[DreadBringer]

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER KIVA EPISODE 14 - “POMP & CIRCUMSTANCE: THE SHOCKING PURPLE EYE”

I liked the Wataru story, incidentally. It’s not a very robust part of the narrative (it’s basically just Shizuka getting Megumi to tell Wataru that Kengo’s getting fleeced and may have his dreams of stardom devoured by a decorative vampire monster), but the emotion behind the final fight with the Rhino Fangire was nice. We’ve seen plenty of fights where Kiva was competent, and a couple where he was reluctant, but I think this is the first one where he was righteous. He’s not just defeating a monster; he’s punishing an evildoer.

That side of Wataru… I mean, obviously, not something you want to see all the time (he’s a very sweet boy!), but it's like Otoya’s new strain of self-sacrifice and quiet heroism: it’s adding dimensionality to a character that you could feel like you’ve already seen all the sides of. It’s an episode that wasn’t really twisty in plot, but had a few surprising character turns.

This Wataru right there, this reminds me of again Kuuga, which is Yusuke against Jaraji, the one he's pushed into brutally beating the monster with full of hatred. Though I don't think that this part is righteous for Wataru, or more righteous than the other times, while it's appropriate for Wataru to be enraged for this Fangire, I think if you're filled with hatred and vengeance for killing evildoers, it can be a fuel for.... becoming more and more severe in punishing until you end up like Nago (not that Wataru will of course, but sometimes these kind of monster can urge the hero to stain themselves while finishing them off in the process), giving excessive punishments to anyone that is bad just to make sure.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Like Otoya not blowing the whistle (or Whistlestle) on Jirou! Took me a minute to figure out why he wouldn’t just show up at Mal d’Amour and go This Man Is A Clawolve, but I think I get it. (Well, the main reason why he doesn’t say anything is to prolong this story, but I think there’s some narrative cover for the decision, as well.) Otoya is trying to protect Yuri from Jirou, and that’s heroic, but it’s still Otoya being heroic. There’s a top layer of heroism now, but everything underneath that is still The Worst. He doesn’t want to, like, tattle on Jirou. That’s cheap, and unmanly. It’s cowardly. (It’s also exactly what Jirou does.) Otoya wants to defeat Jirou, to end his threat against Yuri with his own hands. He also needs to do it in secret, because this, strangely, isn’t about showing off for Yuri. It’s about keeping her from harm, but a patronizing A Woman Shouldn’t Bear This Pain type of harm. He’s toxically masculine, in his need to shield Yuri from painful knowledge. It’s more bullshit paternalism, but it’s also exactly the sort of bullshit paternalism that Otoya would reflexively go for.

The "everything underneath that is still The Worst" is exactly about Otoya's heroism here, that is, Otoya is only concerned about certain people, which is women, that he wants to protect, but he'll be detrimental to non-women ones like for example males, which he'll likely be apathetic or potentially dangerous to them (the talk about Otoya's heroism, I'm more convinced for him against Oomura rather than Yuri, as he's womanizer), like you said, toxically masculine. Being a womanizer has either 2 outcome, being fiercely protective to any women and likely detrimental to non-women, or being detrimental to the women itself for the objectification and tactless approach (like Spider Fangire). Being caring and protective of your loved ones; friend or family, doesn't necessarily make you a good person, which is why I prefer to judge morality on what will they do to people less related to them like civilians or strangers, as there are villains that is revolved around their loved ones.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

It makes for an episode that just, like… delivers. Nothing was a huge surprise, but the fundamentals were rock solid. It’s another episode where the visuals are insanely good (there’s this shot of Jirou lounging on the roof of Monster Squad Massage that is disgustingly clever), the humor is whip-smart (Otoya’s answering machine greeting!!!), and the character relationships are specific and engaging (Shima and Megumi trying to, like, manage Nago’s fragile but bottomless ego).

Nago gets his just desserts for shifting the blame for his defeat to IXA, which Shima pointed out that it can be Nago not capable enough to bring the best out of IXA . Other than that, it's seen again for Nago's self-righteous extremism, that he gives excessive punishment to a human criminal that even Megumi had to stop him as he can potentially kill the human. Again, unfortunately some people are like-minded with Nago here to kill anyone who does bad, because likely being influenced by media negativity to think the law is never competent even once for dealing with criminals (them getting off scot-free) for one of the reasons.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

It’s still a middle installment, though, so I don’t really have a ton to comment on, really. It’s weird to see Kengo spurn Wataru, but there’s some impatience in Kengo that was bound to bristle against Wataru’s sweetness at some point. There’s Nago’s new Ixcavator, or whatever, but I think my feelings towards CGI monstrosities are abundantly clear by now. And then there’s Kiva’s new purple Whistlestle, which turns him into Titan Form With A Hammer. (I liked it, but: it’s literally just Titan Form With A Hammer.) Good stuff, all of it (well, Ixcavator), but nothing I have a lot to say about.

Yeah, it seems that Kengo reverts back to the more selfish part of him after initially getting to know Wataru's violin stuff, though I likely will give less flak about this as Inoue wrote Kiva from the beginning and this part's also done by Inoue (no clashing between different writers), but for the sake of conflict character growths can be ignored. I feel like Nago feels betrayed by Wataru that he feels Wataru is giving him false hope to become a pro rock star (as the manager turns out to be Fangire, and apparently, humans with burning passions has more life force for Fangires to consume). And yeah, new form for Kiva, the mighty glacier one in Dogga Form, a purple one too like Kuuga Titan. Dogga's main finisher is slamming the opponent with a projection of purple fist... but as Fangires crystalize when killed... it can be that the finisher attack is the shockwave that got released from The Eye instead.. although when I read other sources, the shockwave is meant to immobilze them, not killing the Fangire..