[Kamen Rider Die]

FUUTO P.I. EPISODE 5 - “THE TERRIBLE M - THE SOUND OF A LEAK”



I don’t know if this one 100% came together for me? It’s a mix of a story I understood, but didn’t like, and a story I liked, but didn’t completely think worked in this episode’s larger narrative.

Let’s start with the latter! I was pretty into the story of Tokime and Megu in this one, where our perception of ourself comes up against our internal desires, and how we have to be honest with ourselves. Both Tokime – as essentially a court-appointed detective-assistant in an office where no one will give her any work to do – and Megu – as the browbeaten, overworked idol that only wants to be a programmer – are stuck in jobs they act indifferent towards. But, y’know, not completely the case! Megu actually really likes how excited people get when she performs, and Tokime feels an unexplained need to prove herself to Philip, risking her life to keep Shotaro’s client safe. They both like to think of themselves as merely doing what they’re told to, but then fate forces them to admit that the thing they’re doing actually does make them feel fulfilled. Much like Shotaro’s unfortunate ability to find lost pets, these two women have to confront their own attitudes and accept who they really are.

Which, now that I think of it, does sort of work alongside the story I didn’t like?

I didn’t really care for the Jealousy stuff. I got it, and I think the show did a decent job of both looping it into the case (with the Maxsoft employee who resented Megu’s ambivalence) and trying to show their work with Akiko’s rooftop scene with Philip, but it just didn’t land for me. I don’t think it’s believable that Philip is jealous of Shotaro’s quick connection to Tokime.

I definitely don’t begrudge the show taking the opportunity to tell a story of how platonic male friendships inevitably take a backseat to romantic relationships (I have definitely been both guilty of this and the victim of this at different times in my life), since it’s not really anything Kamen Rider shows have ever spent time on. It’s a more adult concept to explore, and good on them for the originality. I just don’t buy it from Philip. His relationship with Shotaro hasn’t seemed in jeopardy due to Tokime’s arrival, not least of which because Tokime and Shotaro don’t even share a scene in Episode 4 before Philip and her are at each other’s throats. Shotaro isn’t exactly forgetting about Philip to romance Tokime, so it’s weird that Akiko’s like Hey Jealousy and Philip’s like I Love That Song And Also Yeah Totally. There’s virtually no deep interaction between Tokime and anyone in the cast, but now we’re told that a character who never exhibited a single possessive action towards Shotaro is so blinded by jealousy that he’s taking it out on a coworker. Even if you could make this story work for Philip, this version is way, way too fast. It feels forced, and I don’t buy it.

Luckily (?), it’s completely dispensed with by the end of this episode. Philip is aware of his negative reaction to Tokime, apologizes to her, and then we’re only a a FangJoker Henshin away from the end of this installment. I didn’t love the storytelling decisions for about half this episode, but I can at least respect where the creators were coming from. Even with that distraction, I think this was still a solid enough episode. Terui shows up to be a badass supercop, Shotaro gets an incredibly funny scene that classically undercuts his cool facade, Philip maintains the spotlight in a credible way, Tokime naturally loses part of her shirt because anime, and the incremental progress from Aurora was just the right amount of tantalizing. Not perfect, but still fun!