[MarsHottentot]

I Loved this episode. For one thing they explained the Christmas shenanigans with a throwaway line that, in today's gaming, actually makes sense. For another, Brave, once again, was totally confused by all of the seasonal baloney - pretty much just standing there with his mouth open. That they returned to this joke actually worked, given the context. Speaking of jokes, Poppy is clearly the in-show troll, the writers acknowledge this during her admittance of being a bugster and everyone being "No shit, Sherlock". Man, did she reach critical obnoxious during the "Pipo All the Way (Straight to Hell Mix)" part of the first half.

Third - I liked the cruel tone shift. It's so Rider to have a big bummer moment; for Ex-Aid, a seemingly bright and shiny show (bolstered by that X-Mas segment) to do it and on X-Mas... brutal! I'm thinking that maybe Toei expected that Kiriya / Lazer would be a loathed character - his forms have been less than loved, he was a liar and stubborn - they might have expected this to be an X-Mas present? Ah, but Onozuka-san just did such a great job with his portrayal of Kiriya that just didn't happen!

I hate zombies (I suffer from AZBS) but, damn, I LOVE Dangerous Zombie Genm - what a great design / Henshin sequence / bugster control. So cool!

Okay, so am I the only one slightly disturbed by the idea that Ex-Aid may be riding around on something amounting to Lazer's corpse? Are they going to make Junior Genius Gamer N (Secret Sister) Nico Lazerette? If so, that's going to be even more awkward than before! Still, we need more Lady Bikers, so I'm all for it.

Also, Snipe needs some serious CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT (as vinish13 would say), I'm pretty sick of his one note ass.

Finally, again, I love Episode 12 for hooking in my niece in; we didn't really need another bonding activity - but she knew my obsession, it's nice that she now shares it.