[Fish Sandwich]

I'd imagine a lot of people will like this episode simply because they're happy to see a misunderstanding in Kamen Rider cleared up so quickly, but I think that superficial joy risks missing what actually makes the story work. It's not a matter of if it avoids the kinds of themes and character dynamics you might see elsewhere; what's important is that it stays so true to the themes and character dynamics of Gavv.

Sachika is the person to look at if you want to know what I mean by all this. (As she so often is!) There's a simple relief to seeing her refuse to give up her faith in Shouma after last week's revelations, but that by itself doesn't actually move the drama *forward*. Where that comes from is how specific an angle the show finds to have Sachika express her feelings, with her instead being explicitly upset with Hanto. Trusting a friend is one thing, but Sachika shows an immense consideration for Shouma's own perspective on top of that, and both of those things are key to how Hanto ultimately makes amends with Shouma.

Last week, he was smart enough to step back and try to view things objectively, but that was also part of what led to him being fooled by Bitter Gavv. What he learns from Sachika here is that it's still important to think about those subjective viewpoints too, which leads first to him understanding his own feelings better, and realizing why he instinctively got in Vram's way.

That's enough to get him to that conversation with Shouma, and I think, of all the great things going on in that scene, the one that most speaks to Gavv's overall themes is how Hanto, with so little direct prompting, figures out his own culpability in why Shouma kept that secret for so long in the first place. The two of them are able to patch things up so thoroughly -- to the point their bond is ultimately even stronger for it -- in large part because Hanto stopped to imagine what it was like to be in Shouma's shoes. And I feel like that's kinda the show in a nutshell? Finding happiness by allowing yourself to feel the sorrow of others as if it were your own? Maybe?

I know I'm on the right track because I was just talking about something like this with Vram a few weeks back, but I'll also probably try to express this same thought several different ways talking about episodes yet to come. It's sort of like putting together a thesis on a work, but the work in this case isn't even halfway through, so I'm also still just guessing at what the full picture looks like any time I try to make broad statements about Gavv as a whole.

What I can talk about in its totality right now is this one episode, which was supremely enjoyable. I picked my one thing to dig into, but of course, on top of that, there's obviously copious amounts of smaller plot threads that move in exciting ways, and a bombastic action scene bringing Doumaru back seemingly just so it can team up with Caking to make cream-filled donuts. That's how they choose to symbolize the teamwork between the two Riders through the action! And you get this level of creativity basically every week on this show!