Jin maybe had the best moment in the episode when he's leaving the Daybreak Town hideout, sees Fuwa sitting there, and wonders if he's just been sitting there all night waiting for Jin and Horobi to walk out. It's a great jab at Fuwa's terrible - but effective! - stakeout techniques.

Yeah, this is an industry that makes perfect sense for Humagear deployment: hazardous situations that require split-second decision-making and nerves of steel. It seems like it's a total lay-up for Hiden, so it's fascinating to watch it kind of get away from them. I don't-- I don't really love the specific argument being used against 119, but I like that there's more conflict than I'd've expected.

It's Episode 26!

-Nice follow-up with the Vice President playing the "dying" person in the mission, when he was the corpse in the movie episode!

-Like the basement, you cannot convince me Fuwa hasn't been staying out in Daybreak every since they broke out, sleeping in his car or whatever. That kind of timing is too quick to suggest anything else!

-I like how this episode gives Homura's and 119nosuke's methods equal weight? There are things that Homura could be more perceptive of that a Humagear like 119nosuke can detect instantly, and things 119nosuke wouldn't know due to not having decades of experience like Homura, but they're both doing their best to save lives, aren't they?


-Hey, Yua gets something this episode! .........I don't really like it that much? Gai is forcing her to be a little more than passively complicit in his schemes this time, asking her to make 119nosuke to go berserk if given the chance. And then.....she does it! Like, I get it. Gai's a very powerful person, if she disobeys him, getting fired is the least of her worries (getting blacklisted in the industry, taking a Thousand Break to the face unarmored) But man, something about her arc's been handled....I just don't care? Even though I want to? Maybe it's because Yua's thoughts about this whole thing are mostly internal? She'll give a conflicted look most of the time, an occasional pipe up of protest every other week, but that's about it. I feel like I don't particularly have a real hook into her thoughts concerning ZAIA's goals (or her precervied version of their goals, before the reveals started kicking in) or even how she got into this in the first place, depsite it going on for so long. (And I'm not usually one to turn my nose up at character who's thoughts are kept hidden/complicated/vague, they're some of my favorites, but something about the way it's been handled with Yua just annoys me more than anything)

- This is probably one of the careers the kids watching at home are *really* interested in, so I get the need to um......punch the overall energy up. Gai's whole speech to the reporting cameras is so hilarious to me lol. And they turned "Aruto does nothing but grab the Magia and hope it turns back to normal" into a gag! That's always fun.

Yeah, this is something I've brought up before. We're well past the point where the production team should've added some depth to Yua's story, and they've fought harder to not do that than Aruto's fought for anything on this entire show. We've got absolutely no idea why Yua will participate in actions that will terrorize and endanger the public, beyond a vague feeling that she doesn't want to get on Gai's bad side. But that lack of specificity, as Gai's actions become more monstrous and cruel, makes it so Yua's whole character is Just Following Orders, so she might as well just be the most underwritten lieutenant of all time. There's absolutely no heroism or conflict in Yua's characterization, so why should we think she's going to hit some hypothetical breaking point? And if she does hit it, what about the last few months of ALL THE SHIT SHE DID FOR GAI?!

It is interesting seeing the perspective of a human vs machine conflict when it comes to life-saving, one driven by sheer compassion and drive to save others while the other is ostensibly doing the same profession but more clinically and pragmatically. Like, maybe it's safer and more effective for a machine to be doing this kind of work, but you still need that human touch.

It was nice to see Freezing Bear...and it got Jacked. I feel like Aruto's other forms deserved better.

The Panda Raider is probably the worst Raider because it's very obviously trying to murder a bunch of people.

Poor Fuwa in that second Rider phase of getting beat up because he hasn't gotten his new upgrade yet.

Yua deserves better than functionally being no better than a henchgirl. Like, at least someone like Marika was honest with herself about why she was doing it and the kind of person she was (not that following the strongest man in the room is a particularly empowering message) but Valkyrie was intended to be more of a hero than Marika was.

