[Shin Henshin]

So I've been keeping up with Saber by watching weekly with a friend and while I'm enjoying what I can of it I can't help but notice that head writer Takuro Fukuda has been having the same sort of problems as he did with Ghost's overall writing and plot: It feels like his story can't support the average Kamen Rider series run time. And I found that kind of fascinating since the issues Saber currently has are also very similar to Ghost's.

Now I defend Ghost constantly and still do. I think it gets way too much hate as a series and is overall a good series, but nowhere near as good as most of its predecessors or almost all of its successors. I feel Saber's gonna be in that same category. Reason being is that when watching it weekly, the series feels slow or like its spinning its wheels while if you watch it in chunks, the story flows better. I watched Ghost weekly, fell off for weeks on end then went back to catch up and enjoyed myself more by watching 2 or 3 episodes at a time. Saber's storytelling so far feels like it's gonna be better to watch near its end where you can binge it in portions, too.

There's also Fukuda's apparent habit of writing what feels like an endgame plot only 10-13 episodes into the series run. By around episode 12 Ghost found all the eyecons, got a wish, the apparent main antagonist was defeated and...now we've got like 35 episodes left. So we get things like the Ganmeisers, Another Makoto, Takeru dying for real though two or three more times, etc.

Saber? Same thing! By episode 13 we've got beams of light in the sky, wonder books opening up portals all over the place, our antagonists getting close to their goal, a showdown between Calibur and Saber aaand...35 episodes left still. So now we've got a conflict between Touma and the other Logos Riders that feels like it's been, what a surprise, spinning its wheels too much in terms of progression. Characters don't simply talk to one another, question motives that deserve questioning, devolve into what feels one-dimensional versions of who they are (REN...), repeating the same conflict over and over and while it finally feels like it's slowly starting to actually progress with Slash's side-swap and all, it's still a very notable problem I've been having with things since we ended Calibur's arc.

I can't help but feel like Fukuda's storytelling excels best in short-form mini-series length works or even single episodes rather than long-form, year-long plot threads since his ideas don't seem to be able to stretch that far. I don't think he's a bad writer at all, but I think Toei puts him on projects that are longer than his skills can deal with.

This whole thing was just an interesting thought. Especially when comparing Saber's current place to where Ghost's was around the same time. The similarities become super apparent.