Wizard Episode 50: "What Is Important?" Discussion
 

When I thought that Koyomi will simply die running out of mana.....the ending did made a good troll.....

After I saw what went down I can no longer hate Haruto. I can only pity him because Koyomi and White Wizard are dead, Gremlin has the P. Stone which has Haruto's mana in it AND he will use it to hurt and kill people and no one can help him with one Mage suffering a breakdown (Mayu) the other saying "screw this I'm going home! (Green) Blue being unable to help because he's too young and Nito having lost his powers to save Tokyo.

I don't foresee a happy ending here. Only darkness and despair unless there's something to turn despair into hope.

*wink wink*

Don't feel like futzing with Spoiler tags, so if you haven't seen it, don't read this post.

You can't make me feel for Fueki, regardless of how tragic a situation you put him in. He's just too much of a monster for me to give a crap.
Oh, and Koyomi kicked the bucket too? It would be a bigger surprise if she actually chose to stay dead in the next episode.
I'm sorry. I know I'm supposed to be tearing up and getting misty eyed during her death, but she's been such a non factor that I haven't grown to attach to her. Honestly, Shunpei or Rinko dying would've had a larger emotional impact on me. Koyomi means less to me than Yuzuru and his bike.

For the rest, it's rather nice. Yuzuru trying to pick up Nitou's slack by keeping his Wizard powers, Mayu realizing she was just a tool, like Misa/Medusa, and I guess the theory was true. Gremlin was the one who got to place take out White Wizard. I don't know what's so special about his sword, though. I wonder if they'll explain it.

It's a nice episode with lots of deaths. Didn't see Fueki's death coming so soon but I guess Gremlin was set up to be the End Boss all along (although he's been in the background of late). Koyomi did her best acting job in this episode so it's a good way for her to go, but we all know that she will be back, judging by the preview for next week's ep. It's going to be Kengo all over again. Sigh.

Yet another awesome episode! The final run of this series just continues to impress me. Fueki's death while not totally unexpected was done well. I originally theorized he would fall by Gremlin and get a sliver of redemption from it. Even though I hate Gremlin it was nice to see Fueki utterly defetead.

Also as I thought it appears Gremlin wants to use the stone to become fully human but as a side effect of being the paradox that he is, he'll simply mutate into a new Phantom Form. Since he's a human within a Phantom I doubt he could use it to ever become human again.

And Koyomi's death was likewise expected but I really do hope that her words "you can't bring back a life that's been lost" hold up. I'd be incredibly disappointed if they pulled another Kengo on us this year and the death wound up being meaningless.

I think that part is going to be vital for the ending, in that a Phantom can't become a human again.

Anyway, add me to the "Hope Koyumi stays dead" bus, too.

:cool:

Very good episode. Gaim is going to have to really pull out all the stops to make a main Rider more awesome than Haruto.

I'm glad they didn't try to redeem Fueki in the end. He was a villain up until the very end. His goal wasn't bad - selfish, to be sure, but what parent wouldn't want to save his child - but his motives were completely evil and there was no coming back from it. Not even if a bunch of people got up on a stage in a gym and made speeches while Haruto beat him up. :p

I'll admit that I didn't initially peg Gremlin as the final boss, but I like him so I'm willing to roll with it.

I still don't see what you see in Haruto...

I still don't see why people don't like him.

I mean, I can see why he feels very different from the last several guys, but I don't see why so many people find it off-putting and dull.

I think he's great. It's kind of hard to easily put it into words without just listing stuff I like about him, but it mostly boils down to just really, really liking the character. He's a dedicated hero who proactively hunts the monsters, he doesn't get easily sidetracked, and he's willing to make some hard decisions when he has to (the film student and his old teacher). I like that he's confident and serious on the surface, but still can display emotions when he can't keep up the cool facade. I think he can be really funny - in a subtle way, not the broad rubber-faced overacting that is standard tokusatsu humor. Really, I like that he's basically a modern version of the Showa Riders' best qualities (minus Ichimonji and Kazami's evil laughs - we need a Rider who can bust that out again). He's not an arrogant jerk, he's not a barely competent goofball, he's not a bathing emo, he's a bonafide superhero. And he's awesome.

I actually don't see the differences from Haruto and Eiji or Wataru. From your description, those two fit that rather well, too.

I've stopped "Not liking" Haruto, however, I don't see what makes him one of the greatest protagonists you hail him as.

Well said sir!