It's fascinating seeing someone in real-time go through the exact same feelings I did about Yaiba while I was watching weekly. Found her interesting in the beginning and was so excited to see a woman in a role as important as a tertiary rider, was willing to see where the new direction would take her and then was super let down by this point. I love the job competition arc but this is one area of it that's just an undeniable flaw for me; she's been handled terribly

I probably won't talk much about the Job Arc in general (Definitely going to just be making small comments, especially on 28) until we hit Episode 29, like Wednesday if I'm correct on how the schedule goes.

But like... there's one major flaw of this arc that ends up hurting a lot more characters than it does helping them. But I can't really explain that until we get past Episode 29 without veering into too spoilery of details.

Same here. Some of my complaints about this arc only make sense with the knowledge of what happens later, that's just the nature of a competition where the destination is more important than the journey. So I'll probably write up a full analysis after Episode 29.

I will say for now that I consider the fireman round to be the most frivolous part of the competition. It's also pretty ironic how they went from selling houses to setting them on fire. Gai has a weird sense of humor!

I'm honestly curious who's most to blame: the producers or the actor?

The easy answer is the producers, and they probably bear the most blame. Yua started off secretive, became distant, and ended up redundant. We got Fuwa's formative trauma immediately, and a whole movie dedicated to Aruto's familial feelings for Humagears, but have we ever gotten even a single line of dialogue about why Yua works for ZAIA? She acts like an indentured servant, but, like, can she not quit? There're a million questions I've had about Yua since Episode 1, and I never once got the sense that the production was interested in answering them.

But, like, the actor also isn't doing a ton to force the issue? Sometimes, when you're given an underwritten shit part, it's vital to make something out of it. Come up with your own backstory, and imbue the character with that. Add captivating twists to line deliveries, do a weird bit of business in the background, create some off-beat physicality... anything to bring attention to your character, and force the writers to give you more material. But this lady, she only ever seems to play down to the material: mopey reactions, dry readings, blank stares. She seems as uninterested in her character as the producers, and that's regrettable. Someone somewhere needs to fit for Yua!

I was happily surprised that the competition was staged! When Gai suggested judging the contest by lives saved, I was like Oh Hell No. Instead, it's a cute little game for the first half, and I liked that.

Man, I get home from work and I just see all this bashing on Yua and her arc?

I suppose then that, among my many other titles, it's time for me to become The Only Yua Fan as well. I believe I summed up why I like her arc with:

Yeah, I'm not being ironic when I say that I felt Yua and the way her arc went throughout most of the show was something I really dug. She makes for excellent contrast to not just Fuwa, but alot of what the show highlights as a whole.

Whereas Fuwa and Aruto prioritize freedom, unity, and righteousness from the outset, Yua is focused more on self-preservation and security; She's literally a slave to her job. Which, given the increased focus on the work force the show takes, is something really important to highlight, I think.

Her arc being all about what that kind of mindset gets you in the end, as well as how difficult and time consuming it can be to overcome it are presented nicely via Yua. Becoming a top engineer ain't easy, and throwing all of that away, whatever the reason, isn't easy to do either. I really don't blame her for any of her actions, really. Afterall, people have done alot more just because they're ordered to.

I always found her fascinating in these regards, only further helped by how much I liked her character throughout the first act. In a story about different career paths kids can grow up to take, I think stuff like highlighting the horrible kinds of bosses you can fall under and the dangers of feeling like you absolutely need a specific job are important things to teach kids too.

And in terms of pacing, this is a multi-cour show, so I have no issue with things taking more than just an episode or two to resolve. It's not like this is a 12 episode show and there's a ton of meandering going on(hi, Dynazenon), so it doesn't at all bother me that her resolution is saved for later. Aruto and Fuwa might be considered heroes from the outset, but Yua certainly isn't one, atleast not yet.

