[ComicGuy89]

Great episode. I don't even care for the Beat Riders that much but this was epic. Really got the sense of their passion.

Jonouchi is such a spineless coward.

Quote:

Originally Posted by NGW

Not a bad episode but in a way it does feel closer to filler than anything we've had from the season to date. Knuckle had a solid introduction and he's made for a pretty cool rider from what we did see of him, and it was nice seeing him fight alongside Baron.

I do hope this was a sendoff to the beat rider plotline, and if it is indeed one then I feel it was a good way to go about doing so. I was always somewhat..hesitant on the whole street dancing concept for the show, but it was at least done in a way that wasn't really obtrusive and managed to work well enough, and at times was somewhat enjoyable. For instance I loved the all girl dance troupe we saw in white, with those nice short shorts...*cough*. But yeah, it's time to see this aspect of the show off so we can, as Kaito says, focus on what really matters.

I'm of two minds on what Bravo has become. He's really seeming to suffer from some serious Flanderization. When he was introduced, yeah he was over the top, yeah he was flamboyant, he had speech bubbles and all that, but he was also a serious threat, he was BADASS, and in a way that really just pulled all of that together in such a way that just freaking worked. But now he's becoming less and less threatening, they're pushing the humorous aspects of him more and more without having that serious, hardened military badass behind it to help prop it up and it's making him seem more like a parody of himself. The humor is still funny, for the most part, but while his incredibly flamboyant first henshin led to a seriously scary opponent that just wrecked shit up, he's just...comic relief when he should be this dangerous agent for Yggdrasil, with all of his training he should be given the tools to actually take out the beat riders. If his power is no longer able to stand up to Gaim's, freaking give him an upgrade or something, poor guy has had just the one lock seed from the get go, and while I LOVE durian arms I also love the character too much to watch him become what he looks to be turning into. I rather they not kill him off, but that may be a better fate. Again I do like the humor he brings, I still think him swooning over Zangetsu was one of the funniest things I've ever seen in a toku show, but they gotta balance it out.

I think Bravo is being phased out as a villain. After all, the new, real scary bad guys are the Energy Riders, and Bravo just doesn't have the gear to compete. I feel he's now meant to be this somewhat threatening villain to keep the Riders on their feet so the producers can avoid using the Energy Riders too much. So in essence, Bravo's threat level is sacrificed to keep the Energy Riders' appearances sparse and therefore, threatening.

Anyhow, Bravo's not completely hopeless like most Toku villains become at this stage. No Rider can best him except the Energy Riders and Gaim in his Jinba form. He's still an exceptionally tough opponent.