Kamen Rider Revice E17-18: Deadman Backstories

Kamen Rider Revice, Episodes 17-18:

Okay, I'm like... almost ten episodes late? More than that? I've actually been vastly enjoying Revice and keeping up with it relatively regularly, but it does irk me that real life made it so that I really didn't have the time to watch and review it. By the time I knew it, it's almost been two months after I last posted a Revice review. Every time I sat down to write a review for 17, I kept putting it off because I had so many more episodes left to review, and then it went on and on until now... so I guess I'll just bite the bullet and try and get through this, and do the reviews for these episodes in bulk, and briefly. I'll do these in batches of two-parters until we catch up, though I'll try to fit in a 4-5 episode batch at some point. 

Episode 17: Deepening Betrayal, the True Value of Buddies

After the destruction of the Deadmans' base in episode 16, we take a bit of a lighter set of two-parters. We get to rather randomly meet Hideo Akaishi, a.k.a. this show's Blofeld cosplayer and someone who's very obviously intended to look suspicious from the get-go. We get some foreshadowing to things not being quite on the up-and-up at Fenix and foreshadowing Weekend a bit, though 17-18 primarily just revolve around Ikki and Vice having to figure out how to use their newest upgrade, where Ikki and Vice have to be perfectly synchronized to utilize this new form. It's... it's okay, I guess, for a two-parter. Volcano Rex ends up obviously being unstable for the first part, and they perfect it in episode 18. 

This episode focuses primarily on the backstory of Julio, or, as he's known, Go Tamaki. He plays a fake Yu-Gi-Oh game as a child and got bullied by it, and ultimately got betrayed by one of his friends who tore up a prized card in front of him -- and that friend asks Ikki to help find Julio for him. It's a backstory that feels relatively common in these tokusatsu shows, although... again, I don't like pooh-poohing on Saber all the time, it does help to put a lot of Julio's anger at betrayal in the past couple of episodes in new light. I also do like that it's Sakura that's a bit more involved in trying to solve Julio's problems, because she did strike a bit of an odd sorta-friendship with Julio and Aguilera over the past episodes. 

Episode 18: Buddy's Trajectory, A Miracle of Fire And Ice

Ikki spends a good chunk of this episode basically trying to reconcile his temper tantrum that caused him to get set on fire when Olteca mocks his inability to save everyone, which I felt is a surprisingly mature thing. There's a bit of Ikki admitting to himself that part of the reason he wants to help people was also somewhat selfish. It's something that one of the secondary villains have been calling Ikki -- an 'egoist' and it's clearly gnawing at him. Sure, Revice doesn't get anywhere as dark as other earlier Kamen Rider entries, but I do like that this bit is actually explored a bit, and that Ikki and Vice have a nice, quiet moment of maturity in acknowledging this. Ikki finally builds up his trust in Vice enough to allow him to manifest in the real world, and I do feel like it's pretty powerful that we actually see that the journey of them trusting each other to this degree isn't instantaneous. 

Julio (or 'Tamaki', as I should be referring to him from now on) get the bulk of the screentime here. He might be pissed off at the friend from his backstory, but he's deathly loyal to Aguilera -- and him trying to both get Sakura's aid to help protect Aguilera and Sakura herself trying to get Julio to reconcile with his friend in the past is pretty neat. It wasn't anything revolutionary, there's a reason why Tamaki's friend never went to meet him, and the plot goes in where you expect it to go... right up until Julio's friend get straight up fucking murdered in front of him. I mean, at least they reconciled, right?

I also fully expected the friend to be revived in a happy ending, but no! He's just dead, and that felt... refreshing? Suddenly there are stakes, something that I haven't felt in a Kamen Rider show since... since a while now. Julio's transformation and him one-shotting the Gifterian into a building wall as his fist transforms, followed by the rest of him... that's badass. He transforms into his 'Wolf Riot' form, rips out a chunk of Olteca, before unleashing a giant explosion visible from the skies. Pretty cool! Wolf Riot beats up Jeanne and Live, before Ikki and Vice, fresh off their reconciliation, go Volcano Rex and purge the Deadman out of Tamaki. Pretty cool stuff, and I do enjoy it whenever a show successfully makes a one-note villain into something more sympathetic. Aguilera even still keeps Tamaki around even after losing his powers, and saves him from Olteca. Pretty cool two-parter all around. 

Random Notes: 

• I like the fake Yu-Gi-Oh card game that Julio plays in the past. It's neat!
• My feelings about Volcano Rex as a form... it's... it's a'ight. With the CGI fire-and-ice thing going on, I get what they're going for, but I just am super indifferent towards the colour palette. 
• There's a pretty cool effect when Julio remembers the past and his friend's face is scratched out. 
• Episode 17 shows that Olteca still has an army of faceless cultists that explicitly die for him to create his Gifterians. Ikki's new form is even focused more on saving all the guys that get killed in transforming into monsters. After Saber being so bloodless it's not even funny and Zero-One mostly having robot casualties, it's actually refreshing. I'm not expecting any of our main characters to die a bloody seinen manga death, but it's neat in terms of having stakes to the show. 
• We get some great "GODDAMN" from George. I love George. 
• Episode 18 doesn't have the opening sequence. Weird. 
• I don't think it particularly matters in the long run, but Vice explicitly confirms that he was created out of Ikki, and used to be part of him. 
• I get it, Vice is the ice part of the fire-and-ice part of Volcano Rex.
• We get a brief hint at the next two-parter at the end of this one, with dr. Akemi making her first appearance and telling Hiromi that he can't transform into Demons again. 

One Piece 1044 Review: FIVE

One Piece, Chapter 1044: Warrior of Liberation

Spoilers! Spoilers! Spoilers! Spoiler warning for anyone who hasn't read 1044 yet!

And... and you really do need to realize the sheer amount of theories being thrown around over the past couple of weeks. I don't think I've watched this many One Piece theories in such a short period amount of time in my life. What a time to be a One Piece reader! I think two of the more prevalent theories that I read on what the cliffhanger of 1043 meant was either the fact that Luffy's fruit was the Resin Resin Fruit (with a lot of very convincing arguments) and the idea that Joy Boy was going to possess Luffy via some reincarnation bullcrap (which I would loathe if that happened).

But nope! One of my biggest worries was that Luffy wouldn't be Luffy, and that was allayed pretty quickly. He does seem to be... high, for a lack of a better term. Or maybe it's just all that laughing is giving me the impression that he's super-duper high. He's just laughing and talking about how he's 'having a blast', and we get to see a lot of people reacting to Luffy's literal awakening. Zunesha, Momonosuke, Yamato, Kid, Law, Marco, Hyo... even Sanji wakes up! 

We cut to the Gorosei discussing Luffy's fruit, and it seems like all the hints about a Devil Fruit that they had to rename, as well as Who's Who being sent to guard the Gomu Gomu no Mi and the insanely severe punishment he got, were all foreshadowing this moment. The Gorosei think it's a very much good set of priorities to sacrifice Bowlerhat McCP0 to kill Luffy, because they've been hunting down the Gomu Gomu no Mi for 800 years. Apparently, the fruit itself has been 'evading' the Gorosei because Zoan fruits have a will of their own. 

...yes, the Gomu Gomu no Mi is actually a Zoan fruit. The Mythical Zoan fruit. The Hito Hito no Mi, Model: Sun God Nika. 

(One big plot hole is, admittedly, if the Gorosei knew about the importance of the Gomu Gomu no Mi -- and putting Who's Who in charge of it seems to imply that -- why didn't they send more people to hunt down Luffy pre-timeskip? Even if Luffy isn't super well-known at the time, you'd think at the time of Marineford hunting down Luffy would be a super-huge priority.)

It's... it's a bit surprising but not wholly unexpected. I think I honestly would prefer the 'resin' fruit as the true form of Luffy's devil fruit, all things considered, but it being the Sun God Nika fruit would explain the importance the Gorosei places on it. The Gorosei further notes how the Sun God Nika does grant its user the properties of rubber, so that's that explanation right out the gate. Apparently it's a fruit that is only 'limited by imagination' and is the embodiment of the warrior of liberation. Okay, then. Basically, it's the freedom fruit and stuff... and this raises so many questions. And so much foreshadowing! Both Doflamingo and Kaido have recently commented how Luffy's 'rubber' shouldn't be able to do the things he's doing with them. 

One that I'm proud to figure out on my own is something that's a bit of a personal joke for me and a couple of friends that read One Piece -- a joke about how Chopper, at one point, panicked at the idea that Blackbeard was hunting down Devil Fruits, and someone had to calm Chopper down because the Hito Hito no Mi is useless to Blackbeard.

...now that Luffy has a god version of the Hito Hito no Mi, and it's been well-accepted that Blackbeard would hunt down the strongest Zoan to complete his trifecta of strongest Logia and strongest Paramecia... we all thought he'd go for Kaido, but he might very well be going for Luffy!

I am not super in-love with this revelation just yet, but I will acknowledge that it's a pretty damn interesting one, and something that I felt not a lot of people expected. 

