[FreshToku]

I didn't really care for the climax of this episode. I'm actually in full agreement with you about the Tiger Undead's perspective from this, how this is her way of fighting back in this rigged game, and she gets to help out this weird spider boy at the same time. It's probably the best way for her character to head out!

My issue is with Mutsuki, and maybe this is just me expecting something different from what the show was ultimately heading towards. All that time spent with Mutsuki pursuing strength above all else, and then repeatedly either getting beaten down or being forcibly reminded that he does still have attachments (well, one in the form of Nozomi) that make him 'weak', I thought it was all headed towards him finally realising that no, this path he's on does not have any good end for him and he goes back to being a good guy.

For them to instead, in the solution, to paint it all as being the Category King's influence, and that getting rid of that alone is enough to fix everything... It's incredibly lame! It's the least compelling decision they could have made. I know obviously he's always been 'possessed' to some extent, but I was most intrigued by his character when they implied that the Undead's influence was just drawing out his latent dark desires to the surface.

So he embraced that darkness, it did nothing good for him, and so then he needs to choose to push it back, and does so with some extra help from Tiger and Shima . As is though, I think he feels fairly uninvolved in how his own plot wraps up.

Also it was a while ago by now, but episode 40 is one that sticks out in my mind among Blade just for how all four riders came together to kick butt in that climax. Was literally the only thing I remembered as opposed to all that robot dad stuff. It's kinda like how for a long time, I remembered episode 40 of Faiz ending with all three Riders transforming to the theme song but nothing else about it.