I don't even feel like the show is setting up a storyline for her, though, let alone slowly teasing it out. The only person she seems to have any interactions with anymore is Gai, and she's just gone ahead and done everything he asks of her. There's no exploration of her feelings or goals or motivations or backstory or relationships; no exploration of anything that could provide a dramatic context for her actions. She's a grumpy Siesta at this point, and that will never not feel like a let down.

Burning Falcon's here! And it's a great suit (love how he was the prelude to the next Rider Season in a way), but also how it's a parallel to A.I.M.S.'s ShotRiders, both doubling as weapons and having "Kamen Rider" as their standby. Jin also gets a new look, which is kind of neat, I especially like how the Burning Falcon Progrise Key is shackled to his wrist, as though he's bound to his duty.

It may have been half a recap episode, but it was still a pretty good episode.

Now the Firefighter Arc, oh boy, do I love this one.

Almost the same reason as Die, it's just so much fun. From 119's (the Japanese 911) little jogs, to him just staring at the human firefighters' reactions to everyone they can save in the building. The cheering at the pretty girls on floor one, then stopping on the guys on floor two, THEN absolutely no reaction to floor three, with Fukuzue, once again, being the dead guy, and his partner just chanting "save me," while the secretary just stands there. That whole scene had me laughing.

I don't know if anyone else mentioned it here, but the panicking reporter is none other than Akiko from W (I don't remember her actress, sorry), even using her catchphrase.

I do like how Homura isn't just going out against the Humagears, more like judging the performance and giving them a chance unlike some of the others, though to be fair, some of them were being told by Gai in order to rattle them up, while Homura has to focus on saving lives, meaning even corporate greed can't sway him from his duty. It is understandable to him, as a human, to not abandon even someone on the brink of death, to have beef with 119's actions, and it's also commendable that he didn't go Magia right then and there like the others. But as Die mentioned, this episode was just so much fun, that it almost doesn't matter.

You, sir. Are a man of integrity. I like that!

Not to knock on Yua, as she still has some great moments, so it's not as though she was completely wasted, I can understand the disappointment, but I don't despise her. I'll have more thoughts after we're finished on that subject.

...

...

NOBODY TOLD ME ABOUT THAT!

Man, I totally did not get that that was my fifth or sixth-favorite character from W! (It mostly depends on if we count Fang Memory as a character or not.) Thank you for catching that!

No, like, I understand that; it's just very badly done and very dramatically inert. At absolute best it's just repeating the same points over and over without any real twist to it or meaningful escalation. There's no more depth to it and nothing new to it since the first episode she was working for Gai

Does it really need some big extra oomph though? It is what it is and I feel that it serves itself well. Even disregarding some later episodes.

Yeah, actually, I would preferably have a character motivation to it. I'd like anything to it. Otherwise it just feels like a waste of time and a waste of a character

I myself take sustaining one's' livelihood as its own qualifying motivation but hey, to each their own.

I would take that! A bit... boring without any more depth or exploration of her life or personality, sure, but it'd be something -- but there's not enough to her to even infer that as being her reason.

Why isn't there? Maybe I'm reading too much into it here(which would be ironic given my usual way of consuming stories), but given her whole set up is her contrast with Aruto and Fuwa, it basically speaks for itself. She's choosing self-preservation, and as such, is preserving herself, her livelihood, her well being. A job is major part of that at the end of the day, whether it's someone's' dream/passion or not.

Is it the most super exciting thing in terms of storytelling? For many, I'd imagine not. But for me it worked, and Yua always had my attention whenever she was on screen.

KAMEN RIDER ZERO-ONE EPISODE 27 - “I WILL NOT GIVE UP ON LIFE”

https://kamenriderdie.com/images/kr/...zeroone27a.png

My favorite thing about this series is how it demonstrates the heroism of re-examining biases.

It’s an all the time thing in TV shows, really. Folks are against Topic A, they go through a series of adventures/difficulties, and then they begin to understand the value of Topic A. Societal harmony is only a few commercial breaks away, usually. But: real life, you know? Admitting mistakes or walking back from stated beliefs… you’d have an easier time doing a real-life Rider Kick. Most people don’t want to change, and don’t care to do the hard work of understanding other people.

