[Fish Sandwich]

Yeah, the Den-O episodes explicitly not being some wild alternate take is a rather off concept for Decade, but then, Den-O always was the odd one out among these ten shows. With Kobayashi handling the script and some manic direction from Ishida, I think these episodes turned out to be very entertaining, without having a ton of substance. It's got elements that are trying to get somewhere – Tsukasa's usual speech comes together nicely, and I appreciate it reminding us of Natsumi's angst over the whole destroyer of worlds thing, even if that only results in a very surreal fight scene at the halfway mark. (The emotionally charged yet vaguely defined nature of which does ~sort of~ capture an aspect of Den-O's style, I guess.)

Still though, you definitely want to be watching these ones for the wacky Imagin antics. Like, even Diend's scheme here is hilarious. It makes absolutely no sense, and I wouldn't have it any other way. Momotaros is holding the plot together of course, and he's great as always. Apparently Ishida specifically had Takaiwa playing Momo too, even in shots also featuring Decade, so I'm glad to know he appreciated how much Takaiwa brings to that role. It's sort of crazy to think that these episodes were probably my first real exposure to these characters, but it definitely created an interest for me, so just on that level, I can say they did their job well.