...and then a good chunk of the chapter goes to Hiyori and Orochi. And... and I am kind of going to breeze through this. Not that it's badly written or anything. Hell, not that I don't care about their story either, because I actually find myself surprisingly invested in the story of Hiyori specifically killing Orochi. This scene isn't truncated and is actually well-paced too! It's just... it's just in all this Nika and Kaido and Luffy and Gorosei madness, the Hiyori/Orochi scene going just as expected really doesn't grab my attention all that well. Orochi tries to bullshit, we get a very powerful dressing down from Hiyori, and we get this extremely cool panel of Hiyori taking off her mask and giving a very detailed and contorted expression of anger and grief. Again, though... it's something that's kind of a distraction since it more or less happens as we expect it. 

We don't even quite get a conclusion -- Hiyori doesn't cut Orochi to death yet, Kyoshirou doesn't show up, and instead we get... Kanjurou's weird-ass tiny ghost showing up and accidentally burning Orochi? Okay whatever SUN GOD VERSUS DRAGON GOD TIME.

Luffy calls his awakening his "Gear Fifth", something that I've always thought was going to happen but some parts of the fandom are super-against for some reason. Luffy unleashes waves and waves of Conqueror's Haki and we get a particularly cool shot of dragon Kaidou being baffled at the transformation that's going on. 

And then we get the absolutely comical scene of a giant arm dragging Kaidou out like a goddamn worm out of the Festival Hall back to the rooftop, with Kaidou's eyes bulging out and trailing behind like he's a Looney Tunes cartoon or some shit. Luffy's Gear Fifth form is shown to us in full detail and he's... he's got the flaming/cloud-like wreath of Gear Fourth, except his hair's on fire and he can freely flex his muscles into... into something that really reminds me of Yu-Gi-Oh's Toon World. He just spins Kaido around and bashes him to the ground, with, again, more cartoony eyes for Kaido.

...the weird googly eyes is a bit bizarre for me, but you know what? I actually like Gear Fifth. I think a lot of people are expecting something a bit more Dragon Ball-y, but save the cool traditional anime forms for Zoro and Sanji. Luffy gets to be just a bit ridiculous with his final form, and I appreciate that. 

Kaido retaliates with a Boro Breath, Luffy gets a giant eye-popping scene of his own, before he grabs the ground, and I think he rubberifies it before lifting up the ground as a shield to reflect Boro Breath back at Kaido. The chapter ends with a full shot of Luffy at Gear Five giggling to himself. Kaido apologizes for the CP0 guy, Luffy goes 'don't sweat it', before going all ready for a beatdown. Some really unsettling way that Oda draws Luffy's eyes in that last panel. After so many comical eye-popping shots of Luffy and Kaido, it's actually kind of unsettling to see how... how intense those eyes look. They look almost like... they're vibrating in place, in a way? 

Anyway, this does admittedly seem like it's going to follow the typical shonen trope we've seen a lot of times -- in One Piece as well -- where Luffy unveils a new power to win against an opponent that's beaten him before. Same thing that happened against Crocodile, Lucci, Doflamingo and Katakuri. Only I think this one feels bizarre because the awakening seemed to happen without a reason the audience is privy too, and I bet the discussions about destiny and reincarnation and all that jazz will continue. I really do think that the next couple of chapters will conclude the rooftop raid and... and while it will end like most arc structures in One Piece, I do really feel like the hype generated by the 1043 cliffhanger has been absolutely momentous. All the foreshadowings, all the different ways the story could go... I feel like that alone has been pretty much worth the admission in and of itself. Pretty cool stuff all over. I have so many questions. I have so many questions! I really hope Ryu'o and advanced Conqueror's Haki play into this! But hey, let's just enjoy the incoming beatdown!

Random Notes:

• Cover story -- a bunch of random Big Mom children, including one that's got an octopus lower body and that one pumpkin guy who fought Pedro, is about to operate on Niji and Yonji. Okay!
• A lot of people have called that the 'drums of liberation' sound effect from Luffy's heart might be the drum tiddy that closes off every episode of the One Piece anime. I would love it. 
• I have admittedly seen people make theories about Luffy's fruit being actually a mythical fruit, usually revolving around the idea that he's a Myo'o/Wisdom King thanks to a line from Hyo early in the Onigashima raid; or that he's Sun Wukong or Hanuman or some other monkey-based deity. He's a sun god, though, not a monkey god! Another fun idea I saw was this being the Giant Giant fruit due to Gear Third as well as all the references to gigantification in the Punk Hazard and Whole Cake arcs. 
• So is Gear Fifth Luffy's... hybrid form? How does a human eating a human fruit even work anyway in terms of the regular human/beast/hybrid form? 
• It is worth mentioning that Chopper has been doing his 'Point' transformations since forever ago, and Chopper's transformations originally were shown to be him emphasizing certain aspects of either a human or a reindeer. Luffy's Gear transformations... also emphasize certain aspects of the human anatomy (blood vessels, bones, muscles). It could just be a coincidence, but it's also worth noting that Chopper and Luffy are two of the only characters to show off so many transformation forms in this manga...
• If he's a sun god, it does really explain the whole Red Hawk thing. We've always assumed it's just rubber friction homaging Ace, plus some typical protagonist power stuff, but if the Sun God stuff does work off of imagination....
• To be fair, by 'imagination', some people are freaking out and calling Luffy a reality warper or something. I feel like it's more like it's bending reality (heh) in the confines of his rubber body more than actually being able to do something akin to a Bleach villain or something. 
• I am a little miffed that this is some 'fruit of destiny' when I loved the appeal of Luffy achieving so much with merely just a random rubber fruit. This reveal does take away from that. But... we'll see. I'll reserve judgment as we know more about the fruit. 
• Someone pointed out to me that in chapter 440 or something when Ace fights Blackbeard, he did mention specifically that the power of the sun would fight the power of darkness...
• Also, all this talk about Joy Boy, Nika and smiles... and Kaido and Doflamingo trying to create SMILE fruits... hmm...
• Okay, let's be real -- who the hell expected (or wanted) Kanjurou's weird blob-spirit to come back? Just let the man die already.
• ..so is Kaidou going to awaken as well?
• Sorry about the lack of consistent updates recently. Real life plus a bit of a writer's block has been really making things super-slow for me lately.

Kamen Rider Zero-One: Others Metsubojinrai

Kamen Rider Zero-One: Others: Metsubojinrai 

I said I'll get to these eventually, right? One year late is still eventually in a way, right? I was going to do a more comprehensive breakdown like what I did with the RealxTime movie, but... but I really didn't actually have all that much to say about these. "Others" is a bit of an epilogue in the style of Ex-Aid's "Another Ending" trilogy, giving us a new threat and wrapping up the stories of the secondary characters. New toys/forms are involved, of course. 

Except... I don't know. Between the ending of Zero-One and the RealxTime movie, I felt like the stories for most of the characters involved here are done. Yes, it's left rather open-ended, but it's not like "Dan Kuroto escapes karma because the good guys forgot that he's a mass murderer and he never gets his comeuppance". It's not quite as bizarrely unnecessary as Build or Zi-O's post-series extras since Zero-One: Others doesn't have to work within the confines of an alternate universe, but... I don't know. I don't dislike Zero-One Others, but at the same vein I don't love everything about it either. 

The whole thing runs for around 50 minutes each, making this a pretty significant storyline. The first entry, Metsubojinrai, involves the introduction of our villain-of-the-arc (hee hee), Mr. Arkland, the head of Zaia USA, who's creating something called 'Project Sold', and is in cahoots with Azu. Meanwhile, Aruto is off in space dealing with some satellite business, meaning that he's not going to do much other than show up for a cameo here and there -- it's the same kind of main-character-shuffling that they did with Emu in Ex-Aid: Another Ending, and since I feel like Aruto and Izu's story was beautifully wrapped up in RealxTime, this was definitely a great decision. 

The big story point that we never really got to wrap up, of course, is the reason behind Jin's rebirth. It was kind of handwaved as 'another Zaia faction did it', and turns out that Jin's second body is 'Sold Zero', the first of a new generation of robot-people called Solds... I guess the major difference is that the Solds are specifically built for warfare? Arkland shows up in a black version of the Thouser suit called Kamen Rider Zaia ("I AM THE PRESIDENT", screams the belt) and he beats the crap out of Horobi and Jin. 

All this while, the two kind of have... not exactly an argument, but they share their different viewpoints, with Jin thinking about how nice it'd be if there's no conflict anymore and everyone can live in peace and the Ark won't show up looking for a new host... while Horobi's a bit more cynical. I feel like this might be the biggest thing that made the 'Others' series feel so different from the main series -- the tone it takes is generally a bit more cynical and less headstrong-optimistic. And that's not necessarily a bad thing! It's just odd compared to the series this is supposed to be a sequel to, is all. 

