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06-07-2020, 05:38 AM | #531 |
The Immortal King Tasty
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Maybe it's just me, but every time Yuuji does the Heroic Orphnoch thing, I think, "But you murdered two people." I'm not sure if the show wants me to remember that, or forget it, but it's something I can't let go of. So the rage we see at points from Yuuji, it's like, There He Is. It really doesn't take a huge story from Kusaka to get Yuuji to feel that betrayal viscerally.
The obvious way to look at it is Yuuji is this real hero and good person that jerk Takumi should be looking up to, and that's the whole subversion the show is doing with its main characters, but I'd argue it's a lot more complex than that. Underneath the smart mouth, Takumi has a sort of nobility to him that surpasses Yuuji in some ways. His constant habit of blaming himself for everything, the way he's always prepared in his head to find out he's the one ruining things, it's all extremely unhealthy, but it shows how deeply he wants to avoid hurting people. It's not about having a code of ethics like Yuuji, he just instinctively feels that way. Back in episode 17, you know, Yuuji has to be the one to tell Takumi that Orphenoch has lost his human soul, because Takumi can't make himself pass judgments like that on anyone, even if it's right. In a way, I think that's what really makes them opposites. Takumi, he'll call you names, act extremely unmotivated and disinterested, have generally terrible manners, but that's all he'll do. He's all bark and no bite. Yuuji is the pinnacle of class, and one of the kindest, most gentle people you could ever hope to meet, but a lot of that is about how good he is at practicing restraint. We're seeing Yuuji at his best most of the time, because he keeps himself in control, but that begs the question of what his worst looks like. For Takumi, you see him at his worst pretty often, and, even if he needs more pushing when he's in those moods, not much about him changes. If you wrong Takumi, he just starts barking louder, but if you wrong Yuuji enough, he starts pulling against the leash he's on.
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06-07-2020, 06:47 AM | #532 |
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Here’s an advance notice (not that you’ll understand that reference). This arc with Faiz vs Horse lasts for a tenth of the series and the HBV falls in the middle of it.
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06-07-2020, 10:53 AM | #533 |
Standing By
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--2--
And betrayals are at the heart of this story. Takumi thinks he’s been betrayed by Yuuji, Yuuji thinks he’s been betrayed by Takumi, and Kusaka is betraying them both. But that all comes later. First, it’s the show rewarding you for caring about Yuuji and Takumi. There’s the requisite I Don’t Even Know Who You Are stomp-off by Yuuji in the beginning, where he thinks his friend is a Smart Brain assassin. And Takumi handles that rejection as well as you’d think, namely by making that face and irritating his friends. (He still tries to play the Stop Having Feelings For Someone But I Can’t Tell You Why Card! Still! He never ever learns!) That’s expected, but the pivot the show makes after that is extraordinary. You’ve got two men who have found out they don’t really know their friend at all. So they go to a friend of the friend to find out what the deal is. The whole middle section is great, where the two Teams pair off for some character definition. Mari tells Yuuji that, uh, Takumi does not have grand plans for the power of Faiz, he’s 100% not a plans guy, have you spent more than one minute with him ever. Yuka tells Takumi that, hey, Yuuji would never harm a human (again?), he’s a total sweetheart, you could do a lot worse. (That last part is implied.) Meanwhile, Kaido and Keitaro dye their hair in a hilarious attempt to reclaim their self-worth after being destroyed by love. The last one doesn’t really go anywhere, but it’s sincerely delightful. Those two actors are a comedic treasure. It was good to see Takumi and Kiba trying to find out more about each other from Yuka and Mari. Takumi knows that Yuka is a good Orphenoch so he'll believe her if she says Kiba is good. Kiba has trust in Mari and wants to see the good in people in general so he'll believe her if she says Takumi is good. And sure enough, none of their descriptions match up with what Takumi and Kiba previously thought of violent rampaging Horse and cold mercenary Faiz. They weren't fighting each other as arch enemies, they were fighting fabrications of evils that didn't exist due to a series of justified misunderstandings. Quote:
--4--
