Kamen Rider Zero-One E34-35 Review: Glasses Apocalypse

Kamen Rider Zero-One, Episode 34: This is the Path of Destruction

The past couple of episodes have been basically ben revolving around the status quo of Hiden Co. Ltd, as well as Fuwa and Yua going through their respective character arcs and dropping a bunch of plot twists regarding Fuwa. This one, though? It brings back Metsubojinrai.net and finally sets up a three-way fight between Hiden, Zaia and Metsubojinrai. In previous episodes Metsubojinrai.net has been set up and been porrayed as basically stooges and a fall guy for Zaia, or Jin has been shown to basically be all down for Aruto's dreams, just in a far more pro-Humagear mindset... but I'm definitely all for a three-way fight, which is a lot more interesting than the alternative of just fighting Zaia again and again until the show's conclusion. The fact that Thouser hasn't really felt like much of a threat -- Metal Cluster Hopper and Rampage Vulcan have been shown to outclass Thouser in a direct fight multiple times, making him not feel like as threatening as a physical threat.

This episode starts off, again, with another relatively simple plot-of-the-week. Aruto and Izu visits the Hatakeyama vegetable factory. And having Midori the Humagear be basically there to monitor every single facet of a huge vegetable farm is another pretty realistic usage of an A.I., isn't it? And Midori is... she's basically a typical demure, likable, wholesome Humagear-of-the-week. Likable enough for the purposes of the episode, but not quite as memorable as she could've been. There's also the older owner of the farm, and his younger son, and they're... they're all right for what they are, but they're honestly kind of forgettable.

The plot gets kick-started by Metsubojinrai.net wanting to restore all four members of their group. Horobi shows up with an army of Trilobite Magia and starts shooting up the farm as he demands Ikazuchi's key from Aruto. Horobi basically doesn't give a shit about human/Humagear relations, and gives even less of a shit about humans. The son, Koichi, attacks Horobi with a pipe and gets beaten up about it, and we get an interesting scene that I feel is going to be relevant later on when Horobi sees Koichi's dad defending his son. All we get from Horobi is a 'hmph', but notably, he doesn't attack the humans, and ends up retreating with Midori as a hostage.

We get an interesting scene with Fuwa, too, who arrives late to the fight and Izu asks some hard questions to Fuwa -- is he disturbed about recent events? Fuwa is evasive, and later on he meets up with Yua, who offers Fuwa an option to get his real memories back. Fuwa declines, but Yua just... karate-chops Fuwa's neck and drags him back to Daybreak Town. Yua and Jin hook Fuwa up to some bizarre brain-scanning thing to tinker with his brain and get Naki out.

We get a couple of neat lesser storylines, showing old man Hatakeyama still working even when he's injured, and Koichi deciding to use a Zaia Spec... which I do appreciate the episode as not portraying Zaia Spec as the devil's plaything or whatever, and we actually do get to see that Koichi is trying to do right by his father, attitude notwithstanding.

Aruto is sort of angsting about Raiden's key, and Izu notes that they could find out about Horobi's backstory by reading the information in that key, and Aruto basically finds out about how Horobi was originally programmed to be a 'father-type' Humagear, which... didn't we already find out about that in the Hakasebot episode? Okay, sure, whatever. While this is going on, Midori tries to talk to Horobi, asking him why he would fight humans. And it's basically some home-hitting questions (what was your original purpose?) that Horobi tries to deflect with "it's the will of the Ark" answers, and eventually just bitch-slaps Midori when she asks one hard question too many. I really do wish that the Ark itself is something that's a bit more concrete, but there's a certain fascinating aspect in keeping it so removed and all we ever see of the Ark and Zea is from what other characters tell us.

The episode's huge climax is Aruto bringing Ikazuchi's key to the meeting point with Horobi, and tries to appeal to Horobi's past as a caring father-type Humagear and how (as the audience have surmised) Horobi is raising Jin as a substitute for a human charge. Horobi lets Midori go... but then stabs her in the back and blows her the shit up. It's a pretty long and painful-looking way to go, too, and Horobi rants about how traitor Humagears are not required in the Ark's vision. Aruto gets pissed off and throws out one of the best usages of the "I'm the only one that can stop you" catchphrase, and we get a very cool Metal Cluster versus Sting Scorpion fight.