Jin gets captured by the Solds and gets integrated into the whole Mass Brain system, where they try to forcibly integrate Jin into a hive-mind. I'd... I'd honestly take this a bit more seriously if it wasn't just a bunch of stone-faced Solds yelling at Jin a whole bunch. I don't know... even something like Aruto being overwhelmed by the Ark back in the Zero-One TV series and him sinking into a sea of hatred feels a lot more dramatic than the Solds just staring at Jin and yelling at him a bunch. 

All four of the Metsubojinrai Kamen Riders show up and fight against the Solds because, well, they want to free other forms of A.I. from this kind of tool-enslavement. We get a fight scene and... through it, the four Metsubojinrai A.I. basically decide that they share the same will and transform into Kamen Rider Metsubojinrai. Except Kamen Rider Metsubojinrai is, well, it's very single-minded. It speaks in perfect English, which is fun, but is basically completely uncontrollable and doesn't quite have the same degree of sentience that Jin, Horobi, Naki and Ikazuchi have. 

The four individual Metsubojinrai characters wake up after Kamen Rider Metsubojinrai disintegrates and they kind of panic because they lost their senses of self. Arkland monologues about how he's going to need to fabricate an 'evil', and Metsubojinrai is going to fill the role of the evil-to-be-vanquished so he can sell his Solds. Which... again, would feel a lot more impactful if this exact same plot hasn't already been repeated multiple times in the Zero-One story itself. He does give a pretty cool monologue, about how Kamen Rider Metsubojinrai is even more unstoppable because it's powered by a sense of 'justice' instead of 'hatred' like the previous Kamen Rider Arks, but ultimately... I don't know. I guess I'm just a bit burnt out by the repetitive plot?

Also, for all the setup that Azu gets in the first half of this movie, she gets very unceremoniously shot and killed off by Arkland's goons. It's kind of disappointing, honestly.  

Metsubojinrai's members kind of fracture over their mission to protect other A.I. and liberate the Solds... but they also can't fight humanity. Of course, they choose the exact wrong time to broadcast their "we will not tolerate enslavement of our A.I. brethren", because it's in the middle of a public address given by Yua -- which also gets interrupted by Arkland. All of these is kind of just setup for the 'Vulcan/Valkyrie' movie, but at the same time Arkland talks a bunch about the dark legacy of Hiden and that particular story is never really followed up on. 

Interestingly, what drove Metsubojinrai over the edge is basically Fuwa, who shows up to talk to Horobi. Horobi asks Fuwa a rhetorical question -- what happens if someone goes after people you care about? And Fuwa's answer is "I'll obliterate them with all I got". And that, I think, is what makes Horobi change his resolution to help Jin out and form Kamen Rider Metsubojinrai as an entity that will give its all to free the Solds. 

As Fuwa and the Solds witness the fight, Metsubojinrai.net transforms into Kamen Rider Metsubojinrai, becoming a mindless, soulless killing machine just to get rid of Arkland and free the Solds. Except they go too far, they straight-up kill Arkland, blow up the Zaia building, and keep talking in absolutes like "Zaia will be extinct", "Metsubojinrai will be extinct", and... and they basically become an uncontrollable beast, leading to the downer ending as Yua is dispatched by Japan's minister of defense to eliminate Metsubojinrai.net once and for all. 

I don't know. Maybe it's because I really didn't care for Arkland as a character (which might be just me -- the hammy acting is certainly entertaining, but I feel like maybe they could've focused more on him, or dragged him a bit into the next movie to give him time to breathe?), or maybe because the sudden switch from an optimistic ending with Metsubojinrai as a shadow vigilante dealing with rogue A.I. into them being forced to make a tragic choice is a bit too far... but it's a good story. I'm just not entirely sure why I'm not fully invested. Maybe it's the fact that the movie isn't entirely clear why they need the fusion-mind of Kamen Rider Metsubojinrai, since Arkland doesn't feel that interesting? Maybe it's because they haven't even tried to ask Aruto, or Yua, or Gai, or Fuwa for help? Maybe it's because I genuinely am not invested in the Sold storyline? I don't know. It's still a very solid story especially all throughout the two-parter (we'll cover Vulcan & Valkyrie next week-ish) but I do feel like they could've done this twist in a bit more gradual manner. 

Kamen Rider Zero-One: REALxTIME

Kamen Rider Zero-One: REAL x TIME

It took me so long to get to this. 

So just like the previous couple of series before it, Zero-One's final episode foreshadowed a villain that'll appear in a feature movie, and that movie acts as an action-packed epilogue for the series as a whole. I kept intending to review this movie, but kept putting it off and then got distracted (and, honestly, quite burnt out) with Saber. Better late than never, right? Frankly, considering how messy Saber has been, it's even more impressive how much Zero-One still managed to stick the landing despite it all. 

This movie itself is pretty fun, dealing with a lot of the loose ends left by the series. We do have the foreshadowing of Kamen Rider Eden in the final episode, but this movie also explores what the secondary characters end up doing in a post-Ark world, as well as giving Izu (Izu II?) some more of a concrete resolution. 

The movie opens in medias res, with Aruto as Kamen Rider Zero-Two fighting against Es/Kamen Rider Eden, the Rogue-looking dude whose movie-supervillain gimmick is misquoting the Bible. "God built the Earth in six days, I will destroy it in sixty minutes!" "From the moment we draw breath, the Lord bestows trials upon us!" It's always fun to have villains like these. Eden monologues about how his main plan is to 'set us all free' as the 'shepherd of mankind' and rants about how he's going to guide humanity into 'Paraiso Guardia'.

Meanwhile, his army of one-note-personality goons -- a long-haired caped man, a cute girl holding a doll on a chain, a thuggish looking guy, and a glasses guy with a cloak -- all transform into their generic-looking 'Crowding Hopper' forms, while Es gives a monologue about his paradise. They rampage and toss gas grenades, and we cut to other parts of the world where similar things are happening; and the rest of our secondary characters watch ominously. Pretty cool shots all around. We get the movie title, and then immediately afterwards, Kamen Rider Eden does a CGI attack that summons a giant pool of blood, creates blood spikes to block Aruto's super-speed, then crushes him in an "Eden Impact". God, I miss the noises of the Zero-One belts!

Es knocks Aruto halfway across the city after ripping off his... belt? The part of his belt that allows him to turn into Zero-Two, anyway. He uses that with the Thouser weapon and apparently it'll destroy the world in 60 minutes. Aruto gets saved from falling to his death by the CGI cyber-grasshopper -- only in the movies do these sort of more CGI-intensive gimmicks actually get to do anything beyond being present in transformations. Aruto finds himself in a Neon Genesis Evangelion-style empty train, and arrives at a station to see a bunch of people passed out other than a woman. It's not entirely clear what's going on here beyond a 'main hero gets defeated' thing, but I always enjoy these sorts of plotline. We had this in Ex-Aid's post-finale as well, where Emu ends up being taken out while his supporting cast deal with the enemies. 

So first-up we have AIMS, who engages the Crowding Hoppers. There are some pretty cool shots as AIMS opens fire on the enemy hoppers, while Yua turns into Rushing Cheetah to fight the lollipop girl Mua. Some pretty neat effects with Rushing Cheetah zipping all around the place. Another Crowding Hopper, Behru, shows up and snipes the AIMS goons from afar before unleashing gas bombs on the nearby civilians. The civilians, unconscious, get teleported to the endless train station that Aruto and the mysterious lady find themselves in, which makes it kind of clear that the train station isn't a normal place. 

Other action scenes take place in the city, too. Fuwa transforms into Vulcan and goes into Rampage Vulcan in order to fight -googles names- Lugo and Buga; and we get an unreasonably cool shot of Horobi jumping off of a skyscraper, transforming mid-air and slamming down and making a shockwave as he transforms. As their combined finishes take out the army of generic minions, weird digital stuff spins around their fallen forms. Izu shows up at this point to deliver a message from Aruto to Fuwa. 

Valkyrie, meanwhile, is using her bike! A Kamen Rider is actually riding a bike! That's such a rarity nowadays, holy shit. It's a relatively extended scene as far as these things go, too, and she just completely wrecks house with an army of the Hoppers. Between using her bike to bodily knock enemies around, or driving around a warehouse and stuff, it's actually pretty damn cool to see them use a bike. The two leaders of the Hoppers, Mua and Behru, shoot each other while talking about how they're wasting time. Shesta shows up and delivers presumably the same message to Yua. 

We get the 'flashback', so to speak, as Aruto shows the message that Es gives to Hiden Corporation before all of this happened. Es essentially challenges Aruto to a fight to see if he can stop the arrival of paradise. But as the audience (and now our secondary cast) knows, Aruto got defeated in the cold open. And now he's telling bad jokes to the mysterious lady in the empty facsimile of Japan, while trying to figure out who Es is and why he's trying to destroy the world. The primary theme of the movie also gets shown to us here -- in the flashback, Aruto tells Izu to stay behind and act as a messenger to his allies because he doesn't want to lose her again. Some great acting from Takahashi Fumiya here, you really can see the sadness even though he's smiling while talking to Izu. Horobi asks Izu some questions that gets her to think -- "is this what you want?" and Izu walks off, seemingly having gotten some emotional breakthrough.

