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Originally Posted by Matrixbeast

I've yet to see Hibiki, but what happens after the midseries change, anyway? What does the new staff do to make it go downhill?

It basically just turns into Kamen Rider Generic. Real Hibiki was an incredibly original show with a very unique aesthetic and tone. A lot of it took place up in the mountains and forests and featured Hibiki and the other Oni fighting creatures that could almost pass for realistic monsters (in design, if not execution). A lot of the focus was on interpersonal relationships, though, especially Asumu learning to become a more confident and self-assured adult by exposure to the various Oni.

Then episode 30 happens and Hibiki is fighting a weasel monster with a wheel motif in one of the ten Toei stock locations while Kiriya comes in and starts creating the exact same interpersonal drama that dominated Faiz. It's honestly not objectively bad (outside of the incredibly misogynistic Shuki arc), but so much of what made the show unique was lost in order to make it more like the other, more profitable shows. And yeah, ultimately the show did become more recognizably Kamen Rider at that point, but it did so at the expense of being Hibiki.