What’s nice about this show is that, even with the fortnightly happy ending of humans and Humagears finding common ground, it never feels obligatory. When you get a scene like Homura declaring that 119 was a real firefighter, and that the credit for the victory should go to Hiden, there’s a genuine feeling of catharsis to that. This show somehow manages to make these lessons in judging people by their actions into something almost profound, and a pleasant surprise. The recurring character beats of folks slowly realizing that they’ve misjudged an entire species, or failed to see the ways in which their desires overlap, I never get bored of them. I love them more than a hundred finishing moves. Shit, someone going I Was A Bigot And I Can See That Now is my favorite finishing move in all of Kamen Rider.

So, yeah, I liked how this firefighter thing ended! It’s all deeply affecting hero moments, for about eight minutes straight. And, like, firefighter story! That’s a genre that can ladle out hero moments from sunrise to sunset without it ever feeling forced. All of the 119 stuff was beautiful, and I don’t mind saying it. It’s nothing too revelatory – we’ve seen any number of heroic and dedicated Humagears by now – but the execution is a goddamn bullseye. That shot of 119’s burning face as he yells at Homura to go save the Hiden employees! Aruto carrying out 119’s body on his back, because his employee did a good job today! (I am tearing up just typing that out; goddamn bullseye.) Homura saluting Aruto to honor 119’s dedication to saving lives! Just… man, what a thrilling first half of this episode.

(I can’t decide if Fuwa and Yua charging into the burning building is hilarious, or stupid, or both. When Fuwa douses himself with a bucket of water, grabs Yua by the hand, and races into the building to possibly literally fight a fire, I was like HELL YES. They’re both Kamen Riders! They can use their superpowers to safely rescue the trapped civilians! But then they… don’t do that? They just go into a burning building in winter coats and work clothes? At which point even the formerly terrified firefighter is calling Fuwa a dumbass? It starts off as such a great idea, until it looks like Yua forgetting she can Henshin becomes a disease that’s transmitted through contact to Fuwa. Weird subplot!)

The second half, though? It was okay.

I mean, it’s another A+ Jin fight scene, and that’s always welcome, but a lot of the rest of it was just some plot reveals. Things that’re necessary to know (finally established that ZAIA has been manufacturing the Raidrisers), while still sort of being unceremoniously dumped on the audience. Like, the Raidriser thing just happens in an alleyway? It’s fun to hear Gai’s defense of arming humans to start a Humagear genocide, which is a neat inversion of MetsubouJinrai’s M.O., but it feels less like a hard-fought discovery and more like a timer went off and everyone was allowed to talk about it.

(On that topic, I wish the show would just say Yua was Gai’s daughter or whatever they’ve got up their sleeve. I wish they’d’ve done it ten episodes ago.)

That first half was so good, though!

—

KAMEN RIDER ZERO-ONE SO-DO AI 08: HUMAGEAR

https://kamenriderdie.com/images/kr/...zeroone27b.jpg

In honor of 119’s excellent effort at work today, let’s take a look at the Humagear SO-DO!

It’s a one-box figure, because of course it is. Beyond just being a troop-builder, what in the hell would a second box add to a Humagear? What you get here is a figure, an extra set of hands, and a ton of stickers. You actually get the option of stickering up the head as Docile or Deranged, and I went with Docile. (There’s a Trilobite figure we’ll be talking about in a little bit, as well as a Fuwa’s Nightmare model of Humagear, and I thought they both covered the Evil side of things well enough.) The rest of the stickers are needed to fill out the incredibly blank figure, and they do a solid job. The ones for the eyes are infuriating, because they’ve got to curve around the side of the head and cover a sliver of the eye… but pressing down on them causes the stickers to move out of position. You need to use two points of pressure on these stickers to keep them from sliding around, and it sucks.

