[DreadBringer]

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Makura... I don't know, he means well? He's an abrasive doofus, but he genuinely believes that Shotaro's casual attitude and lack of official status is a detriment to law and order.

Being jerk is the approach, regardless of the intentions. These types can have absolute obliviousness to other people's perceptions of them. Nothing they do ever strikes them as out of proportion; they never realize that anything they are doing might ever be considered inappropriate, excessive, and/or cruel; believing they are actually right and others are in the wrong. By genuinely believing in good those can rationalize it or shrug the accusation off.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER W EPISODE 12 - “V FOR VENDETTA - RAGING BEAST”

The failure of the previous episode, as I thought more about it, is that it put way too much of the narrative on Shotaro’s back. Philip was doing his dumb Idiots Don’t Catch Colds research, Akiko was worthless, Kirihiko was barely involved, the other Sonozakis were absent entirely, and there was only one City Of Fuuto scene (which was terrific). The monster plot felt thinly sketched-in, with both victim(s) and perps coming off as ideas rather than characters. That left Shotaro to carry the plot and the story, and it’s just asking way too much of a cosplay detective.

Didn't expect a criticism about Shotaro here, considering that, well, it's W, from my experience (albeit some have different ones like Mesnick) is that, this is one sacred cow series where it's the perfect golden standard for KR shows and people seemingly can't criticize it (except Akiko who is divisive). About the praise for Shotaro's dynamics like with Akiko, I know him or other characters standalone can be different, but for you, of all people Shotaro's the one who you deem as, rather than another main Riders who are sweet boys, who gets more hate from people due to being "cookie cutter". Shotaro gets less criticism for being "standard" compared to others, though he's almost always exclusively talked with Philip as a partner who fills each other's voids. And at the ending, Shotaro catches a cold.... either proving he's not an idiot or that the idiom is wrong.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

And those details are, without exception, incredibly fun. Like, the scene with Saeko and Kirihiko! Where he thinks he’s cracked the code on something that’ll win Saeko’s respect and solidify his place in the family hierarchy (basically, making him more valuable than Mick), and she’s like We Already Found Out That Was Worthless? Amazing. So fun to watch her destroy his ambitions and not-so-subtly remind him of what a disappointment he’s been as a husband/flunky. And that’s just the first thing that was more delightful than most of last episode – we also got a fun Queen/Elizabeth scene (Queen teasing Elizabeth about maybe hooking up with some art creep!), Philip handling the investigation into Sachi’s motivations, a couple fun monster attacks, and a few intriguing twists.

More exposition here in how both Phillip and Kirihiko talks about how the Gaia Memory works by transforming their consciousness from intense rage and hatred, which Kirihiko finds as unique. Kirihiko then tells Saeko that from Nezu's information Sachi wears the Virus Memory before the Blazer hits her, where Virus Dopant left her comatose body and absorbs Kouhei's anger as well to take revenge, and apparently the Blazer the Dopant used was a different one, taken from a junkyard with a repaired body. This is also setup for Kirihiko's plan to develop this data and make up for the disappointments to Saeko, but this type of Dopant has a weakness too, the ones from mental energy will be weaker from transformed body, as Virus Memory should be able to kill entire city population, as opposed to just one at a time.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

If there’s a thing that doesn’t work in this episode, it’s that those twists are maybe a little too convoluted. Sachi being the one who’s motivating this story, through the applied rage of her brother… that’s all fine. (It sort of makes the brother incidental to the overall plot, since he’s not a factor in this episode, and Sachi would’ve just killed those dudes anyway. There’s maybe some narrative value in viewing her vengeance like a virus, but it’s not really a thing that passes through multiple characters. Kouhei wants revenge for his sister getting run over, while Sachi wants revenge for that AND a completely separate thing that Kouhei never knew about.) But there’s a bunch of stuff that comes up in Sachi’s explanation/confession that’s just weird and coincidental – they can show it a hundred times, but it never feels logical or believable that she’d shove the Virus Memory into her arm instead of diving out of the way of an oncoming car. (Also, the Memory seller just happened to walk down the stairs when she saw her fiance cheating on her? What?) I appreciate that the story got significantly more complex than Family Vengeance, but it’s stuff that maybe would’ve worked better spread out across both episodes.

Philip has unseen ability, to contact Sachi's consciousness as its state is altered by Gaia Memory, telling her that Shotaro's trying to save her, and reasoning with her about attacking Yushima. Now Phillip implements something he deems as half-boiled before in Shotaro, claiming that he tries to save Sachi from succumbing to her rage and despair. She gives in to her hatred though and expelling Philip, albeit at first Sachi refrains from taking revenge on Yushima proposing to another woman, but does so after the accident, which Philip claims she's under the control of Gaia Memory. This makes for a good twist that the victim's the one wreaking havoc this time, despite suspicions that she's in coma. I think Kouhei's just natural reaction, but Shotaro gotta know the real source to stop the rampage, about the unrelated stuff Sachi had that Kousei doesn't know about. About the move of trying to talk down someone from revenge, the one doing the talking is often seen as the one in at fault, as the one wanting revenge sees them as pompous (as the talk's often about being the "bigger person", I disagree with that too though) with others supporting them.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

DIE-A MEMORIES

-Not much in the way of future teases or memories in this one, but I did sort of recall that the sister was the Dopant at the beginning of this episode, despite the show pointing in the immediate direction of the art creep.

Yeah he's ruled out by Virus Dopant appearing separately from Yushima and wreaks havoc, which means Yushima's the Dopant's target instead. The one causing problem here is just a scumbag normal human, but yes he does fair share of villainy outside of Dopant fighting as well, like using women for his art, conning people into marrying him, and tossing the girl he's with into the monster to escape.