I mean, that’s drama, right? Something good happens to make it more powerful when something bad happens, and vice versa. But, god, it hurts so bad. Kusaka sees a future with Takumi and Yuuji working together, and he hates it. He’d be marginalized, made redundant. They’d be saving people, protecting some Orphnochs, fighting Smart Brain, being heroic in front of Mari… it’s his nightmare. And after Sawada brings up the mysterious events of the Ryusei Reunion, tossing out a Failure insult for good measure, Kusaka is feeling boxed in. So he schemes. He tears Yuuji and Takumi apart, framing each of them in turn for betraying the other. It’s honestly a pretty great plan! He knows that while they want to see the best in each other, those old resentments haven’t just disappeared. They’ve fought enough times that it doesn’t take a complicated lie to turn them against each other. (Although, when Kusaka calls Takumi “a silver-tongued liar” to Yuuji? And Yuuji’s like Wow Really? Again, have you spent even one minute with Takumi my dude.) There’s plenty of blame to lay at the feet of Kusaka, but I don’t think Takumi and Yuuji are blameless here. They both very easily believe the worst about the other. Takumi’s flaw is that he’s always waiting to be villainized, so he’s not surprised if people hate him. If Kusaka says that Yuuji really hates him and has a grudge, that sounds correct to Takumi. For Yuuji, his trigger is feeling betrayed by people he trusts. His cousin. His fiancee. Letting someone get close and then having that used against him, it’s one of the few things that enrages Yuuji. (He loses it at Kaido after he learns the truth about Takumi.) He’d thought he’d misjudged Takumi, been angry for nothing, but that knee-jerk is what Kusaka manipulates. Yuuji falls back on his original anger, forgetting his forgiveness. And, man, maybe that’s why it hurts so bad? Their culpability? It’s not just Kusaka tricking them, it’s him exploiting their insecurities, encouraging their worst behavior. They make the decision to see the worst in one another, and that’s heartbreaking. This is why Kusaka's so infamous, how destructive he is, the way he so easily and nonchalantly ruins relationships in pursuit of his love. Before, it was just Faiz vs Horse. Takumi and Kiba didn't hate each other at all. They were starting to become good friends. But now it's even worse. Kusaka has fabricated more imaginary evils and misdoings on both sides of the conflict to give these people who should be friends another reason to fight while behind the scenes, he just laughs at their hurt feelings and reaps the rewards of their destruction for himself. Quote:
Same goes for the "spicy food" thing, they can enjoy spicy ones more, but I don't exactly approve if they call non-spicy foods as bad or uneatable (to themselves yeah, but can't speak on the same behalf for others), or especially call those who doesn't like spicy ones (actually... that's me) are bad to not enjoy what they think are good/better.
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06-07-2020, 12:08 PM | #534 |
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In a way, I think that's what really makes them opposites. Takumi, he'll call you names, act extremely unmotivated and disinterested, have generally terrible manners, but that's all he'll do. He's all bark and no bite. Yuuji is the pinnacle of class, and one of the kindest, most gentle people you could ever hope to meet, but a lot of that is about how good he is at practicing restraint. We're seeing Yuuji at his best most of the time, because he keeps himself in control, but that begs the question of what his worst looks like. For Takumi, you see him at his worst pretty often, and, even if he needs more pushing when he's in those moods, not much about him changes. If you wrong Takumi, he just starts barking louder, but if you wrong Yuuji enough, he starts pulling against the leash he's on.
I think some of it also comes to down to how the show examines the strengths and weaknesses of the idea of motivation, of having a code. Yuuji answers a higher calling, the defense of Orphnochs' right to self-determination, and that gives him a certainty that can both give him strength and cause him to lash out. Takumi doesn't really have that core ideal. His faith is in other people, definitely not in himself, and that uncertainty in his actions both frustrates him and keeps him from making an unforgivable mistake. Quote:
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Takumi and Kiba finding out they were secretly arch enemies all along is totally a major development for their steadily growing dynamic and makes them question everything they thought they knew about each other. Takumi telling Mari to give up on him without explaining worked just as badly as it did with Keitarou but I guess he remembered what Kusaka warned him about the consequence of telling Mari about her father. Of course, keeping people in the dark works in Kusaka's favor and allows him to manipulate them easier.
