[Kamen Rider Die]

KAMEN RIDER GHOST EPISODES 43 - 46



I feel like I'm in the home stretch now. Everything feels appropriately apocalyptic. Adel's plan is underway, the Ganmeisers are indefatigable, everyone's working together to stop the end of the world. One of the things I kept thinking about watching these episodes was, "I thought these were supposed to be super awful?"

People kept referring to the last stretch of Ghost as some soul-crushing, miserable slog, and that's just not my experience? It's a little dull, sure. Adel's plan is grandiose but also somewhat benign. It's not "monsters rampage through the street"-apocalypse, like Gaim. It's "everyone dies in their sleep"-apocalypse. I mean, still bad! Still killing everyone in the world! There's no such thing as a nice genocide! But it's a difficult thing to punch into submission, so it's hard to see it as an imminent, horrifying threat. And, Jesus, the Ganmeisers are actually worse than the stumbling shock troops for entertainment value. They're bland machines, and I wish more than anything that the show would stop regenerating them. Even the fights against them suck due to how limited the suit movement is. The villain situation is not nearly as good as the better Kamen Rider series, that's for sure.



But there's still a lot of good in these last few episodes! The "Onari possesses Alain's body" plot is comedy gold. It even enhances Onari's character, allowing him a bit of humanity to express his dissatisfaction with being so massively, massively useless. Mostly, though, it's just a joy to see Onari-as-Alain. Hayato Isomura is a goddamn treasure, and can elevate anything this show gives him. There's a moment where the possessed Alain's in the background, and he's straightening the eyebrows on Onari's body. It's a hysterical gag, and it's just this cute bit of business in the background. If they'd've built this show around Alain's character and Isomura's performance, I don't believe people would be so down on Ghost.

Not that I think the show's treatment of Takeru is some blight or anything. I like Takeru in these last few stories. I really appreciate the way the show decided to make "human connections" both the thing the villain is weaponizing, and the way the hero might achieve victory. It's a solid thematic conclusion to everything Ghost has done right with Takeru's character. I don't know if they'll stick the landing, but I'm not currently seeing the show everyone seems to hate.

I mean, they remembered Cubi and Music Note exist. Hard to hate on that!