Kamen Rider Saber E14 Review: Almighty

Kamen Rider Saber, Episode 14: These Feelings, Dwell in This Blade

This episode sort of picks up immediately after the previous one. I completely missed that Saber's Dragonic Knight form sealed the big ritual book with a huge flame sphere, but that's the reason both Logos and Meggido are able to return to their base and regroup and talk a bit about what's going on.

Oh, and Calibur reforms from the mass of dark shadows around his blade, witnessed by... Desast? All the while, the other Meggid scheme and talk about how they are about to achieve their plans. On the Sword of Logos side, everyone is understandably morose and sad, and we get a couple of pretty great lines. Again, the scene is paced pretty quickly, but I do like just how appropriate a lot of the lines being said by Ogami (he acts as the dad squashing down Mei's guilt), Ren (he's an angry younger man), Touma (he's resolute in keeping the promise to his dead friend) or Rintarou (the conversations he and Kento had over the past two episodes really hit home for him, huh) are. 

And... and the Wonder Ride Books have honestly been one of the least memorable or visually interesting as far as collectible power-up gimmicks are, but the sight of Touma giving out Espada's three yellow books to Ogami, Ren and himself is actually pretty badass. The opening startrs, and both the Meggido sub-bosses, as well as the non-injured Kamen Riders, head out. Meanwhile, Daishinji is working on another power-up, and Rintarou stays behind and leaves all the blue books because he wants the power to avenge Kento. 

The fight quickly starts between Saber and Kenzan against Calibur; and Buster against Legeiel. The two sword-boys can't really get as dramatic of a transformation as what Saber did here, where he uses Brave Dragon and Lamp do Alangina to go into a red-and-gold form and... y'know what? I have been basically ignoring a lot of the show's two-book-three-book-combo forms lately, but both the emotional impact here of Touma using a fallen comrade's transformation device, and the fact that red and gold look great together... yeah, seeing Kenzan and Saber dual-wielding swords and charging at Calibur is easily the best action scene in this episode. There's a lot of yelling about Calibur's truth and both Saber and Kenzan's more emotional and personal goals.

Meanwhile, Legeiel can summon rocks to squish his enemies. Had he ever done that before? I don't know, but we get a nice little combatant-switch as Kenzan jumps Legeiel and fights him, while Buster gets his turn to help Saber fight Calibur and get a pretty neat "we used to be comrades!" line against Calibur. Buster and Kenzan also use Espada's books as part of their attacks, which... which honestly doesn't amount to much -- Kenzan's Tri-Cerberus at least summons a blurry CGI cerberus, which is something, but it's clear that the show's SFX budget went into the other forms. And then right before the commercial break, we get Saber doing an Alangina finisher. It's... it's pretty dramatic, even if in the bigger scheme of things none of these did jack-all against Calibur. 

Then everyone comes to fight. Zooius, Legeiel and Storious show up to block the swordsmen, and Slash also shows up to help Saber fight Calibur, and... things get just a bit messy. I don't think it's quite as vertigo-inducing as one of the previous episodes (was it episode 6 or 7?) but comparing it to the first Saber/Kenzan/Calibur fight, it's kind of a bit harder to follow. Buster, Kenzan and Slash swap out their power-up books, and... and it honestly doesn't amount to a whole ton, but I know some people really appreciate this plot-device-swapping thing. The longest action beat in this three-way fight is Storious vs. Slash, where Storious makes clones and Slash uses 3 Pig Brothers to make clones... okay.

Desast gets a brief scene hooting and being all happy about the massive party that's about to start as random civilians see like, Digimon dragons and flying whales flickering in and out of existence in the sky. Saber and Calibur get into a typical "humanity is worthless" argument while clashing with each other, but the three Megido minibosses show up and hold back the entire squad of good guys while Calibur turns into a flying orb and exits stage left. 

So it's Rintarou's time to show up with his huge blocky new power-up, King Lion Daisenki. It's the "Rhyming Riding Rider" with two cannons on the shoulders and lion heads on the arm-guards, and... it's actually kinda cool. I'm honestly kind of numb with the new-super-form-per-episode thing that we have here, but Daisenki is still admittedly pretty cool. Rintarou and the rest of the swordsmen basically beat the shit out of the Meggido sub-bosses. In order, we've got Blades using all three of Espada's books (which is honestly kind of underwhelming); Buster, Slash and Kenzan doing a finisher with their little swapped power-up books; before Blades straight-up turns into a CGI robot lion and tosses everyone around. That last bit is... it sure is interesting. 

The episode ends with Rintarou roaring in triumph, while  Saber flies up after Calibur and disappears into the mysterious book portal. Okay!

And this is possibly the most action-heavy episode of the series so far. There isn't even a plot beyond 'beat up Calibur and his flunkies'. But the unified goal of avenging Kento and carrying out his wishes really elevate a lot of the angry yelling beyond what they would otherwise be. It's a simple trick to heighten drama in a fight-heavy episode, but still pretty effective! Again, some of the scenes -- particularly in the second half -- still feels a bit too messy and chaotic. And maybe that's more 'realistic' when you have a huge melee of a dozen fighters. But still, I kinda wished that the action scenes flowed a bit better, you know? Still, not too much of a complaint here, I do enjoy the fact that we seem to finally be going for plot revelations next episode. 

Random Notes: 

• At the time of writing, I haven't really watched the next episodes yet, but... Desast is kind of interesting, huh? He tries to take Dark Blade Kurayami in the opening scene, he's missing from the scene where the Meggido are planning, and we get that short bit near the end where he's laughing about chaos and stuff... he's actually Kento's dad, isn't he? Or something? You don't just cast a Kamen Rider alumni and only use him for like 30 seconds in flashbacks. 
• Man, I know I'm bad with names and all, but holy shit I keep mixing up Legeiel and Storious apart in their monster forms.
• Ren fared a lot better than Sid from Gaim when it comes to being squished by huge rocks.
• Rintaro did spend the opening scene shirtless and wearing only a massive set of bandages, which is a neat understated way to have him actually be benched while he waits on Daishinji to work on his power-up item. Having him be wounded feels a lot better than if Rintarou just decided to skip out on being a superhero because he wants a power-up.
• I do like that Slash is notably more somber and serious in this one. Although I think he only gets super hammy when he uses Bremen no Rock Band, so maybe that's the reason more than the mourning?  
  
• Mei's actress doesn't get much to do in these episodes, but she puts in a lot of work in making funny faces in reacting to everything involving Blades' new form, and the bits where she pretends to be a lion or mimics the power-up toy flipping open like a book are very adorable. 
• So why didn't Touma use Dragonic Knight in this one?