[Fish Sandwich]

I'm struggling to think of a way to start this post that isn't just like, the transcribed sound of me swooning over this show.

Uh, there's a new director, I guess! Hiroki Kashiwagi, apparently? One of the usual guys who spent years and years as an assistant director with Toei before getting some bigger opportunities. He directed at least a couple episodes of Ryusoulger prior to this, but I believe 36/37 of Saber are his first director credits for Kamen Rider. I don't really have much to say about the direction this time, beyond it seeming totally competent, but you know, trivia is fun, right?

Okay, now that I calmed myself down a bit with mundane facts, I think I can give this a better shot.

I think the overall reason I was so impressed by this episode was because it had meaningful moments for a massive percentage of this massive cast, and I found all of it natural and easy to follow. It's another occasion where I look back to the overstuffed early episodes of this show and feel like the current stretch succeeds because of those choices, rather than in spite of them, with how readily this show can now play off of all these well established characters.

It's in things as minor as Ogami and Daishinji being super giddy about having their swords back. It's how there's that space for Sophia and the swordsmen to reaffirm their mutual trust. It's that Touma is the one sincerely thanking everybody in that emotional moment, which is just about the most Touma possible thing to do. It's when Ren realizes like 30 episodes down the line that Kento knew exactly what he was talking about when it came to Touma this whole time.

And then it's also in more major things, like Kento's ongoing crisis of faith, and how Yuri is the one to go talk to him this time. It's a great example of what I'm talking about, because the show doesn't have to do any real work to find an angle for these two. Their brief but effective chat is merely an extension of something that's long been implied about Yuri -- that he knows all of this already -- combined with his even more established belief in Touma, all working together with the recent parallel the show drew between his giving up on Bacht in the past with Kento's current refusal to put his trust in Touma. Like, I'm sure I'm overselling it when I try to pick the writing apart piece by piece this way, but there are so many moving parts in this episode, and they're all moving so smoothly,

It's much the same deal with the Shindai siblings, who have a very quick but logical turn away from Master Logos here that I found myself surprisingly engaged by. I think there's a bit of a disparity between how much more depth Reika has had time to be given versus Ryouga, and yet the one thing I knew for sure about the guy -- that he is excessively prideful -- clearly plays a huge factor in the specific way he switches sides. I adore that little moment where Touma calls him out for being so petty as to refuse help fighting Solomon, and he thinks about it for a hot second, and then just plainly agrees that a team-up is the best way to protect the world. Ryouga's character is pretty much paper thin, and yet, even here, you can see the show making good use of the values it's established for everyone. Reika is obviously great, and both Durandal and Sabela are cool, so it's good to see them get such a nice spotlight here.

Their fight scene with Solomon is also extremely impressive for how it shows them making clever use of their tricky gimmicks to support each other while also further showing that Durandal and Sabela rely way too much on their tricky gimmicks. They manage to look cool while losing, which is way more than I can hope for when the newest evil Rider strolls into town to show off their new toys. Very satisfying to see, and that goes twice as much for when Saber and Blades join the action. I mean, it just makes sense as a line-up, you know? It's like two sets of red and blue Riders, and we got to see Elemental and Hyoujuu Senki standing next to each other fairly quickly. That's more than Dragonic and King Lion were able to get!

Oh, and I should probably talk about Solomon himself, shouldn't I? I unironically think that kitbash suit works great! I'll say that much upfront. Kasshiin was a weirdly cool design for such a minor role in Zi-O to begin with, so if anything, Solomon feels like that suit's true calling being finally realized to me. It all comes together pretty nicely as a straightforward big bad Rider. That's a type of character I'm liable to get sick of easily, which is always worrying, but I am liking the idea of Master Logos basically being an angsty teen rebelling against his family because he hates all these like, rules and stuff, man. It's mostly a question of where the show wants to end up taking that all thematically, and how many fight scenes in a row are going to be against the same one dude over and over again. Saber has some other villains still kicking around, fortunately, so I have a good feeling about that last point, at least.