I like the general Humagear design. AkibaSilver already traced the genealogy of Hiden’s various human-looking robots, so we’ve got the basics of the suits well covered. I honestly don’t have any points to make about the Humagear suit; I think it looks neat? It’s a mook suit, and those are designed to be sort of nondescript and unobtrusive, so I’m not sure there’s much to be said about what they communicate or how they push forward on the themes of Zero-One. If you’ve got a read, I’d love to hear it!

This two-parter is my favorite of all the competition ones, it has a topic I like and the characters are great. I will admit that I don't like Yua at all, it's not that I hate her, just that I really don't care about anything she does, at least Gai is a good villain, Yua just feels like she follows Gai without really doing many things that make her, her own character besides following Gai. I just don't like her right now. But, the rest of the episode is rather good, I like Takeshi and 119, and 119 sacrificing himself was a good moment. I can't think of much to say about this episode or the next two, but I like this one.

So I don't particularly have any strong feelings about Zero-One,(which is why I haven't been commenting) but, uh Aruto, why are you just standing around and doing nothing? It is so frustrating watching Aruto just stand there and watch Gai beat the absolute shit out of Fuwa for the 5th time. This is your company on the line. Fight for it, you absolute moron!!! Did the smoke you inhaled cause you to lose your damn braincells?!??!?

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vAvcxe...ature=youtu.be

I think what really works about this one is that it's this very controlled situation that grows out of hand and allows both Human and Humagear to shine in various ways. The firefighting part was just an absolute joy to watch and this is personally my favorite of the Competition battles purely because of how it ended. Just everything involving that burning building was good!

I should not say that about burning buildings because that's bad, but what it caused was good so um, sure! Don't do arson kids, that's what I'm saying!

Anyway um... yeah we're at the point where Gai's fights kinda get more stupid if I'm being honest because we've run out of jacking targets and he's seemingly just using random keys (Scorpion) now. I say random but you might've picked up on an interesting pattern as aside from Shining Assault Hopper, all of the keys he's been jacking or using for his finishers have been fairly standard and basically all used by the Riders as their main forms or auxiliary forms, no extra attack based keys at all.

The uh... the Raidriser bit honestly rubbed me the wrong way at the time and still does now in how it's presented to us now compared to how it was shown to us at the very start of the arc, and I'll get into more on that... on Wednesday.

Other than that Jin is on fire as always.

The characters in this one are genuinely fun. I didn't warm much to Homura in the first part, but, man, they really landed his story in the second part. That Homura/119 arc was really something special.

It was very weird! There's nothing stopping Aruto from Henshining and helping Vulcan defeat Thouser, but he just doesn't do it? For some reason? Like, there's a moment where Aruto is racing to save the evidence (that Fuwa stupidly waived in the face of the culprit; top-notch policing there, dummy) before Thouser stomps on it, and all I could think was Boy I Bet Zero-One Could Get There Faster. Not a great episode for folks remembering the usefulness of their superpowers!

I feel like he had to use Scorpion specifically because the Jin plot was him regaining the Key for Horobi. Narratively, you've got to at least have Thouser use it once in the episode, to show that he has it in his possession.

But, no, I didn't notice that! Thouser's Jacking, and all the things he's Jacked off of the men of the show, it's not really memorable to me? I find his finishes (and all weapon-based finishes on Zero-One) to be sort of bland, and way less cool than non-weapon finishes.

I would love for Fish Sandwich, DreamSword, anyone actually to come explain to me Aruto inaction in this episode and actually try to put a positive spin on that. Cause if you can tell by my tone of my voice from what your reading I'm not exactly happy right now remembering this. Easily one of the dumbest things to ever happen in this franchise frankly.

It isn?t. He?s just falling into the usual issue people seem to have of ?two people/animated characters look alike/have similar names, ergo they must be the same person?. I?ve seen it several times on YouTube, with people assuming Superman TAS Lex Luthor was Tom Clancy, Batman TAS Two-Face was the same guy as Arkham City and Fowler?s superior in the second season of TF Prime was the security guard from the previous season (despite them not even sharing the same VA and how patently ridiculous that idea is)

Absolutely understandable! While it's interesting to see Gai's arsenal expanded, it's done in probably the most boring way possible. I just figured I'd note that given how repetitive it's been tbh, it's an interesting detail.

