[DreadBringer]

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

I'm not sure what to respond to? Plenty of other characters in Kamen Rider have been horrible, sure. If you want me to call out negative character traits from, like, Gaim, I don't know if that's going to happen in this thread? Other than as a drive-by?

No, but this one's about Kageyama, a shithead that isn't favored by audience (means the exact reaction he's supposed to get). But I mean, for any series, when the horrible character is someone who is liked by audience (I'm afraid that they can be given free pass or something)...

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

If a parent risks their life or their freedom or their happiness to save their child, I think we can agree that that's heroic? It doesn't diminish the sacrifice by making the recipient someone they already cared about.

It depends, on which action they'd take to save their child. As you've mentioned Sam Raimi Spider-Man in Blade thread, I'm also giving an example of that; Sandman there wants to save his daughter, but he became a criminal for that and later supervillain, which means he's an anti-villain.

Not a full-heroic one for the part where he's going to kill others to achieve it, but the part at the end of episode 18 was a heroic action yeah. But for their whole alignment, anyone have to look at the bigger picture in the entire show and ask ourselves: "in the bigger picture, how much did they do good overall and how much did they do harm overall?". Which is again, why I think character's morality depends more on what they do/or will do to people less related to them, for both good and bad guys. Caring for friends and family is usually pretty universal and inherent for not only white-zone but also grey-zone characters or even some of the black-zone ones. But what about, for example, civilians or strangers (taking care of them for good guys, and preying them for bad guys). Caring only about friends and/or family won't necessarily cut it (if they would care, more apathetic, or outright cruel to others; overall), and so does for bad guys if they only brutalize primarily those that are in their target.

Like the part of Kagami as TheBee (for this one moment, but not Kagami overall) before; him siding with Tendou, being his friend, and quit being TheBee and leading Shadow, it solidifies Tendou and Kagami but can have a negative aspects to him just cutting Shadow loose, abandoning coworkers for your own issues (especially if they might depend on you for their jobs/lives), and you pointed that out as a bit of a dick move. For this one, Daisuke's first stint of saving Gon by killing Tendou is closer to this (what'll Juka, Kagami, etc. feel?!), but not for the 2nd stint (when the cast including Daisuke banded together and helped her reclaim her memory).

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

So, one, Daisuke absolutely would have gone through with his plan to kill Tendou, since he did it twice in one episode. Tendou deflected the Rider Shooting in the beginning, and used Cast Off to fake his death later. Daisuke sincerely thought he'd killed Tendou after that.

Two, it's pretty well established at this point that Gon is the Brains Of The Outfit. It makes sense to me that he'd not be able to think of an alternative to doing ZECT's will, and it's not fair to ask him to be as clever as Tendou. It is not unheroic for Daisuke to lack the mental acumen of the smartest man in the world!

Well, it's true that not having a best plan can come from airheadness or denseness, the unheroic part is that Daisuke straight up goes to kill other people, expected as he's also established as having selective care; for Gon and women. and killing someone that is faultless is objectively morally wrong. Those with a tad higher moral compass, if faced with decision like this, could have a hesitation, that it'll be a sadistic choice for them; to lose the ones they love or preventing that while doing a wrong thing.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER KABUTO - EPISODE 19

The Phantom Shadow Thief plot is, obviously, about exposing some Worm or something. It’s basically the only place these three ZECT characters could take this setup. (It could be them trying to discover some ZECT secrets, but I just don’t see that being a thing for them yet.) But it’s so separate from what Tendou and Kamishiro are up to, that I’d maybe rather it just be its own plot.

Because it 100% could be. Misaki is a fantastic character, and we really don’t know anything about her. Having a slow build of the PST story, where we delve a little more into her character, get to see her beyond the context of the ZECT Van, I think that would be really welcome. But this thing does the barest amount of setup, and then starts rushing through its developments. As it is, we’re given a clue that Misaki might be the PST, and then immediately have it confirmed that she’s the PST. The scenes of the PST doing crimes are great, this show knows its way around an action sequence by now, but… I don’t know, it’s like there’s both too much PST plot for a Tendou story, and too much Tendou plot for a PST story. With neither plot coming together yet, it makes for a slightly overstuffed episode.

