So OOO 43 really didn't leave me as much to praise but that doesn't mean it was a bad episode.

It was an especially great episode for Hina who manages to be endearing even though she is one of those many Kamen Rider side characters who are just kinda...there. I guess she is more likeable because she is determined to be there and the show puts no expectations around her, it isn't like she's supposed to have a purpose and isn't living up to it, she is just a woman with a huge heart dragged into the middle of this and deciding to help anyway, even though she could just walk away and has every right to do so. I dig it. This show just nails the formula for great characters, it is just a damn shame it can't seem to nail a great story as well.

Also, they should have designed Uva on a cockroach instead, that would be much more fitting.

Blade 27

Oh boy a Mutsuki episode... Anyway, Shima had a bit of intersting insight into what the Undead are...or were fighting for. Also that's a pretty noble idea to get tear Mutsuki from the Spider Undead's grasp. Understandably, no one else wants to do it 'cause Shima's cool. However they solve this, I hope they tear the Spider Undead a new one, he's beginning to get obnoxious.

Although, the Spider Undead also seems to notice something off about Hajime. I wonder if it has to do with his obsession with knowing how humans work? I dunno, but it's interesting.

Huh, I didn't even consider Uva's endurance and a cockroach's.

I still don't get why Hina exists. I don't hate her, but she is the deffinition of non-essential. You could have removed her outright and given all her scenes to... fuck, what's the diner girl's name? Mix their characters together and you get Hina's personality with the usefulness of providing the heroes with a place to stay and a job. Boom. Could've even shifted the Maki plot onto this hybrid character for extra effectiveness.

Blade 28

Continuing to deal with the problem that is Mutsuki. I suppose I shouldn't be too annoyed with him though as I sorta feel bad about his situation. It's also largely the Spider Undead's fault. Hmm Shima can erase memories and seems to have other assorted mind powers. That seems like a useful ability for keeping identities secret...though they're somewhat lax about how secret their identities are kept sometimes.

Hmm. So Hajime's card category is Joker. Other Undead certainly seem wary of him, but Shima's seems pretty lax. I had to rewind to see if I wasn't just imagining Hajime cracking a slight smile at one of Kotaro's quips. That was bizarre.


I was thinking he was something different, but Shima seems to be another spider type undead? Maybe a different breed of Spider of something, I dunno. His Undead form is pretty cool looking though. And now Mutsuki's finally got the super rare card he'd been whining about wanting. Too bad that desire is what put him back in this mess in the first place, costing Shima his freedom (since he's not dead really).


Okay....at the end of the episode, there was this weird clip with Kotaro on a wanted poster along with an office lady quitting her job by Rider Kicking her boss in the face. Soon after she was attacked by what appears to be Isaka and a new Rider. So yeah. Really weird! I'm suspecting that it's a movie?

I'm glad I watched the movie then.

den-o.
started.
like it.

and momo? :3

She works for me because it is only her. She is the only spare part and in story she is given a reason to be as such, as she was just dragged into the middle of this. It isn't like Wizard or Fourze where the entire side cast are Hina's, just there with no purpose but determined to be there any way. She feels special and unique in her show, rather than another piece of scenery to drown us in.

OOO 44, I can't tell if this episode was awesome or awful. For example, the explanation for why Eiji is the perfect vessel for Os and the purple medals, although total nonsense, makes so much sense within OOOs universe and is sold with such conviction, it's hard not to feel like you do when an intricate mystery plot slots into place. Hina as well was extremely enjoyable, who in the midst of a massive fight, still managed to steal the show by being badarse in her own way.

The real problem however was Cazali, not only was his complete form underwhelming and poorly realised with shit CGI but just as he comes together, he is defeated. Defeated in a truly epic battle to be fair but it's hard to soak in the awesome when a fight is so extremely brief. Not to mention that stupid design choice of having the Greed take human form when they die, even though it makes absolutely no sense in the slightest.

I mean why leave it so late? We've only got four episodes left, it feels like they should have been accessing their complete forms, and getting killed off, like twenty episodes ago. It's funny now I think about it just how little participation the villains have actually had in the series, I mean I know Sentai has villains stand around til the end of their seasons as well a lot of the time but normally that is one main villain and one, maybe two generals. There is twice as many here, it just seems a waste.