Also being honest, I feel like the weapon ones can be fun sometimes but I get what you mean when you say you don't like them. I assume you feel that way because like, everyone in Zero-One has some good dynamic movement when it comes to them in general, so they're able to pull off really fun stunt-like finishers compared to other Riders.

Personally though I always find it fun when they manage to mix finisher types together, even if those are rare/few and far between.

As I pointed out elsewhere, there?s the fact they?re in public, being filmed on live television, combined with the fact that people are far more inclined to trust Gai, the CEO who?s successfully ran a company for at least 12 years with few major screwups, over Aruto, the kid who?s allowed his company?s products to become defective and start killing people, and who?s assurances that the problems have been dealt with have turned out to be false. If Aruto attacks, Gai could simply claim that Aruto tried to murder him to salvage his waning reputation, and then Aruto would go to jail and Gai would won by default.

I feel like this argument in particular falls apart when uh... I'm pretty sure the entirety of the second half only involves the Kamen Riders themselves with no one else in the area. Nothing about live television involved at all with the second half of Episode 27.

Aw, that's too bad. Thanks for the clarification!

I think the problem for me is that, with the weapon attacks, the movement is the same every time, it's just a different CGI explosion. Like, every ax attack looks like every other ax attack, but sometimes it's a blue light show instead of a red light show. With a non-weapon finisher, there's a huge variety of physicality to them, a lot of it situational.

Yeah, the whole point of Thouser's attack on a duly-deputized agent of the state is that he's trying to destroy evidence that would negatively impact his reputation. The whole fight is happening in a totally deniable way. I don't think anyone's worried about secret identities at this point.

Hello, Die. This might be my first reply on your thread. I have kept reading all of you and the other members' opinions from the start you made your Kuuga thread. So I guess an 'Iwae' toss for your accomplishment until today. Keep your love for Toku and stay healthy

I don't want to add fuel to the fire but I also want to criticize Aruto's inaction when Gai and Fuwa was fighting. It might just because some misdirections in the directing. Kamihoriuchi may has distinct directing that I love but... He's not the best when it comes fight composition. I question why they didn't just let Aruto use Metal Cluster Hopper here. For one, it gave more advertisement to a form that had just debuted before. You could just make the Panda Raider lost to Shining Assault Hopper, or even Rising Hopper. It doesn't even hurt to show MCH twice in the episode too. That or maybe Yuya Nawata was a bit busy during this week?

One simple fix for that fight is simply having Aruto and Fuwa fighting together against Gai. This explains why Gai specifically used Horobi's Scorpion Progrise Key. He could make a feint attack one Aruto with that stinger attack when the actual target was Fuwa. When Fuwa loss, you could just make Aruto rushed to his side thus leaving room for Gai to confiscate the evidence. It's honestly disappointing that we don't see enough dynamic between Aruto and Fuwa after ep 25 where Aruto gave a token of friendship to Fuwa by throwing Authorise Buster. We need more than that. This is around the late 20s and by this point we had so many great interactions between the Main and Secondary Rider. This is at the point where Geiz admitted his friendship to Sougo, Banjo kept check on Sento in case of Hazard went berserk, Hiro called Emu by his 'literal' name and started being rubbed by Emu's earnestness.

Sorry if this ended up like a bit of a ramble. But at this point, I want for the show to keep the rather good standard that have been set by previous series with the Main and Secondary Riders' relation. I know that Aruto and Fuwa's relation is more of a professional one. But, man... I wish Aruto and Fuwa was more buddy to each other, at least one the level of Geiz and Sougo. Still, don't be discouraged by my words, there are more people who still love Aruto and Fuwa's dynamic. I'm pretty sure either one of them would give a much better input.

