[Fish Sandwich]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER KABUTO - EPISODE 37

I vividly remember this fence.

Like, I don't know how true this is for other people, but the weirdest things get lodged in my long-term memory sometimes. Little associations that become inextricably linked with some feeling or event. I have a special fondness for the Liar Dopant episodes of Double because I can still smell the pleasant summer breeze coming in through the window I had open when I was originally watching them. That sort of thing – where you're not even sure what you remember happened that way (was it even those episodes?), but you remember it all the same.

The thing I associate this fence with is how entirely checked out I was on Kabuto in its later stages. I think I let these two episodes dominate a lot of my memory of the show in the long run, which is hopefully a huge mistake on my part, because this specific episode honestly was exactly how I remembered it, and that's not exactly a good thing.

First off, I mean, it was honestly sort of validating to find out how important that fence is. That school rooftop setting sees a ton of use in this first part alone, and since these are Nagaishi episodes, you'd better believe he's in love with prominently displaying that fence to stress it as the unique defining feature of that location. The other positive thing I remember about this episode is Tsurugi being the only character I even remotely care about, and that held just as true. He is beyond cute, and his puppy-like enthusiasm is impossible not to respond to in kind. This episode bores me, by and large, but not when he's on-screen. Never when he's on-screen.

Beyond that, though, there's a very generic, pretty low-stakes monster mystery plot that, honestly, I don't hate as a concept. As a huge fan of both Ghost and Wizard, I'm actually quite into the idea of a Rider show that can still make the time to do some fun weekly adventure stuff late into the run. It's nice to have some room to breathe, at least occasionally. One of my favorite bits in here is even just the classic Tendou/Juka scene at the start; a comforting return to the status quo after Kageyama and Renge were tearing that house up earlier. But like Die says, the emotional substance here is a little sparse, and as I'm about to say, everything surrounding it is full of things I remember not liking about this stretch of Kabuto.

I mean, while I don't want to bang on about this forever (I mean, I definitely do, but that's not the point), I definitely would've been way more invested in whatever weird filler plot the show wants to do if it involved Hiyori. But it obviously can't do that right now, and her absence is one of those things that symbolizes how Kabuto has sort of entered a new era by this point, with many things starting to fall by the wayside. The old guard of supporting Riders are largely downplayed in favor of the Hoppers, characters I've established don't rub me the right way, which is why I cling so much to Tsurugi's continued presence. On a pure mechanical level, as well, their lack of Masked Forms is a sign of how the series has stopped caring about one of its defining features – Clock Up. There's a bit in the middle were Kabuto and Gatack ride in on their bikes, already in Rider Form, and the monster gets away by running fast.

It takes a lot to make me not happy to see bike action, but that'll do it. It's a scene that belongs in Blade more than it does Kabuto, and Tendou taking a dare not to even use Hyper Form's entire defining feature at the end rubbed some serious salt in that wound. I do not like the Perfect Zecter, or its introduction. It's a less clever rehash of how Tendou got the Hyper Zecter, and it feels more like a parody of him as a result. I feel like people who hate Tendou probably think scenes like this are how he was always written, when the show often handles him with so much more grace than summoning a sword from the sky to show off.

While there's a second half to this story left, this episode, at the end of the day, didn't do anything to convince me I was exaggerating its flaws in retrospect. It's not a total misfire, don't get me wrong; I wasn't sitting there waiting for it to be over, and it has its fun moments, but on this rewatch, I've repeatedly been surprised by how much better Kabuto holds up than I thought it would, and that wasn't the case here.