[Kamen Rider Die]

KAMEN RIDER HIBIKI VOLUME 17 - "TARGETED TOWN"



"Yeah, somebody should tell you to stop
Feel it coming out of my eyeballs
Is it just because you're jealous?
And you, yeah, somebody should tell you why
Crawling out of my skin
Is it just because we're old friends
Or is it because of love?"

-Shout Out Louds, "Time Left For Love"

If you've seen this episode (oh god, I hope you've seen this episode or I'm going to spoil it for you), and you've read any of these episode posts, you're probably going to know exactly what I thought of this episode. I thought the monster stuff was fine, thankfully brief. And I loved the relationship stuff with the force of a thousand exploding suns.

I don't... I cannot imagine doing an episode like this was a huge mark in favor of the current production team. It takes forever to move along its actual superhero action, and what's here is pretty minor. Hibiki is only in costume for one scene of testing out new gear, and he's got one more out-of-costume scene late in the episode. Todoroki, the brand-new Oni who's now in the credits, never Henshins or fights a monster. The one Oni who gets in costume and fights a monster does it all without his toyetic weaponry. It's an episode that feels not just reluctant to do anything with superheroes, but actively resentful. If I was Timothy Toei, Senior Vice-President of Kamen Rider Production (check the Wiki!), I don't know if I'd've let this crew make another twelve episodes.

But Timothy Toei's going to have a tough time firing the team responsible for this episode, because the bulk of it sprung fully-formed directly from my heart.

This is another pitch-perfect episode of One Theme, Three Casts, where the idea of dating and attraction filters through a bunch of different perspectives. It's an episode that lets this funny, gorgeous, charming cast have comedic interludes and romantically-charged conversations. It's an episode that could come off as a respite from the tension of the last couple stories, if it weren't for how huge the emotions are of teenagers.

Akira's finally showing up to school, and things immediately get weird with her, Hitomi, and Asumu. Well, not really Asumu. He is... let's go with Charmingly Oblivious, since the dark cloud hanging over Hitomi is completely unnoticed by him. Akira gets it, though. When Hitomi sees Asumu cheerfully volunteering to copy his notes for the perpetually absent Akira, Hitomi sees an interloper. She sees competition for Asumu's attention and (possibly, eventually) affection. Like, she sees the inevitability of Akirasumu, and she's worried. But Akira isn't really about that kind of relationship yet, so she tells Hitomi that it's not that Asumu has feelings for her, but that Hibiki asked Asumu to keep her up to speed. As soon as Hitomi hears that someone put Asumu up to it, that he doesn't have romantic feelings for Akira, it's a sigh of relief and a hand reached out in friendship.

So, some thoughts on that.

There's a part of me that regrets that we're in a place where two smart, capable women could squander a burgeoning friendship on (and I love him) a doofus like Asumu. I like that Akira instantly tried to defuse things, to befriend Hitomi and keep the drama to a minimum. I'm not thrilled with Hitomi feeling so weirdly jealous and possessive. But! I was so dialed-into this story that I'm okay with characters I like doing things I don't like. I'm unbelievably excited to follow this weird Like-Like Triangle. I am so gratified that this show decided to run with a story so completely isolated from the superhero action that people are ostensibly watching this series for.

Even the actual superheroes are spending most of their time this episode in romantic comedy plots! Todoroki gets some on-boarding (Oni-boarding?) paperwork done (why did this production team ever get replaced), and then gets interrogated by Ichiro about Hinaka's affections. It's still cute, how easily Todoroki flusters. What little confidence he has goes right out the window when Ichiro switches from his Compassionate Boss tone into Judgmental Father. He even does that thing where he gets the Oni's name wrong, to show that he disapproves! (I mean, jokingly. I don't think Ichiro thinks either Ibuki or Todoroki are beneath his daughters, but he's going to have a blast teasing them.) It's a cute little scene.

Hibiki's barely in this one, and what's here is tangentially related to all of the romance in the air. There's an Oh They Definitely Hooked Up vibe to Hibiki and Midori, and not just for the way they bicker like a married couple. There's a sweetness, a softness to their demeanors, when it's them together. They get their work done, but it feels as much like a date as anything else in this episode.

Way more of this episode is handed over to Ibuki and Kasumi, who are basically the slightly-older versions of Asumu and Hitomi. They've known each other forever, they've got a ton of trust built up, and Ibuki can't seem to move things to the next level.

I really liked how they fleshed out their relationship in this one. It's her knowing what he'd like to wear, him deferring to her taste, her wanting him to be Oni Decisive in his everyday life, him trusting her to help raise Akira... it's a really fun thread to the episode. It's something that maybe wasn't 100% necessary (was not asking for a lot of progression on this plot), but I had such a great time going on this dumb date with them. It's relentlessly sweet and doggedly low-stakes. I don't know. I love shit like this. I love two attractive people going on a goofy date in the middle of a series about monsters from mythology roaming the countryside. I love half of a show about superheroes being handed over to a teenage love triangle that is so chaste, your genitals could disappear just from watching it. This... it's such a flex, you know? It's a production team that feels invulnerable. I'm glad they got to make this weird-ass episode, even if it probably cost them their jobs.