To be fair, I do like Eiji. He's not one of my all-time favorites, but I like him quite a bit. Wataru... I get yelled at when I talk about Wataru. :p

But no, the biggest difference between Haruto and the other two is that Eiji and Wataru's stories are very different. Both start off as kind of reluctant and not completely competent heroes. Eiji spends much of the series letting Ankh guide him in battle and Wataru sulks in the bathtub whenever he has to do anything. Their stories are more about their journey from that novice state to the moment where they are fully independent and capable badasses (or Kiva). Haruto skips that growing phase and begins the show as a fully formed hero. We don't have to see him go through the days when he had no idea how to fight or use his rings, we start the show with his powers fully in place and under control. That's not necessarily a better or worse kind of story, but taking out the neophyte phase tends to make him look stronger because we never had to see him try and figure stuff out.

I liked Nitou over Haruto but still both of them are in my top 10 list. Sad that Nitou lost his powers to transform into Beast i hope chimera returns back to Nitou and i also hope that Koyomi dies or else i will go into despair and turn into a phantom. LOL......

I didn't like Haruto for the first half of the series but as he's been opened a bit since then I do like him. He's noble. Amongst all the post-Decade riders he seems to be more innately heroic. He's a noble character. All he wants to do is help people find hope within themselves and not despair. Part of that is the lack of extraneous circumstances to distract him, but it still counts I think.

I still think Nitou has the better character arc though. I bet Chimera comes back and he gets repowered in the finale.

A very nice ep overall. Loved the fight scenes especially since the Wizards hand to hand was more of a Chinese style kung-fu rather than the more traditional street brawling style.

Koyomi's death was just....so foreshadowed. We all kinda knew it was coming but it was nice to see Gremlin get a little bit of revenge. As we all know, if you don't see the villain die, they didn't actually die. My only gripe with the ep was how Fueki 'died'. Gremlin just destroyed the belt, he didn't actually strike Fueki. Weird.

But he did strike Fueki, like right before the belt. He sliced Fueki's back knocking him to the ground then took the Hamel Cane and sliced the driver in half. And using the magic of the Cane utterly destroyed Fueki's body along with his driver.

*Looks at sig* ... Sometimes they work. :lol

Well, the belt being destroyed leading to Fueki's death could also be significant because completely draining a being of mana (Which is channeled through the belt) could kill them. So even if the first strike didn't kill him, there was a mild precedent for why he died, anyway.

I feel that wizard has just taken some of the elements from previous Kamen rider series.

Belt smashing... Kuuga.
A person who has lost his family members and manipulating other riders.... Ryuki.
etc etc etc

Fueki's sad ending.

Does every Kamen Rider series end up in a river? At least every one that I've watched seems that way.

And I get the feeling that Haruto will be sporting a new tattoo sometime in the future that reads "Forever Koyomi"

Poor Fueki. He just couldn't catch a break. He went all Fullmetal Alchemist trying to save his daughter, and instead created this mess.

I have to say, I thought I was going to be disappointed after Pheonix was aced halfway through. He made one of the best protagonists of the series, and really, was one of the best finishers I've seen in a Rider series. However, I'll be dipped if Gremlin hasn't only been just as good with his duplicity, but just freaking hands down one of the creepiest. Serial killer turned evil monster? I actually got chills watching that reveal from the thought of that in a reality situation. And he wants to be human again, why? So he can feel the ecstasy of killing again and again? Shivers.

I'm also guessing that Fueki's flute sabre was a part of the philosophers stone creation in that the power in it was able to gather the mana in the first place. It was strong enough to break Nitou's belt, and obviously strong enough to destroy Fueki's belt too.

Oh, and Drake, you also missed "character that is only half here but is important to the storyline" like OOO and Ankh.

Personally, I liked Haruto's character, but he's in the top five, not number one though. I'd have to say Shoutaro and Philip are my top pick currently, only because (and maybe I'm in a minority) I really enjoyed the storyline.

I wonder how they're going to write the rings and stones into the Foundation X theory though.

Great episode, although like most its difficult to feel for Koyomo's emotional death when she's barely been in the series.

I'm also resigned to the fact that she will inevitably come back next episode. While it would be an interesting twist to see the eternally optimistic Haruto realise that he can't always save everyone, given that this show is essentially about never giving up hope I can't see that happening.

Um...Ankh had more speaking lines and character development than just about anyone in the show.

… By the great and powerful pen of the writer. This is one of the strongest episodes of Kamen Rider that I have ever seen. The acting, the story, the emotions—I even cared about Koyomi! But I think the highlight of the episode was Haruto himself. This was his best performance to date. Anyone who says his actor is terrible at his job can shut their mouthes with how wrong they are. He wasn't sobbing, but he wasn't stoic—he was at that perfect level of intensity. I really enjoyed the subtlety of his performance. I will miss Kamen Rider Wizard…

But we've got three more episodes, so it's cool.

