[ThirstMcGurst]

Quote:

Originally Posted by JusticeMagnum

We saw him with the real gun at the end of episode 15 after he wakes up and is found by Fujimi & Nasuka.

Appreciate that, because I completely forgot.

[Frontier]

I don't think either actor for 5 and 6 got flowers, for what it's worth.

[ThirstMcGurst]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frontier

I really got the impression it was a set-up and NOX faked their deaths.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frontier

I don't think either actor for 5 and 6 got flowers, for what it's worth.

With secret agent type fiction, there is usually a double-agent. A person seeming to be a traitor ends up getting close enough to the main antagonist. But they also can end up losing themselves.

Correct me if I'm wrong, because I'm going off ADHD memory, but when he was deactivated by CODE, didn't NOX end up trapped in the dream realm?

[Sh Ranger]

Really shows how the difference between Baku and Seven is bigger than just aura and skills. When Seven received the mission to "eliminate the enemy", he accepted it. While he was willing to eliminate Nox as a last resort, he used logic to get around it by redefining enemy to mean Shadow Nightmare, making Nox a victim to be saved. Furthermore, when it seemed like he was trapped in the dream world, he didn't do nothing. He confronted his thunder nightmare and moved forward to confront Nox. Seven has his morals, but he doesn't dwell on them to no end, he keeps his head in the present.

Faiz had a memorable development where Takumi retired from fighting, as he couldn't handle the guilt of taking lives. And what brought him back to fighting was the revelation that innocent people die when he does nothing. The path of a Kamen Rider is lonely and unpleasant, but it is also necessary. Inaction is the worst sin of all, when you have the power to protect.

And that's what we're seeing with Baku here. The thing preventing him from truly becoming Seven isn't the fact that he can't speak fluent English, defuse bombs and flirt with girls, but rather his hesitation to act in an unpleasant scenario. Five even gave him the morally simple mission of eliminating the Demon King Nightmare, yet Baku couldn't even stomach being complicit in Nox's elimination. So, he does nothing and Six dies. He realizes too late that the world needs Seven, right now. "I am Seven. I am Seven. I am Seven.", he says, but he arrives to find Five dead as well, with Nox blaming CODE for putting them in front of his gun.

This is where "Seven" finally locks in and confronts his Catastrophe Gore Nightmare, whose name is so edgy that you know its power is going to be strong. "If this is the power of bad dreams, then I'm going to make your bad dream come true." is such a cold and awesome line. Sparing Nox had made everything worse, so he's not making that mistake this time.

Nasuka grieving for Kureha/Six while Fujimi comforts her was a strong emotional scene with a great performance by their actors. Fujimi calls out Baku for his failure as an agent and promptly learns the complication of CODE targeting his friend Odaka. It'll be interesting to see if he can accept this now that his friend is guilty of killing his friend's friend. Fujimi's like a specific type of viewer perspective for those who choose to have faith in Nox, defending him based on vague implications of good intent. However, I believe he has gone too far this time and I hope Fujimi will find the courage to admit that.

This arc is such a sudden escalation for the plot of Zeztz and I'm excited to see how it resolves!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frontier

It's definitely not normal for a baby to dream of a desolate landscape with the crying moans of dead people...

How would you know? That's not exactly a testable hypothesis.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ThirstMcGurst

I love this episode, but that definitely caught my attention. On top of that, he executed both Agents 5 (I believe anyways) and 6. But that was what caught my eye: Instead of using the large gun-sword combo, he chose to shoot them with an actual gun, and we the audience technically didn't actually see the shot. Just heard the noise and saw the outcome. I find that particularly interesting, but I may be overthinking that.

Shooting undisguised humans with a launcher would turn them in to red smudges, so the handgun is the PG-rated option.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ThirstMcGurst

Correct me if I'm wrong, because I'm going off ADHD memory, but when he was deactivated by CODE, didn't NOX end up trapped in the dream realm?

Nox was trapped since Shadow Nightmare wouldn't let him wake up.