So for what you've said about ZECT (and at one point you said ZECT's cons extends to anyone involved in it except Kagami) what you think about Misaki is this. For the Tendou part of PST, he's actually an unofficial part of it, and it'll be more prevalent. I mean, of course if this part can delve more to Misaki's character, or discovering some ZECT secrets, it'll be good, but I don't think that is necessarily in place for this part? Establishing PST is just a standard ZECT mission, done in different way, and of course the other part of ZECT missions don't delve into those people's characters (especially Tadokoro who is mostly a full-on drone for ZECT), so I won't think that this part will change any of that. And anyway, carrying PST as a mission, that'd be even more high stakes, as you're practically potentially ruining your life or entire organization's reputation as a thief (they didn't only dress up as a thief, they act as it for real), you probably should purely focusing on your missions only instead of having a trivial talk to get to know about anyone more, either in-universe or out of universe, which is distracting, and not something a professional should do.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

It doesn’t help that the Tendou plot has to accommodate the massive ego of Kamishiro, which, again, really could’ve/should’ve been an episode of its own. Like Yaguruma, he’s a pretty straightforward variation on Tendou. Kamishiro has the same bottomless ego and unshakeable sense of impending greatness as Tendou, but turned up to Inoue. Tendou does everything for his own sake, while Kamishiro feels the burden of lineage. Tendou has Juka, while Kamishiro mourns Mika. Kamishiro’s as skilled as Tendou in every way (so far), but he’s got a more imperious sense of his supremacy. Tendou views the rest of the world as his beloved subjects, the people he’ll protect because they’re helpless without him; while Kamishiro views the rest of the world as commoners, whose insignificant lives are nothing without his grace and light. Like, where Tendou is frequently rude or condescending, Kamishiro is dismissive and unmoved. Tendou wants others to succeed because greatness has inherent value, while Kamishiro views greatness as a finite resource, and thinks he’s cornered the market.

Well, obviously Hiyori is bored pretty-quick, and that probably also comes off from how overbearing he is (and unlike Tendou, likely won't having a soft spot for Hiyori). It's normal and is frequently the case for real life (and Hiyori is an in-universe character so Kamishiro is real for her) to be repulsed by other's jerkish behavior, especially for someone with social anxiety like her (people like this can be a target for narcissists with huge ego to like, bully on, but dunno if Hiyori had gone through that, other than the meteor flashback for her traumatizing moment). Anyways, Kamishiro is a full-on Tendou 2.0, and this feels as if the writers realized how overbearing Tendou was for those that can't stand him, so they gave those guys as the alternative to establish Tendou being still better than them. Though with your insights here, it's clear that Kamishiro is also a foil to Tendou in every single way (and probably I'd add up for the part of imperious sense of supremacy; Tendou's family is commoner seemingly, but Kamishiro is a part of royalty, and that Juka is Tendou's younger sibling, while Mika is the older sibling; Kamishiro addressed him as "onee-san" which means older sis). Kamishiro is a worst consequence of royalties, that he's a total elitist by that and he feels that he's superior to everyone else to the logical extreme, that he thinks he's above any rules and laws in the world and isn't above showing complete apathy to the disasters he caused like a killed cop. He's (actually Kabuto is rife with this) an Übermensch, who rejects the norms of society and lives by his own moral code. I wonder though, unlike Tendou... Kamishiro actually brought his soccer team before Tendou boasting that he can win alone.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

A QUESTION

But, obviously, the one flawless part was Juka, who is never anything less than a delight. She’s typically thrilled with the massive breakfast Tendou has made for her, even if she’s too rushed to finish it. How do you feel about breakfast? Is it totally skippable, or the most important meal of your day?

With Juka being always on a delight, that's likely the reason why the trope to keep things a secret to people like her exists? Breakfast is important. Some of the benefical part of it is that it can make you concentrate better, prevent diseases, or multiply your academic marks by 4x (and I'd assume the same for things outside school, like your work progress). Even the commercials on my TV also addesses this.