Neat! Thanks!

Wait, it was? I distinctly recall paying more attention to that moment on a rewatch specifically because I remembered you speaking of it so fondly when going through this show. Either way, totally a point worth reiterating.

You know, I hadn't even considered the possibility this subject would come up during this thread? Like maybe you just dodged that whole aspect of this show's popularity, but then you mentioned the merchandise and it's like "oh yeah, I guess it's kinda hard to miss!"

While we're tackling this directly, though, as easy as it would be to kick in my own misgivings about the sort of fanservice that makes people mistakenly believe "anime" is a genre, I'll instead take the more interesting option of noting that I also, at the same time, have to wonder how much of the long-term success of this series genuinely wouldn't have happened without its two female leads becoming so popular in that way. Did all the statues and everything pay for Dynazenon? How much did the free publicity of all the fanart draw people to the actual show proper? It's easy to sit here all disapprovingly, but I have to imagine there are definitely people out there whose genuine interest in Gridman as a whole began merely as an interest in Rikka's thighs, and I honestly wouldn't want to disparage that? I could bemoan the expectations that seem to come with being a late-night animated series aimed at nerds in Japan all day long (though, similar to what DreamSword is saying, I don't actually find this show itself that egregious), but I guess I also can't help but see some nuance in there, too?

What you might be thinking of is when I called back to that moment during my watch of Dynazenon. I won't say exactly how I did because, well, spoilers for Die.

But yeah, when it came to the Gridman posts specifically, while I did mention the moment, it was very brief on the post for this episode.

Still, happy to know my fondness for it stuck in your mind! I'm honored, haha.

Yeah, I don't... like, it's not like this approach invalidated anything for me, and I hope I didn't make it sound that way. While I don't have a ton of interest in a show that wants to get horny about high school girls, it doesn't really bother me if that's what people want from their entertainment. And I get that merch is required for these shows to survive, and sometimes it can't just be robot action figures and replica transformation devices. (As someone who is expecting two different HG Girls Tsumuri figures in the mail soon, I am not morally opposed to buying tiny vinyl representations of toku girls!)

Plus, even within the specific discussion of lingering shots of certain cast members trying on their swimwear for their digital co-conspirators... like, it still served a narrative purpose here? I'm not gonna say I couldn't've used less of it -- pretty sure I said exactly the opposite -- but it is coming from two specific plotlines that the show has been working on since the beginning: Akane's duality and the fact that these are teens with (horny) attitude. It's not like this was a dour show of trauma and violence, and suddenly we've got teens trying to look cute for each other and/or manipulate one another into divulging secrets -- this is still the teen toku action/comedy! All of that stuff is here for very legible and defensible reasons!

...it's maybe just a little too much, too often, in this one episode for me.

I went back to check and you're completely right about that. Which I guess validates your decision to bring it back up in the first place, because apparently I was exactly the kind of person who only really got it the second time. :lol

SSSS.GRIDMAN EPISODE 6 - “CONTACT”

https://kamenriderdie.com/images/kr/ssss/gridman06a.png

I really love how unhurried this show is. Not in a particularly laconic or lazy way, but in how it lets the rhythms of school life dominate its episodic structure. In much the same way Akane resets the world after every episode’s kaiju battle – well, almost every episode’s kaiju battle – these kids go to school, and then they kill time, and then they go home, and then they go to bed, and then the next day everything repeats. That’s the routine, and somehow Battling Kaiju became just another thing that happens daily, like going shopping or riding the train. It’s soothing in its regularity, even when what’s happening is insane and irregular.

Like, for example, a dreamlike visitation from a nameless, eternal (?) kaiju, that serves to fill in some of the many blanks that Yuta’s protagonist inertia was already sort of cluing him in on. While I’d normally roll my eyes at a brand-new character showing up to exposit to our powerfully uncomplicated amnesiac superhero pilot, I can’t say that Music Note (I love that they referenced my favorite Ghost character!) really bothered me too much. For one thing, like I said, this is stuff that Yuta was already starting to get curious about, so the info dump here mostly just sped things up, rather than completely upending our comprehension of the narrative or its possibility space. For another thing, it was just a super fun sequence? It paired nicely, almost musically, with the Anti/Rikka stuff. Every scene rhymed, with a kajiu helping a human better navigate the kaiju world, and a human helping a kaiju better navigate the human world. Everything compressed down into trying to align multiple perspectives into one truth, and so a character opting to guide that process for the viewer felt appropriate.

