[Kamen Rider Die]

KAMEN RIDER BLADE EPISODE 37

This time on Kamen Rider Blade: Kenzaki risks it all to save Hajime! Mutsuki executes the world’s most tense card trade! And Tachibana steals from his employer because Tachibana!



Last time I ignored everything in the episode to talk about one thread that I loved. This time, let’s see how many random things I can address!

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Right away, there’s something where I was like I Don’t Know How I’ll Fit This Into A Larger Discussion, which is almost entirely the reason for this format. Tachibana and Undad are watching footage of Kenzaki powering up into King Form… but the footage they’re watching is from, like, an episode of Kamen Rider Blade. Are they… is this Spaceballs? Are they watching this week’s episode to try and glean clues from it? If not, what camera team do they have at the site of the battle that’s capable of these very quick and accomplished edits? Honestly, it’s a little thing, but it’s so uninterested in anything approaching verisimilitude (for a value of verisimilitude that is appropriate for a crazy man who voluntarily works with Tachibana to defeat monsters from eternity) that I needed to talk about it.

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Also, hey, Undad is here to tell us that Kenzaki’s numbers are going up! FINALLY someone on this show has their head on straight. Sure, Kenzaki has a glorious new suit, and sure, he can now obliterate foes with awe-inspiring displays of force, and sure, Hajime has indicated that this is a fearsome new power Kenzaki wields, and sure, Undad has told us the same… but that was all horsehit and conjecture because WHAT ABOUT HIS NUMBERS, SHOW?! ARE THEY GOING UP?! I need hard data in my superhero program about handsome men who use magical trading cards to do battle with monsters from eternity!

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That Blade/Joker fight is a blast, though. I love that Kenzaki lets loose his most powerful form just so that he can withstand Hajime’s animalistic rage. It’s all defense from Blade, with him just trying to tire Joker out enough to reach the man inside. It’s not the Power vs Power blowout that another show would do, since Kenzaki really doesn’t think Hajime’s gone for good. He wants to give him every chance to come back. That’s such a fun idea.

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Oh, man, how great is that golden-hued flashback Kenzaki has when he’s deciding whether or not to seal Hajime? I like that it’s one mean thing (backhanding Kenzaki), one nice thing (letting Kenzaki care for him?), and then Kenzaki telling Tachibana he’ll put Hajime down if he goes rabid. It, uh, it definitely paints a picture of their “friendship”! The music is very sweet, though, and it sells the weight of Kenzaki’s indecision.

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I just… I find Undad impossibly dull. Every plan is just Here’s A New U.N.D.E.A.D. Every interaction with Tachibana is Tachibana trying to make a case for calm discussion and Undad being detached and horrible. It’s… there’s no way in to Undad, as a viewer. There’s no part of his character that I can relate to or understand. He’s all smooth surfaces, with no purchase. He’s just a void where an antagonist should be, and I don’t find him intriguing or mysterious like I’m probably supposed to. He’s bland, and he’s completely not working for me.

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On the one hand, I really like that it’s Kenzaki who figures out that Hajime just needs more cards to get his shit together. I like when that sort of solution can generate from within the core cast, through discussion and problem-solving. It’s not a given! But, man, an email from Karasuma is maybe not great writing to kick off that discussion. He’s only really giving them info that exists in the story that they weren’t privy to (Kenzaki fusing with 13 Undead is not supposed to be possible, even for very sweet boys), but it’s still so dumb that I did an out-loud Oh Come On when Hirose mentioned it. Karasuma’s narratively-variable usefulness is not something that got better with a new writer!

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I absolutely love how the show pushes the idea of destroying the rampaging monster, the one that could end the world, as moral weakness. Tachibana and Mutsuki are both quick to disregard any plan other than defeating the Joker, while Kenzaki would risk anything to help him. Kenzaki has the strength of his convictions, while Tachibana and Mutsuki resign themselves to cowardice and easy outs. It’s that core concept of the franchise, that empathy is a Kamen Rider’s greatest power, and I’m always a fan of it.

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I give Tachibana a lot shit (deservedly!), but I love seeing him back with Team Blade, even if it’s just a cameo. Kotaro puts his dukes up to defend Kenzaki from him, and Tachibana just very gently pushes them down to say You Are Adorable But I Would Murder You. Hirose passive-aggressively calls him out for his lack of faith in other people, and you can tell her judgment gets to him. But he still tries to make a case for why he’s doing these things, and it becomes sort-of easy to see why he’s not been cancelled by them. Some of it is that he is a disaster, and they’re all pretty used to that by now, but some of it is that he is sort-of desperate to prove himself right in a way that is very, very sad. He’s once again put all of his chips in on just the worst person, and you can see how much he wants to salvage things. Every new bad decision is just him trying to get the old bad decisions to finally pay off. If the Sunk Cost Fallacy were a person, it’d be Tachibana.

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Great conclusion, with Kenzaki giving up his powerful upgrades and Rider Belt to be able to give Hajime a chance at regaining his humanity. I just love that it’s him as a man, going to his friend. We saw the Blade Versus Joker version at the start of the episode, and now we get to Kenzaki Plus Hajime. It’s not conflict, it’s cooperation. Very into that.

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Not as into the new Chalice King Form, though. It’s got a lot of the same problems that Garren’s Jack Form has, where the red/gold/green palette is too much, visually. I like it better than Garren Jack Form, but not as much as Chalice’s base suit or any of Blade’s suits.

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Huh! I think that write-up went okay! Was not sure how it was going to work out (I wrote it as I watched, instead of waiting until afterwards), but I didn’t hate doing it this way.



Next time on Kamen Rider Blade: Mutsuki needs a Queen! Undad is having problems with his body! And Chalice is probably going to have something to say about Garren’s recruitment strategy!