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08-21-2022, 07:32 PM | #891 |
I have a problematic type
Join Date: Jan 2012
Posts: 10,430
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I completely forgot that Jin got killed again. I’m realizing that a lot of Zero-One’s endgame didn’t stick in my long term memory.
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08-21-2022, 10:39 PM | #892 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
Join Date: Aug 2019
Location: Chicago, IL
Posts: 6,159
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KAMEN RIDER ZERO-ONE EPISODE 44 - “THERE’S ONLY ONE PERSON WHO CAN STOP YOU…”
See, this is all I wanted. This episode was so good that I mostly don’t give a shit about how much I disliked this story’s beginning. It’s literally everything I want in a Zero-One story: personal stakes with societal metaphors, and societal stakes with personal metaphors. There’s weight to every interaction, and a sense of how minor ripples become crushing waves. Aruto and Horobi become a story about how difficult it can be to let go of hatred, as well as a story of how valuable it can be to think of the similarities of our circumstances. Mostly, though, it’s a story about how Hatred and Hope are each others’ antithesis, and how one can only exist in the other’s absence. Aruto spent a year fixing his friends (and some foes), helping them see the pointlessness of anger and hatred and intolerance and bigotry. His work let them dream of better futures, and hope for a better world. They can be the force for good that Aruto used to be. It’s a role Aruto can’t take on, because he’s chosen hatred instead of hope. He’s given himself over to anger and self-deception, defined himself as someone who wants to destroy someone else, and left himself no room to hold onto a dream. He can’t leap towards a dream when he’s rooted by hatred. Giving over an entire episode to the ways hope can be just as transmissible as hatred… that’s really lovely? This is a story that doesn’t shy away from real-life parallels (that AIMS guy was going to execute a protestor, right on this superhero show designed to sell toys to Japanese children), and so it gains additional power from its hopefulness. The point of the heroes here is to argue for the right of Humagears to feel let down, to feel underappreciated, and then to ask for a chance to make it up to them. It’s trying to meet rage with acknowledgement and apology. It’s defusing anger by admitting culpability. It’s the most humane way to resolve this sort of situation, and I almost can’t believe this show did it. Because it’s kind of the entire point this show’s trying to make about people, you know? It’s that we’re constantly divided by things, despite being so fundamentally the same that it’s ridiculous to hate one another. The humans and Humagears have different origins, but they both want to be free and safe, while fearing that someone might prevent that. We all just, deep down, want to know that we’re safe to be ourselves. That’s it. The loss of that, or the denial of that, is what makes us turn on each other. The ways we hate each other is one of the most common things about people, just like how Aruto and Horobi’s rage and shame are identical. Being able to see the same dream in one another might be the answer to so much pain. Also, this was a completely awesome superhero show. I sometimes forget to talk about these shows on that level, but, HOLY SHIT. The fight between Aruto and Fuwa was beautiful and heartbreaking, as Aruto grew more and more enraged at Fuwa’s attempts to stop him. We got a little of last episode’s silent dismissal, until Fuwa’s emotional attacks started making contact. Then, Aruto just started pummeling him. It’s hard to watch, because the fight isn’t tokusatsu action, really; it’s a beating. Fuwa’s two-headed wolf form (so great to have Naki back in the plot) is janky and almost inoperable from the start. He can’t hope to stop Aruto, but Fuwa can at least weather enough punishment to maybe talk some sense into him. It doesn’t work, because Aruto can’t let go of his mix of denial (none of this is his fault, he just needs to defeat Horobi) and depression (it doesn’t matter if he’s hated, it doesn’t matter if he hurts his friends). It’s the saddest fight Aruto ever won. AHHHH I’m doing it again! The fights! The superhero drama! Incredibly cool to see Horobi and Aruto have their final battle on the same car park that Geiz and Sougo almost had their duel! And with Ark-Horobi as the hot new suit and the Progrise Key that is the Ark half of the Ark-Zero face instead of the Zero side like Aruto has! And with weapons everywhere! In a fight no one can really win because doing violence to others is really doing violence to yourself! Because AHHHH I’M JUST TALKING ABOUT THE EMOTIONS AGAIN SHIT SHIT SHIT THE END
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08-21-2022, 10:53 PM | #893 |
New Member
Join Date: Mar 2022
Posts: 89
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This episode is mostly buildup, which I guess makes sense, so that the final episode doesn't have to rush through several plotlines, but it also leads to this episode kind of disappointing me. They make an incredibly big point about how Aruto and Horobi fighting will cause a war between HumaGears and humans, which seems strange to me, just because someone who loved HumaGears and is now fighting one of them, there's riots breaking out, just because one person (who has fought HumaGears in the past) is now fighting someone they know is evil?
