Kamen Rider Zero-One Episode 25- "I Will Save The HumaGears!" Discussion
 

Satellite communication is cut off as a mysterious new Rider appears.

Jin out here looking like Isurugi Evolt.

Raw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3CuRb-7D7U

Oh hell yes, Metsubojinrai.net is back!

I can't wait to watch this subbed as they finally seem to be dropping some exposition I was craving for. And then, Burning Falcon – damn Jin, that's one way to make an entrance, that fight scene was amazing. Really, really good. The suit is pretty awesome too, gives me the best TaJaDol vibes.

I never really minded the Thouser-arc as much as others, but this show was at its best when Metsubojinrai.net was calling the shots, and it seems like we're heading straight there again.

Also, I need to buy the Slashriser now. Dinky toy swords aside, the Shotriser is super fun to play with so I don't mind getting a remold. Plus, the Burning Falcon key cover being made out of translucent plastic is awesome. That’s going to look great with the LED illuminating it.

The 4th member revealed in the trailer for the prequel special like rogue and snipe. I could see burning falcon burn off all the hopper locusts. I'm curious thouser gets stronger if he manage to jack higher level forms. His strongest finishers so far is the all progrise animals rush combo.

I can see Gai trying to Jack Burning Falcon. Question is could he and even then can Jin still overpower him?

Who needs TaJaDor when you got Burning Falcon? :rock:

Not bad for a recap episode. Pretty smartly done actually, cause we ended up with new revelations and story development. So in a way it refreshes viewers but also gives them something to look forward to. Seems it tied Reiwa The First Generation into the show as well.

And Jin Burning Falcon's debut was amazing! That fight was brilliantly choreographed with some slick camera moves and special effects. Can't wait to see the direction the show will go down now that Jin and Horoboi are back together!

Jins Rider debut was really good. Great fight scenes.

Aruto was super annoying so I was glad to see even Isamu was restraining himself from slapping him around.

I have such a hard time seeing Aruto the goof-ball as being the same person in that killer neon yellow Rider suit. They're just not the same person to me at all.

One is a badass Kamen Rider, and one is the most annoying main character out of any Kamen Rider show I've seen.

Just a big ol' info-dump of explaining the plot, but it was better than most info-dump episodes I've seen. I really like the detail that Horobi was originally a father-type Humagear, it's a neat connection to how he called Jin his son. And I totally called it that Gai would want to sell Kamen Riders as weapons.

Isamu was trying to hide the fact he was trying(and failing) not to laugh Aruto's joke.

For all the serious revelations in this episode, I have to commend how they started off the episode comedically. And that being successful!

On a minor note, I kinda hated the Slashriser when I first saw it but seeing Jin wield it was just awesome. Reminds me of Eternal's weapon

Jin makes his fabulous return in a nice mafia suit.

Pretty much a recap episode but with enough new content to be enjoyable. Jin with his new look was awesome. Liked the threads. And it seems that the hierarchy of MJ.net will change too.

I wonder how different the next set of episodes are going to be since they'll continue the match up of Hiden vs ZAIA but now with MJ.net in the mix.

This is what’s stopped me from watching the show beyond the first three eps. The acting overall is pretty fucking terrible, but Arturo is so insufferable to watch and listen to. He’s always, always mugging and it’s just painful.

I really don't understand this hate about Aruto being "goofy" while it's happening in really rare occasions now.

I hope people hating him are not the same praising W for being one of the best KR shows because half of it is only that...

Because Aruto's actor sucks and Shotaro's doesn't.

I think Aruto's actor is doing a good job just compare to some of the others in the show it might not seem like it.

If only W was only about Shotaro. But there is Akiko, and that afro guy and probably others Im forgetting.

I can understand the contrast in Zero-One can be annoying. There are terrorism, high-tech world/companies and "shouting" comedy mixing with each other, and maybe the change of tone and huge contrast can be disturbing and make it even more standing out.

This episode was a good example of that. Showrunners probably knew the episode would be information packed and the kid audience would probably find it strange and overwhelming to get so many information without breathers. That's why Aruto shouted more this week.

But look at the episodes before this one, Aruto is not really doing is thing often anymore. the only real time I found it too much was maybe with this old builder/construction worker.

