist to me than another rubber-masked nameless monster who grunts and screams. There was tension in some of the turns of this one, wondering what she'd do and how the heroes would react. It may sound like faint praise, but I'll take a human story about a character I don't totally get over a straightforward A Monster Shows Up Until Agito Kills It story every single time. Agito as a series is in a weird phase. There's so much left frustratingly mysterious about what the hell is going on with all of the players, and we're nearly halfway done with this series. That's not fun for me. But the monster-of-the-week plots are becoming more nuanced, and less repetitive, which is a welcome development. I guess I'm cautiously optimistic about what comes next, but there are definitely a few things for this show to fix. That said, the one thing they do not have to fix are Houjou and Nijou. Every scene with them kills, and this story pairs them up for some action, some humor, and some insightful conversations about the innate goodness of humanity. I loved, loved that Houjou views humanity as inherently good because he views himself as inherently good. That is such a weird, unexpected inversion of what you'd expect from a judgmental narcissist. That is, god, that is brilliant writing. I think it totally works, though. Houjou sees himself as a caring, empathetic man, hindered by weak fools and clumsy oafs. He upholds virtues like honesty and justice, despite being a manipulative coward, and he does it because he believes humans are worth saving and protecting. I wish every character on this show was as complex and surprising as Houjou. He's the star of this show. He validates Masked Rider Agito as a concept. https://kamenriderdie.com/images/kr/agito/agito21.png |
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Personally, my favorite "hey, it's that place" toku location will always "under that one bridge", where Bravo's first transformation in Gaim was, for example. Or, you know, that really awesome entrance Agito makes in episode 12 that's perfectly timed with BELIEVE YOURSELF playing. (I refuse to write that song's name in anything but all caps by the way) |
So, first, I think there's a difference between Shouichi's normal sweetness/mindfulness and whatever is going on in episode 15. There's trusting, and then there's being taken advantage of because you don't comprehend deception. It's not something I'd normally consider a fine line, but that Aki story sure managed to find the dark side of Shouichi's worldview, in a way where they weren't even, like, critiquing it. It's apparently harder than I thought to keep Shouichi from needing round-the-clock supervision!
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There are so many great iconic/overused locales in modern Rider shows. I genuinely enjoy seeing them pop up. Under that bridge, absolutely. The short bridge the Fourze kids took to school. The hill where people ride bikes. The stadium! One of my tics when I watch Phase 2 shows is, whenever characters are fighting at/around the stadium, saying, "Big day at Kamen Rider Stadium!" I love that they shoot on every part of the stadium, nothing goes to waste. |
Well your wish is semi-granted the people at Tokusatsu Network actually made a list of fliming locations in Tokusatsu and where to find them. It quite informative and you may disagree with me I would totally go to the Pore-Pore to meet up will fellow Kuuga Fans.
https://tokusatsunetwork.com/2019/11...ing-locations/ |
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