I guess it makes sense Humagears can't compete in actual sports but dang it if they can't be enthusiastic coaches.

I guess at this point it's not all that surprising that Gai completely fabricated Fuwa's entire memories and identity to be the Humagear hating tool he needed him to be...although it really makes Fuwa's entire character arc up to this point and his sheer fervor and passion kind of funny in hindsight. Then again, how would one kid have survived a swarm of killer robots? I dunno, Fuwa makes the rules or something...

I guess it's just good that Fuwa's in a better place and had already overcome that hatred, so it wasn't necessary, although now I guess he has to deal with the fact that all that anger was completely misplaced and constructed the whole time.

Valkyrie returns! It's nice to see Yua in proper form and to see the AIMS duo fighting again. And she gets the Finisher!

Man, it's got to be rough for Thouser this beat down around. Like, Vulcan helped, but Gai literally lost to probably the weakest base Rider in the entire show. And then that punch!

I didn't have much to say on the last episode, but I can say a little on this one, I don't think that there has been one time so far into the show where I've actually liked Yua's character. This episode fixed some of the problems I have with her, but even so, I just can't consider her compelling character that I enjoy watching, but that's just what I think, and I'm sure there's a lot of fans who actually like Yua from this episode and up, but I still don't like her that much. Besides that aspect, the rest of this episode is perfectly fine and I do still like it.

I think it works, since it's basically just another layer of Fuwa rejecting someone else's control, and him creating a version of himself that he can believe in. It'd probably be more shocking if we had a sense of Fuwa's life outside of work, but OH WELL. (Like, does Fuwa not have family that could go You Were Never Terrorized By Robots? I know that All Dads Are Dead, even in Reiwa, but is there not the traditional younger sister who could correct him?))

The only downside to this fight scene is that once again it hinges on Gai just assuming his underlings will eat an infinite amount of shit, and he can gloat while they choke it down. I know he's pathological in his dismissal of anyone else's autonomy, but this is just some incredibly bad corporate leadership. Does ZAIA not have an HR department? Can they not sit Gai down and try to go over some ways to interact with employees without trying to conversationally dominate them. Just a thought!

I loved this episode, and I'm pretty much completely on the hook for Yua going forward, but I can't deny that this show could've done a better job of illuminating her character before now. Like, all the stuff we learn about her in this episode... it could've shown up any number of times before now? Just have Yua say that she doesn't think dreams are valuable! Or that tools serve more of a purpose than dreams! But it's just a dozen episodes of her acting grumpy and wandering off, which makes it seem like the show hadn't figured out her motivation until this week.

This! THIS! This is *chef's kiss*. Perfection. I'm glad that Die ended up enjoying this one a lot and reignited the reason why we all love Yua. This might be my second favorite ep of Zero One, behind ep 30. I might be in the minority here and it's going to be a hot take but I always love and enjoy Yua even in the Job Arc. The conclusion that Takahashi gave to Yua's character was the perfect culmination of Yua's development in the series.

Die already made a splendid opinions about this episode. Your opinion about how Yua is different from Aruto and Fuwa was spot on because there's always something about Yua that clearly set her apart from her companions. When Yua said 'Dream, dream, and dream. What kind of bullsh*t is that!?' that's what they key line to summarize Yua's whole character and your opinions in a single line. Yua had always been a reactive character. She only does thing in reaction not by consciously doing so herself. She only transforms to Valkyrie in the first half because of reaction to Rogue Humagears and doing everything that Gai ordered in the second arc. So it's also relieving and refreshing to see her finally took an action for her own cause. I must give props to Hiroe Igeta who was able to do incredible acts in the climax of her character in spite of all the shortcomings she might have several episodes back.

I also love that it was 'Fuwa' who was the trigger that pulled Yua from Gai's hand and started rebelling against him. It might be subtle but Yua has always care for Fuwa even in the early series and even in the Job Arc. So, the fact that someone used the technology, that she has believed in up to this point, to harm not just a normal civilian but also someone Yua knows and also cares for is the single line that Gai had crossed in this episode. In addition, it was also Yua who aroused Fuwa again after receiving such harsh truth from Gai. It was after seeing YUA, the single person who was loyal to Gai but now standing up for herself and him also, Fuwa managed to regain his spirit not only to crush Thouser again but to declare his newfound dream. I can continue this all day long but Takahashi did make a good step in this one. I don't think Yua's redemption would make such a big impact had it not been because Gai harmed Fuwa and Fuwa's declaration of his new dream was enriched after Yua took the action. Say that Aruto was the victim of Gai, instead of Fuwa, I don't think the impact result would be as good as if Fuwa was the one who Gai had machinated.

Now that I mention it, it's kinda weird that we are in more than a half in to the series but Aruto and Yua barely had meaningful interaction. Aruto said 'Yaiba-san!' was the single line that Aruto had to call Yua by her name instead of Aims or Zaia to refer Yua. I might be greedy because Fuwa and Yua's relation was more than good enough but I wish we had more interaction from the Main Rider to our 'Tertiary Rider'. Sougo and Woz, Sento and Kazumin, Emu and Taiga, etc. I think from our past series, I can say we had a solid relationship between our Main Rider and our Tertiary Rider even in the early stage of the series. It's a bit shame that we didn't have the same amount of interaction between Aruto and Yua, especially late into this series.