While AIMS was fighting the Crowding Hoppers, Amatsu Gai attacks one of the Zaia heads, who claims to have been 'chosen for paradise', in order to find out what's going on with the mysterious cult that surrounds Es. Jin and Naki also separately aid Fuwa and Yua into investigating the Hoppers' true nature, hacking into their weapons and progrise keys to figure out the true nature of these enemies. 

Es summons a goddamn F-35 fighter jet to shoot Horobi and Fuwa, and we get the most glorious action scene in this entire movie. Dodgy CGI? Perhaps, a little bit, but I absolutely love the shot where Fuwa does his regular poses as he transforms into everyone's favourite form, Punching Kong... right as the fighter jet runs into him. As he holds on to the flying jet and tries to figure out how it's flying without a pilot, Burning Falcon Jin flies in and cheerfully gives exposition about how the red cloud we've been seeing throughout the movie are actually nanomachines. Jin panics as 'gorilla' falls off from the jet, before we get the jet flying around chasing Jin through the city. Jin leads the jet to Fuwa, who Rampage-Gatling's the jet and blows it up. We get a fun scene where Jin dropkicks Fuwa to prevent the wreckage of the jet from falling to him. 

Gai, Fukuzoe and Yamashita have been interrogating the cultist board member, and gives some exposition to Yua about the nature of the nanomachines. Turns out that they're a former partner of Zaia who specializes in medical technology, and the head developer is Isshiki Rihito, a.k.a. Es. Also, he's supposed to be dead! Aruto also finds this out from the mysterious lady, who says that Rihito suddenly 'changed' and 'lost his humanity'. The lady leads Aruto to a church, talking about how Es wants to destroy the world with Zea's powers. Horobi also simultaneously gets some information from Azu, who's just casually lurking around. Turns out that during the climax of the TV show, the Ark also happened to hack the nanomachines' AI. And Rihito transferred his consciousness to the nanomachines, allowing him to 'transcend humanity' and essentially survive after his death. It explains his self-regenerating powers during the fight with Aruto, and gives a whole backstory for him. It's... it's admittedly kind of abrupt, and while I do like the storytelling method of multiple characters finding out the backstory all at the same time, it's also... kind of awkward? 

Aruto, having realized what's going on and having heard the backstory from the mysterious lady, reveals that he can actually get out of the digital other-world with Zea's powers, but Zea wanted Aruto to meet the mysterious lady. He wakes up in the wreckage of the car he's fallen onto. And... and remember how I keep saying that only the movies get the budget for the bikes? Yeah. Ikazuchi shows up with a truck to deliver Aruto's motorbike, and he drives off into the auditorium that Es is monologuing to his white-hooded cultists. 

Es transforms into Kamen Rider Eden, with a pretty interesting effect of a mysterious, blue figure made up of veins flying all around him while Es himself gets reduced to red veins as well. The two embrace before the Kamen Rider pieces fly in and complete the transformation. "Imagine: Ideal Illusion! Eden: The Kamen Rider! The creator who charges forward believing in paradise." Aruto turns into Metal Cluster Hopper (a personal favourite!) and the two fight with their blades. Eden seems to have the upper hand with his ability to instantly regenerate from having his limbs blow off, but then it seems like his nanomachines are malfunctioning. There's a typical supervillain-being-deluded thing going on with Es convinced that his superweapon will bring paradise instead of destroying the world. Aruto manages to block the world-destroying kaboom, but Eden's attack still blows up the building they're fighting in and reduces it to ruins, while also knocking Aruto out of his transformation.

We don't see anything graphic, but Gai and the VP's make it clear that all of Es's cult has been killed in the explosion. They bring in some cameos from the show -- the lawyer Bingo, muscle-man Taro and the nurse Mashiro-chan -- to essentially comedy-torture the cultist they've caught. It's... it is sure a scene. I don't quite care for this comedy segment, but they discover a modified Zaia Spec that Es build in order to access the 'Thinknet', an underground website that he uses as a recruiting tool for his cult. We get the pretty interesting revelation that all the Crowding Hoppers -- including their anime-villain-squad human forms -- are all nanomachine-created avatars, and the true members of the paradise cult are just regular people that control these false forms with the Zaia Specs. Pretty interesting twist, actually.

Yua, Naki and Shesta apprehend one of the members of the Hoppers, and Shesta rather hilariously does a wrestling move on him. The VP's have a pretty great short scene where they act completely unbothered by the cultist talking about the destruction of the world, and gives a speech about how President Aruto has a goddamn dream. 

Izu arrives in the wreckage, trying to deliver a belt and key, but she's just confused at what she has to do. She decides to access Zea, at which point she meets with the... consciousness of the original Izu? It's a bit rushed, and I did wish that the movie does let us spend a bit more time with Izu II, but at least she does get a moment equivalent to a 'singularity point' in the home series. Sure, Izu I and Zea ends up providing a shortcut by merging memories, but at least Izu II does end up thinking about wanting to help Aruto on her own first. 

The rest of the good guy Kamen Riders converge on the paradise server, only to be faced by the four Crowding Hopper generals. Horobi solos Lugo and Buga, blowing them up with his cool scorpion-tentacle. Aruto confronts Es in the chapel, and in order to save the world, takes the Hellrise Key and puts it in his own belt. ("Hell's energy has destroyed the world. Hell Rising Hopper! Heaven or Hell? It doesn't matter.") It's not the first time Aruto has been forced into an evil berserking form, but this one looks particularly painful, especially with the black goop sloshing off of Aruto's face mid-transformation.

It's a bit that kind of comes out of nowhere. It's pretty badass, don't get me wrong, especially when Hellrising Hopper starts fighting with Eden with the dark smokes in the background. Pretty horrifying scene of Hellrising Hopper just rampaging and breaking Aruto's bones, too. Aruto's just screaming 'destroy, destroy!' before unleashing a Hell Rising Impact on an untransformed Es... but that blow is blocked by Kamen Rider Zero-Two. Who de-transforms to reveal herself to be Izu! And while it is a cliched moment, if there's anything in this franchise that has earned this sort of friendship moment, it is Izu regaining her memories and emotions. 

Izu tells Aruto how she still wants to laugh from her heart, how she can't lose Aruto yet, and Aruto (and the audience) cheer at this pretty goddamn d'awww moment. Aruto realizes his mistake at the beginning of the movie -- where he sends Izu off instead of trying to figure out what she wants like what he's done to all other Humagears. This segues into a speech from Aruto to Es, asking him if his actions will bring happiness to his loved one. With some intel from Horobi (who finds a human brain in the server building), Aruto gives exposition how Es is trying to build a perfect digital world for the consciousness of his dead fiancée Akane (she was killed during Daybreak) -- the woman Aruto meets in the digital world. And the perfect world includes, um, sending all of humanity into the digital world. Es is full of self-loathing, but Aruto gives this whole speech about how even artificial intelligence have heart, and Es's preservation of Akane's consciousness preserved her as essentially an A.I., and how Akane is waiting for Es. 

It's your typical anime movie plot, if we're being honest, but I did feel like it's consistent enough with all the talks of 'paradise' and 'illusion' throughout the movie. It's not particularly in-depth, but the movie does do a relatively decent job at explaining Es's motivations and making us empathize with him.

The leader of the Crowding Hoppers, Behru (a.k.a. long-hair cape guy), figures out what's going on at around the same time. Realizing that Es wanted to kill all of the cultists and that the whole 'paradise' thing is a sham (what did Es promise them?) Behru and a group of cultists show up and gun down Es in the chapel. Es refuses to let people with an 'appetite for destruction' like the cultists to enter Akane's perfect world. Behru is pissed off, steals the Eden Driver, and transforms into Kamen Rider Lucifer. His transformation involves a giant skeleton bursting out of the ground and biting his head off! What the shit!

Behru is a flat character so I really don't care about him, but Es's story is done in a way that doesn't really provide for an action scene. And as much as Es's story is narratively done, I can kind of understand that the movie-makers wanted to give one last huge action scene with Aruto and Izu. So Es runs off to rejoin his wife in the digital world, while Aruto and Izu do a goddamn double henshin into Kamen Riders Zero-One and Zero-Two. About goddamn time -- I was absolutely disappointed that Izu was never part of Aruto's forms, and you'd think that Zero-Two would feature Izu as the A.I. or something... but hey, she gets to be her own Kamen Rider! That's cool regardless. I do like that despite having the same attacks and suit as Aruto, Izu as Zero-Two does some of her own unique flourishes that are unmistakably the same gestures that Izu usually does. 