Although really the biggest complaint from me is they kind of shot themselves in the foot with this story turn. I know that they are going for this horrifying shock value story of two best friends now fighting and trying to kill one another but as Ankh was a complete and utter arsehole through the whole series, none of this has any emotional weight, I'm just shrugging and asking Eiji 'what did you expect?' this is why Ankh should have had at least one character arc throughout the show. Criticise Naruto for homosexual overtones all you want, at least when Naruto and Sasuke swapped blows there was actual established emotion behind the fists.

Kiva Episode 19

Another great episode.

Yeah Wataru got really weird in this one. Awesome seeing Kengo again, I freaking I that guy :D. I find myself watching this series at a much faster pace then W for some odd reason. Also, why doesn't Otoya know the name of his own son? On second thought, don't answer that.

The add for King of the Castle in the Demon World just showed up after this episode, when would be a good time to watch it? Also, is it cannon to the series?

Blade 29

Hmm. I wish Shima was around longer. Especially since his sacrifice apparently didn't stop Spider-Mutsuki from being awful.

So the Snake/Medusa Undead also seems to know Hajime is Joker class, though Hajime doesn't seem to have any idea what she's referring to. ...Um. They're going into a bizarre amnesia inspired Prince and the Pauper plot? Really? Is there any real reason that this guy looks exactly like Hajime? All this is doing is making me wanna try that takoyaki stuff. Everyone's reactions to Not-Hajime were hilarious though. I really like how their plan to switch places included not making any effort to hide the fact that they were a different person whatsoever.

Well, all of that was weird. But, hey there;s that 'New Generation' segment again. A guy loses his job as a waiter by headbutting a belligerent customer. Then he runs into the chick from the last episode of the segment and they both run away from Peacock Undead. Um...alright.

OOO 45 was a pretty epic episode but also another rushed episode as well.

The storm on the Maki Mansion should have been way longer and should have felt way more important and once again Mezul gets her complete form, underwhelms, then dies.

Yah the pacing was pretty bad on Fourze's second half but at least the Hotoscopes got full character arcs and two dedicated episodes, some even lasted longer than that for an an epic final skirmish at the end. The Greed have done nothing for the whole series now they do something and within a minute of actually achieving something, they die.

And Mezul didn't even really put up a fight, at least Cazali did some damage before he went down, Complete Mezul may as well have been a Yummy. Let's just hope Gamel puts on a better show, he has by far the best complete form so far.

29 and 30 are very, very weird episodes. Rider shows sometimes do these weird comedy arcs that don't really fit with the rest of the show - Ryuki has one when Megumi first shows up and Wizard just did it recently with the arsonist two-parter.

So is OOO Final Episode just the final two episodes stuck together?

Are you talking about the Director's Cut of the final episode? Because if so, then yes.

I assume so, it's just called 'Final Episode' on KRDL.

Yeah. That's the DC of episode 47 and 48 put together. It's 53 minutes, so it's got about 9 minutes more footage than watching the two episodes individually.

Blade 30

Continuing off from last time...this is something. And now yet another person who doesn't need to know Hajime's secret does. Though, his reaction was funny. I like that Not-Hajime just instantly accepts Hajime being a monster is a thing, given the world they live in. Though an actual interesting thing was revealed. Snake Undead also seemed to think him winning their big fight would be a really bad thing.

How does the father not recognize his son's personality though... Why is almost everyone a moron in this episode?! Where did Not-Hajime even get that armor?! Whaaaaaaaaat?

But, seriously. THIS is the episode where Tachibana gets his Jack form?! Well, I guess it was nice that Hajime paid respects to his new friends wedding ceremony...

EDIT:

I forgot the new generations segment. The mysterious rider following the two job-forfeiters seemed to hand them some sort of change card.

I don't even really mind them, they were just so off-tone with the rest of the series, I couldn't help but stare slack jawed at what I was watching. But Tachibana getting his Jack Form in this episode...That's a little stupid to me. They should've saved it for when they finally got after Mutsuki again or something.

