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01-16-2021, 02:41 AM | #631 |
I have a problematic type
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Yeah, this one was definitely weird. I liked it, but it feels really out of place. The show just went in hard on its lore in the last few episodes with the Natives, the Red Shoe System, and some big reveals about Hiyori. And the follow up is something that feels like a complete throwaway Monster of the Fortnight story. There are some attempts at nodding to the larger story, but it feels like a major halt in the show's momentum. Even the first appearance of Hyper Kabuto's sword doesn't feel like a big event since it just appears out of nowhere with no explanation, Kiva style.
It is really fun, though. In some ways it feels very Showa with the whole school haunted by monsters and the Riders investigating it. There are some really nice shots that help build the horror element, including that great bit at the beginning with the baseball team. Keiko's a really engaging guest character, too, and I like how the show develops her character. It's a really funny episode, too. Tsurugi's presence is incredibly forced and nonsensical, even by his own standards, but goddamn if he doesn't continue to be hilarious. I'm not sure what part I liked the most: the running gag of Jiiya getting dragged out of the classroom, the absurd response to the math question, or Tsurugi's delightful misinterpretation of his punishment as some kind of reward. So many good comedic bits in this one. So, small piece of trivia I discovered when looking up the cast for this episode: Keiko's actress also appeared on Fourze as one of its teens in trouble, too. She was the photographer who didn't want to graduate because she liked high school so much. |
01-16-2021, 02:52 AM | #632 |
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It's a really funny episode, too. Tsurugi's presence is incredibly forced and nonsensical, even by his own standards, but goddamn if he doesn't continue to be hilarious. I'm not sure what part I liked the most: the running gag of Jiiya getting dragged out of the classroom, the absurd response to the math question, or Tsurugi's delightful misinterpretation of his punishment as some kind of reward. So many good comedic bits in this one.
Otherwise, yeah, A+ episode for Tsurugi insanity. You will hate me for saying this, but it reminded me a ton of the first appearance of Kiriya on Hibiki, and that made me happy.
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01-16-2021, 04:00 AM | #633 |
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I won’t have much to say about this storyline until you get to the concluding part.
And like Switchblade said, Keiko’s actress, Kasumi Suzuki, did go on to appear as the Coma Zodiarts in Fourze (the one where, if you ask me, they weren’t even trying to make their identity a mystery). But prior to that, she portrayed the villainess Rije in “that claw-footed Sentai you can’t remember the name of”. |
01-16-2021, 07:29 AM | #634 |
The Immortal King Tasty
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I vividly remember this fence. Like, I don't know how true this is for other people, but the weirdest things get lodged in my long-term memory sometimes. Little associations that become inextricably linked with some feeling or event. I have a special fondness for the Liar Dopant episodes of Double because I can still smell the pleasant summer breeze coming in through the window I had open when I was originally watching them. That sort of thing – where you're not even sure what you remember happened that way (was it even those episodes?), but you remember it all the same. The thing I associate this fence with is how entirely checked out I was on Kabuto in its later stages. I think I let these two episodes dominate a lot of my memory of the show in the long run, which is hopefully a huge mistake on my part, because this specific episode honestly was exactly how I remembered it, and that's not exactly a good thing. First off, I mean, it was honestly sort of validating to find out how important that fence is. That school rooftop setting sees a ton of use in this first part alone, and since these are Nagaishi episodes, you'd better believe he's in love with prominently displaying that fence to stress it as the unique defining feature of that location. The other positive thing I remember about this episode is Tsurugi being the only character I even remotely care about, and that held just as true. He is beyond cute, and his puppy-like enthusiasm is impossible not to respond to in kind. This episode bores me, by and large, but not when he's on-screen. Never when he's on-screen. Beyond that, though, there's a very generic, pretty low-stakes monster mystery plot that, honestly, I don't hate as a concept. As a huge fan of both Ghost and Wizard, I'm actually quite into the idea of a Rider show that can still make the time to do some fun weekly adventure stuff late into the run. It's nice to have some room to breathe, at least occasionally. One of my favorite bits in here is even just the classic Tendou/Juka scene at the start; a comforting return to the status quo after Kageyama and Renge were tearing that house up earlier. But like Die says, the emotional substance here is a little sparse, and as I'm about to say, everything surrounding it is full of things I remember not liking about this stretch of Kabuto. I mean, while I don't want to bang on about this forever (I mean, I definitely do, but that's not the point), I definitely would've been way more invested in whatever weird filler plot the show wants to do if it involved Hiyori. But it obviously can't do that right now, and her absence is one of those things that symbolizes how Kabuto has sort of entered a new era by this point, with many things starting to fall by the wayside. The old guard of supporting Riders are largely downplayed in favor of the Hoppers, characters I've established don't rub me the right way, which is why I cling so much to Tsurugi's continued presence. On a pure mechanical level, as well, their lack of Masked Forms is a sign of how the series has stopped caring about one of its defining features – Clock Up. There's a bit in the middle were Kabuto and Gatack ride in on their bikes, already in Rider Form, and the monster gets away by running fast. It takes a lot to make me not happy to see bike action, but that'll do it. It's a scene that belongs in Blade more than it does Kabuto, and Tendou taking a dare not to even use Hyper Form's entire defining feature at the end rubbed some serious salt in that wound. I do not like the Perfect Zecter, or its introduction. It's a less clever rehash of how Tendou got the Hyper Zecter, and it feels more like a parody of him as a result. I feel like people who hate Tendou probably think scenes like this are how he was always written, when the show often handles him with so much more grace than summoning a sword from the sky to show off. While there's a second half to this story left, this episode, at the end of the day, didn't do anything to convince me I was exaggerating its flaws in retrospect. It's not a total misfire, don't get me wrong; I wasn't sitting there waiting for it to be over, and it has its fun moments, but on this rewatch, I've repeatedly been surprised by how much better Kabuto holds up than I thought it would, and that wasn't the case here.
