[Paladin]

Baku questions his role in CODE as the Disaster Nightmare appears in the real world.

[Frontier]

I genuinely thought everyone was going to be permanently asleep, but no, they woke up! To witness the living nightmare the world was about to become!

I love how Fujimi is like ALL IN on finally meeting other people from CODE...who also conveniently have their own entrance into Baku's base. Because there's no time to waste: AVOID THE NIGHTMARE SCENARIO!

(Also 5's shirt is...everything).

Baku will waste Nightmare Kaijin, but taking a human life? That might be a stretch too far for him, even if NOX has gone off the deep end. But that might be what's expected of a true agent, for the sake of the world.

So was there some kind of shared dream of the children in Baku/Kureha's generation? Something about Baku that made him tailor-made to be able to wield Zeztz? They haven't really dived that deep into what Zeztz even is, but apparently it is something unique that only Baku can use.

You know it's serious when Nem finally uses Baku's real name.

It's definitely not normal for a baby to dream of a desolate landscape with the crying moans of dead people...

Is that Baku's true Nightmare? The Zeztz Nightmare?

I notice the Lady didn't actually say she found CODE's base. I don't think she and NOX really have the same goals at this point.

Well, bad news...the Disaster Nightmare is unleashing a wide terrorist attack on the city. The good news is the electric dinosaur nightmares that everyone can see probably means people will start actually taking Fujimi seriously!

I appreciate how much out-of-suit action we got between NOX and 5. We even got their finishers out-of-suit!

Kureha did her level best but she was facing off against a Nightmare that is literally every natural disaster at once, she didn't stand a chance. But she still risked her life to protect a fellow agent, even at the cost of her life. And 5, for his part, cared about his fellow agent.

It's still surreal for me that NOX has a real gun that he uses alongside his "toy" gun.

Dang, Nasuka having a complete breakdown at Kureha's death. Baku too, from his doubts about CODE preventing him from collaborating and not being there to save them...feeling responsibility for their death...and that it was all because he was sympathetic to Odakka.

NOX can talk about bad dreams, nightmares, the evil of CODE all he wants...but Baku has finally embraced his Nightmare. He's now embraced inflicting a Bad Dream on someone he feels deserves. He's embraced nothing but his rage and anger. And in doing so has transformed his Driver and unlocked something to PULVERIZE his enemies. Zeztz Catastrom.

Also NOX really did not see this coming...but the Lady seems amused?

Zeztz Catastrom isn't fast or efficient, but it makes up for it in being able to no-sell everything Nox throws at him and having enough strength that he doesn't even need to connect with Nox to knock him back. "I'll break you."

Next week: Baku embracing being 7? Nasuka raging out at 3? Zeztz Catastrom vs the Disaster Nightmare? Lady and Minami? Wow.

[Fish Sandwich]

I think this is an episode of ZEZTZ I wouldn't have cared for if I still thought about ZEZTZ the way I did for most of last year, but I guess I really have adjusted to this show's whole rhythm, because I kinda loved this one?

And you know, it's difficult to properly quantify that, in terms that would be understood by anyone who's in that position I was. This is another episode where a lot of things happen -- concepts are introduced, concepts are moved forward, but almost none of those concepts are resolved. There's a fundamental ZEZTZ-ness to this episode in that way. The show will tell you a whole lot, but it puts most of the burden of making sense of it on the viewer. (For example, even though I still don't know what this all means, I'm happy the episode seemingly validates my assumption that a lot of the abstract stuff in the first episode will turn out to be more than random, given stuff like Baku's arm melting the same way as when the Gun Nightmare was taunting him.)

Why I think that honestly works great here, and why I've started to believe it maybe does work in general for this series, is that the confusion a viewer is liable to feel about the details is directly reflected in Baku's whole journey, and that does have the effect of making him easier to identify with. There's no obvious right path for him to follow that we can see, the same way he can't see it either. Instead, this episode piles on the pressure, forcing his hand and ultimately leaving him dealing with the consequences of his actions in a way that's probably better than continuing to do nothing at all... but it doesn't seem very good, either, does it? He once again faces down the fears deep in his subconscious mind to gain new power, but the thing that gets him there seems like a broken Baku retreating into his identity as a mere number, which would mean he's also avoiding those inconvenient truths again. Yet another contradiction.

So yeah, I can't exactly say how all these ideas will ultimately feed into the larger narrative yet (and I mean, this *is* technically only the first half of an episode block), but I really like all those ideas, and I really like the way it's all presented. Especially NOX's brutal executions with a realistic handgun, which seems like the kind of thing you'd have to really fight the censors about nowadays to even do indirectly like that! The show held off on doing more action in the real world for a long time, and I definitely think they made this episode feel appropriately huge in its stakes to go with that.

[DreamSword]

Wow, 4-parter. I'm digging this direction so far!

[ThirstMcGurst]

So, is this the first time we seen NOX with an actual gun?

I love this episode, but that definitely caught my attention. On top of that, he executed both Agents 5 (I believe anyways) and 6. But that was what caught my eye: Instead of using the large gun-sword combo, he chose to shoot them with an actual gun, and we the audience technically didn't actually see the shot. Just heard the noise and saw the outcome. I find that particularly interesting, but I may be overthinking that.

I have more thoughts, but they are a jumble mess right now.

[JusticeMagnum]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ThirstMcGurst

So, is this the first time we seen NOX with an actual gun?

We saw him with the real gun at the end of episode 15 after he wakes up and is found by Fujimi & Nasuka.

[JusticeMagnum]

I'm very curious about what direction Nox's character arc is going in. Really invested in that, I also find it to be a breath of fresh air to have an openly antagonist Secondary Rider, I feel like it's been a while since we've had that (and I don't mean "oh, they but heads for an arc or two and then they're friends, or they're both good guys but they don't see eye to eye").

This could always change later of course, but for now 22 episodes in it's neat.