[DreadBringer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

I mostly meant that teenage girls generally have an inner strength that makes them formidable, to a degree that may be daunting for most superheroes. Sometimes it's used for good, sometimes for evil. I'm just noting their inherent qualities, not ascribing a value to them. I don't think being a Mean Girl is something to emulate! One cutting remark from a snotty teenager can and will stay with you for decades! Decades!

And exactly, the bolded stuff there is me. Obviously it's not something to emulate, plus, "teenage girl having inner strength" to me, seems to trace into gender's society status where females are treated as innocent and male as savage, of which females' bad behavior are excused, forgiven, or blame-shifted into males, giving them more leeway and allowing them to do as they want freely (it's... dirty social tricks they employ! As a form of... power). but bringing that up because, many people in the fandom (on relief, not those on Rider fandom so far), downplays or cuts off morally ambiguous or downright villainous character's bad traits. A common example is if they had bad backstory (which is what Umi has), everything bad they do is excused by "do you know what they're going through?", "they only had bad upbringing, they aren't evil just misunderstood", etc. as if it somehow gives excuse to behave as any way you like.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

I think Umi gets that intellectually, but it's hard for her to accept emotionally. From a detached viewpoint, we know that sometimes tragedies happen. It's sad, but there was nothing anyone could've done to save her family. But, emotionally, it's impossible for her to accept. If her family couldn't be saved, then there's no such thing as heroes, otherwise her family would've been saved. Kenzaki does the smart thing here by not just telling her to grow up, or make her peace with a bad situation. Her tells that, okay, maybe there aren't heroes, so maybe you should be one. It allows her to feel her grief, to treat her sense of loss as valid, while asking her to do something productive with it. It's that early-Blade thematic stuff getting reexamined, and I love it.

Yeah like above, for her being hard to accept emotionally, from it being impossible, it comes from tragedies and it explains how she turned that way, but having a tragic past doesn't make wrong behaviors right. Kenzaki was being humble that his failures haunt him and made him beat himself up by saying there aren't heroes (though he continued with trying to be a hero), which well, as I said before with the heroes being not omnipotent or omnipresent, they can't save everyone, they can't be anywhere at once, but heroes are also more likely to feel guilty over that like Kenzaki did.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

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.

Lol, breaking fourth wall joke?? Who knows if it's just Yoshito and Tachibana actually being one of the audiences, watching Blade together and discussing what happens in the episode they watch! Or it could be Kotaro secretly achieves more than writing in the show, to directing, creating the same Kamen Rider Blade show in-universe for others to watch, and for Yoshito and Tachibana to gain clues! Besides, yeah, the previous footages of anything happened in the past in-universe like Tachibana "kidnapping" Karasuma was recorded from CCTV footage.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

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!

This is something to make an Ultimate Form more compelling story-wise; they had to have drawbacks. A reason to not use it. Otherwise, there was no reason to not use it over their base form, which some Rider series can suffer. It gives the high stakes part to keep things interesting. And when the hero gets access to a powerful new ability that has no drawbacks, the normal form becomes obsolete. It also gives an actual logical reason for the producers to keep the earlier suits around as a way of pimping toy sales.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

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.

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.

Jo has stated it herself though, King is someone on par with Joker, which is shown in the fight that Kenzaki has to use King Form to match him, really cementing Joker as the ultimate Undead, one that threatens the world, and being feared by other Undeads. Though he had no choice to finally use the finisher at the end. Blade King Form's finisher so far, has only been used on Trial Undeads, which completely destroyed them (and them being unable to be sealed). I do wonder what will happen if an Undead is just hit by finisher, but left out and not being sealed, would they eventually wake up like a human being KOed, or their body going limp? Dunno if Joker is probably different one as he's special within an Undead, transforming to other Undeads, and it seems that being defeated reverts him to Hajime form, but Kenzaki did hand out a card, which probably means Joker probably can be sealed that time, thus, with Joker waking up later... Undeads are truly immortal then, they truly cannot die and had to be sealed. Well, there's one-sided friendship, and Kenzaki with Hajime can be that.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

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.

Hmph. "Undad". If only I could talk about this further with your nicknames that it is a spoiler. Kenzaki at this moment had Rider related problems, just like Tachibana up to ep. 15. Kenzaki's approach to him is obviously, gently processing his grief though that is constantly dismissed. While Yoshito's approach is sending monsters after Kenzaki to prevent him becoming a Rider. With both times Tachibana working for BOARD masterminds (Yoshito is part of BOARD still), Isaka at his arc and Yoshito at Kenzaki's arc. And well... Kenzaki at Tachibana's arc can feel relegated in story for you, and your comment regarding Yoshito is like this.... I guess, other solution can be better if Yoshito listens to Tachibana and, if Tachibana has a plan, work on that?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

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!

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.

For Blade yeah, Joker situation at this time is not totally hopeless, so a plausible solution can be found (solution founding is also depending on the writing, other than email, it can't be a total turnover from nowhere that it ends up as an asspull even if internally generated). Mutsuki is corrupted, so Spider Undead would, concludingly, beat other Undead, especially if they're Joker. And finally? The "just kill the threat" approach that most audience find to be the most logical and reasonable approach, something they want heroes to turn brutal like that (turning them into anti-heroes) because of the "just kill the threat" way turning them into more "effective" hero, is portrayed as weakness here? Most audience would label Kenzaki's approach to risk helping someone perceived as a threat as a weakness unfortunately, which just make them hate and bash on traditional hero character types like Rider leads with their compassion (which they read as weakness), but it can be unfair as, actually, this choice of "kill or let the bad guys go" creates dramatic tension, which makes the story/show interesting thought-provoking to read or watch. Audiences are left thinking "if I am the hero, should I kill or risk letting the bad guys escape?" Good stories make you think and ponder over such questions. Also, in some stories, it often requires clever, tactical and/or skilled application of those powers to make a non-lethal stopping possible. It's indeed hard to argue against "sparing bad guys when bad guys has 0.001% chance of repentance, and after being spared they will cause even more destruction".

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

I give Tachibana a lot shit (deservedly!), but I love seeing him back with Team Blade, even if it’s just a cameo.

Oof, some traces of Tachibana's self pre-episode 15 is resurfacing, him just dead set declaring about killing Joker and Kenzaki being foolish. Him being tactless to just drink Kotaro's milk. With Hirose on Kenzaki's side of not killing Joker, I wonder what Kotaro (who hates him, and also chastises Kenzaki for caring too much for him) thought to Hirose regarding that. And him trying to prove himself right in a very sad way... that by default isn't genuine, and can negate anything good about that action, as it's egocentric.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

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.

Yeah... Blade and Garren's mid season upgrade are named Jack Forms... but for Chalice... in a subversion, not named the same way. As already mentioned above, it's Wild Chalice. Other than that, it fits Hajime figuratively too, Hajime is a Wild Card character. Aside from nobody knowing his motives at the beginning of the series and switching on and off between being a normal hero/anti-hero, he's the Joker Undead (which is the card usually called the wild card).