Arsonist two parter sounds amazingly goofy, though.

But then that would detract from whatever the hell Mutsuki's story is. And we can't have that, now can we? :I

Uuuuuuuuuuuuuuugh....

OOO 46: I understand that Ankh wants to stick with the detective because of the human sensations he doesn't get as a Greed but why specifically the detective? I'm sure there are like a thousand bodies he could take at the local hospital? Oh wait because then there'd be no conflict...

I got sick pleasure out of seeing Ankh pour his heart out and for Eiji to just shrug his shoulders, kill the bastard already! I also like how unprofessional this sequence was as well, the poor actors looked both freezing and terrified of drowning through the whole thing as they are assaulted by the waves, it was really distracting. Their full Greed clash was awesome though, I love how Ankh's feathers match his hair.

But oh yeah, Date is back bitches! Double Breast cannon and that is the end of Gamel, whose final thoughts although fittingly about Mezul, they were about the human form which he would by no means relate to her as his first point of thought. Best send off for a Greed so far, even if I don't understand why the Breast Cannon can now destroy Core Medals.

Got back into Black since there's all these rumours about a new Black Figuart, plus Locke's new avatar. 15 was good, but 16 was better. Yeah, undercover! Yeah, non-powered allies who still kick ass in a fight and pull off cool moves! That episode could have only been better if he used Battle Hopper instead of Road Sector. It's not even like I dislike the idea of Road Sector, it just looks so dumb compared to the sleak and minimalist Battle Hopper. Plus, what does Battle Hopper do these days? Sleep? He can't sleep all the time. Where does he get his exercise? And how does he stop from getting bored? Does he have a TV in that warehouse, because he can't read books without fingers? I wonder if Kotaro just puts the remote in front of his tire and Battle Hopper changes channels with the tread bumps on his wheel.

So Black 02, wow this was awfully paced, I'm glad that the show has a specific story focus but this was about five minutes worth of story stretched out into twenty five minutes, the rest was weird and pointless drawn out scenes or footage from the previous episode.

On the upside this show is so gloriously 80s it's brilliant in a so bad it's good sense. And the action scenes and are genuinely pretty good bar the few times when the show takes the cheaper option and makes no attempt to hide how cheap it is being.

Blade 31

Wow, what a harsh contrast to the previous two episodes. New villain pickpockets people so he can trick them into getting hit by oncoming cars while he films it on his phone. Spider Undead still being a raging tool, I see. And woah! New theme song! Wasn't expecting one. I like it though.

So yeah, two potential new villains. Phone guy and the dude from the beginning who wanted Kenzaki eliminated.And pone guy's goal is apparently to besmirch the Kamen Riders' good name in the newspaper? It's fitting that he took pic of Leangle's the one, er..."framed" as a menace.

Tachibana has some probably valid concerns about what happens after all the other Undead are sealed. Hajime doesn't seem to like the potential ramifications either.

Hmm, the Undead with the camera phone's gonna irritate me...he has that kind of personality. Not to mention he can fucking stop time and space.

And as much as the Spider Undead irritates me as well, the fact that he decided to turn into a mob boss for no reason amuses me. Anyway both of these Undead assholes seemed to want to make Kenzaki and Tachibana distrust Hajime. And now phone guy's taken Hajime's change card. Can't see this going well...

Speaking of things going bad, Kenzaki's assassin appear to be an artificial Undead. Interesting...

New Generation segment...Okay, so those two job-quitters don't want to be Kamen Riders. And I had to rewind it to check, but...is that Kenzaki as a garbage man? What the hell is this...

You're at the point where the show's new writer takes over more or less full time. It's a really seamless transition, especially compared to Hibiki and Decade. The biggest change is that shit just keeps getting more and more awesome from here on out.

It's a promo for the Blade movie: Missing Ace. The two people you've been watching are L'Arc and Lance. And yes, that was Kenzaki as a garbage man - Missing Ace takes place several years after an alternate ending to the series.

I will look forward to this then!


