No new undead today, but i will point out that there is now only one Undead in the suit of hearts left to complete the set. The King.

I think that for Shinmei, knowing that he's going to be competing against the rest of the Undead and that he isn't likely to be able to be the last man standing on his own, insinuating his way into the organization that unsealed the Undead to begin with in order to find some kind of advantage he could theoretically use against the rest of the Undead isn't necessarily a bad plan. It is possible that Tachibana screwed up his plan by, you know, destroying BOARD.

Drawing out Kenzaki and Tachibana by posing as an ally in order to get access to the only working pieces of BOARD tech remaining with the aim of finishing his weapon is maybe also not a bad plan.

As far as the race track goes, I got nothing :lol

The story is heavy on event-driven and light on character-driven and the consequences thereof for our main characters, and I'm not going to tell you that it not working for you is wrong - over the past many threads you've been pretty clear about what kind of stories do and don't work for you, and this is not the kind of thing that you have been positive about. Which is a tl;dr way of saying that I don't expect you to feel differently about the story whether or not it makes any kind of internal sense (and that's ok!), just that I don't necessarily think Shinmei's plot was Entirely Ridiculous. :D

No, that would be going full Ninja Storm. Never go full Ninja Storm.

Yeah, a lot of it was how much the show was just going We've Got A Motorcycle Chase! This may sound heretical from someone who claims to be a fan of Kamen Rider, but I don't give a shit about motorcycle chases? I just found that whole section incredibly dull. If they'd try to make it less about, honestly, the thematic elements, I might've found it easier to tolerate.

Because, you know, it all is about something! Kenzaki wants BOARD to come back, while Tachibana thinks the real BOARD is the friends they made along the way. So Black Fang ends up embodying those feelings, where they want it back before realizing they need to let it go.

But then it's so much motorcycle riding and I just couldn't invest in it, at all. And since they're wrapping all of the emotional and thematic climax in But The Bike You Guys, there was just nothing there for me.

There's some broad strokes where I can see what the show's saying with Shinmei, especially doubled up with Miyuki's story. They're both characters who feel underpowered, and they'll need to scheme a bit more if they want to win. As a basic concept, yes, sure, a good plot for a Kamen Rider Blade story.

It's just, for me, the specifics were both dull (that chase) and nonsensical (everything at the race track). There's a million little things that needed to go right for Shinmei's plan to work (why not just call Kenzaki and get his help?), making the reveals come off as rushed and convoluted.

Because this one has no place to quote with, just gonna place here. With the varying characteristic of high-level Undead seen on last few episodes, it seems that every Undead seen so far has the same goal; to become the last man standing, each with their own methods to achieve that; Hajime just uses Chalice and seal any Undeads, Miyuki wants to absorb other Undead's powers and become stronger to win, Shinmei wants to upgrade Black Fang to become the strongest and seal other Undeads, Daichi/Elephant Undead (the lazy one) wants to stay away from fighting and let other Riders/Undeads destroy each other.

Well, this is quite personal because I hate that outside of Undead fluff, pretty people can get away with things (which is by assuming them can't do anything atrocious only because they're good looking), and the lack of consequences will warp their worldview accordingly.

Didn't he explain about what's going on with Karasuma that he carried his body away? Also killing Isaka is lumped there? I forgot to respond with this back with the Isaka decency talk, but Isaka is one of the most evil Undeads in this series, along with Shinmei here. As the first Category Jack Undead, he designed Rider System 3, a belt that allows the user to transform into Kamen Rider Leangle. Unfortunately, that same belt requires using an improperly sealed Ace card that contains the Spider Undead, meaning that its user would be mentally enslaved by the Undead. After designing the corrupted Rider System, he brainwashed many people that he was going to use as expendable slaves to create his "Ultimate Rider". When this plan failed, Isaka turns his attention to Tachibana and attempts to retrieve him as a prototype user. Isaka knows about Tachibana's subconscious fear and takes advantage of it. Isaka tricks his defeated opponent to getting addicted to Schuld Ketsner seaweed, lying that the aggression-inducing plant would eliminate fear. When Sayoko notices her lover's addiction, Isaka smugly kills her for attempting to clean up her lover.

Probably at least, people would talk about how Kamen Riders used to actually ride motorcycles from here, as one of pet peeves people had for phase 2 Rider series is that, the motorcycle usage is so minimal compared to before. And as for me myself here, this one's merely just chasing (with drafting involved), none of the extraordinary stunts seen in Kuuga (vs Badaa). The one that I can talk about is also how, Shinmei's presence in Suzuka is much less... dangerous than I expected, he merely just pushes away the racers off track, despite the power it contains, or that the race officials didn't intervene in any manner like giving red flags or something.

