The tone of this episode is so different from the way things started!

I think Saber has always been a show that wanted to rush through all the multitude of exposition and character introductions and just get us to the meat of the show- relationships and fighting and drama!

Also, prolly cuz they know it'll be more painful if it was Daishinji first, seeing as he is a lot of people's favorites and he's the one who's most passionate when it comes to the Seiken. So, it's more raw when he gets to suffer first.

I'm betting Ogami would be the one who'd be the one who will be absolutely floored and angry when Gekido gets sealed OR the, the most likely one I feel, the least angry about it. He is getting up there and I'm thinking he'd say something like: "I get to spend more time with Sora." Something like that.

I feel kind of bad for Ren as no one's really telling him anything at this point. He has a slight awareness of the situation but has no real clue as to what's going on. I mean, of course part of that is due to his impulsive and 'slice first, talk later' attitude, but at the same time the SoL's been feeding him some real garbage 'info' and not all the details.

Honestly, I feel like he's going to leave the organization soon for that exact reason.

Now I'm imagining Ren ditching from an important meeting or something, only to show up at Touma's doorstep, asking what the heck is going on.

Now that I've said that, it probably won't happen.

I feel like Ren will join with Desast and the Megid soon.

That's also a good reason for why Daishinji lost his seiken first.

I really like the idea of Ogami being relieved from losing his rider abilities. One can only fight for so long before they either a) need a break or b) to just stop. He loves his son a lot, who knows maybe by the end of the series Ogami will pass down the sword to someone himself.

Edit: I also expect Ogami to try and dad to Kento, but I don't think that's gonna work.

I'm guessing cause it's Ren he's going to run into Desast before getting to touma but after losing his sword to kento. The betrayal of trust from Kento will make Ren trust Desast and will get like a monster rider fusion of the two of them.

Honestly Ren being the next one to lose his sword would fit the most.

Justice is Strength, Strength is Justice.

But what happens when one loses ones strength? Hmm? I feel like him losing Hayate will be the big tipping point for him.

Yeah I think Buster is going to feel remorse that it should have been him to lose his sword.

I could also see Ren trying to join Kento and fight beside him, with the promise to willingly hand Hayate over to be sealed once they finish with the others. After all, idolizing Kento is a full half of Ren's personality at this point, and if his idol says something is needed to save the world he'd almost definitely go along with it (at least at first).

Kento will probably will deny Ren at his side and wants him to suffer for learning nothing from neither him or Touma, seal his sword and kill him in the process.

Gotta say - it's really fucking weird when you feel the need to express your desire for Ren's death not once, but twice in the same thread.

That's very out of character and inconsistent for Kento, especially when he saw Ren dying alongside everyone else in his dreams. The whole reason he's sealing the swords away is to save the world and to save his friends. Note, he sealed Onjuken Suzune but didn't kill an untransformed Daishinji afterwards. This feels more like a personal grudge from you.

Sorry. I just wanna see Ren get turned into a Megid near or in death by Desast. After all Desast sees something in Ren that he’ll become a monster for his “strength is Justice”. See him go evil and later redeem himself for his actions.

Didn’t wanna spoil my schemes.

This. Pretty great episode overall - though I don't appreciate the generic stock music - but this is what nailed it for me. Best part

This moment right here may be the single most un-Kamen Rider moment I can remember seeing in a long time. One character turns on the others and then takes a moment to justify his actions to the other characters. No "I don't need to explain this!" No "You'll understand in time." No "A guy like you wouldn't understand." We didn't even get a partial explanation interrupted by the arrival of a third party (and Reika was right there, in perfect position to disrupt everything!). This was an open conversation in which Kento clearly laid out his mission so that the heroes could still oppose him, but would do so with the explicit knowledge of what they're fighting (except for Ren and Rintarou, who will undoubtedly hear Reika's bastardized version of events and begrudgingly believe it because they're a moron and a cultist, respectively).

I want to take a second to point out the contrast here with something else I'm watching: Den-O. As those of you following Kamen Rider Die's thread already know, he's up to the point where Zeronos first shows up. One of the main deals with Yuuto on that show is that he has at least some idea of what the villains' plot is (as much as they have one; Den-O's villains have very poorly explained goals) and knows a lot about the disappearance of his future self. He refuses to explain any of this to Ryotaro, primarily insisting that he doesn't need to know. I am so relieved to Saber take a swerve here and actually put the heroes and the antihero on the same page (pun not initially intended, then realized, then intended).