Huh. Garbage man seems like a bit of a downgrade. Anyway, should I watch Missing Ace after I'm done with Blade, then?

Blade 32

So basically, phone guy wants Hajime to revert back to his Joker form, presumably making him fucking crazy as a result. I'm not sure why Tachibana's so quick to believe two villains who would obviously have something to gain by making Hajime their enemy.

So now...Hirose's father is back, offering advice to Tachibana. Nice that Tachibana thought back to Sayoko. Though...seeing as Hirose's dad is the one raising the artificial Undead, I'm not sure how much he can be trusted. Unsurprisingly, it doesn't take much to get Kenzaki out of a funk. And that's a good thing honestly. He doesn't tend to mope around for longer than five minutes.

Spider-Mutsuki is still pretending he's Gambit, I see. I like how Kenzaki pointed out that he's acting exactly like the maniac he's describing Hajime as. Oh and we get how Hajime got his human form finally. Apparently the human undead just looks like Hajime with an Undead belt on. Huh. And apparently he's the cause for Hajime's hmm...sudden humanity, I guess after being an Undead. Like his consciousness sorta.

Surprisingly, Hajime actually knows Kenzaki's actual name and not just his Rider handle. Good to know that whole time rozen thing has a weakness. Even if it is a weird one. Seriously, hold a cloth? What? So basically Hajime being the Joker undead is majorly bad news since it had no species to represent, it'll just kill everything. So NO one should want Hajime to return to being that, and the phone guy is a sick fuck for wanting to do so.Sort of explains why even the most psychotic Undead were like, "man we need to take this guy out..."

You can really watch it anytime. It's non-canon and the only thing it spoils is how Blade doesn't end.

Ah, good point. Well, I'll watch it whwnever I get the chance.

Blade 33

So Kenzaki's Jack Form is stronger than Tachibana's. Because...he's the main character, I suppose. Hajike's bedridden again. Forced to fight the evil of the Joker card. Even Prof Hirose says so. Of course, he's also seems to be going a little loopy. I mean if there's somethiong wrong with Kenzaki...why attack Kenzaki? Why not just tell him?

Oh great....here comes phone guy. So sealing all those Undead and using their cards allows Hajime to suppress the Joker. And phone guy is a beetle undead. I hate to admit it, but his design is kinda cool.Anf course he just kicks Kenzaki's ass with ease in Jack form. Bah. And if that wasn't enough, here comes that artificial Undead. I don't know why he would try to seal it again when it clearly failed to work last time...


I really hope Tachibana isn't just going along with this crazy plot of Prof. Hirose's...

Blade 34

I wish Prof. Hirose and Tachibana would just be straightforward about whatever the hell was wrong with Kenzaki. I do get the feeling that Tachibana realizes that Prof. Hirose is slightly off his rocker and is trying to get him to find a better way of stopping Kenzaki from fighting.

Geeze, spider-Mutusuki. Nozomi gives you the weakest slap ever and you're gonna punch her for it? Haha, why is the spider Undead just this thug? Finally, there's a glimpse of Hajime's true Joker form. It does look sort of like an insect jester. So Hajime morphs into the Wold Undead and finally learns the true power of human emotion while briefly kicking Mutsuki's ass. That was pretty awesome.


Okay, so I guess I have to take back my Kenzaki doesn't mope for long comment, but I appreciate his reasons for doing so. But still. Was pretty easy to get him out of it.

Ha! I like how Hirose tricked phone guy. And wow, Kenzaki, henshining in front of all those people. Not that they seemed to care that much about their secret identities in Blade at all, but still. FINALLY, phone guy gets sealed. Without Kenzaki going into Jack form. But who needs Jack form? Fucking KING form looks awesome. Painful transformation, it looks like.

King Form is awesome. One of my favorite final form designs, especially with the cards actually being in the costume.

Just finished Ultimatum...

Yikes.

The initial Fourze part was fun and I actually really enjoyed it.

The Wizard bit was rather painful. Really... Poitrine? Did not like he-errrr, him at all.

Also, that. "She" was the donut cart owner? Oh god ew. Just. Ew. One, that's gross. Two, it ruined everything up to that point.