I get that him being the Ark is a major betrayal, but that doesn't mean that you need to riot or anything, and most of the HumaGears that are, shouldn't have gained Singularity yet, so they should still be following their intended path, but I guess the show wants us to believe that because of Aruto, they've all turned their backs on every human, so unless they somehow all gained Singularity from finding out that Aruto has somewhat betrayed them, this should be happening on a much minor scale, I get it's something that's pretty minor, but it still bothers me. It's still a good episode, but I personally didn't enjoy that aspect of it, but the rest, including Yua growing to care about the HumaGears was nice, but when I didn't like such a major aspect of the episode, I can't really say it was more than just alright. |
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08-21-2022, 10:59 PM | #894 |
Alias: ZeroEnchiladas
Join Date: Aug 2015
Posts: 2,601
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Yeah I had a feeling this episode would be more your speed. We just really needed to sort of spend the last two episodes building up to this. Because what do you know? Taking vengeance and giving into hatred can sometimes cause ripples that affect everyone involved!
It was a good episode for the side characters, you get to see Raiden almost get through to Horobi, you get to see Fuwa and Naki try and get through to Aruto, Yua steps up, Gai even helps out a little bit. This is really their episode to shine while two characters are just steeped in hatred. I wouldn't even call Aruto and Horobi straight up villains at this point. They're basically two people consumed with grief and hatred who only want to hurt each other despite the fact that their feud could very well shake the world to it's core. So at best their antagonists. Speaking of fights though, we get to Zero-Two once more having a 100% win streak, but not without the chance of it possibly losing. I mean if anyone was going to get some sort of advantage on Zero-Two, it being "I will break my transformation devices constantly to transform" Fuwa, is beautiful honestly. And that's not just talking about how Fuwa is so desperate to not only stop Aruto, but also to just get him to see some kind of sense. He'll take the beatings, he'll take the pain the form gives him, and he'll try and reach out to this guy who's hurting. Cause like, as cool as his new haphazard form is, the writing is on the wall, Fuwa is not winning this. I also like the choice to use Zero-Two in this instance and it having the Ark Scream. You can still tell Aruto is influenced by the Ark, but you can tell he's trying to hold back, especially after last time. Like yeah he easily was able to walk through all his allies, but then he killed Jin with Ark-One. And I think that's why he chose to don Zero-Two this episode, because at some level deep down, that's a form that won't kill Fuwa. Overall a fantastic episode and now you see Bandai's ingenious idea and the start of Geats' Desire Driver roots. Where you can just slap a new faceplate/attachment on a Driver to make it something completely different via Horobi's Zetsumetsu Driver. |
08-21-2022, 11:23 PM | #895 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
Join Date: Aug 2019
Location: Chicago, IL
Posts: 6,159
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Quote:
They make an incredibly big point about how Aruto and Horobi fighting will cause a war between HumaGears and humans, which seems strange to me, just because someone who loved HumaGears and is now fighting one of them, there's riots breaking out, just because one person (who has fought HumaGears in the past) is now fighting someone they know is evil?
Quote:
It was a good episode for the side characters, you get to see Raiden almost get through to Horobi, you get to see Fuwa and Naki try and get through to Aruto, Yua steps up, Gai even helps out a little bit. This is really their episode to shine while two characters are just steeped in hatred.
I gotta buy so much cool DX stuff now! And none of it's cheap! Or cheap to ship!
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08-21-2022, 11:32 PM | #896 |
Alias: ZeroEnchiladas
Join Date: Aug 2015
Posts: 2,601
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Quote:
It's the best. This show was frequently not great at leveraging the full strength of its cast, even pre-COVID (Fuwa didn't get a lot of quality material during the Job War arc), so it's nice to see the show remembering that Naki, Fuwa, Ikazuchi, Yua, Fukuzoe, Siesta, and Gai are all pretty goddamn great.