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01-16-2021, 09:52 AM | #635 |
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Oof, didn't realize that the HBV discussion also involves ep. 36...
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KAMEN RIDER KABUTO - EPISODE 36
Every show with a Rider team has it somewhere in their season, I think. Someone gets possessed, or gets blackmailed, or whatever. One or more hero turns bad, and the remaining heroes need to fight them. That seemed to be the territory we were in with this Tendou Vs Kagami story, where Tendou’s need to protect Hiyori tips over into outright villainy, and Kagami’s Very Big Feelings are crushed in the fallout. I’d’ve been okay with that. But this show opted to do something smaller, more nuanced, and I really appreciate that. It went for a story about how people can disagree without dismantling their friendships, how you can be pissed off at someone and still be there for them when it matters. It also did a story about how the value of friendship isn’t just cheering you on when you’re right, it’s also checking you when you’re wrong. Quote:
I like the way this episode approaches friendships, where it doesn’t settle for letting unwavering support be just telling people They Can Do It or whatever. It sometimes means hanging around and telling people that they are screwing up big time. It’s not about Kagami abandoning his friendship with Tendou because they disagree, it’s about Kagami telling Tendou he disagrees with him, repeatedly, because he’s Tendou’s friend. That shit can get strained (as much as they’re working together this episode to further their search for Hiyori, they ain’t exactly palling around), but true friendship means sometimes fighting with your friends to keep them from making mistakes. I really love how minor the show made the argument at the heart of this Break-Up story, how much the bond of these two was able to withstand a disagreement.
Also here, Tendou shows defiance to Mishima directly, controlling ZECT members in Misaki and Renge, and talk about how organization doesn't matter to him. Mishima sees Tendou highly, considering him first-rate human, so probably his response to him afterwards isn't like what he did to Kagami, Misaki, Kageyama, Renge, etc? Quote:
It’s the rare Kabuto episode that ends with Tendou apologizing for making a mistake. (Kagami even mentions how weird it is!) But Tendou does apologize to Kagami at the end of this one, and commits to returning the various Zecters. He’s seen what can happen if he’s the only Rider left, and it is not good. The Zecters want to destroy Worms, full stop. While a Rider can harness the Zecters, they can’t exactly control them, which means the Rider doesn’t get to make allowances for The Good Ones like Hiyori. If Tendou doesn’t have anyone watching his back, Hiyori could be the next Worm killed. Tendou’s realized that he needs a support system if he’s going to create a world where Hiyori’s safe.
(I don’t… I’m not sure I 100% believe Kagami Outrageous’s explanation to Tendou about the Zecters being all Pro Ice killers of Worms. Literally the only time we see a Zecter go psychotic is in this episode, and it’s against a Native who could previously summon the Zecter. It doesn’t completely hold up as a piece of information. I’m not sure if it’s a total lie on Outrageous’s part, or if there’s some new evolution of the Kabuto Zecter we haven’t been clued in on, but the behavior of the Zecter here feels different. I wouldn’t be surprised if the belt or the Zecter had been tampered with in some way, to get Kabuto to try and kill Tachikawa. It doesn’t feel like what Outrageous would want, what with ZECT being ordered to protect Tachikawa, but I don’t have any clue what that dude’s endgame is. Anyway, long story short, I’m operating under the idea that Outrageous is telling the truth, while acknowledging that it’s probably a lie.) Also, for the info Tachikawa gives in this episode, that is the answer of why Tendou's parents are already on Earth before the meteorite. The Worm that impersonated Kusakabe parents are Natives too. Otherwise Tachikawa is the good monster for this series, like Shima of Blade or Cubi of Ghost, he had peaceful nature, uses his power only to defend the ones around him. He works at a nursery school and loves playing with the kids. Daigo saw a mother and her child being threatened by Worm and changed to his Native form and attacked the other Worms, letting the mother and child escape. And he's the male that has to be protected by other people! Quote:
Tsurugi is the only person who is able to stomach Renge's food. And that's a total opposite of what he's pampered with for his whole life, with luxurious foods, previously he was able to enjoy an ordinary food in takoyaki, but here, he was able to enjoy a food that is ineligible to eat, the totally opposite end of the food he tasted before. Renge's clumsy tendencies in daily life is a total opposite too of her fighting capabilities that is above most soldiers (the part where the heated lid hits Yumiko, that made me wince). The best preparation for potatoes to me would be the crispy and crunchy one.
