I think its future Mai.

That is great and all, but I'm not learning Japanese and as these subs are supposed to cater to English speakers primarily, they should AT LEAST use basic English grammar but we don't even get that.

I thought the idea was that each world taken over by the forest bears a new Fruit of Knowledge. Maybe he needs two fruits to revive her?

(Sigh...) Wish I hadn't finished Fourze so quickly...now I want more of it... :( Fatal drawback of mass-marathoning I guess...

Are you referring to Final Fantasy Cosplaying Mai? I'm pretty sure that is Mai's spirit from the past and that her name is Eve. Of course, who knows, maybe this Overlords original name was Adam.

Super-1 Episode 42: Also known as the funniest, fantastic episode of the series, lol. Besides the ridiculousness of a Basketball monster (Not the strangest one on this show, lol.) I love that Super-1 infiltrates a costume party held by Jin Dogma. The best part is, is that they make you believe that he just walks in in a Super-1 costume but he doesn't it's Tani in the Super-1 Costume which made even better and funnier. I love when Super-1 revealed he was the Wolfman in the scene, and finally got to meet Marshal Devil face to face, I am so pumped for that showdown now. I also enjoyed him fighting the four generals for a bit too. The Basketball monster was interesting that he could break apart and be hard to hit, it was another brilliant fight. I enjoyed this episode a lot, and also loved that Tani was taking out the Jin Dogma Fighters too.

With ZX having a prominent role in the Kamen Rider Taisen movie and me getting his Figuart cheap last weekend, I decided to check out Birth of the 10th! All Riders Together!!

I started watching it on a really dated rip (no idea who subbed it, its been sitting on my hard drive for about 3 years) that had a short summary of the original Kamen Rider series with some narration that went a bit behind the scenes. It was pretty interesting to hear about some of the landmark episodes and the kind of ratings the show was pulling in, plus it provided me with this gem of a screen cap:

http://i.imgur.com/y6hESw9.png

Oh Japan.

Moving on the the special itself, I switched over the MCS' better quality MKV. It was a pretty good special, but didn't really do much for ZX. His origin is completely glossed over in about 2 minutes, his personal supporting characters are paper thin and a fair chunk of the running time was either spent reminiscing on the past Riders or watching them fight. The suit itself was pretty cool, as were what little I saw of his powers. I should probably get around to reading the manga so I can see a bit more of him.

Badan was...generic evil organisation made up of reconstituted old suits. Kinda what I expected from a 45 min special to be honest. The Ambassador Hell/Darkness confusion gave me a chuckle though.

Before the age of yearly crossovers this must have been a pretty awesome thing to see, but now it's just kinda there. And its success kinda hinges on the crossover-ness of it all, since ZX doesn't really leave a lasting impression.

ZX is a lot more interesting in Spirits.

Oh, and watching more Gaim. Knight of Hammer.

Hibiki 07. Probably the worst episode so far.

Hibiki's training was awesome but duh...he's like the best main Rider ever but I'm getting bored of each episode having the same villains just in increasingly shittier costumes and makeup and I care about absolutely nothing involving Asumu.

Ibuki seems pretty cool I guess but his Rider form is very much like Hibiki only...not as good and although a trumpet is mostly pretty cool it isn't a touch on drumming on your enemy....until they explode.

Man, we think so alike.

And at this point I'm going to let you know that you may have jumped into the wrong season then. While there is plenty of stuff to keep rider fans happy, the show is ostensibly a coming of age story for Asumu and how the riders, particularly Hibiki, have an impact on his growth and development.

It isn't the coming of age stuff I have a problem with, it's just that TVNs translations do little to close the cultural divide. I didn't even realise that Jou place (Jounen? I don't even remember) was a high school until about four episodes after it was introduced and someone explicitly stated it. Half of the episodes were dedicated a guy trying to go to a place I know nothing about.

So Hibiki is another character based show ala Agito? I can dig that.

Yeah, that's about how I'd describe it. The primary conflict is really more of an ongoing thing that doesn't have its beginning nor its ending contained within the show (I know a lot of people seem to complain about this aspect), it's there to provide rider action and conflict, but as I said, the show is primarily about Asumu coming of age, how the riders have an affect on that, and the relationships between everyone and how they change and grow over the course of a year.

So basically TVN subs are impacting your ability to enjoy the show?

Sounds about right.

That kind of sucks...

Oh, and I'm making my way through Gaim. At the rate I'm moving, I doubt I'll catch up by next week's episode (Especially with the Den-O interruption tomorrow for LWW), but soon...

During the scene where Hase died, I had Shin Kamen Rider's "Forever" playing in my head.

Gaim Episode 30

So that happened.

It wasn't a horrible episode, I'm just upset they stole an episode of story for a Kikaider preview. I like Kikaider, I loved Haikaider, but.. I found myself skipping through a lot of the episode to get to the fight scenes instead of sitting through watching the whole thing.

^to be fair, for a crossover episode, it wasn't THAT bad.

Gaim Ep 31

.. Okay then. Watching that fight scene I knew Sid was going to die, but damn. You didn't have to go all Biblical on his ass :lol Still, ass had it coming. And Ryouma proved he doesn't care about anyone. Even Marika. Which means him an even bigger jerk.

And I really hope at some point they get to explaining Sagara.

Recent talk of Hibiki is reminding me to finish my re-watch of Hibiki. When I first watched I almost got to the point where people said the staff changes...but I dunno, I'll probably go and continue it anyway to see what it's like.

