[Sh Ranger]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER DEN-O EPISODE 40 - “CHANGE IMAGIN WORLD”

And Ryotaro rises to the challenge in this incredibly weird episode. Like, the show is not subtle with its thesis statement here. The new timeline is objectively better without Yuuto being in it. Literally everyone is living a happier life. (Well, probably not those two women with Ozaki. I don’t know them, but they can do better!) Every single person is better off… but that would mean giving up on Yuuto, and Ryotaro can’t abide by that. The idea of trading lives is abhorrent to him, inconceivable. Yuuto did exist, he is remembered, and Ryotaro will work to save him. That’s it. It’s an argument grounded entirely in faith, in the belief that no one deserves to be forgotten. The suggestion that the world is better without someone in it has at its core a flaw that Ryotaro can’t overlook: what about the person being forgotten? How would they feel? As long as the argument assumes that’s not worthy of consideration, you’ve lost Ryotaro’s support. He’s meeting Kai’s What Aboutisms with certainty, conviction. Yuuto lived, and he deserves to be remembered.

Oh, this is basically the philosophical Trolley Problem isn't it? Kai thinks it's okay to sacrifice Yuto's life since it improves the lives of so many others? Well, that's logical, if you count lives as merely quantitative data. But I agree with Ryoutarou's perspective here. Even if it makes a hundred lives better, it's wrong to make someone else suffer for that goal. That's not what a Kamen Rider does. Life is invaluable so any attempt to justify sacrificing others for the "greater good" is placing an arbitrary value on it and contrary to the principles of being a Kamen Rider. Yuto can be an ***hole sometimes but he has the same right to exist as anybody else and a world without him, regardless of how objectively better it is, wouldn't be right.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

-Hey, you’re right, I didn’t talk about Zeronos’s new Cosmic Rust Form! Beautifully designed sequence, and probably a crucial piece of this story’s puzzle… except, AS PER GODDAMN USUAL, I’m sure exactly what happened in this Yuuto development. He’s burning up a new memory to power up Zeronos, but I can’t tell from this montage if he’s burning up his memory of Airi, Airi’s memory of him, or both of their memories of each other. That matters! It matters a whole lot! I wish this episode nailed it down more, but I feel like it’ll get elaborated on next time. (That is basically how every major Yuuto storyline works.) Meanwhile, I thought it was really pretty? I just don’t know what it means yet.

Yeah, Zeronos memory stuff somehow finds a way to make even less sense than it already did. Yuto just keeps pulling these memories out of his a** to make the cards and now he's all rusty which I think is maybe supposed to represent sepia, the filter used for flashbacks to show that it's related to memory. It's definitely a weird way for a Rider to get a new form and it's difficult to get invested in that plot or relate to Yuto's problem when all of the stakes are so vague and confusing. But sure, at least the scene looked pretty and appropriately depressing, I guess. It does what a new form episode is supposed to do, although I still prefer his default Altair Form.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

-I cannot even begin to tell you how much I hated this episode’s theme song. I guess it’s the DenLiner Imagin singing parts of it now? It’s horrible. It’s menacing and brash in a way that is antithetical to this show’s vibe, and I hope it was just some one-off goof for this alternate reality. Listening to the theme song was always a delight, and this was like nails on a chalkboard to me.

0_0

I'm going to have to disagree with you here. Sure, the Imagins aren't super talented singers but I love it anyway. I think there's a strong feeling to hearing them sing the theme so passionately which makes it awesome to me. In the full version, Ryutaros even gets his own rap solo!

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Originally Posted by Koh

(song variations)

Thanks. Will watch.