Wizard Episode 45: "The Smile in My Heart" Discussion
 

Is this the first time we see Plasma Shining Strike? Seems like it . . .

Sorcerer's transformation is pretty cool. :)

Holy Den-O Batman

What a fantastic episode, I enjoyed that thoroughly from start to finish...and as such I have nothing constructive to add.

That microwave gag. :lol

Great episode. The plot is really starting to come to a head now. Sora's got plans, Mayu's getting desperate, Koyomi is breaking, and Nitou is now jobbing to little boys. I'm very interested to see how this is all going to end.

I also liked how the Gate story this time resolved itself. The teacher giving up the plane and choosing to just remember his son and to hope for the others, that was pretty awesome. Nice to see something like that finally happen.

I enjoyed this episode. The gate solved his own problem, helped the father and son's problem, and helped Haruto. I liked him.
I liked that Shunpei spoke up against Haruto, and I'm glad Haruto's attempt to put Koyumi over someone else was denied by Shunpei. It was great.

Mayu seems to be on Medusa's level, but she just can't seem to get an edge up over her, and I'm liking that Gremlin is starting to get interesting again.

And the microwave gag was nice. It was cute.

Wow Haaruto. You have ONE job and you were willing to let the one Gate that solved his own drama fall into despair on the faint hope it'll help White Wizard. Way to go Wiz.

I get that he's not like the other Riders we had before, but if he's willing to slack off on his one job then I cannot in good judgment root for him anymore.

I really want a gif of the teacher smashing the airplane.

I think you're being a bit too harsh on Haruto. In the previous 44 episodes, Haruto didn't have nearly as much on his plate as he does in this one. Here, not only does he have to try to figure out what the White Wizard's game is, he's also worrying about Koyomi and what is wrong with her, in addition to protecting Gates. The stress from all of these factors culminated to cause him to make one bad move, and that was a move he regretted. Yes, he should have known better, but I think his excuse is good enough to ease off some of the backlash. Either that or I'm trying to justify the side of myself that is forgiving to stupid levels.

Poor Nitoh. He didn't deserve that. Nice how Haruto worries about Koyomi, even if he was willing to let his teacher go full-on despair for it. Shunpei finally does something interesting for the first time in... I have no idea. Also, we final find out about the Philospher's Stone. And it was... Not Koyomi. There go all our theories

Although I guess it does make Haruto a 'lesser' hero, it was nice for a protagonist to have a genuine moral dilemma fo once and have the Gate stand up for himself instead. The whole 'you can't save everybody' storyline is often surprisingly absent in toku, or given an easy answer or brushed over but I think they handled it really well here. At least as well as you can expect. Especially when Shunpei stood up as well.

But I'm seeing that Haruto haters are already completely missing the point of this scene to continue to rag out on him before it goes out of style and we're all hating on Gaimu because we all know we can only like Kamen Rider shows from a decade back, all the rest are uncool.

It's just a shame that by this point I have so little investment in anyone but Haruto, so Koyomi rolling around in a bed trying to act didn't really engage me how I think the episode wanted it to.