I'll definitely go and check out the movie while I'm at it.

Yeah Hibiki's general humour and content is well... very Japanese and since TVN just do a straight transplant of the dialogue, grammar and all and just put it in English words I find Hibiki very hard to follow. Especially with the speed Hibiki moves at.

Yay, officially caught up on Gaim~

Super-1 Episode 43: Learned more about Super-1 and his hands this episode. I like that his hot and cold hands can regulate his temperature to handle extreme temperatures. The JRS looking out for the Professor was great even if it got them in danger it still allowed Kazuya to find them, and lead to stopping Jin Dogma. Staff Officer Witch shined with her plan in the beginning and trying to threaten the Professor and captured JRS member, also she is pretty hot. The Summer must be hot in Japan especially if the villains didn't like it lol. I enjoyed that Super-1's Cold hands were able to out freeze the monster's ice blast. Very fun episode. Closing in on this series.

What time is it? IT'S SPACE TIME! Because I just watched the first episode of Kamen Rider Fourze and holy shit WHY DIDN'T I WATCH THIS SHOW SOONER!

Long story short, I am in love with Fourze! Gentarou is fun as hell, the villains look awesome, and the fight scenes? AWESOME! This is gonna be a fun ride so come on and SWITCH ON! :D

Over-Time have got Wizard in Magic Land up. I know a lot of people didn't like the movie, but I dug it, so if you haven't seen it it's worth picking up in my opinion, especially now the better group have done it. I'm gonna grab the 1080 release to watch on my big TV.

I totally concur!!! I finished Fourze in about 5 days but now I wish that I hadn't done that cuz I want more of it now haha! Amazing series for sure.

You like better than I did, although I think I like the first episode, but after a couple, it took until Meteor for me to like it again.

I think the first half is some of the best Rider stuff ever made, but I personally felt it really went downhill when Meteor was introduced and never fully picked up again. Really liked Meteor's suit and powers though.

Hibiki 08. That is one BADASS trumpet.

This episode was really, really strong. We learnt more about Takashi, and the most interesting aspect for me is the idea of a Rider organisation that deploys Riders for different purposes. I don't think we've had a dynamic like that explicitly stated in a Rider series before.

Still don't care for Asumu like at all, but I will admit I got some slightly embarrassed giggles around the natural awkwardness between him and Akira and that cringe worthy age when you first discover girls.

Hibiki continues to be wonderful. The scene with Hibiki speaking about his theoretical future, the conversation was light and full of smiles but he was clearly euphemistically avoiding the reality that he may not live long enough to write a book. Or do anything for that matter.

Similarly was the scene of Asumu's Mother, we don't know the story of Asumu's Dad yet and this is purely fanwanking but Asumu's mother has clearly been compensating for the missing half and now Asumu has found a father figure in Hibiki he's drifting away from his mother as Hibiki can provide things she just can't. That scene of her alone with the meal she prepared for him, that little sigh, it was profoundly sad.

This sense that what the Oni are doing is fighting a very real war, but the audience see into the world through Asumu who is innocent and perceives Hibiki in that selfish way that comes from the naivety of youth is a theme that permeates the tone and much better realises the emotions.

And overall, the real season this episode felt so strong, was tone. Toku generally likes the melodrama at eleven and will prefer to scream emotions at you than try and see what emotional response you gleam from simply what is already there. But this was the complete opposite of that, all the story was told through slumped shoulders, eye contact avoidance and awkward smiles. I loved it.

This posted twice for some reason, sorry.

Is there any reason as to why BD encodes do not have the uncompressed 5.1 audio track?

What can I say I'm hooked! :D

We don't get a lot about Asumu's dad. In the first part the only thing we really learn (or would have learned, if TVN hadn't bungled the translation on that line) is that Hibiki resembles him in some ways. After the production switch, though, we get a very different take on Asumu's dad that just makes him a negligent douchebag.

Super-1 Episode 44: Wow I can't believe that Choro can bend like that, I swear he must be like quadruple jointed or some crazy thing like that. Great use of him as a supporting character to be mind controlled by Jin Dogma to get this destructive formula. The Monster of the week was a Ladder monster and was pretty deadly with him and the soldiers all attacking and throwing ladders at Super-1. The combat scenes with the ladders were definitely really fun and a highlight. Can't wait, 4 episodes left and I believe we'll get to the final showdown with the Generals the next couple episodes.

Fourze is fun. I'm glad you enjoy it! I think it has a fairly solid start as you get to know the cast.

While I don't think it went downhill that quickly, it's second half wasn't quite as good as I was hoping.

Being one who wasn't a big fan of the series, what does the movie offer to make it worth watching?
And I'm not being sarcastic.

So I watched episode 1 of kabuto in class today, so... Did tendou actually took the zecter beetle? Or did it really choose him?

It chose him, I believe.

A cast that seem to genuinely enjoy what they are doing, an alt world Nitou who is basically the Nitou we got at the end of the series only with powers. More of that glorious action we got from the original series and the movie has a lot more fun with Wizard's mythology than the show did.

That is a disappointing, but it's nice to know that it isn't some generic "everyone I know is dead!" shit.

You know, Shin Kamen Rider's Forever is too good for that movie...

I was hooked by Fourze about halfway through that first episode, and I enjoyed it more and more as it went on. Though when Meteor does that thing about 2/3rds through, that was the high point for me. Or the movie with Skydain and Groundain, that also might be the high point.

Fourze is a fantastic series, in my opinion. I hope you continue to enjoy it.