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08-21-2022, 11:35 PM | #897 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
Join Date: Aug 2019
Location: Chicago, IL
Posts: 6,159
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God I completely forgot about the Fukuzoe scene! Thank you for reminding me! For me mostly just tolerating him and his assistant all season, to see them all step up in Aruto's absence was a really good scene to see. Again, like, this episode was really just a lot of great stuff for the side characters and a good note to end them on since the bulk of next episode is absolutely going to be the Aruto and Horobi confrontation.
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08-21-2022, 11:36 PM | #898 |
Veteran Member
Join Date: Jan 2020
Posts: 1,093
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This is probably the most "real" the Humagears and their entire conflict within society has felt across the entire show, especially in today's climate, and it's all the more poignant to see it coming at the end with emotions heightened and our hero having lost his path. And he knows this, and doesn't expect he'll ever be the same person again, but he can't break himself away from this path any more than Horobi can, despite the voices on their ear trying to tell them to stop.
Yua got to really step up. Gai's trying to do his part (Williamson is surprisingly on the up and up). Team HIDEN stand by Aruto and the ideals of the company even when all hope seems lost. We're nearing the end so now's as good as time as any to get one last major interaction between our Main Rider and Secondary Rider, as Fuwa confronts Aruto in the most Fuwa way possible, but you can see how much he wants to get through to him and bring Aruto back to being the guy who helped Fuwa through so much. Also, Naki! Orthros Vulcan! It's not even really an upgrade, but the emotional resonance of Fuwa and Naki coming together to transform and stop Aruto, even if they don't really stand a chance (but darn it if they don't try) is absolutely palpable. And if anyone could pull off a crazy last-minute form no one would expect, it's Fuwa. But it was nice to see Zero-Two again just to remind us it still exists even if it got kind of forgotten about in all the Ark-One craziness. Speaking of last-minute final forms, Ark Horobi! Gotta have our Final Boss getting their Final Form and our two protagonists equal as we head towards the Final Showdown and a dash of Unlimited Zero-One Weapons Works. And with so much hinging on this one fight, even when things seem at their bleakest, we set the stage for the finale of Kamen Rider Zero-One. |
08-22-2022, 12:15 AM | #899 |
Reiei
Join Date: Sep 2018
Posts: 3,691
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I thought the Humagear protests were distasteful, especially since they rally under a guy who's only been known to be a terrorist and then is seen publicly with Ark-made equipment. That just felt wrong to me. I get the message, but I wasn't into how it was handled. But it's just my belief system talking, I just don't personally believe androids are a good way to discuss human rights. They're robots sold by a company for other companies.
Fukuzoe's scene was amazing though, I haven't spoken about him but he's one of my favorite side characters. He was initially presented as this sniveling guy who wanted the company, but was revealed to be someone who actually wholeheartedly supported it for all the right reasons in service of Granpda Hiden, he just personally didn't like that he got Nepotism'd (lol). Another thing I really liked was the whole scene between Fuwa, Naki, and Aruto. I love emergency forms and it being a repaint of Assault Wolf makes it better because I love Assault's bulky armor. This is... also might have been the scene that made me kind of ship Fuwa and Naki. |
08-22-2022, 02:44 AM | #900 |
Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2019
Posts: 2,554
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And we’re down to the last two episodes, so we’ve only got a shoestring budget left for new suits, starting with a red to white Assault Wolf repaint.
Progrise: Unbreakable Immortal! Orthros Vulcan! Awakening the instincts of two beasts long lost. And Horobi finally gets a new form, which looks so good I thought it was an entirely new suit for a long time (it turned out to be Ichigata’s suit, which is thematically appropriate, since Horobi is a corrupted version of the program that created Robo-Dad) Progrise (Ark!): Destruction, Ruin, Despair, Extinction! Ark-Scorpion! The conclusion after evil climbs the top of the highest mountain of rock. And there’s a subtle joke in there: “highest rock” translates into Japanese as “Taikawa”, as in the main reason Horobi is our final boss. |
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