I did like how the stories were tied together, with the abducted kids in the present being the psychic ones in the future. And the new Inazuman was awesome.

Yeah it sort of reminds me of the animal crests from the MMPR movie. Always liked those things, honestly....even if they didn't fit the rest of their costume design.

You got that right. The ass-and-sparkles fighting made her character offensive enough, and the doughnut thing made it downright creepy. I guess they needed some way to excuse her not appearing in the TV show, but there are so many other options available that would have made it less terrible.

Blade 35

So apparently King form is bad news, according to Hajime. Whatever it does, it's causing him to Joker out. I really like attacks named after playing card phrases. Looks like a the form was too powerful for Kenzaki to handle for long. But damn it, would it kill Prof. Hirose or Tachibana to explain what's wrong with Kenzaki?!

Hmm. So that girl just kidnapped him and is holding his cards hostage. That's one of the disadvantages of a card based system, I suppose. Well, that and getting the corners folded. Hirose should know better than to get angry with Hajime though...

Oh cool, Jellyfish Undead. Didn't get to see him much at first as he went RIGHT back in the water as soon as he saw Hajime raging out in his Joker form.

I'm glad Tachibana is having some misgivings about working for Prof. Hirose. Though it did take him being fucking cloned into an artificial undead. Prof. Hirose is acting especially creepy.

Mutsuki's still hanging out with the Spider solitaire Gang in his 1940's mobster base, I see. Another Queen level undead is about. She seems worried about Joker, understandably. Though, Hajime's still fighting it from within. And Mutuski's just gotta catch 'em all! This time he's got a Tentacool! I like how the category queen just beat him up and told him he was shit, though. Interesting that he chose Chalice to fight Joker-Hajime though. Interesting in that he probably took the category queen's advice and didn't wanna fight Joker himself.

I liked Ultimatum. Yes, there was a lot of fan service, but I was able to ignore it (probably because I went to high school) and enjoy the film anyway (although it was annoying). The Poitrine reveal was definitely creepy, but I found it amusing. Really, the only thing that bothered me was Inazuman. He's cool, but I can't get over the fact that his Inazuman form is his actual body… and he's not wearing clothes. That raises a few questions regarding biology and natural selection, but I don't think I should delve into them here.

Really? I loved the Inazuman portion. Yeah, it's odd that he's naked, but it was just for a brief gag.

The fanservice was too much and annoying, but I actually found the climax to be boring. It felt like it just never ended, especially when the villains were escaping on their truck thing. I kept going in and out of consciousness because it was just so boring.

I'm not saying I didn't like the Inazuman portion. I just found his nudity to be discomforting and raising a few questions regarding biology.

Personally, I loved the climax. I think it would have been better if all of the Riders had participated for the duration of it, but that's just the Kamen Rider W/OOO fanboy in me.

Also, Nadeshiko riding Accel. That was awesome. Now if only Diend could get a bike…

Regarding Shin Inazuman's nudity, Shin Kamen Rider was the same way. Doesn't make it right, but what do you want?

Blade 06, I'm really loving the exploration of the Rider system, even if it's starting to feel more like a mech anime than a Rider series :lol

Sadly though the more emotional, character led sequences fell pretty flat for me. I barely have a grasp who anyone is or what is really going on in this series yet, so otherwise clichéd but still effective devices like 'it was all my Dad' held no meaning to me because I wasn't even sure of what that woman's name was until we got a five minute scene of them shouting 'Hirose'.

Same with that Doctor woman, who the hell is that? I think she said Tachibana was one of her students, what? I'm not sure if I'm just not paying attention or what but I really have no idea what is going on :lol

And like your parents died in a fire Kenzaki, that is really sad, but I know more about your parents death than I do about you. The main reason Eiji's backstory in OOO was so effective was they established his character first, then went in and explored his past so we had an existing emotional investment. I don't care about anyone yet because the show has given me no reason to.

So I don't think I posted in a while but Earlier I watched more of Kiva so the grand total was episodes 36-46 in the last few days, and I'm so emotional after what I've seen.