[Kamen Rider Die]

KAMEN RIDER ZI-O EPISODE 11 - “ZI-O ON PARADE 2018”



All I want to do is talk about this episode’s cinematography. There’s plot stuff, and it’s very fun, but we’ll save that discussion for Episode 12. For now, let’s just talk about how well this episode tells its story visually.



Right off the bat, we’re going with this overhead shot of Woz delivering the foreword. Beyond just looking dynamic (which nearly all of these shots for the episode will), it’s a fun image of machinery, gears, clockwork. There’s an emphasis on interlocking elements and cooperative movement that feels like a nice clue to this story’s approach.



And then a great big clock! Some of what I like about this shot is the framing, the stillness. There’s also the dissolve out from Woz’z platform of gears onto a working clock, which is a fun transition. But it also elevates a background motif into something Important To The Story, you know? We’re in a loopy time travel story, and we will be seeing a ton of clocks!



There’s a great use of background details in this shot, like how the camera pans through columns decked out in TEAM BARON 2013 posters. With an In Media Res opening, it’s crucial to present relevant info in an almost diegetic way; it can’t come across as exposition, or it’ll kill the exact momentum an In Media Res opening is deployed to create. A lovely shot, and great at building out the players for this story.



Same thing with this shot of the Gaim RideWatch. Just a super kinetic shot that shows off the new merch.



And then, man, this shot of the Gaim Ride Armor! I love that after collecting a half-dozen Rider Armors, Sougo’s all set for the new one to show up in front of him. Instead, it’s Gaim, so it just drops down on him from above. It’s a really good gag!



Pretty fantastic tableau here! Really evocative, quickly creating a sense of scale (this is way beyond what Sougo’s used to) and a sense of stakes (it all looks pretty bad!). This episode is great with disorienting views of time and space, and this is a great toss into the deep end.



Everything about Kouta The Space God feels all-powerful and mysterious here, before we even get into the In Media Res parts of the scene. It takes a while to see his face. He moves four-dimensionally, echoing ahead of and behind his movements. He comes off as someone who’s operating on a literal different plane than Sougo.



THIS SHOT! Kouta’s telling Sougo that if he can’t trust in his friends to take care of themselves – if he has to do everything for them, like he’s above them – then he doesn’t deserve to have them. He deserves to be alone in his power. And then Kouta drops out the floor, leaving the two all-powerful characters literally standing all alone.



It’s been a minute, but I remember these blue butterflies being a Gaim thing? With Mai? Either way, I love how it looks here, with Kouta glitching out before dissolving this whole limbo space.



Jesus, everything in this shot. None of it makes any literal sense – why are there multiple women dancing around in blinding clock masks? – but I could not care less. It takes a story that’s already massively unsettled, with a bonkers opening and an appearance from a Space God, and then makes it even more bizarre and symbolic. The idea of time being an Actual Person who can be frozen, manipulated, avoided… such a fun visual.



There’s some great reaction shots in this episode. I mostly love the tendency to stay on the reacting character, not the speaker. Here, we’ve got Swartz speaking to Geiz, but by staying on Geiz, it makes Swartz’z words feel like they come from the cosmos. It’s all the stuff Geiz thinks he’s hiding away, but it’s being broadcast through the universe. (Also, man, so glad this show decided to land on Geiz Is Pouting Because His Friend Was Mean To Him as the reason Geiz ran away from home! Everyone sees it!)



The Time Jackers are trying to recruit Geiz, and this shot really encapsulates the dilemma Geiz is in. The composition is super symmetrical, with Geiz as the central, slightly-out-of-place component. It really sells their strategy towards him, while letting him not quite fit in. The Time Jacker scheme is smart, in that Geiz could be a valuable asset. Geiz wants the same thing they do: the death of Zi-O. But Geiz sees his manipulation of time as more altruistic than the Time Jackers, even if they’re all screwing around with history. Having Geiz be the central piece of this shot, while being visibly uncomfortable? So smart!



I like this far shot of two Baron guys. A lot of stuff in this part of the show uses really interesting angles on pretty basic plot points (the villain reveal, the hero’s arrival), which is nice. Blocking the shot this way, with the van and the alley wall squeezing these two characters together, does a good job of increasing the tension as the scene begins. Plus, that body language! Backs to us, one guy hunched over a bit… good directing there.