My take on the Humagear design is that I'm so shocked SO-DO made it! It was maybe like the biggest surprise to me at the time? I'm pretty sure it was before they'd even started dipping into monster figures, and out they came with something that's quite staunchly not involved in fights, isn't a specific character and is hardly something that's overly appealing to kids. Just because it was a suit in the currently-airing Kamen Rider show! GOD I love SO-DO!

That shot of Fuwa pouring the bucket of water over his head is stuck in my mind. It was in the next episode preview too; why did he do that?! Love that guy

That's actually a real technique for protecting yourself from the heat during fires. It is funny that he doesn't bother to shield pour Yua or drop a layer of clothes, though.

So uh, sorry to disappoint, but this is actually the second of the few things in Zero-One that I don't like. Aruto's inaction against Gai is incredibly out of character here, and this is the only time in the entire show where I felt the conflict was forced solely for the sake of plot.

The fight between Jin and Thouser is cool atleast. Really liked that it ended in a draw. And the Sting Dystopia Jacking Break was cool(as they always are), but yeah, this was very much a case of plot contrivance.

Ah, my bad.

Sorry, I must have gotten guests mixed up in my head, since I thought I heard something to that effect, but I guess I got that confused with something else.

Thanks for the clarification, and apologies for the mix-up.

I don't know what's wrong with Aruto asking Fuwa about his dreams. Gotta realize that this is the stage where Fuwa's character is developed further, regarding his vengeful tendencies before. Previously Fuwa has blamed all the Humagears for his tragedy and vows to exterminate every last of them, but now, Fuwa is sensible enough to at least redirect his grudge to the real perpetrator. Kamen Rider is usually about using powers from evil sources for good, and for more modern series, frequently had people coming up to terms about it (though dunno if you're not into this or such), like for example Sento learning about him being a pawn to Soichi/Evolt or Sougo learning him being a pawn of Woz or Swartz. For Zero-One, it's done here of Fuwa learning about how AIMS, and fighting as Vulcan, is only a pawn for ZAIA's dirty business. There's usually character progression after that revelation, but Aruto invoked that by asking Fuwa after this revelation.

For other parts, this is the part that explains how Gai is not only about toxic egotism, his goal (or something more ambitious than just stroking his ego), is shown here in how he wanted to use Kamen Riders as weapons to gain profit. Previously too in ep. 25, he openly admits that the return of the terrorist group would be good for ZAIA since they could make more money selling weapons to AIMS. So what Gai wants to do is to launch war so he can gain profit from it, this'd be the real stakes of him gaining Hiden, and to me this makes his goal have resemblance to Namba's goal from Build. This part does show why Jin calls Horobi a father, he's literally made to be a father-type Humagear, and it's clear that Gai is also the reason behind Horobi's rampage. Horobi also had another opposite to Gai here, who looks 24 but is 45 year old, in how Horobi looks 20 but is actually 12 year old (as Humagear production). So Gai looks younger than he is, Horobi looks older than he is (as a robot).

Doesn't mean he's not a villain by this time. He's still an anti-villain, as he'd still retain misantrophic views to humanity in general except to Aruto, but now he had redeeming quality in, actually taking Aruto's anger into account and learning from him (which is why he's an exception), which now means he genuinely cares about Humagears and treats them as his friend, not misusing the word friend to treat them as disposable tool like before, he's no longer psychopathic manchild at this point, he's now much more mature and mellow (regarding evolved Humagear, it's a topic already talked before, Singularity). Jin of course has improved, but for now he still goes from straight villain to anti-villain by gaining real redeeming qualities (thanks to Aruto teaching him the hard way) while still being an invader to humanity. Though other than genuine compassion for Humagears now, Jin also has become more individualistic as well, to make a decision on his own on what to do for himself and Humagears. Individuality seems to be a good trait for Jin (better than before) to learn here, though dunno for the trait in general. Tbf for Horobi though, he hasn't got his turn yet, Jin's real character arc started now (still quite late).

It's Episode 27!