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It was good to see Takumi and Kiba trying to find out more about each other from Yuka and Mari. Takumi knows that Yuka is a good Orphenoch so he'll believe her if she says Kiba is good. Kiba has trust in Mari and wants to see the good in people in general so he'll believe her if she says Takumi is good. And sure enough, none of their descriptions match up with what Takumi and Kiba previously thought of violent rampaging Horse and cold mercenary Faiz. They weren't fighting each other as arch enemies, they were fighting fabrications of evils that didn't exist due to a series of justified misunderstandings.
First, I like when the show remembers that Yuka and Takumi have a history. She's the first Orphnoch he met that had a humanity, and that was a huge moment for him. They don't get a ton of scenes together anymore, so it's a great callback to have her be the one he reaches out to. Great use of character history. The other thing is that the things Mari and Yuka say are things that Takumi and Yuuji could never ever say about themselves. Takumi, in particular, needs a Heroism Translator like Mari to make the case for why he's a good person. And, y'know, it's great to see them making a personal, specific case for their friend. Mari lets Yuuji know that Takumi is not a great friend on the outside, but he genuinely cares about people. (Yuuji doesn't have as many flaws, so Yuka's defense is more glowing.) It's just a great way to sketch out all four characters. Quote:
Peak Kusaka! The taller you build the tower, the more disappointed you are when someone comes along to destroy it. He considers Takumi and Kiba his rivals and he needs them to hate and fight each other so he can keep Mari for himself. Without that hatred, he wouldn't be able to manipulate them anymore so he needed to make them hate each other again.
This is why Kusaka's so infamous, how destructive he is, the way he so easily and nonchalantly ruins relationships in pursuit of his love. Before, it was just Faiz vs Horse. Takumi and Kiba didn't hate each other at all. They were starting to become good friends. But now it's even worse. Kusaka has fabricated more imaginary evils and misdoings on both sides of the conflict to give these people who should be friends another reason to fight while behind the scenes, he just laughs at their hurt feelings and reaps the rewards of their destruction for himself.
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06-07-2020, 12:48 PM | #535 |
The Immortal King Tasty
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Location: Every diner you've ever been to.
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I think some of it also comes to down to how the show examines the strengths and weaknesses of the idea of motivation, of having a code. Yuuji answers a higher calling, the defense of Orphnochs' right to self-determination, and that gives him a certainty that can both give him strength and cause him to lash out. Takumi doesn't really have that core ideal. His faith is in other people, definitely not in himself, and that uncertainty in his actions both frustrates him and keeps him from making an unforgivable mistake.
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First, I like when the show remembers that Yuka and Takumi have a history. She's the first Orphnoch he met that had a humanity, and that was a huge moment for him. They don't get a ton of scenes together anymore, so it's a great callback to have her be the one he reaches out to. Great use of character history.