These two shots, again, some great editing in the way the reaction shots play out. (It was these two shots that made me realize all I wanted to talk about tonight were visuals.) The important part of this scene isn’t Swartz’z… isn’t anything to do with Swartz. It’s about Geiz deciding whether he hates Sougo enough to be a party to murder. (Uh, non-Sougo murder.) The dialogue here is like the devil on Geiz’z shoulder, which is why the second shot just drops Swartz entirely. We’re in Geiz’z very turbulent headspace, and figuring out how much of his sullen demeanor is really just hiding a bad breakup.



There’s almost no reason to shoot this very tiny bit of business from a rooftop. It’s arguably too showy to work. It calls attention to itself, for sure. But it’s also really fun to look at? There’s a read on this shot that I could reach for – that this episode’s all about moving pieces around on a four-dimensional chessboard, so it’s important to see the characters as tiny objects – but I don’t even care. I just like looking at it.



Probably hard to see here, but I liked how Geiz’z disorientation in Helheim was shown through the screen splitting into horizontal thirds and rotating. Static shots are boring! Spice it up!



The action in this episode was terrific. It gets weird angles, and pushes in at climactic moments. There’s this great hold on Geiz’z ax that I enjoyed, where it practically consumes the frame. It gives Geiz – who has been getting his ass kicked a bunch – a heroic beat, something that makes him imposing again.




Tsukuyomi is AWESOMELY weird in this episode, which I appreciate. She’d been in Time Mom mode a bit too much over the last few stories, so her getting increasingly stressed-out by Sougo’s perplexing behavior was what I loved about her in Episode 1. These two shots, it’s a nice callback joke within the episode, but I like how each one conveys a slightly different emotion? The first one is suspicious, as she’s starting to realize something’s up, and the second one is her just defeated by how insane things are. I like when the Time Orphans get to be weird, emotional teenagers!



Not so much the shot, here, but the set dressing. There’s some fruits on the table to the left of Tsukuyomi: bananas, lemons, and an orange. Very cute!




I like when Geiz gets to meet other taciturn anti-hero secondaries, because they can instantly see through his bullshit. Geiz is trying to do his grim executioner thing around Kaito, and Kaito’s immediately like Naw You’re Just Mad ‘Cause Your Friend Was Mean To You. Kaito thinks it’s sort of adorable, how this kid is trying to be all pro ice around him. The shots are composited so that Kaito literally doesn’t even have to look at Geiz to read him like a book. And Geiz isn’t even looking at Kaito when he declares his intention to kill Sougo, because he’s trying to convince himself. Great blocking and editing here.



So, one, I like how all of the red outfits make the two lead actors in the shot pop. Two, I love that these two kids have to shout into each other’s ears, getting more aggravated as the conversation goes on. Third, I adore that Tsukuyomi does her Episode 1 thing of getting Sougo into a fight to see what else might happen. (And it works! Her whole Get Sougo Beaten Up plan works!) Of all the things this episode did non-visually that I liked, giving Tsukuyomi and Sougo a screwball team-up was my favorite. (Second favorite was – and I didn’t double-check this – having 2018 Team Baron do the same Team Baron dance routine from Gaim. The little details on this show!)




This reveal! How great is this reveal?! Just a static shot on the stage, and all of the extras leave the frame. Look at those two shots, the beginning and the end. SO GOOD!



Finally getting to see Kouta in his non-Space God role, and he’s cleaning the glass… including the camera lens?! It’s another possibly-too-showy move, having Kouta interact with the screen, but I think it worked. It’s an episode that exists in an almost wordless space, where the energy and emotion of the visuals renders the dialogue and logic unnecessary. What better, final way to communicate that than having Kouta start fogging up the lens and wiping it down?

What an amazing episode of tokusatsu. Even if you’ve been skipping a rewatch, fire up Episode 11 over the next day or so. You won’t be disappointed!



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KAMEN RIDER ZI-O COMPLEMENTATION PROJECT EPISODE 11.5 - “MYSTERIES OF 9 TO 5!”

Ha ha, it never even occurred to me that the various clocks in the background of 9 To 5 were from other shows, but… yeah, duh. Of course they are! It’s an anniversary season! The background’s going to be full of little easter eggs. I anxiously await Androzani84 pointing them all out to me.

Other than that, boy, did not like any of those unused Zi-O helmet designs! All pretty bad!