Kamen Rider OOO Episode 15


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This is such an action-packed episode.

But let me say this to start: no Ghost episode today. I really wanted to, but I work at a Supermarket and we're currently in the run-up to Christmas so suddenly my schedule's been loaded with more hours than Kougami has medals! It's fine, really; more money means more toku toys I can buy, but it does mean that I have a little less time to cover these episodes, as full disclosure; it actually can take me up to two hours to watch, process and write up something about each one. I do want to keep on top of it especially because I really want to watch the Christmas episodes on Christmas, but it just means the Ghost episode will have to wait a bit.

Anyway WOW SHIT HITS THE FAN OUT OF NOWHERE! Though I mean, I guess not totally out of nowhere? OOO is a show that's pretty effortless and casual in setting up its status quos and creating situations where anything can happen, so I don't exactly need a lot of set-up to buy into "Maki casually mentioning he's curious about all the core medals being collected provokes Kazari into hijacking a cell medal truck with the other Greeed". It's just what these characters do, y'know? And it's fun seeing the four come together again - they're still very down on their luck and scrabbling for any advantage they can, but together they're a threat, and their interactions with Kazari are genuinely interesting; though I'm really liking how Mezool and Uva feel almost like friends now? They've grown into allies with mutual respect in their time working together and it's fun seeing just how much synergy they've got beating up OOO. I'm a sucker for this stuff! It stands out even in an episode where so much is going on; Ankh's discovered one of his Core Medals, Izumi's in danger, Kazari and Maki are planning stuff and it all converges on what feels like a season finale. Suitable for the end of the year!

The real star of the show of course is Eiji and Ankh's relationship. Things just keep getting more and more tense between them; their being allies was always a single step away from chaos and I adore every moment it does indeed snap. Ankh's focus on his core medal putting Izumi in danger would be juicy enough on its own, but the way Eiji resolves it is just... I love it. I love it so much. Despite being OOO and literally fighting monsters every day, Eiji just isn't much of a violent person -- Hina might solve problems with Ankh with her fists (and I support her and love her every single time she does), but the way Eiji looks like he's going to punch Ankh... only to then hold back and say "hey want a year's worth of ice cream" is so so good. At every moment he's trying to appease everyone around him; trying to please everyone without letting it comes to violence while being savvy enough to know what will work and what won't. It coming in an episode that starts with Chiyoko bringing up a 20,000 Yen bill for Ankh's Ice Cream is the cherry on top. It's always nice to see these two come together, even (or perhaps especially) over something so petty.

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IIRC this episode taught me that "Popsicles" in Japan are called "Ice Candy" and I will always appreciate it for that.

This is even more true now seeing the issues Saber is having establishing its main villains, but when I rewatched the show myself, I found a new appreciation for just how genuine the whole Greeed social circle is. Especially once you start taking into account their backstories and everything. They're insanely dysfunctional even when they aren't crossing over into out and out fighting, but at the same time, there's this very strong sense they kind of "get" each other that always comes across in their interactions. They have much more specific motivations than just being evil for the sake of it (the active desperation in particular stands out as unusual to me), and like every bit of natural characterization in OOO, it just makes the show that much better.

Kamen Rider Ghost Episode 11


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I didn't watch this in time for Christmas!

Which is a bit of a shame, because it's probably the one I have the least to say about -- oh, sure; it's the one where Takeru brings Kanon back to life and it's all very emotional and lovely, but the rest of the episode is more or less an extended fight scene and all the interesting fallout is promised next episode instead. Also, Saionji died! RIP dude!

Not to say the fight scene isn't good, mind -- it's a lot of fun, with Onari and the others tossing eyecons to Takeru and Makoto as they find them in the pre-upgrade-use-all-the-gimmick-forms celebratory fight. That old trope! It definitely stands out mind that Makoto only gets an entire two Damashiis while Takeru has half a dozen, but main rider privilege; what you gonna do? Well, what I'm gonna do is bask in the glory of both Takeru and Makoto reverting to their base forms to do a Rider Kick! I wasn't sure if that'd happen again! It gets blocked by a big CGI monster sure and Javert gets to live to no doubt star in a famous french musical, but hey, I'm also watching the show where the main rider's base form rider kick never gets to properly land; so I'm kinda conditioned to like this as-is. Another special shoutout goes to yet another thing I can't believe I forgot happened: Takeru backwards-jumping into all the Damashiis, taking on their forms for a second at a time before reverting back to Ore and doing an all-powers-combined kick. That's an idea that's so good and thematically appropriate; it'd be cool if they did a form about that or something!