Aruto and Izu fight against Lucifer and his army of Crowding Hoppers, while elsewhere, the other Hoppers have regenerated in new avatar bodies. Horobi, Gai and Yua all arrive and each of them deliver a badass, pre-asskicking one-liner, shit-talking the Hoppers for having absolutely no depth and no real motivation like Es. The three of them fight without transforming for a while, which is pretty fucking badass. Fuwa and Jin (who we last saw being wounded by the fighter jets) also show up. And then we get a five-man transformation, and an absolutely grand beatdown. Lightning Hornet and Rampage Gatling get some screentime, too -- it's just such a shame that it's near-impossible to tell which of the Crowding Hoppers are actually the generals (not that they have any personality to speak of) without looking at the shoulders... but hey, we get to see these guys be badasses, and that's pretty damn fun. 

All the soldiers keep regenerating after they fall since they can just recreate new avatars with nanomachines, but Esu manages to upload himself to the digital world and I think that's what causes the tide to turn (the movie doesn't make this super apparent). Gai, Fuwa and Yua do a combo attack to take down Mua and Lugo, while Horobi and Jin do a double rider kick to take down Buga. Aruto and Izu continue fighting Lucifer while rose petals fall all around the battlefield, which is so extra but so cool. As Lucifer prepares to do the same 'blow up the Earth' thing, we get Aruto and Izu yelling out Aruto's catchphrase (with 'us' instead of 'me'), and then REALxEYEZ starts playing as the two main characters deliver the ever-loving speed blitz beatdown on Lucifer. It's... it's a pretty standard movie finisher scene, but I think I'm allowed to fanboy a bit.

Lucifer gets blown up, of course, and we get a scene of a remorseful Es meeting Akane in the digital world, with them in wedding regalia and stuff. They blow up the server, deactivating all the nanomachines all over the world, while all the real person users of the Hoppers are arrested. We get a fun vignette of the characters -- Team VP is practicing laughing at Aruto's jokes; Metsubojinrai and Fuwa talk about being vigilantes; Yua pokes fun at Fuwa's unemployment... while Aruto and Izu end the movie with Aruto telling a bad joke.

Ultimately, the movie does suffer from the in medias res format. I don't really think the mystery is worth keeping Es's motivations and goals for so long, and it's something that I felt would've worked better with the prologue showing us a bit more of Es's rise to power in that case. Plus, the Hellrise key and Aruto taking it into his body feels like it comes out of nowhere. And there's of course the regular problem of a bit too many characters and a lot of the supporting ones really don't do anything -- especially the goons, although that's always a problem in these tie-in movies. Still, considering the time that the movie was filmed and how coherent it still ultimately is, I actually do think that this is a pretty great final outing for Zero-One. 

(Except it's not the final outing. I'm not sure when I'll review Zero-One Others, but that's an... interesting duo of movies)

Random Notes:

• I don't really note it, but throughout the movie there's a countdown of a 'time left' before Es's paradise plan begins. It's not a particularly huge surprise that our heroes save the day in the nick of time, but it's a neat little visual. 
• I really do miss the sounds the Zero-One belts make. I just really don't care about Saber's belts, and Revice's feels like a bit of a retread of previous belts (it is a homage season, so...). 
• Apparently, Es's Crowding Hopper goons are officially called 'Kamen Rider Abaddon'. I really should've looked it up before doing this review, and call them 'Crowding Hoppers' all throughout. Oops! Okay!
  
• It's neat that while they don't do anything, Yua's recurring AIMS sidekicks show up. 
• Also a small thing, but while they don't really get too much of an attention, I did like small world-building scenes like Humagear doctors helping the civilians in the background. It's these smaller scenes that makes Zero-One feels so unique and well-done. 
• The Zaia specs that Izu and Shesta deliver to the two AIMS Riders provides them with an invisible forcefield that protects them from the chemical weapons. A cheeky way to make sure the audience can see the faces of the actors! 
• I didn't even remember that Fuwa and Yua isn't supposed to be able to transform, but Gai apparently 'restored their ability to transform', which he tells us offhandedly. 
• Mashirochan literally disappeared from the show after being turned into a Trilobite Magia, never appearing again even in the "all the episodic Humagears return" episodes. I've always assumed that she was one of the few Humagears that was just straight-up destroyed, but turns out they got her up and running again. 
• It's impossible to tell without listening to the transformation jingle, but Aruto's Zero-One form in the final battle is the Realizing Hopper one, not the Rising Hopper. 
• I love how in the pan of the five Kamen Riders, everyone else has two-word readings of their transformation key. "Sting Scorpion!" "Burning Falcon!" "Shooting Wolf!" "Rushing Cheetah!", while Thouser's is the super-long "when the five horns cross, the golden soldier Thouser is born."
  
• I'm super late with Revice, I know. I've actually been enjoying the show, but thanks to that the more episodes I put off, the more I feel like I should try to do proper reviews for them. I know there's a lot of specials for Saber too but... but I'll be honest and say I don't care about it all that much.

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean S05E12 Review: Deus Ex Froggo

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, Stone Ocean [Season 5], Episode 12: Torrential Downpour Warning

So this is the final episode of the first 'season' of Stone Ocean, and... I guess they picked a pretty good spot for us to leave off. The whole episode essentially just has our main protagonist meet up with the main antagonist for the first time, and... and the dynamic between Jolyne and Pucci is always interesting to me. Parts 4 and 5 of JoJo has both revolved around our protagonist having to look out and figure out who the identity of a mysterious main villain is, but Stone Ocean puts an interesting twist to the formula by having Pucci actually meet Jolyne relatively early in the series... but Jolyne has no idea that Pucci is the mysterious user of Whitesnake that she's been looking for.

Which is why their first encounter ends up with Jolyne making up a story and begging the nice priest to let them pass, while Pucci is smart enough to realize that Jolyne has an ally around and decides to play along so as not to give himself away. Of course, with victory so close to Jolyne's grasp but the episode having just started, it's not going to be that simple. Jolyne gets shot by a guard controlled by Whitesnake once she gets to the courtyard. 

We do get the first of the many flashbacks to Part-3-era Pucci and Dio, which is interesting. It's mostly just exposition about who Pucci is, but the backstory has always been fun to me since Pucci's background is intrinsically tied to the events of Stardust Crusaders. A former lover of Dio who discussed a lot about their discussions about 'souls' and 'heaven', Pucci is kind of obsessed with the ideal that Dio promised him about reaching heaven. Admittedly this could be seen in two ways -- a retcon to Dio's motivations (who, as much as I enjoy him, is pretty much just a generic anime villain overlord) or a way to peel back and reveal his 'true' goals. In any case, Jotaro ends up being the only one privy to Dio's notes back in the era of Part 3, and Pucci wants to get them from Jotaro's disc-minds. 

After the flashback, we get the continuation of the present-day fight and... and just as the brain-controlled guard is about to kill Jolyne, we get FROGS! FROGS FROGS FROGS FROGS! In one of the hilariously most bizarre Stand abilities in JoJo yet, we get the sudden rain of not just frogs, but poison arrow frogs specifically. It's Weather Report's ability, while the narration explains about the phenomenon of unusual rains of animals -- like fishes, frogs or snakes -- but this is obviously to a far larger scale than what 'a tornado happens to pick up a swarm of frogs from a swamp and dump it in someone's garden'. 

Still, it's typical JoJo's Bizarre Adventure exaggerating a weird-but-ultimately-natural phenomenon in the real life, because all the frogs falling down on the courtyard also causes instant blistering and the burning of flesh of the brainwashed guards. This ends up being a huge phenomenon that attacks not just the guard, but also Jolyne and Pucci. Both of them are main characters and obviously survive the ordeal, but it is actually interesting to see how they get out of it. Jolyne uses her strings to make a web-dome, while Pucci -- rather hilariously -- almost got himself killed by the rain of frogs and trapped in a security checkpoint. I do think that this sequence, while also showing the main villain in danger (it's a vulnerability in a main JoJo villain we haven't seen since Kira), also shows Pucci's sadism when he ends up leaving the guard that hesitated to help him blind and writhing in pain. 

Pucci sends out Whitesnake to retrieve the Disc, but gets blindsided by Jolyne faking her death. This allows Jolyne to snatch the Star Platinum Disc and pass it over to Savage Garden -- who turns out to be a trained pigeon from the Speedwagon Foundation. We get the rather surreal scene of Whitesnake picking up a gun and trying to shoot the pigeon, which... which is a mental image that's just pretty damn hilarious. Ultimately, though, Jolyne succeeds in sending away the Disc, leaving Whitesnake to retreat and swear vengeance. 

And that's where 'season one' of Stone Ocean ends, with our heroes getting a token victory, the mysteries about the amnesiac Weather Report deepening a bit more, but our heroes being no closer to figuring out Whitesnake's true identity. It's a pretty nice way to end the season, and..... well, I'm admittedly a bit more lower in energy while writing up the review for this final episode, but I have been really enjoying this season. Still ultimately not sure about releasing it in a batch, but I guess the fact that they're not releasing the entire part all at once is a nice way to help spread out the JoJo content over a year or so. 