Happening simultaneously with the fight, Yua hacks into Fuwa successfully, and farmer boy Koichi puts on the Zaia Specs to help out in the farm... and then the Zaia Spec takes him over. And while initially I thought that this was something to do with Gai's ominous talks in his office, turns out that this is actually Mestubojinrai.net's huge terrorist plan, and it becomes extra clear when the Zaia Specs people rant about exterminating all humans. Turns out that Metsubojinrai.net has played everyone. Naki is reactivated in their own body with red eyes, Fuwa is slumped over, Yua is there (?), Gai is angry and surprised... and Jin arrives as Burning Falcon, stealing Raiden's key when Aruto is distracted with fighting Horobi. So all the Metsubojinrai.net members are assembled, and Aruto is absolutely pissed at the betrayal.

Ultimately this is another one that's "huge events happening!" episode, with Horobi being an interesting focus. Horobi's mostly an aloof character throughout this, but there's some obvious directions the show is trying to push the character, potentially towards a heel-face-turn like Jin did. Pretty fun episode, and I'm just kind of wondering how we're going to deal with the rest of the show and if this whole hiatus situation is going to affect the plans for the ending of the show.

Random Notes:

• We got the vice president duo giggling and gossiping like teenagers about how Gai's face is fucked up and Yua betrayed him, and it's probably the most realistic depiction of working in a company we got from this show. Them passive-aggressively asking Gai about Yua, and Gai's lame-ass comeback about the 1000% perfect way to serve tea is pretty funny. I get the feeling that Gais trying to be his normal greater-than-life boss self, but ends up coming off like a tool. 
• Gai gets sidelined in this episode, but he is apparently planning to make the Raid Riser a global weapon or something. 
• So where did Horobi get that army of Trilobite Magia?
• That expression Fuwa makes when Yua karate-chops him is hilarious, and so is the subsequent scene of Yua having to straighten Fuwa's legs before dragging him away. 
• I absolutely love Jin's impressed reaction and his "oh, so you can do that" line regarding Yua karate-chopping Fuwa. 

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Kamen Rider Zero-One, Episode 35: What Do Humagears Dream Of?

So this episode is... interesting? I really don't have too much to talk about here, and if I had known this beforehand I might've actually combined 34 and 35 together. Oh well. The episode starts off with what's honestly a pretty rapid conclusion to a lot of the great cliffhangers for episode 34. After a fight between Aruto and Jin which has them fly around the area while falling, with Aruto yelling that Jin should be fighting for the Humagears and stuff. Of course, this gets interrupted when an un-transformed Horobi jumps in the way of an attack that's meant towards Jin, causing both Aruto and Jin to flinch and stop the fighting. Even Horobi himself is surprised why he did that. This moment allows Metsubojinrai.net to escape.

And... and I don't know, maybe part of it is my own biases on what I really do want to see out of this arc -- Metsubojinrai.net actually winning, putting both Aruto and Gai on the back-foot. But right after this initial fight ends and Izu reminds us that, hey, humans wearing Zaia Specs are going berserk... Fuwa wakes up, and literally stops Naki's mind-control of the Zaia Specs with a single speech. It's not even a particularly long one, it's just a simple "oi Naki is this really your dream?" And that's... that's really it. The rampage stops, and... that's about it. Of course, the fact does exist that the Zaia Spec's image is utterly tarnished, and Gai promises the public that he will be leading AIMS to take the fight to murder these robot terrorists. I'm not sure if this rampage would've been played out a bit longer if not for the state of the world that might've prevented more elaborate scenes from being shot, but eh.

At this point, we get a bit of an interlude that... that I felt does feel a bit weirdly placed at this point, but I love this scene. Yua and Naki meet Fuwa in the hospital, and after a bit of apprehension from Fuwa (and teasing from Yua), Naki begins to talk about Fuwa's backstory. "He was born twenty six years ago..." and after a brief cut to Aruto and Izu discussing Horobi recovering his own paternal instincts, we cut back to the hospital, and Fuwa and Yua gasp... at how boring and 'agonizingly plain and pedestrian' Fuwa's backstory is. And I love Izu for being the best comedy straight-man ever, but Naki's utterly flat delivery of agreement with Yua's assessment on the boring backstory, as well as their later demonstration of Fuwa's unique sense of humour (that deadpan Aruto ja nai to was perfect) is adorable. And at last, someone else other than the audience knows of Fuwa's deep, dark secret, that he likes bad comedy.