Aside from that? Damn, it's nice to see Makoto just get to smile now. It's great to see that moment when the anti-hero finally breaks down at the end of his quest; now that there's no point to suppressing his feelings, his letting out that there was no goddamn point in attacking Takeru if he couldn't get to fulfill his wish anyway just absolutely hurts, almost as much as him hugging a now-alive Kanon hits me in the heart.

I won't lie, it's still a little upsetting to me all these years later that TaToBa got such an elaborate and memorable Rider Kick and then barely got to successfully use it. :lol

Great episode of Ghost though! Some pretty powerhouse performances from both Takeru and Makoto's actors, and that big extended fight scene that carries with it this almost celebratory tone, with Ghost and Specter finally working together. Just some darn solid Kamen Rider all around.

RIP Saionji, you sure were a good villain, hope you enjoy being banished to the weird spin-off realm.

Kamen Rider Ghost HBV: Ikyuu

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This is exactly the kind of stupid I love.

Last time all the humour was centered around wordplay of a language I only kind of grasp a few words of through osmosis and context, so it didn't really land for me! But this time the humour is coming from, like, everywhere, and it is a non-stop deluge of insanity that made me double check to see it wasn't written by Toshiki Inoue. Talking of which? Difficult, very difficult to compete with the 555 HBV; but this might just be one of my favourite HBVs ever! It's just utterly hilarious from start to finish and exactly what I wanted on my christmas eve night, with the exclusive character photobombing the entire fight to Ikyuu's ridiculous attacks to the sequence of Makoto learning triangles through swinging protractors around like they were batons... and none of this ever, ever calms down for a second.

This doesn't tell me anything about anyone's character, or resolve a mystery, or give me deeper insight or even is anything like Kamen Rider Ghost to begin with but I don't care, this was funny. Loved every second.

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Well that's just how you know the Faiz HBV still stands at the top; that thing was both funny, AND deeply reflective of Takumi's hidden inner feelings.

I could really stand to watch the Ghost HBV's again. I remember liking the first one and then loving this one, but I can't recall a single detail as to why at this point. Like, man, who knows how many amazing Pythagoras-related jokes I'm forgetting about at this very moment!

Kamen Rider OOO Episode 16

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And a happy new year?

Yeah, bit late on this one, huh! Was expecting to have a quiet Christmas, and I did; you still end up a lot busier than you think you'd be even without work (cannot express how lucky I am to be working at a Supermarket yet my schedule lining up just right to get boxing day and new years off). Between that and not getting in the right headspace to talk about stuff and hence defaulting to watching more Ultraman Tiga, which is quickly proving itself to be a lot of fun despite defying my expectations; this took me a while! Still, it's not too bad -- I'm not gonna keep this a secret, both OOO and Ghost took a 2-week break after these episodes. This is pretty standard for Toku I'm finding; taking a week off for new years after Christmas and only catching up around mid-January. So it's not quiiite going for the experience I wanted, I funnily enough ended up right in the mid-point of those two weeks; but hey, it works.

Anyway this episode is a pretty good mid-season finale! A few details first of all -- this was in the last episode too, but there are multiples scenes of Mezool falling over badly hurt... and medals are falling out of her to simulate bleeding. Mwah. Perfect. Funny yet at the same time makes a lot of sense, is quite sad to watch, and is perfectly symbolic of desire being the lifeblood of these creatures. Can you honestly get more toku than that? Also, second and last time Gatakiriba gets used in the show! If you liked that form... well, I hope you like OOO's movies and spin-off material! I promise they get better after War Core. And finally because it would be a crime to leave any OOO thing just short of three points, the shot at the end of Ankh going for the Core Medals only for Ankh and Uva to also jump in in a triangle, all aiming for the Medals and getting their share? Beautiful. I don't have much to say just, look at this, man. Love it.