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06-07-2020, 12:55 PM | #536 |
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06-07-2020, 04:37 PM | #537 |
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KAMEN RIDER 555 EPISODE 31
--1-- I'm sure I'm supposed to find Kusaka impossibly villainous. I'm supposed to be booing him when he enters a scene, hissing at his self-satisfied smile, longing for the moment when his treachery is exposed. But instead, I am laughing my ass off. The fact that this show had the goddamn brass balls to have Kusaka answer Takumi's questioning of last episode's events with an I Am Unbelievably Offended You Wouldn't Believe Me? That Takumi went in thinking that there's a good chance that a man who has gleefully manipulated him to his face and vowed to turn his friends against him might possibly be innocently mistaken, and he leaves the scene apologizing to Kusaka? YOU GUYS. How can I be mad at that? That turn when he says "Guess I'm alone”? That little sigh of disappointment? Chef's. Kiss. I mean, okay, yeah, I can't wait to see Horsepower and Faiz team up to punish Kusaka. Yeah, totally. But this way he has of deflecting all blame and coming out on top... only God can judge him. All the rest of us can do is delight at his awfulness. --2-- And that dude is working overtime this episode to keep everyone apart. He's gaslighting Takumi, sure, but he's also worried that Mari might end up redeeming the actually-sort-of-cute Sawada. (Kageyama was right!) The Mari/Sawada storyline is a good main plot to do when the Takumi/Yuuji plot might need to simmer on the back burner for a minute. (And it's smart to let it simmer!) Both storylines are about whether humans and Orphnochs can be friends. The Mari one, though, it's all about redemption, rather than overcoming mistrust. I really like that Mari's got a storyline of her own that's still woven into the fabric of the show. They could've given her something with the salon she worked at for one episode a million years ago (holy shit, remember when Soeno was on this show?!), but, nope, it's all Orphnochs and Lucky Clover and the themes of the show. It's as dialed-in as anything, but it's still Mari's story. It's, frankly, a lot of Getting To The Stuff in this episode. Honestly, the whole thing feels very transitional, very contemplative, which makes it tough to discuss. The Mari plot in particular is about her hoping there's still some humanity to Sawada, and Sawada fearing there's still some humanity to him. And, like, that's it? It's not a bad story, I'm really into it, but it's mostly just clarified in this episode, rather than moved forward. --3-- The Takumi/Yuuji plot is pretty much the same. Both of them feel out-of-sorts after last episode, and neither wants to risk being hurt again. Yuuji decides to use Kaido as a go-between, wanting to know if Takumi actually betrayed him. He wants to salvage their friendship, but he doesn't want to make himself vulnerable. It's a totally in-character move. It is also so obviously going to get screwed up by Kaido, and that's before Kaido relies on Keitaro to finish relaying the message. Like, you know the second Yuuji says his message out loud that it's going to get garbled, confused. You know it. And, for real? I don't blame Keitaro or Kaido! They're barely aware that anything's wrong, and they certainly don't know that Yuuji and Takumi think they've been attacked and betrayed by the other. So, no, they don't understand the weight of the message they're supposed to convey, and they don't realize that they've made everything worse. Yuuji's search for an explanation is relayed as a severing of ties, and Takumi responds with a declaration of war. Again, I get it if this all feels forced. It's a bit of a clunky device to have a misremembered message make a falling-out worse. But, for me, this isn't wacky Kaido and Keitaro screwing up. This is confirmation bias. It's Yuuji assuming he'll get hurt, so he keeps Takumi at a distance. It's Takumi waiting to be hated, so he responds with hatred. It's a frustrating spiral, these two people abandoning hope for sadness, letting their worst instincts lead the way. I get that it can feel exhausting to watch. I really do like how it's all rooted in character, though. Great story for that. --4-- Similarly, A++ episode for Houjou being a terrified coward! The way that nightmare sequence was shot, with Kitazaki going for the handshake, glowingly lit from below, all smiles. Houjou smiles back, glad to be done with this anxiety-inducing rivalry. His hand dissolves, that over-the-top reaction, big and broad and so funny. And then he wakes up, leaving Kitazaki hanging. Fifteen seconds or so of pure joy. There's a brief discussion about Lucky Clover getting back in sync, working as a team, but we don't really see it in this one. It's that goofy-ass Houjou nightmare, and that's about it. --5-- Yeah, it's pretty much all about the Mari/Sawada plot (which is not the most robust story when they don't even share a scene until the end) and the Yuuji/Takumi plot (which, hey, they also end up not sharing a scene at all). It's an episode about trying to kindle some hope, to allow for reconciliation despite everything that happened. It's all pretty tentative, folks dealing with their feelings first to understand what outcome they want. It makes for an episode of good scenes that somehow feels incomplete. I didn't dislike anything in this one, but it feels like it's more about mood than content, if that makes any sense. Great mood, though.