Sorry, by half here, I meant half Greed, half human. Like Koyomi is a doll. Not half here in terms of lines. I completely loved Ankh. In comparison, Koyomi we didn't even really care about until episode 48. She was background noise only good for pressing her hand against Harutos belt. Cheeky Wizard.

Well, Ankh was just a much better written character. It also helps, though, that his actor was actually available for most of the series. Koyomi's actress is just doing Wizard as a side project. Her idol group work has been getting top priority and is why she's barely on the show.

I feel Rinko and Shunpei were more help to Haruto and were more important characters than Koyomi.

...Yep. That's pretty much true. Koyomi's ability to sense Phantoms was nullified by the fact that the Phantoms make it pretty fucking obvious they're monsters.
She was pretty much the load that Haruto grew attached to.

Until the last few episodes, the donut lady was more helpful and important than Koyomi.

She was also Poitrine in the movie which makes her even more important :lol

Wasn't she also involved in some kind of dinosaur prank?

Yes! I actually just saw that video earlier in the week.

Found it :p
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57lJpR_l2BA

From a pure action standpoint, this episode was incredible. Too little too late maybe, but holy crap is Fueki a badass and watching him fight with Haruto and Gremlin was incredibly enjoyable. I won't say I'll miss him, now he's gone, but I'm grateful that after he spent the majority of the series being Aizen but entirely off screen, they at least gave him some epic battles that happened on screen, before his send off.

Everything else though... it feels like it's all moving too fast. You're right, Nitou did save the whole of Tokyo from being consumed into a giant sacrificial ritual, but that all happened in about five to ten minutes worth of screen time last week and with that wrapped up as quickly as it was, it kinda feels like the shows already climaxed and now we're just having this awkward encore. Not a bad encore, by any means, but considering how much happened last week, it feels weird that the show has already moved on from it, giving only brief reactions from the characters and then moving on to something entirely different. Sure there are other things of importance happening, but not of greater importance, it was the whole damn city man.

And, just like a broken record as I've said it every week for like three months now, Koyomi and her bonds with the rest of the characters is something so underdeveloped, the big dramatic drama scenes with her and anyone else fall totally flat as we have no emotional engagement in her character beyond human compassion.

The same can be said for Gremlin as well. As cool as his backstory arc was (one of the shows many highlights), his entrance into the series was incredibly awkward and despite stepping up to replace Phoenix, who won me over in an epic final fight, Gremlin didn't seem to have any stand out abilities at all. He was fast, cocky and had a giant pair of scissors that could break into two swords but was nothing compared to all the other villains with their crazy ass powers, even the of the week ones, so it's disappointing he stuck around to be the final boss, of all people.

Great episode.

I assume next week is the actual finale, with the two episodes that follow basically just being crap to fill the gap between Wizard and Gaim, and they can be completely and utterly ignored if we so choose? I mean I'll still watch them, I just want Wizard to have a proper ending.

Also, really really hope that Koyomi doesn't come back next episode. It'd be nice if at least 1 season of this franchise doesn't piss me off with that kinda crap at the end.

Without a doubt, Locke states it best. But it does show how awesome Chimera was, and how underused Nitou was. Personally, I'm totally going to miss Fueki's driver (Understand?), The drivers on this series were pretty cool, although I still love OOO and Ryuki's drivers.

I'm still in this camp of "Worst rider series ever"...

This being said, the whole Mayo thing does make me have some feels, because the show was secretly about him, and not Haruto.

But even then. Once the belt was destroyed his story was kinda resolved. Though, I think if this was just Kamen Rider Beast the show could have been about how he had to save himself from Chimera, and it was secretly intended for that, but for whatever reason Wizard took priority, probably due to his color schema.

And thus, we have a bland show staring bland people, in bland events, with the only thing intersting being anything but the main cast or the main plot.

Gremlin and Beast? The only things watchable about the show.

Who gets all the screen time? Shunpei and Rinkos ass!

Actually, this episode made me appreciate Haruto a lot more as a Rider. Shiraishi Shunya (Haruto's actor) gave an excellent performance in this episode, basically personifying everything Switchblade has said about Haruto as a character. While it would have been interesting to see what the series would have been like if Beast had been the main Rider, I think Haruto manages to meet the standard.

Rinko's ass deserves every second of screentime it gets.