[Kamen Rider Die]

SSSS.GRIDMAN EPISODE 8 - “CONFRONTATION”



I think Rikka and I would watch toku the same way.

(Rikka, of course, very much does not watch toku, as established in Episode 7 as a hilarious rebuttal to the gender equality shown in the Akane/Utsumi scene of Episode 6. Rikka is not looking to understand the intricacies and tropes of tokusatsu!)

In an episode that foregrounds a ticking clock threat from Akane – a powered-up version of an old foe, just get things kicking off in the correct motif – Rikka is the one who doesn’t want to treat the situation by boring, staid genre convention. Where Akane says We’re Gonna Fight, and Utsumi immediately comes back with We’re Gonna Fight, Rikka instead looks outside that incurious adherence to conflict and both opts out of it and interrogates it. It’s a clever subversion of the story’s inherent tension, pushing off the clear threat in favor of something that treats things as – appropriately – smaller, and more in need of connection.

The reveal that Rikka is as much a construct as everyone and everything in the city is a good one, mostly for how it instantly unmoors Rikka’s belief in conflict as an avoidable consequence of overexcited toku fans, Utsumi and Akane both. Akane flat out tells Rikka that her own sense of hope in Akane is a byproduct of Akane’s need for the world to love her. (Super telling that Akane created a friend who completely ignores her; Akane wants to be loved, but not be noticed or bothered by that love.) Where Rika once had a certainty that the Gridman Alliance wasn’t something she was a part of, and therefore wasn’t bound to their particular sense of Giant Robot Justice, an inability to trust her own feelings towards Akane means that she can’t go it alone when it comes to solving this problem. She’s going to have to work with the group.

(I actually like how Rikka doesn’t, like, do anything in the days leading up to the school festival. While Utsumi is like WE GOTTA FIGHT, even Yuta tries to appeal to Akane’s purely theoretical humanity first, and then eventually devise a strategy to prevent Akane’s attack from harming any of their friends. Rikka just sort of… hopes Akane won’t do it? I guess? For some reason? She briefly tries to talk to Akane on the bus, but it's not like she goes out of her way to do it. Rikka’s strategy is sort of nowhere this episode, but in a way that speaks to her innate belief in all of her friends, even the ones that just said they wanted to destroy the school and everyone in it. It’s an abdication of defense because of a rejection of the necessity of conflict. Still, I think her even bringing up the possibility of deescalation gets Yuta and Utsumi to talk to Akane, which I will count as Rikka’s positive influence on the story!)

Teamwork! It’s very much what this episode is about, and a good team allows for everyone’s viewpoint to have equal validity. Utsumi’s embrace of action needs to be tempered by Rikka’s reluctance to fight; Calibur needs to consider how Yuta would treat Anti; Yuta needs to think smaller, while addressing Utsumi’s plan to think bigger – the whole episode is a collaboration between what everyone thinks is right, and that’s as good a way as any to introduce Full Powered Gridman.

Hey, it’s Episode Goddamn Eight, lemme take a minute to talk about some of the hero forms. I love how toyetic they are? Everything that attaches to Gridman is in the style of an action figure accessory, for better or worse. (I think I remember hearing that some of the Gridman toys were janky garbage, due to their gimmicks?) Beyond the usual toku delights of something becoming more powered – full powered, even! – I like how a giant robot combination gets more elaborate and consequential as the power levels rise. We have to get three different transformations (Calibur’s just, like, a sword) and then the combination sequence, with all of its bells and whistles. The length of that sequence is like the roller coaster going up the hill at the beginning of the ride, and then it takes off like a rocket as the full (powered) form kicks tons of ass and then even turns gold for its finisher. It’s gaudy, in the best way, and it speaks to how well this show has integrated its teen drama with its giant robot action that I wanted this thing to happen as a reward for Rikka fighting for her independent view while still hearing other people out. It’s teamwork as a way of bringing out the best in everyone, rather than subsuming everything into one set of default actions. And, yeah, that’s golden.