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06-07-2020, 05:03 PM | #538 |
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Though yeah there's dysfunctional part on both Takumi and Yuji, it doesn't absolve Kusaka's horrible traits here at all. He still did this horrible thing, even if it's worsening Takumi and Yuji's personal problems. What Yuji probably doesn't know for have you spent even one minute with Takumi my dude, is that Kusaka's been living with Takumi in Kikuchi household, and latest episodes have them team around. Here they really exploited the thing this series run where belts here can be wielded by anyone. But Yuji has witnessed the belt being worn by Takuma! He clearly just wasn't right in his head. It seems that here, Yuji didn't really fight back, I wonder if Yuji doesn't because of his emotional ties to Takumi, who he thought is a primary Faiz user. Then again he's now convinced that Takumi is a horrible person Kusaka described to him but still didn't? If he defeats Faiz right there he'll demorph into human form and it's revealed it's Kusaka wearing the belt. And instead it's Kusaka knocking him down, and serves to help his plan further by deceiving Takumi too that Yuji is stealing/wearing the Faiz belt in an attempt to hunt him. Quote:
But, shit, maybe folks feel differently! I can see this being a thing that, to some, smacks of writerly contrivance. Kusaka has to scheme a bit to tear them apart, and schemes can make viewers feel manipulated.
It didn’t for me. I thought it all worked like gangbusters. (Well, maybe not some of the Jet Sliger effects work. Definitely took too big a swing on having two of those in the climax!) I loved how internally generated all of the conflict was, how it harnessed 30 episodes of character growth to just grab my heart and squeeze. Did this one work for y’all? Let me know!
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06-07-2020, 05:36 PM | #539 |
The Immortal King Tasty
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You really have to admire the iron will that guy has when it comes to his goals. Even when his stupidly obvious plan to join Lucky Clover inevitably failed, he just brushes it off and moves on like it's nothing. You never know what antics he's going to get up to next. He's so lucky his primary targets are the specific group of people they are, because if he said "Do I look like a guy who would knock you out cold and steal your stuff as part of an elaborate plan to frame you?" to most strangers, his eyebrows alone would probably tell them "yes" in a heartbeat.
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06-07-2020, 06:12 PM | #540 |
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It seems that here, Yuji didn't really fight back, I wonder if Yuji doesn't because of his emotional ties to Takumi, who he thought is a primary Faiz user. Then again he's now convinced that Takumi is a horrible person Kusaka described to him but still didn't? If he defeats Faiz right there he'll demorph into human form and it's revealed it's Kusaka wearing the belt. And instead it's Kusaka knocking him down, and serves to help his plan further by deceiving Takumi too that Yuji is stealing/wearing the Faiz belt in an attempt to hunt him.
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Also Faiz having Jet Slinger too (never realized, I thought he only has Auto Vajin, and Jet Slinger is exclusive to Delta)... would that mean Faiz (and Kaixa potentially) actually has better arsenals than Delta? He has 2 assists compared to Delta's 1 (only Jet Slinger so far).
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Kusaka is one of the funniest characters in Kamen Rider history. I mean, he's a horrible person and irredeemable and also maybe pitiable and whatever else, but he's hilarious. Dude is so overly tense at all times and seems to honestly believe every word out of his mouth once he's said it, even when he doesn't, which is most of the time. It's endearing after a while.
You really have to admire the iron will that guy has when it comes to his goals. Even when his stupidly obvious plan to join Lucky Clover inevitably failed, he just brushes it off and moves on like it's nothing. You never know what antics he's going to get up to next. He's so lucky his primary targets are the specific group of people they are, because if he said "Do I look like a guy who would knock you out cold and steal your stuff as part of an elaborate plan to frame you?" to most strangers, his eyebrows alone would probably tell them "yes" in a heartbeat. (Also, Kusaka's lies are perfectly calibrated to let someone's suspicions and insecurities fill in the rest, but it's all still funny as hell.)
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