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Now, what is there to say about this episode? A lot! Like, wow; it doesn't seem like it at first but this is where a lot of things are converging. So let's knock this one out first: The Lore. Now if you know me, I don't need a lot of Lore to enjoy a Toku show. Kuuga was very intentional about not giving a lot of details about its backstory and I loved that; Zi-O had... a mess of a story and I liked that too; Sentai and Ultra are almost consistently light and I always find something to like there. But when there's a good backstory to the whole thing while managing to keep all the things I love about Toku intact, wow can it draw me in! Every single line Kougami drops about the Greeed's creation, the people who made them, what was changed about them and what the old King did with it all... I don't know what it is about 2010 Japanese television and alchemy, but apparently it's just always a good mix! Or maybe I'm just that attached to the concept of creatures made up of base human desires and how they function with little concept of the world around them and clawing and fighting for things they've convinced themselves they want when actually it's all they know? ... man, at this rate maybe Birth should have just been a walking suit of armour with Gotou's soul hastily drawn on the neck.

Right, Birth! What an incredibly sick move to have the last shot of the show for two weeks be Birth de-transforming into a guy we've literally never seen before instead of Gotou after so much teasing that the secondary hero would be, well, our secondary hero? Sorry to disappoint DS, but I've got good memories of this guy! Can't say anything yet of course but he makes a great impression -- what's his deal? What's his desires? Why's he hauling around a giant milk can? Why is him forgetting what his Rider name is and just holding up the manual instead so ungodly funny?

The best thing about Birth though? He's barely in the spotlight! ... Now hold on, I did just say I liked him! But I can't help but love when a writer doesn't let a new toy get in the way of a story they're telling and instead keep the focus directly on elements that you can't buy in store now for 3800 Yen. The Greeed have their best showing in this and this is what it's all been leading up to. Gamel is wonderful in this episode -- on the surface he's just The Dumb One, the stupid childlike muscle with no depth. And... he is! It's not like he's secretly a genius or anything, there's no new revelations about his character here. But what makes this work is how much they do with that concept; how much he's stumbling around lost looking for the only person he knows and loves, how sad and desperate he's becoming, how perfectly emblematic that is of how much it doesn't matter how many Core Medals you have and how it doesn't matter to how happy you'll be. All it does is break everything down; Uva's suddenly chasing after Mezool for her single remaining core medal despite their established comradery so far, and all the Greeed are succumbing to their desire only for it to ultimately lead to the end for half of them. We're not seeing Gamel or Mezool for a while, and it all leads to the revelation that the reason Ankh wants the core medals; the reason all of them are after this... is because the Greeed are fragile. They lead cursed lives with fragile bodies and incomplete existences after their tenth core medal was ripped from their hearts, and what Ankh wants more than anything else is to be whole again. It's a wonderful scene where it's laid out just how genuine Ankh is about it all yet it doesn't diminish his or the other Greeeds' villainy at all; the same horrifying overture is played over it, it's right in the aftermath of a battle where that desire could have destroyed the world, and the actions leading here are no less horrific. All that remains is Eiji's desire to reach out however he can.

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Kamen Rider Ghost Episode 12

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This is what I was waiting for.

First of all, um, apologies to Fish! I already went on a whole spiel up there about how I meant to watch these sooner, but he's made little secret of this being one of his favourite episodes he goes back to a lot; and especially with me pouring so much love into this rewatch and saying I wanted to watch this on Christmas day I'm sure he was anticipating this. Uh. Sorry for taking a bit!

But maybe it'll compensate a little if I say that not only am I mad at myself for not loving this episode on my first watch, not only is this exactly what I wanted out of a Ghost rewatch - for me to fall in love - but that this is the first time I've preferred the Ghost segment of this rewatch to the OOO?

I know, right after I had so much to say about OOO! After so much of that was about the core of what I adore about that show! And having said that this is the first time it's been in the lead, that’s not to Ghost’s detriment at all - every episode so far has been competent and enjoyable at worst; with very emotional highs and compelling drama at its best, with me noticing new things each episode that make me glad I committed to this. But OOO is, well, it’s my favourite and perhaps next to Kuuga is the most intentional Rider show I find; one where every single detail is finely tuned and worked into an overflowing matrix of Kobayashi’s grand plan. It’s a HELL of an act to live up to; most of the Toku shows I love are not able to be that good -- and that’s fine, damn; you do not need to be that good. But my point is that this can make it a bit harder for Ghost to stand out in this rewatch and yet episode 12 had no problem.

