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This is MJ. I'm an author, I'm an artist, I'm an analyzer. You can find all my work at MJMunoz.com.

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Welcome to Going Ultra. This time I'm talking about Ultraman Z, Ultraman Zet, the dub, episode 21, actually.

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And I'll start off with the credits. The title of the episode is D4.

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It was originally aired on November 21, 2020. That's a while ago.

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The director is Masayoshi Takasue, and the screenplay was written by Satoshi Suzuki.

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So, I'm really... Man... Cydrix. Cydrix, right? That's part of your username.

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I'm really curious as to what you're going to say and what the general consensus in the Ultra fandom is about this.

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Because while I think Z is a great... I think Z is one of the greatest choku I've ever seen.

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I've watched, I don't know, 12 to 15, Kamen Rider, Heisei, mostly Nioh, or I guess 2nd Gen Heisei, or whatever, post-double.

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Double and beyond. Double and beyond to 01. I refused to watch Zioh, because it looked like it was going to be dumb.

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I watched and absolutely adored Kiva. I've seen Gokaijer and Go... Oh, no, hold on. What was the next one?

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Go Busters? Oh, go Busters. A great show. I watched most of Kyoryu-Jorai. I dropped off at about, like, episode 40, because I just didn't like it anymore.

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And I watched all of the space one, Kyuranger. I really liked that one a lot.

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And I don't know what else, as far as Super Sentai cred I have. I haven't watched any show of Super Sentai. I've watched all of Kamen Rider Black.

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Most of... Not most of, like the first 40 or so episodes of the original 1971 Kamen Rider, which is top tier, absolutely top tier.

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And anyway, so just to give you some of my choku cred. I... And also, see, I don't want to be political or too personal, but I'm just going to show it a little bit.

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Like, I believe that people should... I believe people have the right to defend themselves, and I believe people have the right to, like, you know, have powerful defense for themselves.

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So, this moral question of the D4 that's raised in this episode is interesting. And, like, I get that there's outside manipulation going on, and I can appreciate that.

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But I kind of don't understand what Haruki's issue, what Yoko's issue, what Yuka's issue, what Hibikura's issue is with the D4.

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Like, it would almost make more sense to me if they were cautiously in support of it, because we had Bako earlier questioning whether or not they should have the power of King Joe.

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And he might have even kind of brought up, hey, should we be using this Nerongo Horn... I hope I'm saying that right.

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The Nerongo Horn to, like, supercharge, super speed, like, you know, fast charge Windom and, like, utilize all this power.

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Like, he might have said a little something about that, but then when they wanted him to build King Joe or modify it to be used as, you know, storage custody King Joe, he was a little dubious about that.

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But after seeing it operate, he was happy with it. Then, like, the morality of being, you know, lethal protectors, lethal destroyers who, you know, kill Kaiju was brought up with Haruki and the Red King that he killed.

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And, like, it reminding him of his dad and how his dad was killed and, you know, saving people from the Kaiju and stuff.

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And it's, you know, I do appreciate the questioning of power and the use of power and, you know, Yoko talks about how she wants to take on the burden of taking a life because she believes morally that, you know, defending people's lives is worth having the scars and suffering with the consequences of having taken a life.

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And that's, you know, noble and beautiful and Haruki comes to that. He hears that, but then he comes to that assessment himself and believes in that as well.

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And seeing that growth and that transformation in him and that struggle is really good and beautiful and I love it.

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However, none of that really causes this to make sense that they would immediately be against the D4. Yes, the D4 is extremely destructive.

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Yes, the dimension breaking, you know, technology is scary and it should give them pause potentially, but the idea of having this weapon to use in an extreme circumstance doesn't really seem to me like something that they should oppose outright.

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And I think I've made the case that I'm not like, I don't know, out to lunch on this one. I'm saying caution is good and they should definitely be careful and there needs to be a balance there.

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And I guess I just wish, you know, the crater in the ground, like that's not the two kilometer diameter crater.