[Frontier]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sh Ranger

Really shows how the difference between Baku and Seven is bigger than just aura and skills. When Seven received the mission to "eliminate the enemy", he accepted it. While he was willing to eliminate Nox as a last resort, he used logic to get around it by redefining enemy to mean Shadow Nightmare, making Nox a victim to be saved. Furthermore, when it seemed like he was trapped in the dream world, he didn't do nothing. He confronted his thunder nightmare and moved forward to confront Nox. Seven has his morals, but he doesn't dwell on them to no end, he keeps his head in the present.

Faiz had a memorable development where Takumi retired from fighting, as he couldn't handle the guilt of taking lives. And what brought him back to fighting was the revelation that innocent people die when he does nothing. The path of a Kamen Rider is lonely and unpleasant, but it is also necessary. Inaction is the worst sin of all, when you have the power to protect.

And that's what we're seeing with Baku here. The thing preventing him from truly becoming Seven isn't the fact that he can't speak fluent English, defuse bombs and flirt with girls, but rather his hesitation to act in an unpleasant scenario. Five even gave him the morally simple mission of eliminating the Demon King Nightmare, yet Baku couldn't even stomach being complicit in Nox's elimination. So, he does nothing and Six dies. He realizes too late that the world needs Seven, right now. "I am Seven. I am Seven. I am Seven.", he says, but he arrives to find Five dead as well, with Nox blaming CODE for putting them in front of his gun.

I think also that facing the full weight of how his actions indirectly lead to the death of real people, his own moral choices of prioritizing Nox/Odakka, and his Superhero Spy Fantasy kind of falling apart around him basically drove him to retreat into the only thing that could still keep him together: Being CODE 07.

[Fish Sandwich]

So, two minor things about the subs this week I feel like griping about:

- As good as "I'll break you" sounds, if the English title for the next episode is translating kowasu as "destroy", I'm surprised they didn't go with that? It probably doesn't matter at all, but I have noticed Shout seems to be paying special attention to stay consistent with things the show translates for them, like how nakama was always rendered as "comrade(s)" in 18/19, or how kokoro is... *almost* always "mind"! Lady says "soul" here, but the whole point I'm making is about how certain words mean particular things to this show, and it's pretty obvious that even in Japanese, she's using it differently than usual. Actually, I guess this is less me complaining, and more me praising Shout for being on the ball about this stuff?

- That being said, NOX's reaction to seeing Catastrom is ~maybe~ supposed to be less of a "what is that?" and more just a "is that...?" Like, the tone of the delivery sounds more like a surprised recognition of some kind than confusion to me, and it's not like he's ever cared what costume ZEZTZ is wearing before. Of course, it's a NOX line, so even if I'm right about this, I might be waiting a while to find out.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ThirstMcGurst

Instead of using the large gun-sword combo, he chose to shoot them with an actual gun, and we the audience technically didn't actually see the shot. Just heard the noise and saw the outcome. I find that particularly interesting, but I may be overthinking that.

With this show, I don't think it's overthinking at all to pay close attention what specifically we do or do not see... but, in this specific case, we can see that Five clearly reacts to Six getting shot as if it at least looked like exactly what it sounded like. So even if there is something deeper there the show hasn't told us yet, I do think the choice to avoid showing it on-screen probably is simply an artistic choice that may or may not also have to been an effort to avoid angry phone calls from concerned parents.

Quote:

Originally Posted by GoldenXtreme

not to mention some of the other baffling elements like Baku recalling something from when he was a baby.

For what it's worth, the whole point is that he doesn't actually remember it, per se? Obviously there's a certain amount of fantasy magic stuff going on with that plot point to justify it too, but those scenes in Baku's head were actually the most exciting thing in the episode for me. I think with the show's focus on people's subconscious minds, introducing the idea of something traumatic leaving a powerful impression at a young age despite not really leaving a memory sounds like a good way to explore something that does connect to reality in a thematically compelling way, despite also involving some kind of literal scary demon monster who gives Baku new toys. Just kinda sounds like Kamen Rider to me?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sh Ranger

Fujimi's like a specific type of viewer perspective for those who choose to have faith in Nox, defending him based on vague implications of good intent.