-Yeah, the firefighting competiton is my favorite "battle" out of all these. It's such a good time, start to finish.

-I amittedly dont have much to say about the second half other than I wasn't fond of it? It seems like everyone has aired out similar greviances.

Couldn't Aruto have used Freezing Bear to help douse the fire? I mean, he literally used the form in the last episode.

The effects of melted 119's body is absolutely chilling, yet inspiring at the same time.

I don't know what I love more...Fuwa dousing himself with water and dragging Yua with him into a burning building to help people or the fact that he didn't even bother getting her wet before they didn't. Like it totally would've been in-character for Fuwa to just splash her and run with her, but it's kind of funny that he didn't. But yeah, their Rider suits probably would've been more safe, huh?

I love how Jin and Thouser to a dual Rider Kick. We don't get to see that very often, but it's really cool.

This reminds me of an idea I had to like circumvent the pointless Magia fight from last episode.

And it's mostly just, Aruto figures that going in transformed with Freezing Bear will help, and Gai decides to follow him and Jack him of Freezing Bear to sabotage his chances at helping and to get that Jacking Break in.

I feel like that would've been a much more solid and fresh idea for the whole "Aruto uses old form but gets jacked" concept.

Thanks so much! I don't feel like I'm going anywhere, even if the next couple might possibly get a little hectic for me.

I feel like the better way to go would be to have Gai neutralize Aruto somehow, and then fight Fuwa. We've already seen that Metal Cluster Hopper can handle Thouser solo, and adding Vulcan to the heroes' side would make it unrealistic for Thouser to win. If they'd maybe had Gai gut punch Aruto before Henshining and attacking Fuwa, it'd allow the fight to progress without Aruto's assistance.

That would be really great! It's a weird side-effect of this show's various power bases that we rarely see Aruto fight alongside anyone. (I mean, same thing for Fuwa nowadays! It's all solo fight scenes!) I would love to see Zero-One and Vulcan teaming up again to take down whomever. Their last team-up was pretty fun!

Yeah, and they even did the retro model! What a bizarre choice, but it's totally in keeping with SO-DO's inclusiveness.

(It helps that it doesn't feel like we're getting a new suit for Zero-One or Thouser anytime soon, and Vulcan's got one or two left? Not a ton of superhero suits left on this series to make into toys!)

I don't mind Aruto asking Fuwa about his goals for the future! I do mind Aruto asking it with zero set-up in the middle of a random episode. That's the sort of thing a writer should build up to, and deploy organically. You can't just have it come up as a conversation starter.

I can sort of see Aruto not using his abilities, since it might disqualify Hiden and lose them the contest. (Fuwa outright says that he doesn't care about rules, so the contest is irrelevant to him.) Because there's a crew of firefighters on hand, I think Aruto's less inclined to take over the rescue. If Homaura and/or 119 had failed, I think that's when Aruto would've stepped in.

I remember being really disappointed with these episodes when they aired. We'd gotten a nice break from the job competition arc and its repetitive formula of Gai cheating and Aruto utterly failing to have an effective response to it. You can add Fuwa in on this one, though, with his unfathomably stupid decision to tell Gai that he had the evidence needed to take him down. This is such a bad period for the show's two heroic Kamen Riders as the show goes out of its way to make them look like total morons.

The worst part of it all, though, is how the show approaches Gai by making him such an underhanded douchebag. I hate that about Gai because I think that he's right. His motivations and methods are completely terrible, but at the core I agree with him about the Humagears: they are innately dangerous. Yes, a big part of that is Gai's own fault because he sabotaged Ark like the massive fuckwaffle that he is, but that doesn't change the fact that so long as Ark is out there hacking Humagears, every singe one of them is a walking MotW timebomb. I wouldn't want my kids to go to basketball practice with a coach who might randomly turn into a monster and attack them. I know Aruto is very committed to seeing the humanity and potential in the Humagears, but he - and the show as a whole, by extentions - are ignoring a lot of very valid concerns.