[DreadBringer]

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Originally Posted by DreamSword

Because Revice isn't just about family bonds and how they support one another, but also ideas such as independence versus codependency, as well as how trying to force yourself to be something you're not very rarely if ever goes well. I've said so before and I'll say it again here, I'm a sucker for stories that deal with duality, and Revice has that with nearly every major character, instantly making me fascinated with its cast.

Dealing with duality is often what gets praise from wide array of people, of which I'd want to talk about the "opposite" thing here. It's to the point that some people will always forcibly impose the idea of duality in everything, that those think it's the only right way to write story/characters. As a Kuuga fan, what'd you say regarding this especially for perhaps being fans of characters like Yuusuke (of which, not Yuusuke himself ironically, but these kind of characters often get bashed for not giving those duality they seek).

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Originally Posted by DreamSword

Daiji desperately wants to usurp the main hero role from Ikki, so it's a no brainer for him when George offers a quick and easy way to gaining a step ahead of Ikki in the way of Holy Live. Sure, it works out in the short term, but more often than not something that works immediately isn't what ultimately works in the long term. Holy Live is essentially a band-aid on Daiji's' lack of self-esteem and envy towards his siblings. This is brilliantly compounded when we get to the last leg of the show, wherein, true to Holy Live's' design, Daiji ends up becoming a literal crusader for Fenix.

I'd also say, the knight-like appearance of Live and Holy Live represents on how self-righteous he became later after Kagerou's death, fully convinced he's in the right and unwilling to hear anyone else out, believing that Ikki is just going to get more people killed by continuing to oppose Giff, getting a with us or against us approach. The trope of this self-righteousness is called knight templar types, he doesn't only embody this character type in personality but also literally.

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Originally Posted by DreamSword

Afterall, he's come so far throughout the show, and has seen things that his siblings haven't. How could he possibly be wrong in seeing that submitting to Giff would be the best for everyone, especially given that it's the path of least resistance? Holy Live was quick and easy, and that got them this far, so why can't contracting with Giff do much the same? He got rid of his inner demons. He's pure now. He has to be in the right! This entire scenario does a great job in showcasing another ultimate lesson that Revice has to offer: Sure, our inner demons can and definitely will hold us back at times, but other times, our inner voice telling us things we might not be too keen on are what also keep us in check. Without Kagero, there's nothing to keep Daiji from second guessing himself or his methods.

Being a reminder too that 'pure' doesn't only mean being most heroic, or other virtuous and morally upright (so has little to no unheroic traits), of which the term is often used to refer to those (also used with 'cinnamon roll' as well). It also can mean having a mind free of distractions, unnecessary thoughts, doubts, or fallacies, refering to traits like hard work or determination. A philosophical concept of makoto. And that'd be Daiji being steadfast to save humanity by the easiest way he can think - giving up their freedom while ruthlessly opposing those who stands in his way. Not Daiji despite his turn on villainy, but it also applies on "pure evil" too (where some stories have the "only the pure" can wield something backfiring due to this).

Regarding his brief stint of opposing Akaishi within Fenix being without Kagerou before turning into Fenix crusader though, there are talks about Daiji being pure is about him becoming 'too good/heroic' (by recklessly throwing away his life to stop evil) without his evil side Kagerou. Which does give an impression that being heroic discards all forms of reason, thinking that self-preservation, thinking things through, etc. are terrible traits that turn you more unheroic (which is brought up in Die's thread). Don't really want for people to associate shortcomings like recklessness and impulsiveness as inherent traits of heroism, and discourage goodness by this to "get ahead" or encouraging cruelty (like perhaps those stupid neutral moves like balancing metaphorical checkbook) for "balance".

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Originally Posted by DreamSword

And in the end, Daiji learns to not only accept his darker half, but opens his mind to new possibilities and realizes that, number one in life or not, he'll still have people who love him, and that there's no reason he can't also love himself. It all makes for one incredibly emotionally satisfying payoff, and it's this sort of character work that really kept me engaged with Revice as a whole. Daiji, George, Julio, Vice... these are all my personal favorites, but I'd hesitate to call any given character in Revice out and out poorly done. Even Giff, whom I've read many complain about, I found alot more interesting than, say, Masamune Dan from Ex-Aid, who still holds the title of most poorly written villain to me.

People'd likely overlook this regarding the view on Daiji, but to talk about something I appreciated during Revice's second half, I appreciated of how they mainly highlighted Daiji's tactical senses after his full personality is restored with Kagerou back, showing that he's no longer willing to succumb into hopelessness, and would look for another way to solve problems, and that it's also done consistently. I don't like people glorifying Kagerou as blameless good guy though, especially those who mocked Daiji in comparison to him, about how his "death" and return both benefits Daiji, or also framing his claims of tasting Sakura's food as tsundere only because he fought off Olteca, thus his actions produced a good outcome, evil vs evil (no pun intended) is a thing too.