Random Notes:

• One of the things Pucci does is to punt a frog with a Disc within it that orders the animal to explode after 10 meters. That's some Heaven's Door-specific style of not just putting orders, but also warping reality itself. I don't really remember if Whitesnake's Disc abilities are ever that specific again. 
• The revelation that 'Savage Garden' is a pigeon was always cooler to me than it actually is. I'm not sure why. 
• WHITESNAKE WITH A HANDGUN!

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean S05E10-11 Review: Vacuum Cleaner

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, Stone Ocean [Season 5], Episodes 10-11: Operation Savage Garden (Head to the Courtyard)

This is technically a three-parter finale, but since episodes 10 and 11 are titled as a 'part 1' and 'part 2', and the Lang Rangler fight ends here, we'll cover episodes 10 and 11 together. And I do really appreciate that they decided to end the first 'season' of this Netflix release here, since this arc does give us a fair amount of things that do make it pretty suitable for an epic season finale -- the Lang Rangler fight is considerably more tense and brutal compared to the previous couple of fights; Pucci actually does something and becomes active in these episodes; and we build up the mystery around Weather Report a fair bit. 

Episode 10 starts off with more Pucci scenes, and I do really like that we're slowly peeling back the layers between our main antagonist's motivations. Sure, we can guess that he's aligned with Dio after Jotaro's whole speech before, but we get his pretty interesting motive rant where he talks about how humans are defined by their desire to go to heaven.

Meanwhile, in what's perhaps the biggest plot event since Jotaro's coma, Jolyne finally decides to call the Speedwagon Foundation from the phones in the prison, knowing full well that her unknown enemy would be tapping the conversation and this would cause a race against time to get the Star Platinum Stand disc to them. I do like that for a brief moment, the Speedwagon Foundation just denies any knowledge until someone who's clearly aware of all this Stand business shows up to pick up the phone. Speedwagon's spokesperson tell Jolyne that she needs to get to the courtyard with the disc within twenty minutes to meet someone called 'Savage Garden', which is the whole crux of the three-parter, giving us a time limit and a whole lot of tension. 

And I really do like how this scene plays out in the anime, with Emporio finally deciding to help out in a more concrete way. Emporio explains the specifics of his own Stand, which is essentially creating a 'ghost room'. Emporio is always an interesting character and part of the show to me, as essentially someone who can both deliver exposition and recapping as needed. Emporio also brings with him two allies -- Anasui leaves after this scene, but the amnesiac Weather Report and his weather-control powers ends up hanging out with Jolyne for the rest of the season finale. 

Jolyne and Weather have to run through the prison while being stalked by Lang Rangler, and it's a pretty fun, tense sequence. There's always a sense of 'what unnatural ability will this enemy have?' with most JoJo enemies, but Lang in particular feels particularly bizarre due to his design -- he has gecko fingers and would look far more at home as an X-Men enemy or something. Jolyne and Weather have to get to the courtyard, and in this regard the anime once more improves upon the manga by showing us shots of the prison interior and showing us the routes that Jolyne and Weather have to take. Another pretty neat sequence of showing the bribing-culture within the prison as well, which leads almost immediately to Jolyne discovering that Lang's ability, Jumpin' Jack Flash, has to do with creating zero-gravity fields. While Jolyne struggles, Lang manages to steal the Star Platinum Disc. 

Jolyne manages to contact Weather Report, who faces off against Lang and his Stand. I do also really like the design of Jumpin' Jack Flash and its spinning centrifugal-force wrist cannons that launch random debris. Weather Report shows off his own weird abilities, which is using clouds and atmospheric layers as shields... and using the friction to set Lang's arm on fire. Lang manages to escape by using his projectiles to push himself away, but then Weather helps to propel Jolyne by using his powers to create gusts of wind. Episode 10 ends at this point, as our two heroes arrive in the large laundry room -- what's essentially a boss fight arena. 

And a 'boss fight', I think, is a pretty apt description of episode 11. We start off with the guards and Father Pucci realizing that there's an alarm being activated somewhere in the prison. Again, it's such an interesting thing to have the audience know the identity of the main villain while the heroes in-universe are blissfully unaware. 

Also, in typical bizarre JoJo fashion, we get an intermezzo to the zero-gravity Stand fight by having Jolyne want to pee (zero-gravity apparently does that to you) and Weather Report just insensitively offers a cloud for her to piss in. Of course, this leads to the two of them realizing about the dangers of depressurization, which further adds another sense of urgency to the fight. None of these really stand up towards actual rules of physics if you really dissect it, but I do like the idea that the writer of the manga decided to choreograph the whole fight after maybe watching a documentary of zero-gravity and astronauts in space or something. 

I do really like the setup of the fight, though, with our heroes being mostly helpless while Lang Rangler keeps shooting projectiles at them from somewhere in the room. Weather Report eventually gets the idea to cover himself and Jolyne with cloud-astronaut suits in order to keep the air around them from getting sucked out by Jumpin' Jack Flash. Jolyne also figures out that the zero gravity has a radius around her body. Again, the tension of them having a finite amount of air to work with while Lang Rangler just snipes at them from afar is pretty well-done. 

Lang also abuses the bizarre pressures created by the zero gravity field, like causing a barrel to explode, and later a bunch of rats. The exploding rats do end up being an interesting 'preview' of what would happen to living things in complete vacuum, in addition to having their blood cover Jolyne's 'astronaut suit' visor.. Jolyne gets to be heroic as well, sacrificing her own air in order to propel herself around and save Weather. Again, most of the episode is just either exposition about Jumpin' Jack Flash's ability or actual action scenes, but it's all paced very well.

Lang Rangler ends up getting so hyped-up about his own ability that he resolves to hunt down Whitesnake and kill him too... before, of course, the revelation that Jolyne has used her strings and tied them onto Lang's nuts-and-bolts ammunition. With an anchor to Lang, Jolyne pulls him inside the zero-gravity sphere, trying to force Lang to cancel his vacuum. Lang tries to use a makeshift bomb (specifically, manganese dioxide in a bottle of peroxide solution, creating an explosive oxygen reaction in a vacuum... the author really did his research) and rips Jolyne's suit apart... but then it's Weather Report's turn for sacrifice because he moves his own clouds to protect Jolyne. With Jolyne conscious and holding Lang in place, the villain's forced to cancel his vacuum... and gets pummeled to shit by Jolyne. 

The episode ends with a bit of a setup for the final episode. Weather Report talks about the layout of the courtyard, and Jolyne sets up a plan to get past the guards... but, shockingly, it's Father Pucci that's on the other side of the door waiting for them.  

Overall, it's a pretty tense pair of episodes! I've never really thought all that much about the Lang Rangler fight before, but it looks so much cooler in animated fashion. There's a neat theme of all the good guys being willing to sacrifice themselves for their allies, which is nice, and I do like the buildup to the eventual meeting with Pucci. Again, I wasn't super sure about the Netflix format when I first saw the announcement, but having it build up to this season finale and end here is a pretty good move by the showrunners. 

Random Notes:

• Weather Report's name and Stand draws from the jazz band Weather Report; Lang Rangler is named after the fashion designer Helmut Land and the clothing brand Wrangler; Jumpin' Jack Flash is named after the Rolling Stones song of the same name. Savage Garden is named after on the Australian band of the same name. Emporio's Stand, Burning Down the House, is named after a song by Talking Heads. 
• Does Lang Rangler having gecko fingers something that Jumpin' Jack Flash grants him? Or is he just part of the bizarre mutant-humanity people that so many random minor characters in Stone Ocean come from?
• The anime adds a lot of shots of the map of the prison to show us how Jolyne plans to go through the prison, and I appreciate that. 
• Unlike the manga's first appearance for Anasui (where he's depicted as a woman), we get his 'proper' series design for his first appearance. 
• I've always thought that Jolyne bribing the random fat prisoner to get to the phone felt like filler, but I guess it's to show that she's growing to learn how to survive in the society of the prison. 
• I genuinely wonder at what point in Araki's writing that he decided to go from 'zero gravity powers' to 'gecko-man that can jump from wall to wall'...
• Jolyne using the string to make a string telephone is probably one of the more ridiculous things that Stone Free does. Is it anywhere as out-of-nowhere as Star Finger, though?

One Piece Anime: Wano Arc, Episodes 991-995

Yet another shorter batch of episodes. I'm running out of things to say on this opening paragraph. Consider that I write a typical "this isn't a review, just my reaction" disclaimer. Yamato shows up here! 

Episode 991:

• Perospero's giant candy slug is orange. I'm not sure what I expected, but orange is sure a pretty gross colour to give him. 
• Usopp and Chopper very nearly got 'Life or Treat'ed until Prometheus calls Big Mom away and distracts her with Nami and Zeus's presence. I actually don't remember this big from the manga, but it does add a fair bit of tension to the scene. 
• We also get a far more explicit showcase of Usopp and Chopper reacting to the Brachio-tank transforming to the Franky Shogun's bottom half. Remember how everyone was like 'Big Mom turned it into a Homie!' back when this chapter is released?
  