There’s... so much going on this episode that’s hard for me to not just say “watch it and see for yourself”, it’s one of those where the acting is doing most of the legwork and that’s a compliment to the cast. I’ve found every actor on this show really good so far but this is where they all get to showcase that they’ve got serious skill -- this is the episode dealing with the aftermath of Takeru giving up his wish in order to save Kanon instead, so not only do they have very little time to get the Eyecons again, not only do the Ganma actually have a couple themselves, but they don’t even know if any of this will work and their wise sage has disappeared on them. And a lot of this is done through implications but you see Takeru deciding that he is very staunchly in the acceptance stage here -- he’s decided that he’s accepting his death; he wouldn’t have been able to save Kanon if he wasn’t ready to do that and he is convincing himself the entire episode that that’s what he’s doing. So he’s remaining calm, all smiles; all being fun and friendly at new year’s and making sure to try and make his friends happy in his last remaining days. It is a shockingly well-done episode of someone on his deathbed; just portraying what that person is going through and what he wants to spend his last days on. And what really puts a pin in all that is that on the night before his death day, well, there’s a reason I said convincing himself he’s in the acceptance stage: he’s not. He’s really not. He can’t sleep, he’s just about on the verge of tears, he’s crying and we see the spectre of his father looking down on him in sadness. And all of this is conveyed just through the strength of the actor and the implication behind each action without the need for more than very little dialogue. This is toku at its best; this is... this has very quickly become one of my favourite Kamen Rider episodes of all time.

But it’s not just Takeru, it’s how his friends around him are reacting. We get a small scene with Makoto and Kanon but what’s really focused on are Akari and Onari; throwing themselves desperately into their work to try and help Takeru but failing at every step and eventually breaking down in tears as they realise there’s too little time and there’s nothing they can do. There’s a wonderful scene on the beginning of the last day where Onari asks Akari if she’s okay and if she’s eaten and Akari says she doesn’t feel like eating, and that’s a very basic exchange dialogue; nothing wrong with it it’s just what you expect for this sort of subject matter, and yet her actress has all these subtle quiverings and she’s delivering it so well and it gets you in the goddamn heart. Even the scene after where Takeru’s saying he might not disappear, he’s just saying goodbye just in case, and they all laugh about it and the way it’s done is... is amazing! It got to me! Every single bit of acting in this episode got to me!

And then Toucon Boost saving his life is... oh good god it’s so good and relieving. And I know there's a lot of people who will criticise this as very cheap; after the 99-day rule was so clearly laid out he gets saved by his dad overwriting all the rules, and I get that and if that's how you feel fair enough; but... I can't disagree more! It’s a reward for his good karma in choosing to save the life of another, and even then just a temporary extension granted through sacrifice. It’s a beautifully heroic moment and one with all this wonderful fire imagery as Takeru’s life burns bright, and maybe resolve through a new powerup and beating up the powerful bad guy is the most basic modern toku gets; but fuck if it’s not what I love and if it’s not what hits! The wave of relief and restored resolve that comes with it at the end of the episode as the series takes a 2-week break is such a perfect ending I can’t put it into words. What can I say? Kamen Rider Ghost is awesome.

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ah yes

my arch nemesis appears

Outside of that though I remember liking this episode alot too. And uh, looking back on it, it kinda makes what I learned about what Ex-Aid did for Christmas make sense, I guess? I more mean I see what the building blocks were for Toei to think it would be a good idea, if you see what I'm getting at.

Yeah, I know what you mean -- a LOT of Rider shows since W have used this "pre-new year, pre-two week break" to do something dramatic, do something arc-ending. Aside from debuting a new rider or upgrade (as seen in both of these) there's also usually something narrative -- look at Saber having the Swordsmen turn against Touma, or Build having the last episode before the Rider War (which also has Banjou inform a lot of Sento's character after a big fall), or Gaim having Kouta and Kaito escape from Yggdrasil. It's quite the trope and one I'm surprised I never see brought up!

Still one of the most daring introductions to a secondary Rider out there. I mean, you have got to have some serious confidence in the story you're telling to just completely throw the viewers for a loop that way. You literally can't guess who Birth is going to be, because Date just pops into existence out of nowhere here. It's awesome!

So, in order:

- You'd better believe I was anticipating this.

