[DreadBringer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER KIVA EPISODE 47 - “BREAK THE CHAIN: OBEY ME!”

The stupid one is, obviously, Shima’s return. It’s so ludicrous that I almost wish he had been a Fangire or a ghost, because Taiga Only Pretended To Kill Me For No Apparent Reason And Then Changed Me Back Into A Human Because He Loves Me is dumb. Very dumb. (Also, like, when did Taiga save Shima? Because I just rewatched that death scene, and there's no way. Saga immediately fights Kiva after Shima detonates, then Mio gets killed, then Saga chases Wataru into the woods. This episode shows Saga saving Shima while the flames are still burning from his non-detonation, and... there's no way. There's NO WAY Shima's explanation works.) It’s a development that only exists to let Shima participate in the finale (Who cares? I’d rather see Kengo again!), and for someone to argue for Taiga’s salvation. It’s negligibly successful on the latter point, since maybe one scene later Taiga declares that he’s all alone (...you literally just resurrected your surrogate father, but okay) and kills Maya in a rage. It’s a ridiculous convoluted scheme that buys Taiga maybe two minutes of audience sympathy at best. Mostly, it’s just this baffling distraction in an episode that could use maybe a few less baffling things.

I've read that Shima is still alive somewhere, but finding it out how Shima comes back... yes it was underwhelming, for the lack of plausible reason. The explanation in story is to make Shima see the kind side of Taiga, making him realize that his fanatic views of Fangire is wrong, thus tolerating Wataru. I'd think that being "spared" from death is not plausible reason to see good traits in someone, this goes for audience who also treat someone as innocent due to sparing someone from death... ignoring how they savagely attacked them at first. Probably yeah, without explanation can make the scene better to show... toughness Fangires have in Shima, though somehow Shima explodes like a monster being detonated without the monster dying, I think something like Ryuki did the fake explosion better to fake Goro's death, when Ryuki shoots Strike Vent, of which Magnugiga secretly escalates the explosion. Besides, Shima is partly at fault to turn Taiga like the way he is now, as without Otoya or King, Shima was the one who raised Taiga for a while, and Taiga points out that Shima's discrimination to Fangires was already long present before this incident where Taiga attacks Shima in a fit of rage, with Shima's cold and outright xenophobic attitude being what caused Taiga to angrily lash out in the first place.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Like, the rest of this episode lives or dies on whatever Wataru’s actual plan is, because Becoming An Evil Overlord feels slightly out-of-character for a very sweet boy who just wanted to erase his own existence because his rivalry with Taiga got out of hand and people were getting hurt. Usurping the throne from Taiga and dressing like the father Taiga killed as a baby doesn’t feel like much of a de-escalation!

This stems back for my argument regarding system before, system would lead into bad nonsense thing if it's ruled by someone as rotten as King, a sociopath who has cruel ruling of Fangire laws, and his "love" for Maya: he initially claims that he doesn't love her, but seeing her have feelings for Otoya made him very entitled to her being his, even trying to threaten her with Taiga's life, taking her Fangire powers; sparing her from death to make her feel worse than that, and so on. But it's not entirely system fault, the other Fangires need to wise up if they're not entirely malicious and overthrow King and instill a reasonable one as King, especially if there's Fangires who love humans and wants to stay that way (and probably the ones who love humans propose to work together with humans), albeit of course the problem is King's sheer strength. But system can be made to prevent chaos going on (but for King and Taiga, it's to gain advantage over humans), how systems can corner or benefit is based on who's in charge.

Don't dismantle system, improve it, which is what Wataru is doing, overthrowing evil monsters who assume roles as King to put himself as the King, so that he can likely establish a rule to make it fair for both humans and Fangires, albeit Taiga isn't 100% evil unlike King and he's on process to redemption. It's what I think makes sense for Wataru's goal as peacemaker between Fangires and humans (remember besides of trying to eliminate himself, he vows to do this too! the rules established by King is also what takes Mio's life!), despite that it seems to not follow what you want for Inoue being against system (King himself is an evil counterpart to Wataru, that's why he dons the outfit and King can look like Wataru), which is Wataru altering the system to his noble needs but I explained above regarding system.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Shima coming back in a dumb way for no tangible story advantage was a real canary in a coalmine for this episode. That development was so nonsensical that I could almost feel the episode falling apart. There’re a bunch of little things like that. I don’t understand why Nago would ask Wataru to run W.A.K.E.U.P. instead of Megumi, a woman whose family is basically synonymous with the organization. I don’t understand why Megumi won’t use IXA, but will try to coach a blind Nago through a fight. (Terrible coaching; she doesn’t even give them matching shirts!) I don’t understand why Shima is welcomed back with open arms, considering his last appearance was as a rampaging monster, and we only have his non-explanation for why that isn’t the case anymore.

I don't understand that Kiva's sexism here is implemented at this late of the show to keep the status quo of Nago being the IXA user instead of Megumi, as well as Nago forgetting Megumi to ask Wataru to run Aozora, probably Wataru's now strong without even henshin to Kiva Emperor that he can scare off Fangires with just a glare (built-in King quality), that Wataru is the one that fits to influence others by that, 180 degree change from him at the past. For Shima being welcomed back with open arms, you forget about how what matters is "Wataru is Wataru"? Same can go for "Shima is Shima, no matter if he's a rampaging monster or human like them".