[DreadBringer]

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER FOURZE EPISODE 40 - “OF VALUES AND PASSION”

It’s something I’m sure we’ll be talking more about soon, but I liked how it all ended up getting revealed, and I like that the show chose this specific episode in which to reveal it. We’re in a story about guilt, and love, and bad choices made in the aftermath of tragedy, and how dreams can get warped into something more nefarious when left to curdle, so that is exactly when you do a little subplot revealing that the generous and kind scientist is actually a Horoscope who may or may not be working to enact Gamou’s villainous schemes. Perfect place for it!

Secret reveals always have the character use different gender voice to hide their real identity, in how Virgo has female voice when it's used by an old male scientist. I still wonder what may happen if Tomoko, by the power of KRC, was able to give Emoto the actual moon rock she found. After all, KRC was what opened Tomoko's eyes by giving her the means to go leaving the Earth, ending up on the moon. But obviously, as someone involved with the founding members of the KRC and Amanogawa, Emoto would be more familiar with the moon already than Tomoko as just a pale successor of Rokuro's legacy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Like, in nearly any other episode, “Meteor duels a Horoscope in golf to free the enslaved souls of Amanogawa High” would be the climax of the story, because it’s BY FAR the most memorable and iconic thing to happen here. It’s Meteor! Playing golf for the first time! To defeat a bull-themed fascist! And he wins by using his power-up’s cartoony finisher!!! Instead, this episode drops it in the middle, where Taurus refuses to accept his defeat, and the episode just rolls on to a histrionic climax that’s more about Virgo's warnings than anything else. I can sort of see the episode trying to tie together its various threads this way, turning each resolution into a new problem, but the result just makes each preceding element seem like it was a distraction from the current one; the golf thing didn’t matter, then the Taurus thing didn’t matter, now here’s Virgo.

This seems to be similar to Ryusei beating Kijima's challenge back then, where he made Kijima laugh by his futile attempts to fight him without powers. I rather feel that by this, it's better to just make Meteor lose the golf (albeit it's quite good use of KR powers to use Meteor Storm's ricochet ability to get the ball to sink), if the main aim is to give mind-controlled Meteor as a threat (if there'd be Fourze vs Meteor again). Though I also feel it's jarring for Miu to talk about Ryusei's practice last night while he's playing golf as Meteor, it may expose Ryusei's identity, the KRC should keep Ryusei's secret. And Meteor himself also refers to Fourze as Gentaro later in their fight with Virgo.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

It didn’t help that the Sugiura/Sayaka stuff just never clicked with me. It’s, again, I can sort of see where it works: Sayaka’s hurt by Sugiura’s overly-permissive take on school governance, and he lets the Zodairt Switch’s cosmic power warp him into a malevolent view of safety through obedience and control, which is the natural enemy of the KRC’s more individualistic ethos. That’s a natural story to tell – safety through control versus happiness through freedom, and the balance to be found within them. But what we get over these two episodes is way too absurd to find much emotional weight: Sugiura’s cosmic breakdancing, Sayaka’s nightmare hospital (???), and the general This Is Over The Top tone to every nominally dramatic flashback scene. It’s a whole bunch of choices that didn’t work for me, in service of a story that wanted to do way too much, without much sense of how to best arrange its pieces.

I feel about Sugiura against Sayaka, it's a proof about how a just society must hold its enforcers to the same—or higher—standards than everyone else to prevent corruption and maintain legitimacy, as enforcers aren't above biases or having superior judgment where Sugiura is unable to punish the one person he's in love with, when Sayaka acts like the delinquent that goes against what Sugiura stands for. Showing that system stability depends on accountability, questioning authority, and evaluating the legitimacy of the rule, not just the breaking of it or ostracizing any rule breakers as different outsiders who deserves to be mistreated; Sugiura is being pretentious, and his confrontation with Sayaka exposes that. It's a good use though for Sugiura to try to use his Zodiarts power to fight Virgo when he realizes the error of his ways, guess the first time a Zodiart actually tries to beat up the bad guy; where Motoyama was the first Zodiart to accept Gentaro's friendship while being in Zodiart form.

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Originally Posted by Sh Ranger

Not having enough staff can also be a problem though, like for example, a single writer suffering burnout at a critical point in the work. Inoue claims he's immune to this, but there are many who aren't. Generally, I think it's important that the staff are a good match for each other and to keep a limit on how many are involved at once. Too many cooks spoil the broth, after all. Personally, I think Gotchard is a great recent example of various writers Gotcha-N-Going together in a successful way. Maybe we should consider what Fish mentioned in the Rider watch thread as well, which suggests that Nakamura was okay with Sanjo making Yuki a little insane and then it escalated.

I guess I understand how do you advocate for multiple staff like in writing (other than for instance, Inoue), as it's not only Gotchard, but you're a fan of all the other shows that are viewed similarly to it, like Wizard, Ghost, and Saber. I guess, it may be still subjective regarding if multiple writers will improve or worsen a series, based on which series one likes or not. I can feel, and it seems to also relate to my work (where many may suggest to just take the easy but goes against my point approach to solve a problem), about how an original creator is the only one who approached the work, the world, and/or the characters using a particular execution or tone that isn't replicated by later creators. I dunno if this is positive or negative speaking of Nakamura being ok with Sanjo's take about Yuki when it escalated later, where I'm strongly against a character being made uncharacteristically rude or unlikable (as you noted in her response to Erin), which can happen to create comedy, which you may agree as Inoue fan, but against those who didn't have good opinion of a character/series (not talking about Yuki here only, this happens in many instance), it may make one feel like how you feel to the hero characters who rub you the wrong way.