[Kurona]

I was hoping this show would pull a Blade where the final episode is so extremely shockingly emotionally hitting that it would recontextualise the show for me in a way that made me love it, but... ultimately, I've unfortunately come away from this show not a fan.

Not that Saber's a bad show or anything -- putting aside the non-existence of objective quality, I think while there are definite issues I had with the series (the early toypocalypse, about a thousand vaguely-defined plot elements that made the story hard to follow at times, the shindais and luna being really creepy), it's stuff that I think wouldn't have stopped me from loving the show if at the core of the story was something I felt attached to. Unfortunately that just never was the case for me -- I tried to stop posting about this show at some point because I had very little to say with how disconnected I was with it. I think especially with last show and the spate of a lot of bad TTFC specials, Kamen Rider's recent direction has been in a very bad place for me and that made me unfairly judge Saber at a lot of points; and when it's a show you're not into, it really doesn't help that you're tuning into it every week for a year. That's probably going to make it frustrating for you at some point! But ultimately it seems a fine show! I might just give it a rewatch one of these days to try and see what other people saw in it; because clearly there was something here that was resonating with a bunch of people, something that was really hitting a lot of different people from all corners of the fandom. I definitely saw a lot of genuine emotion go into the series as well from all its creative staff, it's just...

...

Honestly? I'm just not used to this. I'm very not used to a Kamen Rider series sitting very staunchly in the "not for me" category. Usually I love or like I enjoy it; or I'm able to find at least one element in it I adore and latch onto; or on the opposite end of the scale it's something I have major issues with that make me really dislike it, or even if the show isn't hitting for me I've been able to step back and see what it was doing and be interested in that. But Saber didn't have any of that for me? There were some characters I liked initially but that didn't go in directions I was interested in, and most other stuff wasn't doing much for me. I'm just not used to this! I'm not used to saying "that wasn't for me" and leaving it at that for a Kamen Rider show!

Saber just didn't do anything for me, unfortunately. And I'm very happy for the people that it did do something for, a LOT for given the reactions I'm seeing; and maybe I'll join them one day, but ultimately after one last rodeo next week I'm ready to dive into something new with Revice. Very happy for everything it pulled off and for the people it worked for; it looks like you got a great finale here!