[Fish Sandwich]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

1: Miu

I find it kinda amusing you decided to give your overall thoughts on Fourze by talking about the characters, because it reminds me of when I decided to do the same exact thing with Faiz after rewatching that show. Like, it's not really that surprising either of us would make those decisions at all, it's mostly, just, it reminds me of that Zi-O two parter, and that has me questioning if there really *is* some secret deep affinity between these two seemingly very different shows which makes pairing up them more natural than we'd think. Maybe that .5 episode didn't need to bother being so insecure about it after all!

Anyways, yeah, Fourze's a great time, because hanging out with these guys is always a great time. It's almost like, *too* precious of a show to me, though?

This is something this thread has got me thinking about lately, but, as best as I can currently put this theory, I'm starting to think my relationship with Fourze is sort of locked in time in a way that isn't true of any other Rider show for me? I associate it so strongly with a really specific point in my life that it's hard to think of it outside that context. It actually made rewatching the show a sluggish process for me, because I kept having that experience I described with the Meteor stuff in the finale over and over again, especially in the early episodes. It's the lighthearted show that makes me smile, but I kept getting choked up over scenes that aren't quite supposed to be *that* emotional, even when they are emotional, dramatic scenes. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the episode where Tomoko joins the club did me in worse than any of them.

And I think, especially because I've since started another rewatch of Wizard, the show that inexplicably ended up meaning even more to me in the long run than this one, I'm finally becoming conscious of just how unusual that is. When I go back to any Rider show that isn't Fourze, I'm generally thinking about it in the context of where I am now, and how that changes and grows my connection to whatever given series. (You can even see this happening in real time thanks to things like my Kuuga thread.) With Fourze though, at least going back for that first full watch-through since it aired, I was mostly making deeper sense of why it resonated with me in the past.

For now, though, I think I'm going to choose to think of that as just another homework assignment to get to one day. I kind of suspect most of that baggage was something that only needs to be squared away the one time, and that still leaves the mystery of what Fourze really does mean to me in the present as something exciting to discover in the future. A future where hopefully, I'll only be crying at the scenes that are actively gunning for my tears. Fourze has long existed in this strange gray area where despite my *way* above average level of emotional attachment to it, it's somehow not a show I immediately think of as a Ghost-level all-timer for me, but, thanks to this thread, I feel like I'm finally getting a handle of some of why that is.