Yes yes, exactly! And putting aside Sword of Logos obviously evil bug ladies and Sophia kidnapping and cursed tome scheming, its probably my most effective indictment of how SoL functions as an organization as a whole. Bringing an orphan kid into this environment was questionable to begin with, even if it was out of a genuine want to help on Rintaro's master's part, but how he apparently was just... lost in the muddle after his master died? Attached to the organization, but without strong bonds within it? Oof. For all the honestly well intentioned members within SoL, to me that speaks of major structural problems for him to have just been... left to turn out that way.

Rintaro's just the worst recipient of Bring Your Kid To Work And Let Them Be Raised By Sword Cultists Day imaginable.

I'm glad other people seem to be elabrating on Kento's new story arc here, because I don't think it ever properly landed with me. I think, in retrospect, it's because it was all framed in some nebulous apocalypic terms - the world is literally going to end, and we're fighting against that ultimate thing. I guess it's the reverse of the Saber dream from last time - that was horrifying because it felt tangible, real - all the other swordsmen struck down, with the final one to go being cheery optimistic Mei. Scaling that all up to the end of the world, idk, I guess I struggled to connect that as much? I agree, his characterisation here follows straight through from his earlier set, just with even more nihilism, but it was something I never quite clicked with.

In fairness, Ogami was clos to being his dad, but said dad has since defected to working at a bookshop.

I think it's helpful to remember two things from this show, when attempting to "enjoy" Kento's return to the series:

1) It's a lot like Yuri's initial storyline, and something the show keeps looping back to -- Saving The World doesn't mean anything if you forget that there are people in the world. Kento's very focused on averting some nebulous apocalypse, but he's giving that more value than the many people he's hurting in pursuit of his goal.

2) Kento's a guy who would've come back and bravely shouldered the weight of his friends' anger even if the Realm of Shadows had shown him reruns of early Simpsons seasons for two months. He's a dude that's always looking for an apocalypse to give his martyrdom meaning.

"Working" and "bookshop" are being used pretty liberally here. I think Ogami mostly just wanders through the Sword of Logos Northern Base book-themed gift shop/foyer, which has been closed to walk-in traffic due to These Unprecedented Times.

I get what you're saying, and I don't disagree, I just found it hard to get invest with Kento's matyr complex. Especially with Touma + Primitive Dragon, the SOL stuff, and Rintarou deciding whether permanently cutting himself off from his family is worth striking out on for his fiends, all of those I was more interested in than Kento's murmurings about an inevitable apocalypse that felt like set-up for the next plot along? It's still good drama in a great arc, but idk, it's not what I have the stand-out memories of from this bit? Or maybe we'll hit on something in the next couple of episodes to help me elaborate a little.

I think this was brought up, but I really love the scene where Mei gives Rintaro his books back. This isn't my analysis, but a friends. As long as Rintaro doesn't have the books he doesn't have to fight Touma, or fight for SoL. He's in a safe spot, but when he accepts the books back he's forced to make a choice again. It's neat.

This is one of my favorite episodes, too. What I love, beyond the character moments or plot developments, is just how un-Kamen Ridery the show's handling of this stuff is. Touma confronts Kento about the whole Calibur thing and demands to know what's happening. In pretty much any other Rider show, Kento's response would have been some kind of deflection: "You don't need to know," "You wouldn't understand," "A guy like you can't stop me," etc. Instead, Kento just explains exactly what's going on, what his end goal is, and why he's doing all of this. Regardless of the fact that it all makes perfect sense from his perspective, it is so refreshing to see this kind of open communication on a Kamen Rider series.

For some context, this episode originally aired about midway through the "Kamen Rider Die watches Kamen Rider Den-O" thread and we were somewhere in the part of the show after Zeronos had shown up. You could really see the contrast with how Saber was playing this out when compared to Sakurai "Do not answer any questions about the plot under any circumstances" Yuuto.

Interesting! I want to say Rintaro still had King Lion Daisenki (he'd just lost his Combo books), but that's a neat view of the situation. I feel like it's more that Rintaro's already made his choice by that point in the story, and he's avoiding facing the consequences. Him talking about traitors during the SoL's all-hands church session was probably the moment he lost Reika's support.

Please get along with Yuuto!

It honestly makes perfect sense that each show would go a different way with it. Yuuto's whole thing is carrying this burden he never asked for, and resenting the pity of others. He hates the appearance of weakness; his catchphrase is reminding you that he's actually very strong. Explaining his situation would be like eliciting sympathy. You saw what he did to Deneb when Deneb tried to be nice to him!

For Kento, I like how his explanation reinforces that he's still the same to friend to Touma he's always been, not some New Terrible Villain. The show is smart to spell out to the kids in the audience that Kento isn't after power, or trying to hurt his friends. If the benefit of that continuity is me getting to have context for a character's motivations in the moment, instead of a month later? I'm happy to accept it.

You know, I'd want this to be the case, and I feel like the show itself realizes that should be the case as it goes on, but Oogami's introduction arc always rubbed me in the wrong way in that regard. He's pretty dismissive of Rintaro there, and there's even a part where Rintaro tries to express sympathy for Sora's kidnapping only to Immediately flinch at Oogami getting angry over it. It's a stressful situation, yeah, but it just doesn't read great between them, especially as compared to Kento actually getting very obvious positive surrogate dad scenes with Oogami. It's probably just Early Installment Weirdness, and they just weren't considering Rintaro's backstory in writing that part yet, but it does bug me.

I dunno. I feel like there might be an aspect of... when Kento was orphaned, it was obvious he was dealing with it in a way that he needed Handling, so SoL adapted around keeping an eye out and being there for him. But when the same thing happened to Rintaro at the same time... well, he's always been Nice, and Polite, and Followed The Rules, so there wasn't anything to worry about, right?

So, this episode. In which Tassel is banished to hell.

But in more serious stuff, I have some interesting facts.

We get our first look at the tenth and final of the swords (again, discounting Kyomu) https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachmen...8/IMG_6159.JPG

According to the show’s production log, Kamijo knew that Kento would suffer endless visions if he was exposed to Kurayami through touch or being trapped in its dimension for two long (if you go back, you’ll notice he always carried it with a gloved hand). The reason he gave it to Touma was so that Kento could be freed relatively quickly and without going insane. (Though how he expected him to do so, I’m not sure).

Next: It’s time to mashimashi