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It's not really sufficient for me to say we cannot use this weapon because I don't know if that was the weapon at full blast. I don't know if you can turn it down. I don't know if it's that was like a wide dispersal versus a directional one.

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I mean, there's been lots of unknowns that they didn't really clarify or didn't really explore or ask about. So I'm a little dubious as to why it's an immediate no. And, you know, is the concept of using a weapon that messes with dimensions probably not a good idea?

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Yeah, probably not. But I mean, I don't know that, you know, the the Zestium ray or Zestium beam is any healthier or more normal of a thing to use. And no one else knows that either.

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And nobody's measured it to like assess it for secondary negative effects. They're just assuming that it's OK.

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And anyway, I just kind of I kind of find that curious. I'm going to move on from that because I spent a lot more time talking about that than I thought I would.

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So I'll go ahead and say this, that it's interesting the amount of conflict that it brings in and that Maya Yuki, I believe, is her name, the, you know, Gaffje lady who comes in. I know Global Allied Forces Japan.

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I'm not being weird about it. She first of all, she's a very dislikeable person, very unlikeable.

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So good job on the original actresses performance. And I think good job on the voice actress, too, because she captures a kind of like smug, arrogant, like, I don't know, some sort of aspect that just makes her very unlikable.

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So good job. Good job both of you. Anyway, but like the way she comes in and takes over is obviously super aggressive.

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And that's a good reason for things to be suspicious and for them to be concerned about what they're going to do.

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And maybe if they were being like more secretive about the weapon, I could see automatically them being, you know, real dubious.

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But they're being pretty upfront about the fact that they want to use this new special weapon. And anyway, that drawing the iron suspicion of everybody again, doesn't work for me.

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But I thought it was super interesting that Bako, like, threw hands at this woman. He grabs her by her armor that she's wearing, like her flak jacket thing.

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What if your Sim is wrong? And like, he looked like, was he going to slap her? Like, what are you doing, Bako?

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I'm just going to make the joke because, you know, we're all adults here, right? And kids, this is a joke if you're any kids listening.

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Of course, I don't, again, because of my beliefs, I don't believe you should put hands on anybody unless it's absolutely necessary.

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And by absolutely necessary, I mean like, you know, to protect your life or the life of somebody else.

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But, you know, Bako, where did you learn to hit a woman like that? It's just something I picked up a long way.

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That's funny, because it's a joke. Anyway, so yeah, that's all kind of interesting.

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So it's like really, you know, getting to a high tension and things are really ratcheting up.

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And I just, I find it curious. And we had that moment in the hallway where the commander guy passes by the, you know, Celebro in his new form.

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I'm almost surprised that Celebro's not in Maya Yuki, right? Maya Yuki? I'm pretty sure.

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I'm really surprised that he's not in her, because like she would be a very logical person for him to be in, especially if he's got plans to like do the most harm.

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Although, I mean, Ebikura was, no, not Ebikura, Kaburagi was like a pretty low tier guy that he was able to use to mess with.

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So maybe the idea of being able to move in the shadows is enough for him. I don't know.

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But I would think like with, I don't know, with all the moves that she's making, it's almost surprising that she doesn't have Celebro in her, I guess you could say.

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So that's pretty interesting.

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Alright, so I'm going to try to wrap this up real quick.

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Let's see. I have a interesting idea of what to do with the rest of this episode.

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And I'm going to be going to be doing a running commentary on it.

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So let's see how this works out. This is the first time I've ever tried to do this sort of thing.

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So let's see. In a couple seconds, I'm going to skip an ad and then I will keep going.

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So you let me know what you think about this different format. I've already watched the episode once.

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I was going through a second time so I could get my notes made for it.

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And it just struck me that this could be a cool way to go about it.

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So anyway, but yeah, that, oh man, that Kaiju that comes along, the Kelvin that Ebikura is used to or knows of, I thought that was a fun detail.

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It's always interesting when things kind of slip for him.

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And anyway, that monster's got a real awesome design.

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The fact that it keeps reproducing is interesting.

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Oh, something about, one of the concerns that they raised was that the pedanium of King Joe might not be able to handle the D4 Ray.