On the other hand, Fujimi is also the guy who exists to illustrate the fallacy of prematurely leaping to conclusions when you don't actually have all the information you need. Heck, even just in this one, his assertion to Minami about Baku being a full-fledged agent is well-meaning but flawed.

With NOX, the audience and Baku have both seen contradictory sides to him, but asking the question "which set of facts should we disregard?" presumes it's right to disregard a fact. The real question is "what as of yet overlooked or unknown truth will reconcile those facts into a single larger picture?" After all those Dreamer stories where Baku can only save the day by considering things from new perspectives, it's tough to imagine willful ignorance of any kind as a positive step forward in his journey as a hero.

Is it really the world that needs Seven, or just CODE's world? If choosing to spare NOX then had unforeseen negative consequences, how are we to say destroying him now will be any different? They say knowledge is power, and I don't think the thing that allows Baku to truly start turning the show's larger conflicts around is going to be available as a role-play toy from Bandai.

[DreamSword]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich

As good as "I'll break you" sounds, if the English title for the next episode is translating kowasu as "destroy", I'm surprised they didn't go with that?

I feel like I know the exact reason why they made that choice.

[Frontier]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich

- That being said, NOX's reaction to seeing Catastrom is ~maybe~ supposed to be less of a "what is that?" and more just a "is that...?" Like, the tone of the delivery sounds more like a surprised recognition of some kind than confusion to me, and it's not like he's ever cared what costume ZEZTZ is wearing before. Of course, it's a NOX line, so even if I'm right about this, I might be waiting a while to find out.

My takeaway was that he had absolutely no idea what Catastrom was and that's why he didn't expect to see it. Like how he didn't expect Zeztz to be able to no-sell his attacks like that, because he clearly didn't expect it to be that absurdly strong and durable.

Quote:

With this show, I don't think it's overthinking at all to pay close attention what specifically we do or do not see... but, in this specific case, we can see that Five clearly reacts to Six getting shot as if it at least looked like exactly what it sounded like. So even if there is something deeper there the show hasn't told us yet, I do think the choice to avoid showing it on-screen probably is simply an artistic choice that may or may not also have to been an effort to avoid angry phone calls from concerned parents.

I think the big question is whether CODE had injected that Nightmare into Baku to make him Zeztz. Or maybe that Nightmare is why he had to be Zeztz?

[Sh Ranger]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frontier

I think also that facing the full weight of how his actions indirectly lead to the death of real people, his own moral choices of prioritizing Nox/Odakka, and his Superhero Spy Fantasy kind of falling apart around him basically drove him to retreat into the only thing that could still keep him together: Being CODE 07.

True, he only felt alive as an agent in dreams, but now that he has to seriously be one in the real world, during a real crisis, it becomes a nightmare instead.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich

It probably doesn't matter at all, but I have noticed Shout seems to be paying special attention to stay consistent with things the show translates for them, like how nakama was always rendered as "comrade(s)" in 18/19, or how kokoro is... *almost* always "mind"!

Now that you mention it, I recall hearing Seven saying something about his kokoro/shin/heart when I watched Episode 1 RAW, but when I rewatched it with official subs, I saw "I know my own mind" and forgot what he actually said. Well I guess now I'm mad at the subs as well, there's a very big difference between knowing your heart and knowing your mind!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich

Is it really the world that needs Seven, or just CODE's world? If choosing to spare NOX then had unforeseen negative consequences, how are we to say destroying him now will be any different? They say knowledge is power, and I don't think the thing that allows Baku to truly start turning the show's larger conflicts around is going to be available as a role-play toy from Bandai.

I mean, the world in general does need Seven to take care of the Demon King Nightmare. Knowledge is power, sure, but is power worth risking the lives of innocents and comrades? Even if Nox is likely to be spared once more, there has to be a better outcome than letting him continue to go around trying to destroy the world to spite CODE. As long as Baku/Seven does something, instead of the nothing that got his friends killed, then hopefully it will turn out okay.