[Fish Sandwich]

I freakin' love the Specter movie sooo much. The amount of guts it had to try and tie together so many of Ghost's sloppier bits into something more worthwhile is commendable, and while the end result still isn't entirely airtight, it really feels like a present for everyone who stuck with Ghost to the bitter end. Just look at how they handled Takeru in it. Everybody else gets their wish granted because it's a story where Alain and Makoto are firmly the main characters, and yet I still get to be happy too because he made sure to do some speechifying in what little screentime he has. It's the definition of a win-win scenario.

And that climax is honestly one of the single most hype moments I've ever seen in Kamen Rider. Especially that Rider Kick. I still vividly remember my mind being totally blown watching it for the first time and realizing after a second or two the significance of the fireworks that were suddenly going off behind Specter. It's this absolutely perfectly timed moment where the literal plot bleeds into the visual symbolism in a way that's just... I mean, wow is it good.

It definitely helps that the movie was directed by Kazuya Kamihoriuchi. He massively elevates anything he works on when it comes to cinematography. He directed a handful of extremely memorable episodes of Build too (as well as both Heisei Generations Final and the summer movie), so look forward to that.

And thank you for making this thread, by the way. I'm not gonna lie, my initial reaction to seeing it was "oh f***, here we go again", so it was a pleasant surprise to see you consistently giving the show such a fair shake and really approaching it on its own terms rather than simply dismissing everything you didn't like about it without a further thought. This is easily some of the most level-headed analysis of this show I've seen, and it was cool to see how unique your particular perspective was. I've certainly never seen someone say Ghost is at its best in the back half before. Even I tend to agree the show was strongest around either side of the middle, so it was something of a shock to see you having so much fun with some of those later episodes.