Though admittedly George can be fun to watch either way for his first memetic and "relatable" parts and I think for second part in his laidbackness while being helpful, would still think that his change is sudden and abrupt in middle part of him being an actual helpful ally, especially with the excuses of him "just following orders" to Akaishi (not convincing to me, given him looking down on Hiromi's ideals), and later apparently having a devil, Chic, transfered to him (which also can make Masumi look so bad given that they're trying to have the audience forgive him, though I haven't watched the Chic movie yet). Then again, there are also another well-received character that I think the change is abrupt too, like Zack from Gaim suddenly becoming a nice guy and buddy-buddy in his first focused appearence (Knuckle debut), though he had very little presence before.

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Originally Posted by DreamSword

I'd argue that Vice was never retconned. His intentions are pretty clearcut from the getgo, especially if you read the LINE messages.

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Originally Posted by Fredbob392

it instead being given by her Stalker with a crush who justifies mocking and insulting her with having been anxious

Wish I can that the new translations (that I got) didn't translate those. Though for Revice I really don't like those messages about "cruel to be kind" being validated (ep. 23 is all about that), which likely applies too for Vice's antics at that time, with it being clearer example to me than the Kyuun one to me, for Fredbob's post. A̶n̶d̶ ̶s̶p̶e̶a̶k̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶K̶y̶u̶u̶n̶,̶ ̶r̶e̶g̶a̶r̶d̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶s̶u̶p̶p̶o̶r̶t̶e̶d̶ ̶R̶i̶d̶e̶r̶ ̶N̶e̶o̶n̶,̶ ̶I̶ ̶a̶c̶t̶u̶a̶l̶l̶y̶ ̶a̶p̶p̶r̶e̶c̶i̶a̶t̶e̶ ̶r̶e̶g̶a̶r̶d̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶h̶e̶r̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶ ̶s̶u̶b̶m̶i̶t̶t̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶c̶r̶u̶e̶l̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶b̶e̶ ̶k̶i̶n̶d̶ ̶a̶p̶p̶r̶o̶a̶c̶h̶ ̶-̶ ̶a̶s̶ ̶i̶f̶ ̶a̶ ̶c̶o̶n̶t̶r̶a̶s̶t̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶K̶y̶u̶u̶n̶ ̶e̶a̶r̶l̶i̶e̶r̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶t̶i̶m̶e̶,̶ ̶l̶i̶k̶e̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶f̶i̶r̶s̶t̶ ̶s̶c̶e̶n̶e̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶e̶p̶.̶ ̶4̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶h̶e̶r̶ ̶j̶u̶s̶t̶ ̶s̶t̶r̶a̶i̶g̶h̶t̶f̶o̶r̶w̶a̶r̶d̶l̶y̶ ̶t̶e̶l̶l̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶K̶e̶i̶w̶a̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶ ̶t̶o̶u̶c̶h̶ ̶h̶e̶r̶ ̶a̶s̶ ̶h̶e̶ ̶m̶i̶g̶h̶t̶ ̶g̶e̶t̶ ̶i̶n̶f̶e̶c̶t̶e̶d̶.̶

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Originally Posted by Fredbob392

Hikaru aside, every character in Revice is so fun and engaging, while none of the recurring characters in Geats do anything other than shout their catchphrase once a scene and then fight each other.

Feels that this claim can apply to series like Ryuki too (and I bash neither Ryuki or Geats, though dunno if you'd take offense to this claim), where I also feel that the characters have an overall singular goal/identity there, with the characters praise coming from inherent complex and nuanced praise (feels more like people's taste) given to morally grey or worse characters (most prominently Kitaoka), as Ryuki intentionally has shitty people being chosen for the war.

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Originally Posted by Fredbob392

Neon not even getting to deliver her own Reason To Fight Speach after her dramatic backstory reveal, it instead being given by her Stalker with a crush who justifies mocking and insulting her with having been anxious. And Tsumuri being a combination of Poppy and Izu, although that's more of a personal opinion on Takahashi's writing feeling repetitive

Looking forward for said Reason to Fight Speech later, but though it seems that KR don't usually do this before, I personally like that Neon's trauma and issues aren't immediately resolved in that 2 parter and it's still being continued as another material for character arc, she gets her drive for self-preservance back, but it doesn't immediately resolve her self-loathing and inadequacy from her real status and a portion of her haters to still searching for what she belongs, currently having self-destructive path, especially with her warped view of likely not properly knowing what is love. Though it still depends, it can make more sense to take longer time to fully recover from that, than resolving it in 2 parter that while it can give warm feelings but still.

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Originally Posted by Switchblade

Geats is a lot like Gaim for me. I think it's a good show, but I'm not seeing what everyone else has gotten so hyped up over.

Overall regardless of the shows being "highly beloved", the only true ones that almost has no hate/criticism (CMIIW though) seems to be W, OOO, and Fourze (which actually suffered from some dislike earlier). Anything else can have controversial stuff, though seems less so for Build for people here. I'd also think that W isn't a perfect show, though it may be a hotter take.

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Originally Posted by Sh Ranger

Akemi was the worst case, that I imagine most people will agree with. She was introduced as a cool character who can fight, but then she got turned in to an obedient Gif Devil and killed just so Daiji could yell, "Look what you guys made Gif do!" Her plan to get Gif's cells failed and she died having accomplished nothing.

Heh... actually she was a damsel in distress, in her being held hostage by untransformed Kagerou. Both surprised and expected that later, she has some combat and survival capabilities against Akaishi, though ofc it's futile for normal human (and weapon) like her.