Couldn't get into this episode. I really just couldn't; I got what they were going for but it feels very out of nowhere and by now they'd burned all the good will I had towards this character. And heck, they couldn't even have the girl get her own battle without one of the guys' new upgrades stealing half of it. Just a kind of okay resolution to a very empty story

Yeah, I think this episode did a good job of reframing Yua and Fuwa as a partnership, even if they've been on opposite sides of the issue for a while. (The show also put in the very clear parallel of Love-chan and his student, whose partnership was constantly dissolving and reuniting, until they figured out a way to respect each other's goals.) There's no shortage of scenes this time with only Fuwa and Yua, at all levels of energy. There's a real feeling of them getting over their animosity/misunderstanding, and dedicating their energy towards helping their partner succeed.

It definitely wouldn't've worked with Aruto and Yua, though, no. This isn't Ex-Aid, where you can mix up the pairings to try and say something about aligned goals; this is a show about how two people collaborate on a shared vision of the future, so it's gotta be Fuwa and Yua.

You're not wrong! Like I said before, the success (to me) of this episode definitely doesn't negate a dozen episodes that would've been better served slowly teasing out Yua's subplot, rather than having her as some barely-defined lieutenant right up until her spotlight episode. Not the best pacing!

I don't know if I totally agree with Vulcan stealing part of her battle spotlight, though? He's there, and he looks cool, but his performance feels very complimentary - even, like, contingent - to Yua's actions. Valkyrie gets the gigantic But Why Heroism henshin, she gets the finisher, she gets the form changes, she gets the very cool acrobatics... I don't know, I felt like she was the unambiguous star of this climax?

No I know, but like...

When Fuwa got his big moment of resolution of taking control of his life against Thouser, he did it solo. When Aruto got his big moment of resolution of fighting back against Thouser after his new company's registered, he does it solo. When Yaiba gets her big moment of resolution of something something dreams I barely remember... it's a double-team fight. She does get the big finishing hit on Thouser and everything of course but it sticks out a lot to me that she's specifically the only one that doesn't get a solo fight. Gotta sell some new toy on shelves I guess

As Love-chan is not mentioned here, what I can say about that is, it's an example of miscommunication causing further problems. Keita lying to everyone about having a girlfriend who views Love-chan as a creep would of course, not have him or anyone else realize that Keita's not trying to become a pro tennis player that reaches Grand Slam. Love-chan's also a rare showing when someone can train others too hard and extreme, while not having the stereotypical tough and demanding personality, but he's too enthusiastic and had a single-minded focus. About the fight, there's a potential human bodycount in AIMS 2 officers Dewaga and Shida, with how there are spent bullet casings and one of their sunglasses on the ground.

Well certainly not now, she resigned from ZAIA and thus she's now turning into the show's secondary heroine. But previously, one isn't necessarily above villain status if they aren't fully bad, aren't full-on moustache twriling types, or such. She was an anti-villain, she's doing ZAIA's dirty works, but there are redeeming qualities in her about her good intentions, or concern of casualities, drawing the line at certain methods (her hesitations, but she's still loyal to them). Humagears was mainly dangerous only because of Gai's work of corrupting Ark, and ZAIA Specs was advertised as something safer after making Humagears a threat via Ark, it's purely Gai taking down his competitors, profiting of his deeds to make public doubt Humagears and escaping trouble from that. I don't know if for this one you overlooked the reason of Humagears going rogue (which Fuwa already acknowledged), or that it's more about Yua making decisions based on what already happened (Humagears already turned dangerous).

Treating living beings as a tool is something terrible though, seen in what Gai does, not only to Humagears (e.g. Naki), but also to humans, seen in how he treats Fuwa and Yua as disposable in ep. 29, and that view has rubbed on Yua but only to Humagears in her case. Though Humagears are androids, there are complexities in them particularly for those which reached Singularity, which at least it's something Yua acknowledged. Otherwise, Yua's treatment of them before, albeit subtler than Fuwa, can be also a form of racism towards Humagears (Gai's a far worse form of this), many fictions often the line between the values of human vs. non-human life getting blurry, automatically placing less value on something less human-like physically and psychologically (like slaughters of non-humans are generally more ok), and Yua's an example of that in her previous Humagear view. Seems to take effect too that cruelty seems to be far more noticeable to people when, it's displayed that someone treats humans as tools instead of something else. There's a hypocrisy too that, to vehemently treat Humagears as tools, Yua herself is also a tool to Gai despite her denial.

It's something consistent regarding Yua before, generally whenever Fuwa is injured or hurt, she becomes noticeably worried. His first fight against Horobi, his subsequent hospital stay (and the threat to his life when the medical Humagears were all shut down), and his first uses of the Assault Wolf Progrise Key all put her in a noticeable state of visible concern and distress; she even forced him out of a transformation once when it became clear his body couldn't take the strain. Other than that though, this is further a turning point for Fuwa, after previously changing his target of vengeance to ZAIA, now here, he further clarifies that his vengeance against Humagears is over, and now he truly gained Kamen Rider sensibility, becoming more heroic and trying his best at making use of Kamen Rider. Fuwa officially has shed most of his negative traits here, here's the time Zero-One ditches the edgy secondary archetype, though Fuwa's still has some temper issues. But still, while Fuwa wasn't villainous, it was still Gai irresponsibly causing trouble for others especially Humagears via someone else, showing more of his rotten side.

I think she definitely took the lead in this fight and works well with Fuwa though I think part of it is that frankly she's the weakest Rider and I don't think any amount of character evolution would've made it possible for her to beat Thouser solo.

It would've been high time to give her a new form but it didn't seem like they were willing to commit to that.