- You don't need to worry about hurting my feelings when you're over there in Die's Kabuto thread comparing us to two of the most notable and talented directors in the history of film. (seriously holy s*** that was a nice thing to wake up to on the first day of 2021 thank you)

- This episode of Ghost is THE BEST. I think you covered it pretty well; I mean, I know from experience how hard it is to go into it without just saying "watch it and pay attention to everyone's facial expressions". It took until right as the series finished its run for me to truly realize Ghost was a new favorite for me, but this particular episode, I remember just flooring me right at the time with how unlike the average episode of Kamen Rider so much of it felt it terms of tone, and how it expresses its themes. It's hugely unfortunate how often it gets dismissed the way it does. I can't think of anything that shows the writers (and this was a Fukuda episode, by the way) knew what they were doing any more than the simple fact that the thing that saves Takeru's life is the undying love of his father.

I've personally been calling them "season finales" for years now, so it's definitely something I've always recognized. I think it actually started with OOO, too, funnily enough! Double was when the whole schedule change happened with Decade running shorter than normal, and in its particular case, they just made you wait two weeks to see the back half of FangJoker's debut, which is insanely cruel. From OOO onward, though, it's usually a pretty straightforward climax to cap off an arc. Or, if you're really cool, like Wizard is, you just save Christmas in a fun, relatively low-stakes standalone adventure. :p

I was in a nostalgic mood and watched a bunch of random rider episodes that had major form debuts. When it comes specifically to title rider final power-ups, I was sure for a long time that my favourite goes to Blade thanks to his mother-of-all-hype moments where he punches King's lights out, and is then rewarded with the effort with his shiny new King Form.

But I actually think I love W's the most. Shotaro and Phillip's uncertainty about their partnership concluding with them riding together to Nobody's Perfect and then transforming on their bridge is like, beyond iconic, and that it leads to CycloneJokerXtreme, them being more united than ever before, is just supremely ace...

The final form that had the best debut fight though, easily goes to Zero Two in my eyes, and it's top notch from a narrative sense as a bonus too!

I'm watching Ryuki and Kiva and I wish I wasn't, lol. I skipped both of these shows initially because, whilst both Inoue and Kobayashi have their moments, I'm not really a fan of their shows often, and, well, watching them in 2021 makes me realise why i didn't watch them in 2002 and 2008 respectively.

Aww, I have both shows high on my list, lol! :mad: I just generally tend to lean more towards the 2000s with Kamen Rider, although I suppose not every 2010s show was the same but I just tend to prefer the old darker and mostly pre-HD shows.

I think you'll be right at home with them in that case, and I do hope you enjoy them. When I was younger, I wouldn't have given them the time of day because I really only liked the Showa shows and the somewhat anomalous Hibiki, but now that I'm an old lady, I am a bit more forgiving, and I'm happy to accept that these shows aren't really made with me in mind, and it's fine them being what they are, regardless of how my definition of what a Kamen Rider is might be a little more rigid than the showrunners of works like Ryuki.

I like you.

Hahah, thank you! I wouldn't ever want to be down on someone else's favourite show or anything, and I appreciate things like nuance and moral ambiguity in characters, but, gosh, even though I'm an adult, I just really like it when Kamen Riders are people you look up to, people with a strong moral code who keep getting up no matter how many times they're defeated.

Ah~! *sighs and looks out of the window*

Double's really nails it! I think I called it something along the lines of "a gold standard, much like the show as a whole" back when I did my rewatch in here, and I only respect it more and more with time. It's just super natural and smooth in everything it does, and in the process of exploring that relationship at the core of the series, it touches nicely on something I'd consider to really be the heart of most tokusatsu heroes, which is, well... exactly that. Heart. Just the idea that Shoutarou's earnest desire to protect the city he loves is a critical part of what makes them Kamen Rider.

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It's stuff like this that keeps Double such a definitive Rider show, even over a decade later.

Despite it being one of my earliest Kamen Riders (literally my second, not counting my catching up with Build at the time)... this part has always, always stuck out. Just the way my mind works, there's certain things I often don't retain - somehow including some of W's ridiculous plots like the possessed car - and it's what's making my OOO/Ghost rewatch so fun (Will get back to that soon, by the by!). But this Final Form moment? Oh boy, it's a STRONG one. The moment I think about it I remember them shaking each other's hands from the bike, walking over together towards the bridge, Nobody's Perfect playing as they face off against the bad guys of the week. It's such a wonderful encapsulation of who they are after weeks of will-they-won't-they with Shroud and Terui. One of the best!