• I do really like that scene with Big Mom making yokai homies a lot. 
• Robin totally breaks the neck of that one random goon that tries to flirt with her. 
• They're most definitely in the manga, but the anime gives the giant stag beetle Gifter and his buddies actual lines and a bit more screentime. I appreciate it. The mantis lady actually tried to get Zoro to join them!
• The anime is also a bit more explicit with Yamato having a flashback to her fight against Ace when she tanks Luffy's Red Hawk. 

Episode 992:

• Robin and Jinbe pretending to be Beasts Pirates and going 'yo, yo' while affecting a bad accent is actually much funnier with voice-acting. 
• I didn't really notice it disrupting the flow of the story, but over the past couple of episodes they did use the Polar Tang transporting the samurai while dodging underwater whirlpools as convenient padding. A bit more noticeable is Nekomamushi and Izo's arrival, which felt a bit too long. 
• Bao Huang is adorable. 
• God dang, that shot with Kaidou and his three lieutenants overshadowing Orochi looks great all shadowed with Queen's club lights and shit. 
• I'm actually surprised they didn't add a shot of Yamato in the Oden flashback scenes, honestly. 

Episode 993:

• As expected, the poorly-paced (i.e. barely-there) Akazaya Nine fight with Kanjurou is extended in the anime, and while I don't expect this to take up gigantic chunks of time, I do appreciate that we get the samurai fighting some headless ink horsemen or Kawamatsu doing a kappa-style attack and stuff.
• No one recapped the fact that Kanjurou is a traitor to Izo and Nekomamushi, but I guess Kanjurou's evil monologue allows them to jump to the right conclusion almost immediately. 
• Kanjurou doing an evil monologue and mocking Kiku's little attempt at reconciliation happens basically how you'd expect it to -- with a pretty generic set of dialogue -- but, again, it's really nice to see it happen as opposed to having it mostly offscreened. 
• That's a pretty cool entrance by Big Mom, with the lightning and the homie army just as Kaidou is giving his big speech. The next episode's opening extends even more on this, shooting Big Mom and giving her this glowing yellow filter. 

Episode 994:

• Yeah, Orochi being decapitated mid-rant is even more cathartic with voice-acting and pretty great animation. Again, another great way of wink-winking towards the censors since there's barely any blood, just a huge slash. 
• Yeah, Kiku-vs-Kanjurou, while it's just the two of them rehashing tricks we've seen them do before, is also really so much more impactful when it's given the time to breathe. It also overall makes them feel a bit more fleshed out since they're doing their signature moves a couple more times more often. 
• Kanjurou also goes back and forth between mocking Kiku for believing in his acting and actually doing the 'oh wait forgive me I actually do like you guys' act a couple of times. We even get to see pompadour Kanjurou from the flashbacks! Again, it's nothing that means all that much in the grand scheme of things, but it gives the Kiku moment later on in the arc a lot more impact since we actually see her struggle a fair bit with accepting Kanjurou as a true villain. 
• A pretty cool final slash, too, with Kiku 'cutting down her heart' represented by a younger version of her chasing after Kanjurou. 
• That's actually a cool shot of Kanjurou falling down on an imagined stage, as well as the other Scabbards gathering around Kanjurou's 'corpse'. It's always been one of the weaker storytelling beats in the manga version how this fight is glossed over so quickly. 
• Yamato's eyes going from the cool opening-glowing yellow to a face-fault is funny. 

Episode 995:

• Always liked the little moment of Old Man Hyo getting pissed off that Orochi's subordinates so casually discard their loyalty to their master and almost immediately join up with Kaidou.
• This episode, unlike the previous episode, just faithfully adapts the Momonosuke-being-defiant scene and the Sunacchi scenes very faithfully... but those two are two of the stronger moments in the Wano arc, so having those adapted well most certainly is a pleasant treat. 
• "We're not the ones who'll start the great battle." Even Luffy understands the rule of drama!
• Holy fucking shit, though, that black-and-white scene of the Scabbards rushing towards Kaido with only red as the highlights of the sparks left by their swords or the fury in their eyes... it's also the most explicit we've seen blood in this arc, with the remnants of Denjirou and Kin'emon's sword slashes and Izo's bullets being unmistakably the blood of his victims.... and, of course, for the huge 'Scabbards make Kaidou bleed' moment. 
• Jack literally just got himself bitch-slapped to the ground by Nekomamushi. This arc isn't kind on the poor dude. 
• All this talk about Ace in this arc and I've never quite realized the parallels of both Ace and Momonosuke doing something monumentally stupid just to defend the pride of someone precious to them. 
• The animation studio really likes Yamato, huh? Or maybe it's just her colour scheme. But I do feel like they put in a bit more effort into her facial closeups. 
• We get an extra scene of Usopp and Chopper just trying to tip-toe around the sleeping Numbers in the half-Franky-Shogun. 
• Also pretty important for pacing reasons is Marco actually meeting and clashing with Perospero in the ocean. For something that's otherwise pretty meaningless, they gave the huge phoenix-brand explosion some pretty great animation. Perospero's distaste for the alliance with Kaido is also more explicitly stated in a motive rant on his part. 

One Piece 1042-1043 Review: He Awakens

One Piece, Chapter 1042-1043

I was so glad I wasn't spoiled for either 1042 or 1043 prior to me reading the chapter, let's just put it that way. I'm genuinely not sure when was the last time I was so hyped week-to-week, cliffhanger-to-cliffhanger for this manga. I guess Reverie?

Chapter 1042: The Victor Needs no Epithet

This chapter starts off with a bit of a deceptively 'oh god this again' eye-roll. Remember when Drake got beaten off-screen? And then Izo and Maha had a mutual defeat off-screen? And now Drake's big moment, stabbing Bowler Hat McMask also happens mostly offscreen. It really does seem to be leading to another Izo/Maha mutual defeat, with Drake shishkebabing Bowler Hat from behind, but getting taken down by a Shigan in the process.

We cut to Luffy fighting Kaido and it's pretty cool action scenes going on, with Luffy's Hydra attack pummeling Kaido from all over. As if a hint to what's to come in 1043, Kaido's monologue even notes that altering the trajectory of attacks is impossible for the nature of rubber... something that could have been a throwaway nod to how Luffy's Gear Fourth Snakeman is super-advanced, or, well... foreshadowing to the fact that Luffy isn't actually rubber. I love it. I love that this comment is so suspicious but it could also just as likely be a red herring. 

We also get the absolutely glorious panel of mid-pummelled Kaido going all "just staaaahp ♥" which the manga identifies as his 'drunken beggar' phase. God I love this manga's comedy. 

We also get a very brief showcase of Kaido essentially copying Snakeman's bouncing serpentine blows with his 'thieving drunk' phase, which Kaido also identifies as his own ability of using Observation Haki to see the future. I mean, Luffy can't complain, considering he also 'stole' the technique from Katakuri during his fight. I'm never that big on trying to power-scale, but little nods to these sorts of 'oh yeah, these other super-powerful characters also have access to other super-powerful abilities'. 

There's a pretty cool action scene of Kaido biting Luffy, coiling up, spitting him out and then Boro-Breathing him almost all the way through Onigashima. I really don't have much to say about this whole sequence other than holy shit it's so cool. Luffy goes into Boundman and rockets back up, continuing to emphasize that this is his final Gear Fourth. We get an honestly pretty typical 'final clash' as Luffy gives a declaration about how the people of Wano need to be free, Kaido also talks about his own worldview about essentially a survival-of-the-fittest mentality... it's all building up to a climax, right?

I also really like the lines exchanged here. Kaido mocking how the losers are just losers who use 'glory in death' as an excuse for their defeat -- which is a bit of a running theme in this final battle -- before we get Luffy unleashing an Over-Kong Gun while Kaido uses a Thunder Bellow Bagua. It's just slightly different versions of moves we've seen before but the art does look pretty cool! We get very cool shots of the two warriors, locked in a deadly dance, and we're just in to it, you know? This is what we read shonen battle manga for...

And then McBowlerHat shows up. 

He grabs Luffy's shoulder -- he doesn't even try to attack the two monsters -- and that slows Luffy's swing enough for Kaidou's Thunder Bagua to ram straight onto Luffy's face and knock him the fuck out. An amazing shot of the despair and confusion on poor Kaido's face in the last page as he flashes back to his old interrupted fight with Oden in the past, and how this fight with Luffy, the one combatant he respects as an equal after so long... getting defeated after a dishonourable interruption. 

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Chapter 1043: Let's Face Death Together!! 

1043's first page gives us another amazing shot of Kaido's despairing face, and... and we're just making sure that, no, this isn't a 'Luffy falls off Onigashima but basically recovers after eating Caribou's buffet' moment. Luffy's actually knocked out. His eyes are whited out. 

Just to hammer it in even further, he just poofs into the air like a deflated balloon. Momonosuke even goes "I can't hear his voice anymore!"