Also on how Shinmei is one of the most evil Undead in the series. Possessing the unique ability to revive human corpses as his minions and having infiltrated human society as an "Undead Hunter", Shinmei goes on random killing sprees and then sends his squad to eliminate his victims, hunting other Undead in the process. Pretending to be an ally of BOARD, Shinmei completes the Black Fang, a motorbike which he had stolen from the company, with the help of Kenzaki and Tachibana, massacring his own crew afterwards and intending on using the motorbike to seal every other Undead and become the strongest.

As a foregone conclusion, Kotaro almost doomed himself here, though Miyuki (n̶o̶t̶ ̶M̶i̶y̶u̶k̶i̶ ̶T̶e̶z̶u̶k̶a̶,̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶o̶n̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶c̶r̶o̶s̶s̶e̶d̶ ̶m̶y̶ ̶m̶i̶n̶d̶ ̶r̶e̶g̶a̶r̶d̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶M̶i̶y̶u̶k̶i̶ ̶n̶a̶m̶e̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶K̶R̶,̶ ̶w̶i̶t̶h̶ ̶h̶o̶w̶ ̶h̶e̶ ̶h̶a̶s̶ ̶a̶ ̶f̶e̶m̶a̶l̶e̶ ̶f̶i̶r̶s̶t̶ ̶n̶a̶m̶e̶) seems to go easier on him with only choking him, but it's still a clear indicator that Miyuki can go apeshit on Kotaro anytime she wants. I catch that Kotaro was partly inspired by Kenzaki here with wanting to believe in any living beings like an Undead, but Kenzaki has only tried this on Hajime, and the non-high level Undeads are just sealed as usual. But the thing is, Miyuki hasn't done anything convincing, unlike Hajime who protected Haruka and Amane, yet Kotaro seems to put Miyuki higher on pedestal here, by saying that if he can believe in Miyuki that'd mean he can believe in Hajime. Hajime would, obviously, at the very best (but certainly could be worse with him just killing other Undeads), just being practical that Miyuki can't be redeemed and it's futile to try instilling that on her, which many people would... agree with this one (they're bad why wasting a chance trying to redeem them at almost zero chance that it would just disastrous at the end? just go hard on them!).

I was just trying to point out that, regardless of the organization, Tachibana tends to leave in the most violent ways possible. Isaka was a bad dude, but in another context he was a(nother) boss that Tachibana tried to murder when he quit.

Yeah, but that's the thing: I came in through Phase 2 Heisei, so minimal bike usage is pretty much my baseline. What's in this episode may be what the franchise did historically, in the Showa days, but I don't truck with Showa.

All the talk people have about how regrettable it is that Riders barely use their bikes anymore, man, it is not a problem for me at all.

I think a lot of it is Kotaro hoping that Miyuki could be better than he was afraid she was. It's foolish, maybe, but it's him having hope that he was wrong about Hajime, that the Undead aren't the remorseless killers he thinks they are. He wants to be proven wrong, he wants to feel like he was an idiot to not believe in Hajime. It's not so much Kotaro seeing something specific in Miyuki, or putting her on a pedestal, it's that she represents all of the Undead for Kotaro in that moment, and he hopes that by showing her mercy he can draw out her potential for goodness.

In a way, it's more devastating that Hajime makes Kotaro think his fears are well-founded, by sealing Miyuki, rather than Miyuki taking advantage of his kindness. If he's doing all of this for Hajime, and Hajime (inadvertently!) squanders it, then that might be worse for Kotaro's feelings on the Undead than being betrayed again by Miyuki.

Alright then, looks like it's time for a surprise guest edition of Kamen Rider Die watches Kamen Rider Blade, now with 100% less Kamen Rider Die!

KAMEN RIDER BLADE EPISODE 25 (AGAIN)

This time on Kamen Rider Blade: (0M0)「スリップストリームだ！」

https://i.imgur.com/3XUbs6F.png

Okay, first things first, the direction in this episode is out there in places. 24 and 25 were helmed by Kenkou Satou, seemingly a pretty minor name in the scheme of Rider, having only directed a couple episodes of Agito, and about a half dozen of Ryuki, from what I could find. Without going back to check all those other episodes, I can't say if this is Satou's trademark style, or something unique to these two, but the camera is trying as hard as possible to be dynamic here. There are just enough stretches of normalcy to prevent it from being a gimmicky mess, but once you notice how many titled angles and shots where the focus is anywhere but the center of the frame there are, it's hard to un-notice. Whether that's to the episode's credit or its detriment, I'll let you decide.

