[DreadBringer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER KABUTO - EPISODE 38

And the motivation was a principal who wanted more success at his school? It doesn’t matter! It is a motivation that feels inconsequential because the only name character in any jeopardy by the time we find out is Juka. Keiko’s already dead by the time this episode starts, which is easily the stupidest decision in the story. There’s this couple dozen body-count partnership with a Worm, but there’s virtually no one important in jeopardy. The baseball player is no one, Keiko’s not coming back… it takes half the story for Juka to be imperiled. The first part of this thing is just a mountain of nameless bodies, and it feels gross. It feels boring.

(Also, so, the Worm bumped off an entire afterschool club seven years ago, and then did nothing since last week? What the hell was it waiting for, Pluto to get demoted? Is this revenge against future astronomers? Is this all just a Fourze story after all? Also also, are you telling me this principal lost an entire afterschool club seven years ago and kept his job?! And he’s got more kids missing since then? If this is what’s going on in the neighborhood, I feel like Tendou needs to start homeschooling Juka immediately. The Worm attacks in his home are a lot less frequent!)

I'd talk about this in some detail; this only shows to display how cruel and depraved the principal is. He's the type of humans are the real monsters in Kabuto, and it's based on the authorities who only care about pride and reputation for what they are in charge of (in this case school, and there are teachers whose priority is only their school's prestige) instead of the well-being of those under their care, and this, being a fantasy world, takes this to the logical (and depravity) extremes. The principal made a deal with Worms, knowing that the Worms are superior to the humans, to preserve the school's reputation as it's threatened by the losing streak, the principal accomplishes this by putting a "cursed mirror" where the Worms hide behind that he used to trick the students that it will accept their wishes (typically making a big achievement in school, and in turn, preserves the school's reputation).

But predictably, it's done by the Worms in the mirror killing and replacing that student who wished something, and live to carry that student's wish. What the Worms doing was waiting for the next student to make a wish, then kill and replace him/her. The missing kids are all unknowingly got replaced by the Worms who live just like the better versions of them (so there won't be anything wrong for the principal in public's eyes), as it's done to preserve the school's reputation after all. What you said about Tendou needs to start homeschooling Juka is valid, but as this is about the depravity of the principal, what Tendou did in this episode was also valid was well, him calling out the principal's cruelty, which the principal of course shifted the blame on the students for making the wish, and him being put under arrest by Misaki (so ZECT can act as a police too).

A̶l̶s̶o̶ ̶j̶u̶s̶t̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶e̶,̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶I̶ ̶s̶a̶i̶d̶ ̶a̶b̶o̶u̶t̶ ̶I̶n̶o̶u̶e̶'̶s̶ ̶w̶o̶r̶k̶ ̶o̶u̶t̶s̶i̶d̶e̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶T̶V̶ ̶s̶e̶r̶i̶e̶s̶ ̶w̶h̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶h̶e̶'̶s̶ ̶p̶u̶t̶ ̶o̶n̶ ̶a̶ ̶l̶e̶a̶s̶h̶ ̶b̶y̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶p̶r̶o̶d̶u̶c̶t̶i̶o̶n̶ ̶t̶e̶a̶m̶ ̶c̶o̶n̶t̶a̶i̶n̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶g̶r̶o̶s̶s̶ ̶s̶t̶u̶f̶f̶,̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶t̶e̶r̶m̶ ̶"̶g̶r̶o̶s̶s̶"̶ ̶I̶ ̶m̶e̶a̶n̶t̶ ̶i̶s̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶ ̶a̶b̶o̶u̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶w̶o̶r̶k̶ ̶b̶e̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶u̶t̶t̶e̶r̶l̶y̶ ̶u̶n̶e̶n̶j̶o̶y̶a̶b̶l̶e̶ ̶l̶i̶k̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶o̶n̶e̶,̶ ̶I̶'̶m̶ ̶t̶a̶l̶k̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶t̶e̶r̶m̶ ̶"̶g̶r̶o̶s̶s̶"̶ ̶l̶i̶t̶e̶r̶a̶l̶l̶y̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶o̶s̶e̶ ̶w̶o̶r̶k̶s̶.̶

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Luckily, there’s this middle section that… I mean, it doesn’t save this story, not even close. This is probably the worst non-movie Kabuto story I’ve watched. But! It finds a little room to spotlight Kagami’s heroism, and that’s almost enough for me.

