... and that's what truly killed Faiz for me :lol

There's no need to feel bad about feeling bad. For me, reading how certain things don't work for you is just as engaging as watching you enjoy the parts you do. Besides, it's only natural you'd be broken up at the show tearing up your ship...

rip Murakami. I was pretty content with him as the 'main villain' of this show, manipulating things from behind his desk at the top of his large company building, though things never got a chance to become more personal between him and the heroes, closest being his squabbles with Takumi during his werewolf phase. I actually like the thought of Kiba taking over as the villain in this last stretch of the show, but I sadly agree that the way it happens isn't that great.

Also it's kind of funny that Time Vent was recently mentioned. That post where you just added links to all your previous episode discussions on that thread was way more effort than I would ever considered doing and that was like, iconic Die moment.

If I'm getting the picture you're painting of how Faiz worked for you, it's:

1. Auto Vajin
2. Yuuji's hair
3. Yuuji
4. Takumi
5. Nothing else

Yikes!

Ha ha, I'm glad that Time Vent post was fun. It was a dumb amount of work to construct that joke post!

Mostly, I just don't have a lot of interest in watching bad shows and talking about why they're bad. It can be fun once in a while, when there's a bum episode, but when something fundamentally loses sight of how best to tell a story, I just don't really feel like discussing it, past a certain point. Maybe the next couple episodes will even it out?

Murakami was a great villain, and I never even talked about one of my favorite villainous traits of his! That dude listened to villainous music exclusively, and that's great. Just, on his own time, relaxing in his office, he put on Now That's What I Call Villainy! 28 or whatever and enjoyed his afternoon. There's a thing that often gets brought up, that no one thinks of themselves as a villain, but I think Murakami maybe did? Not in a monstrous way, but in an aesthetic way. He deserved better than getting replaced!

Watch it at 2x speed then.... like I did. Though I don't know if talking about this part is allowed then with it being boring. Expressing dislike is more encouraged on place like this tbh, even embracing it (though this one is what I would call being an asshole about something you aren't into). And actually, for a certain part of another Rider series later, I hope you would react the same as the Yuji's shift here....

Some people thought about how Faiz has some interesting ideas, but not executed that well, and this is probably the one for yours. The idea is it being dramatically ironic (like Kaido below) that Yuji is, like you said, empathic beacon of humanity, wishing for a peace between humans and Orphnochs, actually becomes his antithesis. It's probably made off-screen because this is meant to be a plot twist. But I do was interested in seeing the Lucky Clover's interaction that the man they hated was their boss now (not to mention Murakami's death), and I was engaged in seeing how that would work out.... but gotta say they dropped the ball on this for me that they don't show it for this one, just the Lucky Clover confronting Team Faiz/Orphnoch again. I do think that the Murakami clone doesn't work that well for me either, as it's too much of a big shift (not a fan of character switching side but also shedding every of their previous characteristics without a trace) but I'm also thinking up on how should Yuji act.... (if they still decide to turn him into villain, if him turning into a villain is still related to his character and not just a forced plot twist). The Takumi/Yuji scene, the one good thing is that Takumi was still fully in character, practically screaming your (or the audiences?) wishes for Yuji to get back his previous characterization. I agree about your comment for Yuji's hair too :p

Kaido does actually consider Yuji a friend here to miss him and constantly looking for him. I wonder how did he react to Yuka's death though (he's mostly an ass towards her, but he does care about her deep down like saving her from Yoshio, his kohai). And even with his plan regarding Yuka being hunted by the police earlier, Kaido is the one broken up by Yuji turning into a being worse than he could ever think he is.

I mean, it makes more sense for Murakami to die laughing hysterically than Minami earlier, because as he said, he wants to facilitate the Orphnoch King, and he just advanced that plan more even with him dying. He's obviously happy that he's one step closer of completing his plan. Also never had a thought about this, but Hanagata, like Mari or Mihara said, was still the kind father figure, he's not evil like other Smart Brain members, he helped contributed kickstarting some of the events while also being a social father figure to most of the main cast, wanting to prepare them for the final battle. He assigned Yuji to be the new chief of Smart Brain, unaware of his personality change at the time.

You are something else to be only infuriated by this part of Faiz only, while others are likely to be infuriated by the majority of Faiz, with all the muscommunitations part, even dropping the show or just can't proceed through it anymore.

