[Fish Sandwich]

This is a real interesting show. I mean, the pacing is still absolutely insane, and I'm sure that, among other things, is still going to be turning a lot of people off; but it's stopped bothering me so much because I feel like it's at least delivering on enough extra story to match that extra speed.

This one episode is juggling a ton of plotlines, and even though I can't tell you how well they all mesh together or if they all "need" to be here, I know for sure I'm invested in every last one. Rintarou's got a new grudge against a monster that adds new dimension to his character, and that's great! Ren is now joining the fray with a lust for battle so unheroic the character he most gets along with is one of the villains, and that's great! Touma's got to team up with Daishinji research the ancient secrets of ultimate power to regain his Rider abilities, and that's great! Kento is doing the regular monster of the week thing because everyone else is too busy, and you know, that's pretty great too. Good on him for taking charge like that.

...Okay, so it's not like every second of the episode was some amazing thing, but my point is that there's a lot in this episode that works super well, and despite how quickly all these concepts are introduced and developed, they aren't coming off underbaked, in my opinion.

Saber as a show is making pretty effective use of the time it has to give things juuuust enough space to breathe, if not much more. I think a perfect example of this is how they establish Daishinji's social awkwardness with him covering his face and whatnot during the conversation between Touma and Ren, which is then payed off later in the sequence where he keeps robotically looking over towards the way to the forbidden books he's trying to pretend don't exist. Which was definitely one of the funniest Rider moments in recent memory, by the way.

Again, it's not using the space perfectly -- Mei is so barely here this week it'd actually be less weird if she wasn't here at all -- but... yeah, I don't even know. I just really like Saber so far! It puts a smile on my face every week and always leaves me excited for the next episode. It's not something I can quantify objectively, but that's how it is.