As for the actual plot, there's a chunk of it about Kotarou and Hajime, but I mean, does that really seem important to anyone? Obviously the real draw of this episode is all the bike action. Just an absurd amount of bike action. Tachibana and Kenzaki are hot on the trail of the Wolf Undead, who has gained incredible power thanks to riding on his brand new super bike, which is called Fang, for maximum edge factor. He's basically unstoppable, and the fact he's on wheels means he's also great at running away, so Blade and Garren spent a lot of time just trying to catch up to him. If the episode put any effort at all into making that look exciting, it might've even been fun.

I uh, I really wanted to come in here and do a thing where I talk this episode up half-sarcastically like it's the most amazing piece of television ever made, but the fact of the matter is, I'm not being given much to work with. This is an episode that goes all in on the action, and that makes it real awkward that the action is its biggest issue by far. There's a plot going on here that's completely absurd, yet draws enough out of its premise to feel sincere. Tachibana and Kenzaki getting nostalgic about their old days at BOARD, and having what seemed like a chance to have some of that normalcy back turn out to be a cruel trick, I love that. The Wolf Undead could've been after a super-powered BOARD toaster oven and I'd still love it. Centering it on a bike is goofy, but goofy is rarely an issue when you're talking about Kamen Rider. I've always remembered this storyline extremely fondly as a cool two-part adventure that really lets Blade and Garren feel like a duo, and after rewatching (half) of it, I'm still going to be thinking of it that way.

I've also developed a much keener sense of good action direction over the years, and I'd be lying to myself if I said this holds a candle to anything Kuuga ever did on a motorcycle. This is some bare-bones bike action. The definition of quantity over quality. It never, at any point, amounts to anything more than people driving in straight lines or taking nice, gentle corners. There's no clever use of geography, no epic ramp stunts, heck, even the big "strategy" moment of Tachibana declaring they need to use the slipstream to avoid Fang's weird energy wave attacks is immediately undercut by them just straight up not doing that. There's an as-himself super special guest star in these episodes, Tatsuya Yamaguchi, who I'm sure is a great racer, but even his big "look mom, I'm on TV" sequence is a whole lot more driving in straight lines.

That's really the whole story with this one. It's an entirely inoffensive hero vs. villain plot that you could pick up and watch without too much in the way of context. Aggressively simple, even. And, you know, I have said before that it's okay for Kamen Rider to just be light entertainment every now and then. Nowhere is that more true of Blade than here. Despite the more serious vibe of Chalice's side of the episode, this is one you really don't need to think about at all, and despite the fact that I just spent all this time chewing it out, I can't help but love it all the same. I mean, I'm a sucker for bike action. Bare-bones or not, I see a Kamen Rider on a bike, and it makes me happy. There's a magic to these two episodes I can't describe anywhere near as well as all the things that are decidedly *not* magic about them. They have a style all their own that feels weirdly out of sync with the rest of Blade, as though Aikawa wrote this two-parter before 22 and 23 as a warm-up, and was shocked when someone from Toei saw the script poking out of his trash can and went "hey, we should use this!"

Wait, no, that's an insult again, isn't it? Man, I really can't make myself talk this one up, can I? I'd better stop trying before I dig myself any deeper. I guess at the very least I now understand why Die didn't want to do this. I feel like such a jerk right now.

https://i.imgur.com/lX808QI.png

Next time on Kamen Rider Blade: ???「そうだ！それだよブレイド‼」

I think technically that would make this Kamen Rider Die watches Fish Sandwich watch Kamen Rider Blade?

Thanks for giving your take on it. I'm glad I wasn't horribly unfair or wildly off-base on this one. My main fear, and the thing that caused a brief but terrifying actual existential crisis, was that I'd be subjected to a raft of fans telling me that I'd denigrated the pinnacle of Kamen Rider storytelling. If that'd happened... I mean, shit, that's a reckoning, you know? That is the time to go to into the wilderness, the time to vanish from proper society.

So, yeah, glad to hear that this one maybe botched it? I mean, not glad glad, but... relieved?

Oh, one note on your post, though. The correct Unused By Kamen Rider Die screencaps should've been Garren saying "Get off that bike, you damn Undead!" and Sloth Style saying "So sloppy... all of them are so sloppy." Good effort, though!

Bro if you could get through disliking Kuuga and if this board can deal with me being the Resident Hipster, you'll be fine. No worries.

(also i need to remember this post for later. no real reason, ignore me.)

Let's just say that it was not super difficult for me to recognize Tachibana's Imposter syndrome.