Well, I'm fairly confused of why you aren't into Keitaro too? I mean you disliked Faiz for it being grim, but Keitaro's someone made to counteract that, being one of the most genuinely good and the type I would expect to be an exception to you by being the optimistic ray hope of light.

Hey now, that's way too harsh! Jet Sliger, Chaco and Saeko's fashion sense are all extreme highlights for me


I guess for me it's because he felt part satire of that and part deconstruction. As if Inoue looked at the likes of Shinji and Godai from the past couple years and went "hey, you know those characters who believed in justice and had unyielding optimism? Well here's how they'd actually be like; they're alone in their beliefs in the world, they're idiots who can't use a Rider Belt, and their development is about that optimism being crushed and learning to accept that the realities of the world don't match up to their ideals". He's to your typical Kamen Rider protagonist what Madoka is to the Magical Girl genre. That's how it read to me, and every time he was on screen I imagined myself pleading Wizard's writer for forgiveness because Shunpei wasn't THAT bad. I dislike him because he felt like the exact antithesis to what you're describing.

Keitaro > Shunpei all day everyday. (No Shade Kurona, you're probably the nicest person that hates everything I love)

I actually like Yuuji's heel-turn. It's sad, no doubt, but there's still more to come that makes it interesting for me. I think there's enough there for the viewer to be able to read-in to his actions, though I will agree with Die that I think this kind of move works better in a book or comic where you can experience a character's inner turmoil more easily. (It was a cleaner turn than Daenerys in GoT season 8)

I think this is less a problem with Faiz and more a problem with Kamen Rider overall. Early Heisei especially has a tendancy, in my opinion, to front load their stories with mysteries and then have a back half scramble to answer all/most of the questions they've created in the first 20 or so episodes. I love-love-love Kamen Rider, but it doesn't always stick the landing.

I think Faiz does a better job than some, but I'll have more to say about that when, y'know, Die actually gets to the end.

Awww, that's one of the nicest compliments I can imagine! And a reputation I'd LOVE to cultivate :p

That's really the heart of it for me, though. I could 100% be onboard with a Yuuji who decides that his earlier behavior was naive, that Yuka died due to his belief in coexistence, to become radicalized through a mix of regret and rage. I could embrace that whole-heartedly.

What I got, though, was an unemotional dude who suddenly cared a lot about all of the shit that Murakami cared about, things that were never brought up in Yuuji's storyline before now. It'd be like if Takumi was gone for an episode, and when he came back he was a disengaged bully who longed for excitement he couldn't feel. A heel turn is more than just making a good character play a villain character's part!

I did really like the outdoors scene with Yuuji and Kaido! It was almost hard to reconcile with everything else (Yuuji seems genuinely happy to see Kaido, but is also willing to use him in the fight against the Orphnoch King), but Kaido more than sold his half of the scene. He's so to-the-bone relieved to see Yuuji. It was emotional, character-based storytelling, and it's the bare minimum of what I want to see.

I guess I'm grateful that so much of this series worked for me, then!

Yeah, it's a problem inherent to telling a season-long story. It's way bigger than a Kamen Rider problem, but it's pretty consistently a Kamen Rider problem. It's just really, really hard to figure out how much plot a season-long mystery/arc needs. Too little, and you're killing time until the next phase can start. Too much, and you're having to rush twists or cram in exposition. It's the hardest part of making these shows!

Like, I love Build, but even that show had a couple episodes where I was like Maybe You Are Trying To Tell Too Big A Story Here My Dude.

One reason to try and get into Super Sentai or Pretty Cure: they generally go for a lower scale myth arc and hose that don’t (Timeranger, Gekiranger, Go-Busters) are more controversial in Japan.

But, like, Wizard. Wizard is the main exhibit against the idea of the season-long arc, and the main exhibit for the idea of a season-long arc.

There's a middle section to Wizard that is so repetitive that it nearly broke me. But all of that repetition is purposeful, and sets up maybe my favorite season-long arc conclusion in the entire franchise. You could make the argument that the middle section's flabbiness and built-in frustration is unforgivable, but you could also argue that the cleanliness and excitement of the finale more than makes up for it.

It's... it's not cut and dry, is I guess what I'm getting at. I don't know that I'd be in favor of Kamen Rider dumping the season-long arc stuff, because when it's done right? Man. Real sweet, when it's done right.