This was a great episode. Action aside as I already gushed about that, I really liked the short recaps sections mixed with new exposition, and most importantly: Hearing Aruto and Fuma talk about what being "Kamen Rider" means to them after Gai treats them like simple weapons to be sold to the highest bidder. And it became even better when Jin stated the same, completely unrelated to their conversation before. How often do we hear what being "Kamen Rider" means to an antagonist? It’s usually just a power that works in their favor, not a symbol they want to achieve something with. I really liked that.

I'm overall very glad that Metsubojinrai.net is back. I really, really hope Horobi just kicks Thouser's ass without it being explained much. He never really "lost" a fight before IIRC, the only time he lost was because he willingly threw himself unguarded into Vulcan's Rider Kick, he meant to lose. It would be great if comes back and continues to be awesome.

"Badass Kamen Rider"

https://i.imgur.com/ZAUEKWB.gif

https://i.imgur.com/7OA2ey3.gif

https://i.imgur.com/teilGun.gif

https://i.imgur.com/ycdeTz6.gif

Shall I post more? :p

They made it very obvious who's inside this suit all along. He's gotten better at it, mostly because the situations at hand require him to, but Zero-One was always a goofball from the very beginning.

Just because you doesn’t like his shtick doesn’t mean the actor is bad. It’s quite the opposite for me actually, I hate loudmouth Toku heroes with a passion but Aruto I can get behind because he can be serious when they need him to. And the actor can perform well under those circumstances which makes it believable.

And they're all better acted than Aruto.


The actor being bad is what makes the actor bad.

Kamen Rider doesn't exactly have high thespian standards, but usually the actors can pull off some kind of range. They don't just scream and mug their way through every performance.

Ah yes, and of course you have seen his entire repertoire to properly back that claim up - oh no wait, its 3 episodes of Zero-One and then only nonsensical "I don’t like this 'cause it’s bad" - comments after. Never mind.

Bro what the actual fuck are you doing here if you can't bring yourself to watch 4 episodes on the thread for episode 25, Inukai's been fucking fantastic for Build but what made him great wasn't in the first three episodes, so I guess he's ok at best as actors clearly are incapable of improving over time, nor can their characters have more to do than make mug shots after episode fucking 3

To be fair, they probably just clicked on the thread to see what happened this week, and KaijuUltraFan's comment about Aruto resonated with them.

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Back onto discussing the episode.

I find it interesting that they actually leave the explanation of Jin's revival/rebuilding a mystery. Although the fact that he's wielding a retool of the ShotRiser, along with Gai's excuse that MBJR.net's survival simply means more sales in the long run, probably says everything we need to know.

Another thing is that Gai (according to the subs I saw) says Thouser will complete the ultimate weapon, not that Thouser is the ultimate weapon. Which I assume means the series "big ultra final super boss"-thingy, will also be Presented by ZAIA.

Lastly it seems from the end of the episode that Jin has other plans for MBJR now that he's back. I doubt he's actually working for ZAIA, but rather he's been planing up of something else than just a Terminator style uprising like Horobi intended.

Episode 2 or 3 where he walked into the press conference in that suit sold Aruto for me.

He can polish up when the situation really calls for it, and ruining the polish with a shine gag in the same scene made me go "say no more fam, I'm behind you"

I love that with each successive generation of Humagear the earphone gets smaller.

Hell if Gai wants to market his products as elegant and beautiful what Jin is wearing on his ear looks a fuckton more beautiful than the ugly shit the ZAIA spec turned out to be.

https://i.imgur.com/UFc9w1Q.jpg

上堀内監督による、カミ回ですね！

はい！或人じゃ～ないけど！

Sorry, I got a little carried away there. But, uh, wow did I end up liking this one. It was a real roller-coaster getting there, too. You know what? Let me just take you on that ride, and I'll work my thoughts in as I go.

First I'm strangely impressed by the concise cold open, and that cool shot of Jin. Then I end up rewinding the opening like a dozen times in the middle (maybe more?) to see Metal Cluster Hopper's amazing shot, which packs an impressive amount of visual storytelling into a short span. The fact that I inadvertently extended the opening to at least double the length then made it that much more of a reveal when I finally got the very end, and, as I always do with Zero-One, took note of the director credit, and suddenly it made sense why that shot of Jin from earlier was so cool. This was a Kazuya Kamihoriuchi episode. That aired back to back with Ryusoulger's finale?! Best Super Hero Time ever, right?

