[Fish Sandwich]

You made sense enough to me, Die! This is definitely a story for the show with a lot of complex stakes going on, and one I remember better than usual as a result. That being said – I mostly just really wanna talk about Ixa right now, and more specifically, his musical motif:

This is hands down one of my single favorite pieces of background music in the entirety of Kamen Rider. It sticks in your head like crazy because it's such a perfect theme for a character who is pretty crazy. Like, again, I can only analyze this so well, but it's the ideal musical distillation of Nago's single-minded pursuit of justice. Those initial few seconds heralding the transformation itself are tense and suspenseful, maybe even a little ominous. It doesn't necessarily sound like a good thing is about to happen, and then the rest of the song really kicks in and just starts pummeling the listener with those strings that almost never let up their raw fiery intensity. Ixa isn't really a hero, and he's not a villain either – he's a mission, and that's what this music conveys better than this paragraph of text possibly could.

And I mean, the guy himself just makes a pretty cool Rider, right? The whole light/dark contrast with Kiva is the most obvious/smartest thing ever, and as someone who came into this franchise during OOO, I honestly prefer it when the main and secondary Riders are meant to be like complete opposites this way. Ixa pushes that whole motif so far too, with things I've always loved like the face that evokes a cross; and things I only just found out about that I wish I had known sooner, like how the silver design on his chest is representing a mirror, because he's fighting vampires. Like, Ixa is the holy light, exposing the truth of these sinful creatures! ...or something. And then apparently his index fingers are black instead of white because they've been stained by having to bear the weight of pulling a trigger? It's all trying so hard, and it's so, so appropriate for everything that makes Nago who he is.

(Also I like it when the visor does the thing. That part is neat too.)