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01-16-2021, 12:33 PM | #636 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
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Beyond that, though, there's a very generic, pretty low-stakes monster mystery plot that, honestly, I don't hate as a concept. As a huge fan of both Ghost and Wizard, I'm actually quite into the idea of a Rider show that can still make the time to do some fun weekly adventure stuff late into the run. It's nice to have some room to breathe, at least occasionally. One of my favorite bits in here is even just the classic Tendou/Juka scene at the start; a comforting return to the status quo after Kageyama and Renge were tearing that house up earlier. But like Die says, the emotional substance here is a little sparse, and as I'm about to say, everything surrounding it is full of things I remember not liking about this stretch of Kabuto.
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Though if you praise their act here, I wonder how would you respond against real life edgelords (one of their characteristics is that they think they're great due to their bad traits or supporting them, and being "different"), especially that on Internet here, they're plenty.
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01-16-2021, 01:08 PM | #637 |
I got nothing
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Posts: 148
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Yup as Fish touched on this is around the point budget issues lead to the removal of clock up from the series for the most part (I legit can only think of a few more times it gets used after this 2 parter).
Speaking of the most recent episode I really dig it granted it’s more in hindsight as setup for the next one, but a particular highlight of this one os the out of nowhere appearance of the Perfect Zector to sell toys..... I mean to allow Tendou prove his bullies wrong. |
01-16-2021, 01:38 PM | #638 |
The Immortal King Tasty
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I'd normally expect Tendou to more forcefully confront a threat, or agitate a situation until an adversary shook to the top. (When he tries to find the Drunk Doctor Duplicate, he's trying all sorts of crazy tricks!) Here, he's just, like, stationing guards? Even his interactions with Keiko are minor, non-illuminative. There's a real sense of complacency in this plot, and that's not what I associate with Kabuto?
Although I guess this could just be a newer, more mellow Tendou, after being broken down so hard in the last story. Like, yeah, he could do something daring and exciting to intervene in this situation, but hey, why not make a fun day with his friends out of it? Just chill on a rooftop making people noodle bread, and take it easy. A Worm is getting away? Eh, you can always get 'em later. One tells you not to use Hyper Clock Up? Sure, you're open to suggestions right now! ...I'm mostly joking here, but on the other hand, I think this head-canon might legitimately make the story work better. You really hit the nail on the head here; it doesn't much feel like a Kabuto plot in terms of structure.
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01-16-2021, 02:57 PM | #639 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
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Also, I think he just wants to run restaurants as often as he can, and he's using this whole investigation as a smokescreen to get ZECT to fund his yakisoba stand.
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01-16-2021, 03:00 PM | #640 |
Standing By
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No joke, I legitimately LOVED how Hyper Kabuto's sword shows up. The Worm Widowettes are mocking Kabuto for needing Hyper Clock Up to win fights, so Kabuto's just like Eff You Here's A Sword From The Sun Now What Are You Gonna Say. It's like he uses his new toyetic weapon as a comeback to shut up some heckling adversaries, and I love that? That feels like an intensely Tendou move.
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I won’t have much to say about this storyline until you get to the concluding part.
And like Switchblade said, Keiko’s actress, Kasumi Suzuki, did go on to appear as the Coma Zodiarts in Fourze (the one where, if you ask me, they weren’t even trying to make their identity a mystery). But prior to that, she portrayed the villainess Rije in “that claw-footed Sentai you can’t remember the name of”. Aba-Aba-Aba-Aba-Abaranger! Quote:
I vividly remember this fence. Like, I don't know how true this is for other people, but the weirdest things get lodged in my long-term memory sometimes. Little associations that become inextricably linked with some feeling or event. I have a special fondness for the Liar Dopant episodes of Double because I can still smell the pleasant summer breeze coming in through the window I had open when I was originally watching them. That sort of thing – where you're not even sure what you remember happened that way (was it even those episodes?), but you remember it all the same.
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