[Kamen Rider Die]

SSSS.GRIDMAN EPISODE 6 - “CONTACT”



I really love how unhurried this show is. Not in a particularly laconic or lazy way, but in how it lets the rhythms of school life dominate its episodic structure. In much the same way Akane resets the world after every episode’s kaiju battle – well, almost every episode’s kaiju battle – these kids go to school, and then they kill time, and then they go home, and then they go to bed, and then the next day everything repeats. That’s the routine, and somehow Battling Kaiju became just another thing that happens daily, like going shopping or riding the train. It’s soothing in its regularity, even when what’s happening is insane and irregular.

Like, for example, a dreamlike visitation from a nameless, eternal (?) kaiju, that serves to fill in some of the many blanks that Yuta’s protagonist inertia was already sort of cluing him in on. While I’d normally roll my eyes at a brand-new character showing up to exposit to our powerfully uncomplicated amnesiac superhero pilot, I can’t say that Music Note (I love that they referenced my favorite Ghost character!) really bothered me too much. For one thing, like I said, this is stuff that Yuta was already starting to get curious about, so the info dump here mostly just sped things up, rather than completely upending our comprehension of the narrative or its possibility space. For another thing, it was just a super fun sequence? It paired nicely, almost musically, with the Anti/Rikka stuff. Every scene rhymed, with a kajiu helping a human better navigate the kaiju world, and a human helping a kaiju better navigate the human world. Everything compressed down into trying to align multiple perspectives into one truth, and so a character opting to guide that process for the viewer felt appropriate.

And while the Yuta/Music Note stuff was surprisingly good, the Anti/Rikka stuff was expectedly good. I would’ve honestly just been fine with an episode of Rikka’s ennui propelling her through a tour of the neighborhood’s least interesting shops – I’m just fascinated by the way this show lets scenes breathe, to build that connection – but running into Anti was definitely the right move for the show. Rikka is once again put into the role of trying to help a weird boy be slightly less of a danger to himself, and she does it without ever losing her agency. She’s not just a caregiver, she’s a girl that is trying to solve a puzzle in a way that satisfies her curiosity while also helping someone else understand themselves better. It’s sort of the exact opposite of the Yuta stuff in this episode, where instead of one person dictating to another, there’s a feeling of connection happening organically. Rikka exists and invites conversation, while Yuta needs to have things explained to him. The way those two options work in alternating scenes – inquisition versus reception – keeps this episode flowing so smoothly.

I don’t know if this is one that worked for other people as well as it did for me? The episode hangs a lantern on it, when Utsumi and Akane talk about how lame episodes without kaiju fights are. (Anti fights Calibur and Max, but that ain’t really a kaiju fight.) Beyond Music Note’s exposition, there isn’t really anything that “happens” in this episode. But for me, this one was perfect. It evokes the repetition of adolescence and then uses that routine to make the impossible and bizarre feel acceptable, which is as heady and exciting of a feeling for me as any giant monster battle. When the kaiju are this interesting, the fights are sort of superfluous.