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Pretty Den-O subbed courtesy of ERankedLuck. 20 minutes of cute fun where Momotaros teams up with a little girl to stop Shocker from getting rich. I already forgot how this special was originally distributed and I'm curious as to the how and why it was conceived, but it was a lot of fun. My only complaint is that the title character, Pretty Den-O, should have been the only form of Den-O to appear at all!

Not shaking hands, but clasping hands as Phillip pulls Shotaro up and goes "Let's go partner"!! I'm pretty sure it was one of the earliest series I started watching myself back in 2013 or so, but I'm also happy in a way that it sort of set a high precedent for big emotional payoffs and form debuts for me so early on. Not that I think just any show just pull off such a great use of an insert like W did here though!

It part of Toei Spring Movie Festival which of bunch short movies ranging from 20-50 minute movies. Other movies you may reconize coming from this is the 90's movie trilogy Shin, Zo and J. And for other properties such as the Digimon Adventure short film or as english viewers might know it as the 1st part of the Digimon Movie

Yeah this got a bit delayed if I recall? Given Covid was hitting full swing at the time.

It's a cute little special, and I enjoyed the historically relevant cameo's they put in there.

But man, Shocker hasn't really been at the top of it's game since Super Duper Hero Taisen huh? Like they were this big army that wanted to take over the world, and then we haven't really seen them since. And now their current plan was "Use the Den-Liner to steal a lotto ticket to get them a grand cash prize to fund a new hideout".

Reminds me of the Build Special Event Stageshow I watched like a while back where Shocker themselves have been talking about how they're pretty low threat lately.

Thanks for pointing this out. This was a really fun little special. The story wasn't all that unique, but it was still enjoyable and had some good jokes in it. There's something really amusing to me about the idea that Shocker's current master plan is to hijack a time machine just to steal a lottery ticket. I loved the gags centered around the Crisis soldier, first the bit where the Shocker mooks thought he was a big deal and then the fantastic stinger with Black RX.

Biggest thrill for me was seeing Rina Akiyama show up. I'm not surprised that Toei can get some voice actors back into the booth to record dialogue, but it's always a treat when one of the actual human characters from Den-O shows up again. Pity we didn't get Owner, too, but I'm more than happy to have Naomi.

Oh, amazing! I was hoping this would come out soon! I'm going to watch this over the weekend after I catch up on Nogizaka Sailor Moon.

Something I was not expecting to watch, or even to see uploaded, a Highlight reel of the Zero-One Final Stage from Toei Tokusatsu World Official.

Nothing too substantial, but still fun, I wasn't expecting something like this to drop with English Subtitle commentary.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-L9i6vJaInk

I cried at the end of this.

I mean, make of that what you will, I cry at everything.

Genuinely impressed by Pretty Den-O. Like, it is such a genuine Den-O story, with all the fun and sentimentality that implies, and while it's obviously not going to be some top tier outing for the series, the novelty of it existing at all is wonderful. I also wasn't aware until the credits that Kobayashi supervised on the writing like she usually does, which was a pleasant surprise, even if I don't want to downplay Yonemura's contribution.

Really, I guess the bottom line is just I am absolutely still down for endless Den-O spin-offs. I truly think these characters are timeless, and it makes me so happy that the second a new era started, Toei made it a priority to prove that once again. It was great to see them all back for a bit.

And that stinger was the best!

Pretty Den-O was a nice episode-length short of bringing people up to speed about Shocker and Den-O. I only have four nitpicks for Pretty Den-O. One, did Naomi get to eat before filming? She lookin kinda thin. Two, why wasn't this a precure crossover?? But seriously:

Three, Sword Form looked off. I don't know if it was just me, but whoever wore the Den-O suit didn't get to fit in it correctly. The torso armor is way high up the chest.

Four, I am tad bit disappointed the Pretty Den-O suit wasn't the one used to end the villain.

Don't know where else to put this but I just really love this fight scene from Zi-O Final Stage Show. I love Grand ZI-O so much.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=imX9aserw20

Does anyone know the viewing order for Den-O? I'm using the playlist from Google Drive and it has all the episodes and probably all the movies.

Should I just watch all the episodes and then the films? I'm assuming most of them all take place after the series proper and are canon

Den-O summer movie I'm Born takes places after episode 27. The show telegraphs this pretty hard though. The rest of the movie just watch after the show in release order.

Also for at least movies made during the shows run the google docs helpfully labels them as .5 episodes as well to indicate where they take place in the tineline.

