[DreadBringer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

This was a messy one! It’s not a bad one, though. I really enjoyed it, probably in ways/levels that I wasn’t supposed to, but it’s pretty much just an overflowing bag of an episode. There’s a loose Takumi/Mari runner, a check-in with Yuuji and Live Action Hatsune Miku, an underground school that was abandoned in 1995, the hilarious suffering of Yuka, and Keitaro, the world’s most impossibly dedicated dry cleaner. All that plus Faiz playing around with his cellphone to figure out how to shoot monsters with it, an unbelievably irritating high-pitched whine of an Exceed Charge, and god knows what else I already forgot. It was a lot! This one was a lot!

After Supra in Ryuki, here comes NSX (facelifted)!


Also even if it doesn't really get you, how the f*** would you equalize Keitaro's suffering with Yuka's?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

That Mari/Takumi runner, though, it keeps this thing on whatever rails it manages to stay on.

The 30cm less than Too Far Away part, again that reminds me of most of the (bratty teenage) girls I met IRL (it's started by don't get too close thing after all), and just like Takumi, it's a potential turn-off material to me (And even to Takumi... he wants to get off her BS. Also I only refer to this particular moment not to her overall, like particular moment of Takumi wanting to run away. Tbf she tried to give thanks a bit here, and helped Keitaro). Also the part where her wrist gets injured for real.... that hilarously reminds me of Ryuki's penchant for irony (particularly, Goro's Zolda sthick), but this time it's just an injury rather than actual death.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

The Yuka stuff was also incredibly funny, and I’m 99% sure that’s not supposed to be my takeaway. Yuka’s pining for Keitaro, a very sweet boy who wants to make everyone smile and will probably kill himself if you don’t get the clothes you needed laundered.

Like Yuji, I feel that, this moment, isn't really to get sympathy, but to show how horrible people in this world of Inoue's creation, that the real monsters are... humans. And obviously to get another fighter to join in (the end part at her "death", iirc, Death by Despair exists). Also people have said that Faiz is Kamen Rider Soap Opera, and Yuka's story is really reminiscent of it (especially, the place I live, where that kind is rampant on TV). A dysfunctional family where there's heavy favoring to the other sibling and ignore/abuse the other one (typically the main character), also typically that kind of abuse happens when you're a step child of that family (I read some sources where it says that Michiko is Yuka's half-sister) to the point where at one point, a family stated to me long ago that stepparents are always evil, also the excessive showing of bullying, and the emphasis of sulking about it (and many inner thoughts monologue). A̶l̶s̶o̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶K̶a̶n̶z̶a̶k̶i̶ ̶s̶i̶b̶l̶i̶n̶g̶s̶ ̶g̶e̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶b̶u̶l̶l̶y̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶p̶a̶r̶t̶ ̶a̶s̶ ̶w̶e̶l̶l̶.̶

For Keitaro, there's already side characters, not leads, that's given The Kamen Rider Theme before, like Minori in Kuuga. T̶e̶c̶h̶n̶i̶c̶a̶l̶l̶y̶ ̶h̶e̶ ̶c̶a̶n̶ ̶m̶a̶k̶e̶ ̶h̶i̶m̶s̶e̶l̶f̶ ̶f̶u̶l̶l̶y̶ ̶K̶a̶m̶e̶n̶ ̶R̶i̶d̶e̶r̶ ̶o̶t̶h̶e̶r̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶n̶ ̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶i̶d̶e̶a̶l̶s̶,̶ ̶j̶u̶s̶t̶ ̶g̶e̶t̶ ̶a̶ ̶b̶i̶k̶e̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶c̶o̶v̶e̶r̶ ̶y̶o̶u̶r̶s̶e̶l̶f̶ ̶w̶i̶t̶h̶ ̶a̶ ̶m̶a̶s̶k̶. His suffering is nowhere near as close to get his van damaged, one of his clothes getting squashed by a car, and getting into fight with Takumi (that tears his cloth), it's probably just a bad day compared to above.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

And the final fight with the Orphnoch was great, if only for Faiz just punching in things on his phone while he lounged against a rock, taking the time in the middle of his third-ever fight to be like Hey I Wonder What This Button Does.

Takumi now just fights by himself and instantly mastered Faiz Gear.... and the second finisher, Grand Impact appears. Unfortunately it's nowhere near close as cool as his Crimson Smash to me, where it's just usual powered punch. Oh I also forget to mention this before (all the finishers have this), I think the part where Faiz' symbol appears in the defeated monster before it explodes, I also like it despite it being simple, because it's so fitting that, as the monster no longer exists, it's crossed out (Faiz' phi symbol is like a crossed sign).