[Fish Sandwich]

Starting things off mellow with Wavering Heart, another one of those contemplative melancholic tracks from this show I love so much, which certainly has a fitting title for a conversation where Wataru finally works up the courage to tell Taiga he's not giving up on Mio only to end up getting backhanded for the trouble.

...And since I decided double features are just going to be a fairly regular thing from here out because I like the second OST that much, here's Zanvat Sword, which is... er, not at all in the episode featuring the proper debut of the Zanvat Sword! Supernova takes priority, as it turns out. Even though the show gets a ton of use out of this one anywhere but here, it does do a whole thing where it starts off sounding a bit ominous and worrying at first before blossoming into a proper heroic battle theme, which fits the sword's role in the story perfectly, so I'm putting it here anyway.

Moving on to the episode...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

...Gosh that suit is so pretty~ Uh, anyway, yeah, I'll join in on the crowd proclaiming the Zanvat Sword to be very awesome. It's got a really straightforward but cool and elegant design (even with the bat on it, it mostly just looks like an actual sword?), the blade is sparkly(!), and it even has a whole established backstory and thorough integration into the plot, which is more than you can say for a lot of Kiva trinkets! It also completes Kiva's evolution into being just another Kamen Rider in terms of how he fights, if you wanna get negative, but looking at Kiva as its own thing, being a sword-wielding hero in golden armor is something Wataru has really worked his way up to, you know?

And for the record, they got the broad idea for the sliding bat from the motion of pulling a bow on a violin, and nothing else! The original concept was even apparently to do an Iaijutsu thing where there would've been a scabbard, but they ended up dropping that so that all that was left was the basic concept of Kiva sharpening a sword as he cuts down his foes with it. While I still miss the elaborate stock footage from the show's early days, I have to admit the Zanvat Sword's awesome sound design is another thing that makes it clear the show hadn't totally lost that touch.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

ZanVat or ZanBat? My subs say Zanvat, but I'm seeing people use Zanbat. Help a Cubist monstrosity out, y'all

It's really the exact same thing either way, as b/v represent the same sound in Japanese, just like l/r do. The name of the sword is derived from the kanji for slicing (斬), which is your "Zan", plus "Bat" and "Sword", which I don't think I need to explain. I believe what's going on with the inconsistency is that, as discussed way back, Kiva's name is written the way it is, and we've also already got Kivat, so... it's the same way Toucon Damashii from Ghost is written that way because of Eyecons, even though it's just a Japanese word.

What I'm more confused by is where we got "Behead the King" from for the title on this one? Everywhere I look has it translated like that, even though the title is kingu GA kiru, and not wo? He's the one doing the slicing! It's about his sword! (Wait, I was supposed to be retired from this kind of thing, wasn't I...?)

On the subject of that King though, the reason he gives for chucking the Zanvat Sword in that wall is one heck of a powerful mission statement as to what his role in the series is. It's the kind of thing that's hard to imagine coming from a writer besides Inoue, because it's deeply thematically relevant while also being utterly insane in a way that's so distinctly him.