Then we get a war! Gai leads an army of transformed AIMS Horseshoe Crab Bros, and Horobi shows up with his own Trilobite Magia army. The two get a pretty badass sequence of transforming as we alternate between Break Horn and Sting Scorpion... and, curiously, Jin is absent for the entirety of this conflict. All the mooks and goons fight each other before Horobi and Thouser finally clash. And, well, we've been seeing Thouser get his ass handed to him by Metal Cluster and Rampage Vulcan on a weekly basis, but Horobi is kind of last year's toy. Gai uses all of his jacked and stolen powers to flashily blow away every single one of Horobi's arrows, but then Aruto arrives to take one of Thouser's Jacking Break finishers, which shocks everyone.

And then Aruto gives a speech (while Gai just stands there?) and talks about how Horobi saved Jin earlier because he wanted to be a father, and tells Horobi that he's not the Ark and he's allowed to have dreams. And... and while I like Horobi as a character and whatnot, last episode did portray him in a pretty unsympathetic, evil role, killing Midori and merrily organizing a gigantic rampage across Japan, and Aruto seems a mite bit too ready to just forgive every single one of Horobi's sins. That's a redemption that I feel might come a bit too quickly if the next couple of episodes (whenever/if we get them) doesn't do any sort of follow-up.

Of course, I fully agree with Aruto's subsequent declaration that Gai is the greatest evil among all the characters in the show, corrupting the Arkin the first place and denying the right of the Humagears to dream.

An army of Gigers show up, and... and Aruto has some mild trouble with them. Again, even multiple Gigers have been shown to not be a threat like two or three upgrades ago, and Aruto's still blocking punches and whatnot with metal shields... but then all the Gigers and Crab Bros go silent and shut down, because Naki shows up with glowing red eyes, having hacked into all of Zaia's systems. Naki then talks about how their dream is to make Horobi's dream come true. And... I dunno, it's another one that I feel could've been explored better. Last we saw Naki, they had the whole "I'll make other people's dreams come true", but why is Naki all so gung-ho about Horobi? Maybe one of the future Project Thouser entries might explain it. The Raiders then beat the shit out of Thouser, and we get a cool scene of Horobi unleashing a single arrow from the smoke of Thouser's finisher, and then unleashing a pretty cool undulating metal whip to drag Thouser towards his outstretched feet and unleashing a Sting Utopia that blows the shit out of Gai, sending him into a retreat. We all hate Gai, but man he survives a lot of times being blown up, huh? We won't see this show for a while, but hopefully Thouser gets either an upgrade or a more permanent defeat soon, because Thouser has really lost a lot of its bite.

The episode (and the series, for now) ends with Aruto watching Horobi and Naki walk away. Horobi still hasn't gone straight into suddenly accepting Aruto's views just yet, but at least acknowledges that he's a unique human that might be able to create a new future for Humagears. We get the typical scene of Aruto and Izu restoring the destroyed Midori, and then it jumps straight to Metsubojinrai.net... restoring their fallen member as Ikazuchi finally returns back to life, completing the unholy quartet of Metsubojinrai.net. Despite Horobi seemingly getting a wee bit of respect or understanding towards Aruto, I guess the Ark's desires still take precedence. 

Random Notes:

• The next two or three weeks' worth of episodes are going to be recap clip-show episodes narrated by Aruto and Izu, because the show is basically ran out of their buffer episodes for the Coronavirus pandemic. I definitely approve and appreciate the precautions being taken to ensure the safety of, well, people. Depending on the amount and significance of the original scenes being shot in the next couple of episodes, I may or may not review the clip-show episodes at all.
• I watched the first part of the 'presidental special', but it's basically just Aruto conversing with maybe-evil-Izu, and also a brief hint of a new suit. It's neat and all and maybe they're recycling some plotlines they couldn't use? Maybe the whole evil-long-haired-Izu bit was originally meant in the main show but they decided to tell the story here? We'll see.
• Which, come to think of it, might be the reason for the abruptness of the pacing of this episode. Doubtless if they had more time and freedom to shoot, maybe they'd at least let the Zaia spec rampage play out a bit more. 
• I genuinely didn't mention it in the body of the review because I genuinely forgot, but there's a minor sub-plot of the plantation father-and-son duo arguing with each other, with the son really, really wanting to do right by his father. I do appreciate the restraint of the show for not just taking cheap shots at the Zaia spec and making it grr-grr-villainous. 
• The first fight between Metal Cluster Hopper and Inferno Wing Jin is actually pretty neat, showing Aruto unleashing his locust swarm in a pretty cool way, Jin unleashing his feather-blades as the two of them plummet down to the ground, and at one point they actually stand on a giant slab of floating metal as they punch each other. 
• It's nice to see Ikazuchi back. His original episode was honestly pretty disappointing, so it's neat that he gets a second run.