[DreadBringer]

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

This is a topic the show's talking about a lot, though: What does it mean to "be replaced"? Ishizumi isn't "being replaced" by G-Pen; he's using his skills to teach G-Pen, and then letting G-Pen create something that only G-Pen can. Villains like Thouser want to make everything (if you'll pardon the expression) zero-sum, where one person's success inevitable comes from another person's failure. But, like, maybe there's room in the world for more points of view, more skills, more possibilities. A new form of life doesn't have to mean the end of another form of life.

Oh right. This opened up insights too. Yeah it's common to see one person's success as something inevitably coming from other's failure, which is also why competition (no matter how underhanded it takes, by bringing anyone down) is really encouraged to extreme degree to reach success (albeit in reality it's also said that successful ones like to see others succeed, not those who like to see others fail). But Humagears here are also done to try reaching common success for multiple parties which'd be something good to stop dragging others down for success.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER ZERO-ONE EPISODE 32 - “MY PRIDE! RUNWAY OF DREAMS”

The main thing I enjoyed was the way the overlapping desires of Fuwa and Naki were used to talk about the universality of the Humageaar experience. Naki’s arc in this episode is just a sped-up version of Fuwa’s, really: they follow orders, then they start to wonder if there’s more to life than just following orders, and then they fight to free themself from the grip of others just enough to find a little space to figure themself out. It’s all mixed in with the childlike stages of Humagear development, where basic concepts of autonomy and desire are slowly discovered and increasingly valued, but otherwise, it’s Fuwa’s whole thing. But that’s perfect, because Fuwa’s need to figure himself out isn't a real unique phenomenon; literally everyone goes through it. So to give Fuwa a mental partner who wants the exact same thing he does, despite Fuwa giving them absolutely zero help in self-actualizing, that’s going to give viewers a resolution worth celebrating. We get a story about how humans are treated like tools, and Humagears want to dream of a better future, and it’s all just one story about people. Literally no difference in their struggles, up and down the episode.

I don't know if Fuwa's someone who follow orders, actually Fuwa had a dog motif as he's more like an attack dog of AIMS, and the reason why Fuwa looked unreliable next to Yua at their debut was that, Fuwa's someone who'd commonly break the rules to pursue his own agendas, total destruction of Humagears and to the point that AIMS can miss their targets for that. More importantly, Fuwa also ignored Yua's warnings when using Progrise Keys, resorting to breaking it. Being a pawn of someone doesn't mean they follow orders, oftentimes being a pawn is something they don't know and used as a reveal, at least in KR. Naki had some comparison for other characters in Jin and Yua though, for the former, he gave humans Raidrisers in contrast to Jin forcefully hacking Humagears to be Magias, and he openly admits to be ZAIA's tool unlike Yua. For this story, it further showed that Fuwa's on Humagear side too though, after rightfully changing his target to ZAIA, agreeing with Naki too that Humagears can dream.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Like, Delmo barely reads as a Humagear, she’s so vibrant and sassy. (I wish she didn’t have a distractingly-testicular face massager or whatever, and I wish her and Izu didn’t gesture with it quite so much, but I still liked her character.) She’s a Humagear that’s confident in her abilities, happy in her career, and unashamed of her origins. Last episode gave us G-Pen as a robot that was learning to dream, and this episode gave us Delmo, and her willingness to fight to retain her dream. Across the two stories, there’s a neat progression of Humagear independence, and a road map of what everyone’s fighting for. Pretty fantastic to get such a quick delineation of the stakes for this section of the show, and in such beautifully dramatized ways.

Yes, Delmo's name is an anagram for model. She can reach some diva-status with her sassiness, but she's still a good example for Humagears to follow in her sheer confidence. Delmo's the driving factor to change Naki. There's something disastrous regrding Delmo's personality though, that her pride can lead into her revealing herself when she shouldn't which'd expose herself to ZAIA agents. After Delmo's injured and had to be replaced by Aruto and Izu at modelling stage, it's quite surprising to me that Aruto got as much approval as Izu (to be specific, in look department there, being called handsome too or such, as looks'd be the main attraction of that show), instead of only being treated as Izu's "manager" or such as it's a female show.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

And then there’s Thouser, once again underestimating how much shit he can make someone eat and paying the price. We’re three in a row on Thouser Shows Up To Be A Big Meany And Then Gets Detonated, and I’ve basically forgotten the time when he wasn’t a clown. (Last time he was like No One Gets To Have Dreams, and now he’s like I Make Humagears Cry. Remember when he had some slight nuance in his methodology?) His schemes are pointlessly vindictive – he mostly just shows up to try and blow Aruto’s house down – and frustratingly dull. I wanted him to have some big scheme when he took over Hiden Intelligence, but it sort of doesn’t matter at all? It’s the same old shit as always, but now with the added feeling that this rivalry is 1000% beneath Gai.

I thought there were some big scheme before in Gai taking over Hiden Intelligence, in how he also wanted to stage his own war for profit using Kamen Riders as weapons. Other than that, as you said before, Gai wants to satiate his ego, but something that can be rather big Gai's trying to obtain is just overall enjoying biggest success in life, like attaining immeasurable wealth, enjoying people looking up on him, and do everything unpunished. Not exactly dominating the world, but can feel like one. To become the most successful he gotta try to take down his company rivals, any casualities damned, so only his product got sold (yeah, there are some villains in media outside KR who had goals of depriving a product source except from themselves to get rich). But yeah he failed because Korenosuke had company foresight, it's fair to complain about him getting beaten up and lasting this long but dunno why complain about villain's deserved failures like that (the takeover one). For others though, Gai makes Humagears cry because he shattered Delmo's dreams, it's still the "no one gets to have dreams" thing?

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Originally Posted by Enchilada645

Anyway as someone who despised how Gai was introduced in his Arc and how he basically won or tied 85% of his victories in 13 Episodes, I'm absolutely fine with him continually losing and being a clown. It's clear the writers and producers are course correcting, and good. Because they clearly overestimated how hateable they could make Gai in an Arc that while having good moments, was generally not as interesting as what comes before or after. Like, there is no way no one will ever try and argue and turn me around on this sticking point I have. Keep the Gai losses coming, he deserves them.

They gotta think up of a better way to still keep Gai active as a Rider while also being beaten up, instead of him easily escaping despite his vulnerable injured state. Another example is in Ex-Aid, some Riders can teleport away after being beaten up, like Cronus (after Muteki debut), and there's an awesome moment later of Muteki negating Para-DX's teleportation to (temporarily) finish him off.