But yeah, this was a great episode. I really like how the show raised the stakes, both narratively and structurally. I liked the big fight scene - I love Saber's three-sided battles and am always down for more. And finally, I loved how we got the full reveal of the show's next big bad, an origin story for the Megido, and the long overdue erasure of Tassel and all of that stuff feels like a footnote because the show's A plot was so strong.

That is an incredibly kind thing to say! Thank you! :)

Oh right, the stock music! I was going to complain about that! It's definitely a little excessive here, and I wish they had either shown a little more faith in their own soundtrack (Kousuke Yamashita does great work; use it!), or even just went for outright silence, which honestly might've been preferable in some scenes. Not a major issue for the episode, but still, it stuck out in a bad way for me.

This sorta summarizes my thoughts on the show as a whole. I feel that Fukuda is a good writer, he just needs the right team to work with him.

He's written about 10 episodes so far, and I think he's done a good job overall. Laying the groundwork for a whole year-long show is hard enough- I can't imagine penning a whole show by yourself.

I enjoyed the first arc on the premise that it went at a breakneck pace purely because a war isn't gonna slow down for a new recruit. But it feels similarly fast-paced now, and that's after 26 episodes of development.

But I digress, 'cause this show feels like its finally ramping up. From episode 21, the show's been going HARD and hasn't stopped. I'm legitimately so excited for this show. It might be one of my favorites by the end, honestly.

Everything I want to say has been said before in this thread and I'm running out of things to say with this show.

For lack of better words and for potentially devolving into repetition: I love this show. I love it so much.

I legit cannot wait to see what comes next for Saber.

In my case it was higurashi and rezero vibes from that whole sequence

I second the Re:Zero-ness. It didn't occur to me at the time, but you are absolutely right.


I also might be holding on to this one part of this week's episode with disproportionate intensity as it's one of the few moments in the show where I felt really engaged with the narrative.

Looking back this show went from Mighty Morphin Logos Rangers to Saint Seiya real quick. I mean Master Logos is practically Gemini Saga at this point.

These past two episodes have easily, EASILY been the best episodes Takuro Fukuda has ever written. This two-parter right here is the story Saber should have been telling all along. It is a bit...odd that we seem to have forgotten about the humans being transformed into Megidos, but I'm going to chalk that up to the show not knowing what the heck to do with those three bad guys. But man, we are halfway through this show and I think we have finally seen this show find its footing and is telling a story that's actually engaging and unique among the KR franchise.

Also, there is no way in hell Tassel is dead. In fact, after watching this episode, I'm convinced he (and Logos) will become Riders down the road.

You know, I praised the episode for having Saikou pointedly move his head to subtly convey Yuri's thoughts, and it's just now occurring to me that there's also something technically wrong about that scene, which is that Saikou Shadow isn't supposed to emote like that.

I mean, it's obviously a simple conceit for the sake of the drama, and I'm not actually saying it's a problem (because it's the opposite of that) – I mostly just want to use this as an excuse to mention one more thing I find cool about X Swordman, which is how no matter what form Saikou is in, his consciousness is always supposed to be located wherever the gold mask is. This is even evident in this very episode, where Saikou looks at Touma and Mei with his arm to ask them if they're alright after he saves them. It's a neat way to keep some of the unique weirdness of Saikou's body language around even though X Swordman's default mode makes him into a "normal" Rider.

Well I'm caught up now, and wow all the emotional beats in this episode hit like trucks.

I noticed that too. It's not the only scene, too. When Yuri was about to charge towards Kento, Touma grabbed him by the shoulder and Shadow looked at him.

It's an acting mistake I think, but in a way, it's also kind of creepy when you consider Shadow is somewhat alive and has its own sensory organs??

I think with X-Swordman specifically, the idea is that it's the light fully controlling the shadow; no matter what form that light takes. It's definitely a little... odd, and I certainly think you could chalk more than a few of its options up to oversights (suit actors, directors and just about everyone else on the creative team is used to more conventional stuff that they wouldn't pick up on every instance of this being broken), but it's something I can ignore.