OK, I want to talk about this in relation to the above one (sorry if the English here is bad), both are about dealing with strangers "nameless bodies", but in complete contrast, this one's about helping and inspiring others, while above one is about disposing anyone for your own gain. So the strangers are more ok to be used as a stepping stone for someone's goodness like what Kagami did here, rather than the stepping stone for someone's evilness like the principal? As said before, I'd think what you do to someone less related to yourself (unlike family/friend) judges your morality more though, like Kageyama doing what he did to Gon is bad, but significantly less evil than what the principal is doing there. Also, what you said regarding above is that the only tiny saving grace was there's only 1 part in regular cast in jeopardy which is Juka, though I'm still not sure about this being the type of the cast having bad things randomly happened to them part (or if this happen for this one, the fault isn't on the cast but lies more on it not done by a main baddies to further their plot like Kageyama to Gon, instead a filler villain?).

The camping part too, Kagami makes an excellent point that camping is done to provide fun and joy for the participants, to refresh others, not to give others pressure like what Renge did by forcing the participants to work hard (no resting/gossiping/etc.) and focused on completing the task under a set time. Renge claims that this comes from her training, which, with her ZECT background, probably comes from something like boot camp, where that one isn't done for fun, but to toughen the soldiers, but she has to realize here, a life outside military, camping isn't only used as a means for training like soldiers do, a varying purpose of why a activity is run, on different fields even if that's the same kind of activity.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Other than that, not a lot that did it for me in this episode. The flash-forward to the solar eclipse was fine. The fact that Tsurugi was just randomly in the woods for the fight was fine. The PunchHopper and KickHopper stuff was fun, basically just for the idea that the only members of the cast who’d be happy fighting/detonating teenagers are these two. (Honestly, all of the stuff with Yaguruma and Kageyama felt too repetitive to me to really work that great. It’s fine, it’s never not funny, but it wasn’t really saying anything new or different.) It was all fine in the second half, after the Kagami scene.

I think, there's something a bit new in the Hopper brothers. This story had Kageyama... helped Keiko a bit (probably unconsciously) from monsters? Which had Keiko looked up to him a bit, by calling him "brother", which makes Yaguruma jealous. Which is a bit contradictory with how Yaguruma previously asked Kageyama not to seek the light, which equals to fighting off monsters, while later, Yaguruma is jealous of Kageyama inspiring others a bit and them looking up to him. It's clearer now, that's an edgelord, boasting about their suffering and acting in a shock (valuing hell, darkness, etc.) to get more attention from others. This is a bit about what I talk about in a bit of a change in their relationship, Kageyama here can unconsciously seek the light, like him fighting off monsters here, which Yaguruma had to warn him of that. While Yaguruma is jealous of Kageyama "inspiring" Keiko here and reminds themselves to stay in the path of hell, he wouldn't be completely immune to that either.

Also for the part where Tsurugi was in the woods, this is the part I talk about Tendou stealing Zecters won't stop after the apology. This is literally what Hyper Kabuto does! The enhanced version of Perfect Zecter (the sword) involves stealing all the other's Zecters to use its full power. Tendou's connection to Hyper Zecter inevitably leads to him stealing other Zecters. He attempted to obtain Hyper Zecter previously also by stealing the Zecters and trading it with Hyper Zecter from Mishima (and I think stealing the Zecter is only done for Hyper Form; Tendou also thinks that Hyper Form is his main goal to save Hiyori), and Hyper Kabuto also works by stealing the other's Zecters. In meta sense, this also shows to the audience that everyone is insignificant compared to Tendou, and unconsciously achieves the "Tendou is the only Rider needed". I'd like for the battle to display that stealing the other's Zecters was necessary though, like that (something series like Kuuga did with Rising finishers failing), the usual finisher won't work on that Worm, so it needs to power up by stealing the other's Zecters.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

A QUESTION

Simple one this time: Have you ever gone camping in the woods?

Yes, more than 1 time even. It's inevitable as one of the things to proceed in an educational piece.