[Sh Ranger]

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

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Making Takumi’s episode even more stressful is that, uh, all of his friends hate him?

Some of it’s Takumi’s fault, in that he can’t really explain himself at all, and I don’t blame his friends for turning on him. I mean, they’ve only known him for a few months, during which he’s been varying levels of insufferable. He’s always been tough to be friends with, and him rudely declaring Keitaro break up with a girl because Takumi has a bad feeling about it, along with being incredibly aggressive with Kusaka, it’s all a pretty bad look on Takumi.

I get it, though. This is a guy who in the second episode kept trying to run away from people who wanted to get close to him. The fact that he ran away from their accusations this time and then came back for more is, like, probably the toughest thing he’s ever done. He hasn’t learned how to fight for what he wants, but he’s sure as shit learned how to absorb people’s scorn.

I think that’s the heart of the “miscommunication”, or whatever. It’s that Takumi can’t talk about what he’s feeling, can’t express the conflict in his heart. He sees everyone turning against him, and he wishes it wasn’t the case, but he doesn’t have the tools to defend himself. Worse, his reflex is to lash out, mope, run away, make things worse. He doesn’t want to be in this position, but he at least can handle it. So he keeps plugging away, hurting feelings and confusing his friends, letting them get over it, then doing it all again. He’s probably his own worst enemy in this one.

Some people call it miscommunication but it's definitely in character for Takumi to accept the blame for something he didn't do, as shown in Episode 5. At his old job, his colleagues blamed him for stealing money and he outright said it's better that way, for him to be scapegoated, even though Master never believed he did it. Takumi thinks he deserves punishment. That fear of hurting people makes him alone. If he doesn't fight, people die. If he fights, people die. He accepts the blame cause he blames himself. Even if he did defend himself, against Kusaka's reputation, who would they believe? He knows he wouldn't stand a chance as he is now. Kusaka doesn't hesitate to kill Orphenochs, which makes Takumi feel like he's not good enough anymore.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

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Ha ha NOPE it’s definitely Kusaka. That dude… I’m pretty sure he’s the devil?

He’s great here, though, for real. Every time he’d trick Takumi into looking like the bad guy, and then Takumi would make himself look even worse than that… I mean, it couldn’t’ve gone better for Kusaka if Takumi had been in on it.

Real curious what his endgame is, though. He’s got two moves, manipulate or destroy. Keitaro and Mari could be manipulated, so they seem safe. They treat him like a hero, take his side in his rivalry with Takumi. He seems happy with that. But Takumi didn’t buy it, so he’s got to be forced out, humiliated, reviled, probably killed. But what for? Why all of these machinations? Right now, Kuasaka’s all schemes, and I dig it, but I want to see where all of this is going. Like, currently it’s Control and Sadism, but, and then what?

So you understand Kusaka's two means: Manipulation and Destruction. He also has two ends, one of which is a means unto itself, the end of Orphenochs. He doesn't see the good in them like Takumi does, he doesn't try, he doesn't care, not unless he can use them. This is actually his least important goal. His main goal was briefly mentioned by him in Episode 14 but it's not in the foreground quite yet.