[Kamen Rider Die]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Androzani84

That aside, I did end up with a lot of love for this episode’s message. But the next two parter blows it out of the water for me.

I kind of love that there's this subsection to Rider episodes, where the lesson is It's Okay To Quit Things. I mean, it absolutely is okay to quit things you aren't passionate about, but that's such an unusually (to me) mature message to pitch directly to children.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zatyme

This is Kiva syndrome the introduction of a new form power or piece of equipment and after and episode or 2 never use it again no matter how useful it would be. so at this point Shuu Doran, PoweredIxa, the Boron Booster, the fake Fustles, 08 Ixa's save mode, and DoGaBaKi have all been introduced and tossed to the side for the sake of shilling a toy or gimmick. Reminding me once again that above all else this is nothing but a toy commercial and it starts to get worse the further into phase 2 you get.

I can see it getting tiresome (it's a little Deus Ex Machina, especially the IXA stuff), but I'm okay with for a couple reasons.

First, there's the poetic nature of Agito's all-changes form change being a one-and-done form (up until way later in a movie), and now Kiva's all-changes form change is another one-and-done. That's too funny to not admire. It'd be like if Dogga Form was introduced by having Nago fling the Dogga Fuestle at Kiva's head. It's such a specific disregard for toku conventions that I find it really entertaining.

And that's sort of the second thing: I mostly don't care about that stuff? I like form changes and power-ups (less into the CGI monstrosities), and I would certainly prefer they be well integrated into the story (Build's various upgrades are pretty much the gold-standard for me), but it's not really the end of the world for me if they aren't. It's also clearly something Inoue doesn't really care that much about, and I'm willing to cut him slack on it. When the stories are strong and the themes are prominent, I don't really think too much about the show's indifference to accessories. Sometimes they line-up like the last episode, though, and it makes it all the better.