Moving into the meat of the episode, I braced for disappointment as it became apparent a huge chunk of this episode would be a combination infodump/recap, "characters stand in a room stating facts" being just about my least favorite form of storytelling. My spirits became lifted again as I hypothezied that Kamihoriuchi was chosen for this episode just so he could come up with the most visually interesting possible way to handle a flowchart.

https://i.imgur.com/hmPk8Ce.jpg

Before I had time to further come up with a hypothesis for why Aruto was doing so many puns in one episode, things moved into the back half, where I also didn't find time to wonder why everyone was suddenly throwing around the word Kamen Rider like it's going out of style, largely because I was preoccupied with how great the second half of this episode is. Sure, everyone announcing their Rider names and central motivations is both extremely cheesy, and further emphasizes how much I can't wait for Yua to move out of her phase of having nothing to do besides be sad about being Gai's lackey the same way every episode, but it really starts coming together.

There's stuff about this episode to this point, that, like a lot Zero-One lately, I'm not too keen on. Yua, obviously, which I've gotta talk about in detail at some point. The infodump which, combined with the trailer for Project Thouser, really casually spills the beans on Naki when it seems like a mysterious hooded figure like that should probably be more of an enigma and/or have a bigger reveal. And if I want to get really nitpicky, ever since I saw the ThousanDriver, I've been wondering what the actual difference between Progrise Keys and Zetsumeirise Keys is supposed to be, and the way the infodump covers it does not help on that front. Where the heck are Assault Wolf and Metal Cluster Hopper supposed to fit into that explanation?

All that just started to fade away right around the time Zero-One and Vulcan go into action together, though. It helps that I'm a long-established sucker for Vulcan's BGM, but the dialogue between Aruto and Fuwa there, it's all great stuff. A subtle advancement in their relationship that, like a lot of this episode, seems to also be catered towards catching up new viewers on things. Maybe this script was expected to air alongside Kiramager's premiere to catch people tuning in for that, I don't know. But it's a sweet fight scene that lives up to the standards of the hottest director in tokusatsu right now.

And after holding it back for so much of the episode, we get the big exciting event here. Jin is back! I forget how much I actually talked about him, but Jin was definitely a favorite character of mine throughout his first run. I really enjoyed his gradual evolution, and thought making him the final boss of the show's initial arc was a great exit. What I was really looking forward to with him coming back was the potential to see that go even further. I wanted to see a Jin that wasn't just the same as always. He should feel more mature. He should have more defined goals, and perhaps a bit of a harder look to his appearance, transformed or otherwise. The show should play with the viewer's expectations of who Jin is. So not only did Zero-One hit literally all of those points, it did just in the episode he came back, when it easily could've resorted to ending the episode on the cliffhanger of him revealing himself, and made us wait for further elaboration. I'd like to think I wouldn't have found that an issue either, but I'm super glad I don't have to worry about it, and this episode packed all that story meat right in, here and now. It's an immediacy I'd love to see more regularly from Zero-One. A nice balance to all the elements that have spent so much time simmering without a lot of progress (*cough*Assault Wolf*cough*).

And the cliffhanger we did get? Hoo boy, that's a good one.

So, in short, I loved this episode, and I'll leave off by mentioning one thing I loved about it before even seeing it. The title. I've given Zero-One crap for its bizarre titling conventions, but this one continues a trend I really like. "I Will Save The HumaGears" sounds straightforward enough, but I'm betting I lot of you assumed that was in reference to Aruto, right? The trick is, the pronoun used for "I" there is boku, making it clear that this is Jin speaking. Titles like this, or the subtle contrast between the premiere and Thouser's debut, they make it clearer to me why Zero-One uses katakana for those pronouns. It's a matter of emphasis. The subject is the key information being presented, instead of whatever comes after. Not all of them work out this nicely, but when they do, Zero-One's episode titles have a sort of understated simplicity to them that makes them rather poetic in their own way, and I dig that. How much they can accomplish with so little.

I just feel like pointing out I think it's funny how both GenmCorp and Over-Time went with the Arthur meme for their release posts.

My guess it has to do with Vulcan's super form because Rampage Gatling has all the animals that Thouzer hi-jack.

I'm another one that hates how high pitched and loud the because it's how you know it's Aruto schtick is. Only consolation is now that Izu does it. For some reason it also makes her chest pop out more whenever she does the motion.

Look, if they don't want to watch it because of the actor, that's their choice. Unfortunately, I also happen to be in that same camp, but I just try to stick it out.

Absolutely. It’s also their choice to be fair about it and not drop in at the episode 25 discussion to proclaim that the actor is bad though.

Just like that Michael Learns To Rock song: 25 Minutes (episodes too late)