And just to hammer it even further, we get the narrator boxes declaring that the winner of the battle as Kaido. It's been a stylistic choice of using the narrator announcing the winner and loser in this arc, and without exception it's been one of the good guys that won.

and you know what? I actually really like this surprise plot twist. I've never been on the camp of the 'raid failing' or whatever, but I have been kind of sighing and slightly disappointed that every single fight is going on the side of the good guys -- particularly with how none of the Scabbards other than maybe Ashura Doji seems to have been killed. I think I was ready for CP0 and the World Government to pull a Blackbeard or Kuma and just screwing over the good guys at the end of the arc, y'know? After Kaido and Big Mom and King and Queen and the rest are defeated?

But no. This one is a nice plot twist. Again, not a huge power-scaler, but with how unstoppable Kaido had been portrayed as in the previous chapter, as well as the damage Luffy himself has taken all throughout the Wano arc, I actually wouldn't like it as much if Luffy just beats Kaido with just a huge rubber punch without at least some sort of good explanation of awakening or conqueror's haki or some sort of new form or a team-up with the others. Admittedly, CP0 interrupting the fight the way Oden/Kaido was interrupted wasn't high on my list of possible plot twists, but I actually really like it. 

Oh yeah, Kaido glares at Bowler Hat Dude and... and I've been kind of mocking how One Piece really could stand to kill its characters more. Is that why we don't have a name for Bowler Hat Dude? So the audience won't feel any sort of attachment to him, and when he does his cool hat tip and Kaido lightning-bashes him to death, we would believe his death?

Kaido straight-up just swirls down into the fortress in his full, imposing dragon form and starts demanding for Momonosuke's surrender. I absolutely love that the manga takes time to show the change in morale among the ground troops. Sure, none of the actual people that matter on Kaido's side is still up, but seeing the random Beast Pirates goons all cheering, while Kid and Law and Chopper get all demoralized and stuff... that's very effective. 

Nami demonstrates that she probably has the biggest balls among any cast-member in this manga, too, because she immediately rants and stands up to Kaido, telling him to basically fuck off with his lies about Luffy dying. Nami doesn't exactly get a proper fight in this arc, but I love how between her earlier confrontation with Ulti (a very understated moment) and this one, she just refuses to back down. Motherfucking Kaido even Boro Breaths Nami and she would've been vaporized if Marco didn't show up and create a fire shield. Bad ass!

Kaido spends a couple of pages delivering a bad guy speech, talking about how he's going to enslave all of Wano and force them to work. He talks about how this is the fate of the defeated and... and I really am curious about Kaido's flashback now to see just why he places so much emphasis in strength. 

We get a pretty great conversation and argument between Momonosuke and Yamato again -- an interesting contrast to Usopp's argument with Kin'emon earlier in the arc, too. Momonosuke is ready to surrender, knowing that the battle is hopeless... but Yamato insists that their 'survival' in this case is essentially a fate equitable to death, and gives a pretty cool speech that gives the chapter its title.

...and then Zunesha starts to speak. He talks about the 'drums of liberation', how 'he is here' after 800 years, as we cut back and forth between Zunesha and Luffy's body... and then Zunesha name-drops JOY BOY. As Luffy's fainted face turns into that Clan of D grin... while he melts upwards?

WHAT?

I love this. Such an amazing cliffhanger. I have no idea what's going on -- I expected Luffy to get back up, of course. I didn't expect him to die, of course. This is One Piece, this arc will most definitely end with Kaido defeated and Wano free. But I expected just... just an awakening, y'know? Or maybe Luffy mastering Conqueror's Haki. Or Yamato or Momonosuke or Zunesha doing something... but no. Joy Boy! What does it mean? Some sort of possession? Is Joy Boy the true identity of the Gomu Gomu no Mi, whatever the hell that entails? Is this just Luffy realizing the true nature of his fruit? Is Zunesha mistaking Luffy for Joy Boy? How does this relate to the Will of D? Is this why Kaido has been seeking death, because Joy Boy is related somehow to death? Is the reaper with Zoro connected to this? Bink's Sake lyrics! Sun God Mika! Sap conspiracies! Devil possessions! Wisdom King!

MASS HYSTERIA! God, I love this manga. 

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Random Notes:

• I guess we can all collectively agree that Luffy's fruit is going to be awakened with all the hints we're having, and the mystery fruit that the Gorosei are talking about, right? All the hints throughout this arc with have really pointed there, right? Now the question is, what is the true form of the Gomu Gomu no Mi?
• The biggest 'theory' people seem to like seem to be it being some sort of Resin or Amber or Sap-based fruit of some sort, which... which I would actually like, not going to lie. It expands on the capabilities of the rubber fruit but also doesn't deviate too much from it since those are the 'original' form of rubber.
• WE STILL DON'T HAVE A NAME FOR BOWLER HAT DUDE. 
• The cover story is just Oven and Brulee taking the book with the Vinsmokes in it to Whole Cake Island. Eh, I guess. 
• I really love the short scene of Luffy almost deflating after being hit by the Thunder-Bellow Bagua and having to physically close his mouth to keep the air from leaving him. 
• I've always thought that Luffy was going to 1v1 and defeat Kaido this time around, maybe with a new Gear Fifth or Awakening form (or if those are the same thing) but I absolutely love that we get a twist here. I absolutely love that there's a complication and that there's no 'oh, third time's the charm right boys?' victory without any explanation.  
• Frilly-neck McMask the CP0 guy who's just hanging out in the Go board room has a short moment of mourning Bowler Hat Dude, but... but I looked at that scene and I feel like the thought going through his head is probably 'wow, shit, thank god I volunteered to stay behind and take calls'. 
• Jean Bart does something! Jean fucking Bart! He and a random unnamed Kid Pirate goon jumps in to protect Law and Kid from the Beast Pirates goons. 
• Some people have pointed out that the 'drums of liberation' is Luffy's heart starting back up, in the similar way that Enel's Goro Goro no Mi did a self-defibrillation during the Skypiea arc. I like that! 

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean S05E09 Review: Take Me Out To The Ball Game

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, Stone Ocean [Season 5], Episode 9: Marilyn Manson, the Debt Collector

This arc feels a bit more like a much-needed padding with a villain-of-the-week, and after the relatively rapid or progression-filled pacing that Stone Ocean has, I did feel like a lower-stakes fight like this is pretty needed at this stage before we get to what's essentially a three-parter season finale. 

Still, in a pretty neat case of Stone Ocean's more tight writing, Miraschon is involved a bit more with Father Pucci. I've always found it kind of interesting that Pucci was introduced to the audience without some huge revelation to the in-universe characters... although I suppose we've already had a huge 'the audience discovers the identity of the mystery Big Bad alongside the protagonist' with Diavolo last part. We get to see how Father Pucci essentially gets minions to fight Jolyne and company. It's kind of sinister, in a way, that Pucci basically preys on the prisoners that are looking to him for (admittedly selfish) aid, and shoves the Stand Discs into them to make them into his minions. 

(All the while, of course, Pucci does a typical "JoJo character does weird JoJo things" with cherry stems and pits.)

The actual fight against Miraschon and her stand Marilyn Manson is a pretty standard once-a-part thing we have in JoJo -- in Part IV, it's the super-deadly janken game. In Part III, we've got the d'Arby brothers and their own respective bets and games. In this case, Miraschon's Stand does work into the whole 'money is a very important resource' theme that we've been seeing throughout Green Dolphin Prison... and I've always found that the fact that Marilyn Manson can rip out people's organs based on their black market value as payment for their bet is pretty neat black comedy. 

The actual game itself is playing catch-ball for money, and Marilyn Manson essentially acts as a judge of knowing when someone cheats or not, which it displays when Ermes uses Kiss to cheat once and retrieve the ball. This little problem is also compounded by the fact that the time for them playing the game ends up running out, and both Jolyne and Miraschon ends up having to bribe guards and run around elevators in order to continue the game. Not something that we haven't seen before in JoJo, and the way that Jolyne wins via rules-lawyering (the guard counts as someone she can play catch with) isn't particularly mind-blowing, but it's ultimately pretty fun stuff.

We also get one of Jolyne's more badass ass-kicking lines, playing catch one thousand times with an ORA ORA ORA barrage with that ball and Miraschon's face. 

This arc also essentially serves to introduce Foo Fighters as a part of the primary cast of Stone Ocean, forming the weirdo in the dynamic between her, Jolyne and Ermes particularly with how they're still struggling to fit into human society and their obsession with drinking water from rather unconventional sources. We don't learn anything particularly groundbreaking about F.F., but it's neat to see them integrating bit by bit. Overall, a pretty well-done fight. 

Random Notes:

• Marilyn Manson is named after the heavy metal artist of the same name. Miraschon is named after the fashion band Mila Schön.
• The English Netflix subtitles turns Marilyn Manson into "Mary Lynn Manson" and that's kind of genius.
• The money within Ermes's breast implants also gets ripped out by Marilyn Manson, a neat little continuity callback. 
• The anime makes Jolyne's 1000-ball-fetch with Miraschon's face a lot more vengeful -- in the manga, Jolyne actually has to do the fetch with Mirashcon in order to satisfy Marilyn Manson's requirements and get it to disappear.