And while the Yuta/Music Note stuff was surprisingly good, the Anti/Rikka stuff was expectedly good. I would’ve honestly just been fine with an episode of Rikka’s ennui propelling her through a tour of the neighborhood’s least interesting shops – I’m just fascinated by the way this show lets scenes breathe, to build that connection – but running into Anti was definitely the right move for the show. Rikka is once again put into the role of trying to help a weird boy be slightly less of a danger to himself, and she does it without ever losing her agency. She’s not just a caregiver, she’s a girl that is trying to solve a puzzle in a way that satisfies her curiosity while also helping someone else understand themselves better. It’s sort of the exact opposite of the Yuta stuff in this episode, where instead of one person dictating to another, there’s a feeling of connection happening organically. Rikka exists and invites conversation, while Yuta needs to have things explained to him. The way those two options work in alternating scenes – inquisition versus reception – keeps this episode flowing so smoothly.

I don’t know if this is one that worked for other people as well as it did for me? The episode hangs a lantern on it, when Utsumi and Akane talk about how lame episodes without kaiju fights are. (Anti fights Calibur and Max, but that ain’t really a kaiju fight.) Beyond Music Note’s exposition, there isn’t really anything that “happens” in this episode. But for me, this one was perfect. It evokes the repetition of adolescence and then uses that routine to make the impossible and bizarre feel acceptable, which is as heady and exciting of a feeling for me as any giant monster battle. When the kaiju are this interesting, the fights are sort of superfluous.

https://kamenriderdie.com/images/kr/ssss/gridman06b.png

https://i.imgur.com/FDA20zD.png

There's alot of meta context to this episode. Not just in terms of stuff from the Gridman franchise, but also TsuPro and its fans as a whole. One thing I've always dug, and even moreso now that I'm more familiar with Ultra, is how Akane is a stand-in for the Ultra fans who don't really care about anything a given Ultra show has to offer outside of the Kaiju blowing stuff up. It's one of those things that speaks volumes about her character in universe on face value, but adds another layer for those in the know.

Yeah, she definitely isn't the type of fan who's interested in the human cost of kaiju battles, or the more human scale of relationships. She also chews her straw, which is a nicely subtle visual cue of how little she likes having to dance around what she wants from a conversation, rather than just getting what she wants by demanding it.

Another fun episode in terms of easter eggs.

1. The Uchusen magazine cover in particular (the one that appears when Sho and Akane chat about toku in "Starbows Coffee") features three Ultramen in their armored forms; Tector Gear Zero, Hunter Knight Tsurugi, and Andro Melos.

2. The pink wallet thing that Rikka looks at has the Matrix of Leadership on it.

3. The customer who asks Vit about the synth is voiced in the Japanese dub by Masaya Obi, who played the original Gridman host Naoto Sho in the 1993 tokusatsu show. They made it even more obvious for those who knew what he looked like at the time by using his likeness for the character. When the anime first came out I was hoping they could get Matthew Lawrence to voice him since he was Sam Collins in Syber-Squad, but oh well. Would've been cool to see, but I understand if it never worked out or the thought never really crossed the English dub staff's mind because they weren't aware of this tidbit during production.

Honestly, my favorite thing about this episode is probably just how easily Akane immediately makes Utsumi seem like some filthy casual by comparison? I mean I'm sure him being all sweaty and nervous around a cute girl is 99% of the problem, but "d i d y o u e v e r n o t i c e R e d K i n g i s n ' t r e d ?" is such a lame icebreaker, it's downright patronizing. It's like "Yes, Utsumi, we *all* noticed! Everyone notices that!" :p