Been hearing interesting things about recent Saber, so I've started getting caught up after not watching since episode 5. Got through episode 8 tonight, and so far it feels like a bit of a chore to watch. The suits are great and the fights are fun, but the cast seems bloated, and the story hard to follow, though that may just be the fault of Genm Corp's subs. I wish Overtime would come back to Saber now that it seems clear the rumors of official subs were nothing. I like most of the Riders though, Rintaro and Ogami are top tier, Touma and Kento are pretty good at times, and Ren is obnoxious. Also very excited to see Daishinji become a Rider with such an incredibly over the top suit next episode. Started off the series really not liking Mei either, but her being in love with Rintaro boosted her character into being legitimately likable. Oh, and there's also the villains, who have so much character and charisma that I almost his post without even remembering to mention that they exist. I couldn't even tell you which which one is Storious and which one is Legiel in their human forms, or tell you anything about their personalities. I only know Zooous because he's the feral one without sleeves. And Calibur I understand has some interesting stuff going on later, but for now he feels like a less interesting version of Night Rogue

I don't have much to contribute other than it's nice to see someone echo a lot of how I feel about the show. Like, I don't hate it, but it's just so inconsistent in the way it tells its story. What annoys me most is the number of fake-outs in plot development that aren't really really fake-outs, but rather sharp right turns in the opposite direction that often come across as complete nonsense because there is no build up or suggestion of this new direction.

Each episode feels as if it's being worked on by someone who has only received a synopsis of what happened prior and is making it up as they go along. Please contribute to my crowdfunder in an attempt to hire an editor for Saber, lol.

I do actually have a soft spot for Mei though, and I think that as the show goes on, she is possibly one of the show's few assets, especially her reactions during action scenes in later arcs. I also think Genm are doing a really good job subbing it and I'm constantly grateful to them for how quick they always are with putting this stuff out.

I agree with you on Mei, I would actually rather she'd had more development and less focus on the more prominent blander characters, like that slightly hipster-type protagonist! I am still up in the air as to whether I will catch up/get back to it eventually but also Tassel doesn't help, I really was starting to hate him!

I would definitely take any kind of focus on Mei over a moment of screen-time for Ren. I don't wish to be so mean, as it's obvious the actor playing him is being told to act in such a fashion, but I find the performance really grating, and it feels as if his character has been introduced not so much because such a character was needed in the story, but the production had mandated that they had to include an extra Rider. As much as I enjoyed 555, I think Inoue stumbled in the show's third act when asked to introduce a new Rider like this; likewise, Kiva wobbled when asked to do the same. Saber had this issue within the first 5 or 6 episodes.

I'm try and find a positive note to end this on, but all I've got is, well, I like Tassel more than Ren, lol.

My big issue with Saber is the pacing. I don’t think there are too many characters, but it feels that way because they were all thrown at us in the first five or so episodes. I wish they’d handled the Riders more like Den-O did with the Imagin: new character appears in a two-parter, then there’s a two-parter that focuses on them, then we get the next character. Ren would still suck, yeah, but at least I’d have a better sense of why he sucks so much.

As for Mei, I’ve been really pleasantly surprised by her. At first I thought she was just going to be obnoxious comic relief - she gives me big Shunpei vibes. She’s really grown on me a lot in the last few weeks, though. It’s almost like sequestering most of the cast off to the side and on,y giving them one or two scenes allows the other characters room to grow or something. Also, her posture has been improving; the constant bending over annoyed me a lot for reasons I don’t understand.

I thought this too! As an example, I have never liked Ryutaros, but I've learnt to live with the character because of the way Den-o paces itself and introduces its cast. If I being mean, I would argue that Ren is broadly just a different flavour of Ryutaros that, like Vanilla Coke, I have little fondness for, and I would suggest that Den-o falters in its last half as a show and that subsequent movies reduce its cast to one note caricatures of their original arcs—but I also don't really mind this in a way, because there is enough weight behind these portrayals in order to fill in the blanks. Ren, like a popular Taylor Swift song of several years ago, is just a blank space.

I digress. Yes. Basically. I agree.

Again, I absolutely agree, and it seems crazy to me that she's now the most developed and consistently portrayed character in the whole show.

Oh god, don't even get me started on Tassel. He feels like what homophobes think gay people are like!

Very excited to hear that! I always love when an annoying comic relief character can turn out to be legitimately well written. She definitely reminds me a bit of Akiko like that