[Kamen Rider Die]

KAMEN RIDER BUILD EPISODES 26 - 28



This is a step in the right direction. It's an episode that's building to a big story element, (another) proxy battle between Kamen Riders with nations at stake, but also making sure the individual characters aren't lost within the conflict.

Since this is the middle chunk, a lot of the character development is spread amongst the supporting characters, with Sento in full-on Rider Science mode. That leaves Banjou and Grease to piss each other off, bond over the catharsis of battle, and cheer each other to victory. It's a fine line, drawing them closer as friends and teammates while still keeping them unique and slightly antagonistic. The show does a good job of it, though. The "who is the traitor" scene between the two of them is hilarious, hearkening back to the goofiness of the first chunk. Really, there's a lot of what I liked in the first chunk here: an emphasis on small groups bouncing off of each other, meta humor leavening the exposition, and a little bit of investigation to uncover the traitor.

Which is Sawa. Sawa is the traitor. Again! She faked them out twice. I wish the show had integrated her a little more, which would have both concealed her involvement better and made her betrayal (or "betrayal", who can tell with her anymore) hit a little harder. As it is, the show would frequently forget about her for episodes at a time, pulling her back in when there was a plot reason for her to appear. So, yeah, when they're like Who Planted This Bug and it cuts to Sawa being back on the show, no points for guessing she's the traitor. I guess it's not a big deal, her reveal. She's a clear suspect, the show doesn't really drag it out, and it's not like suspicion is tearing the team apart. Everyone else is really clicking as a team, leading to a rousing, emotional victory for Grease over Engine Bro.

Grease's post-invasion motivation is something I've had trouble seeing, and I'm glad the show took a moment to elaborate on why he's fighting, what the Crows meant to him, all of that. It makes the fight personal, which is awesome, but it helps explore where Grease's attitude and perspective fit into the team. Good use of a fight to deepen a character.

Yeah, pretty good episode!



I'm really digging this tournament story. Build is back on track for me.

I thought this was going to be an episode fully devoted to Banjou, to give a clear idea of what he's fighting for as Cross-Z, but that ends up being only half the episode. It's a good half, though, with some interesting twists. Sento is a Rider who fights for everyone, Grease is a Rider who fights for his people, but Banjou is a Rider who only fights for himself and his friends. His motivation in this tournament is to end the war before Sento has to fight. He doesn't care that much about the horrors of war, or about who has Pandora's Box, or any of that. Sento's his friend, he blames himself for the war, so Banjou's going to end the war for him. It's straightforward and true to Banjou's character. So of course the show has to throw an obstacle at him that makes him question that straightforward goal. I really really loved that the Hell Bros fake him out the way they did, appealing to the guilt he'd feel ending one life to help his friend. It looked like the show was going to grow Banjou, widen his perspective, but nope! The Hell Bros were lying, it was bullshit, don't never trust nobody. Interesting lesson for a character to learn!

The rest of the episode was the Build/Rogue fight, and the debut of RabbitRabbit. (Beautiful suit, love the little wing cape and the symmetrical bunny ear eyes.) Rogue comes in with the by-now standard This Is All Your Fault guilt attack, which gets a full-throated assertion by Sento that he's not going to feel guilt about what Takumi did any longer. I hope that's true! It was a cool idea, but the show's really worn it out. I'm ready for a less guilt-ridden Sento to emerge from these war arcs. Time will tell, I suppose!



God, yes. This is the show I've been missing. After the post-Hokuto War episodes left me feeling like the show didn't know where to go next, these three episodes just did the work and stuck the landing. Maybe they didn't reach the emotional heights of 21 and 22, but there's a great synergy of character-focused emotional storytelling, long-term plot machinations, and clever individual episode plotting.

Like, the tournament structure is awesome for providing character-driven fights that center one character's story while progressing the entire show's storyline. We've seen Banjou, Sento, and Grease get their moments in the previous two episodes, and in the finale we get a bit more with Sento, plus Rogue and, uh... Sawa?

Yeah, Sawa. So, I've got this friend. They're fun to hang out with, and they're a caring person. You also cannot believe a single thing they tell you. Everything, even the most innocuous thing, is in doubt. But, yeah, they're fun to hang out with as long as you remember that they're probably lying to you. That's where I'm at with Sawa. The show's probably told me everything there is to know about Sawa, and she's probably legitimately regretful over her actions against Team Build, but we've been here too many times for me to believe it. Instead, I'm just going to go with it. Maybe she's repented, maybe it's another ruse, I'm good either way.

The Sawa stuff was good, though. I like that, even in the midst of an epic struggle between Rogue and Build, the show found a space to tell a story about someone who got so caught up in the fake feelings she had for Team Build that they became real. That peace and love actually worked. It's sweet, and it's sweet that Team Build (especially Misora) is able to let Sawa know how she hurt them, but clearly want to forgive her and move on. It's nice to not have some bullshit hand-wringy But Can I Ever Trust You Again thing. That's boring, and Sawa's great, so let's all just move on and have fun.

Speaking of having fun: that goddamn Rogue/Build fight! Epic! TankTank is awesome, Rogue's counterattacks are cleverly portrayed, the sleight-of-hand of showing Seito RabbitRabbit so they won't expect TankTank is a great strategy, it's all excellent. Loved the fight, loved it more as the conclusion of tournament storyline. Especially, especially, the use of on-set projections to visualize Rogue's mental state and emotional journey. I wasn't expecting the story to slow down a bit for him to get a word in, but I'm incredibly glad he did. What could have been a simple Hero's Declaration-type finale for Sento to triumph over Rogue instead gets a bit of subtlety, where Rogue's view of "one person should have the power to protect everyone" is set in opposition to Sento's "one person should protect everyone's power" view. It's more shading than is strictly necessary, especially when the loser is going to get blasted in the face by a tank, but it's (as always) to the show's credit that it's willing to do the extra work.

Looking at the episode count, and feeling the wave of relief coming off of the cast at the end of this story, I think we've reached the end of the second act and the middle of the series. The second act, from 15 or 16 to 28, had some incredible highs and a few bum notes, but it ended really well. I don't know if I'm going to say I'll miss these war stories, assuming they're over. It's an interesting genre to play in, for a little while, but it ends up taking the series away from the lighter tones where I find it most effective. I'm really hopeful that the tone recalibrates for the next act.