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Like using the D4 weapon might destroy King Joe. That's a concern that they have.

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Even if it's pedonium, we don't know that it will be able to withstand whatever.

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So is pedonium some sort of metal from Ultraman that I don't know about? Probably.

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And like Chrome Digizoid from Digimon.

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So I guess that would make sense. And that's kind of a cool idea that there's this special metal.

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And you know, when they talked about pedonium, I don't know, pedonium fist, pedonium missiles and all that stuff,

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I didn't really know what they were talking about. I assumed it was something in the world building and in the lore that I didn't know.

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And you know, I just accepted it. So, you know, like you do.

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So I thought that was pretty neat little detail.

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And I'm pretty sure that's what it is, you know, by the hints given in this episode.

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So again, I like that.

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So yeah, this Kelpman thing being attracted to power and Hibikura saying the line, you know, power attracts power.

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That's interesting. But what's the alternative to not have power and then be taken over, be killed, be destroyed?

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Like there I can understand.

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Like if it was more that the dimensional rift attracted them, that would make sense to me.

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But just the concept and the raw idea of power attracts power.

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If you apply that broad spectrum to everything, then like why didn't King Joe summon Kelpman?

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Why didn't Windom summon Kelpman?

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Like it's a little bit of a logical inconsistency. If it was something different, like if it was Malice that summoned them,

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or if it was, I don't know what, just like something different than just raw power, it would make sense.

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Maybe it's the D4 specifically has, like I said, some sort of dimension thing like that's related to Yapool that makes sense that Kelpman would be attracted to it.

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I would prefer that. But that's not what the case was.

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So I just I have a little bit of a quip with that. I mean, this isn't an all complaints episode.

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It's just kind of a back and forth analyzing stuff as it's coming to mind.

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And there's some inconsistencies that don't quite make sense or things that I'm just not aware of, maybe that make it a little bit weaker,

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even though in its presentation, I appreciate it. I think it's really cool.

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Speaking of something that's really cool and the presentation of it is really awesome.

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Zet in space with Belly Rock being like a, you know, giant purple flowing or glowing laser sword that's like, you know, twice or three times the length of Zet.

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So he can defeat that Kelbom mother out in space is awesome and the colossal scale of that Kelbom mother mothership thing is freaky.

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And those meteorites that are coming down, I guess that means that those are actually her eggs that she's shooting down at Earth.

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And if she's so powerful, I don't even know what she needs. What is she doing?

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Is she going to eat the the D4 Ray or what? I don't know.

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Anyway, him fighting her in space looks absolutely awesome. And I absolutely love it.

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And, you know, I really like, though, that while they're raising these concerns over the D4 Ray and its level of power,

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that Zet himself says, hey, it might be good for humans to have this kind of power because then they can defend Earth without me or without us.

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And that's not a bad thing necessarily. And that people have to be the Earthlings need to decide whether or not they use this power.

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And I found that really fascinating and really like mature and evolved and, you know, very wise of him.

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And I really appreciate that. And I appreciate that while the humans and Hevikar are all freaking out about the D4 Ray,

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that he offers this more nuanced position on it because he has he's coming from such a different perspective.

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And he wields so much power. And, you know, I I would argue that his power rivals that of the D4,

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especially with how he neutralizes the hole in space by dumping a Zestium Ray into it.

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So, I mean, does Ultraman Zet have power that is similar to or matches the D4 Ray?

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And if so, would he have attracted Kalbham all on his own? I don't know. It's kind of confusing.

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And, you know, I appreciate things being written vaguely so that they can be modified and, you know,

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utilized in the best, most flexible way possible for the creative team.

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But at the same time, when certain things don't make sense, it just makes it harder to, I don't know, accept harder to see what you're doing.

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And it muddles the point that you're making. And I think that is a bad thing because, well, you don't want your point muddled.

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You want it to be absolutely as clear as possible. So with that, I think I'm going to go ahead and wrap this up.

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I don't really have much more else to say except for I'm so excited for this, you know, wrap up of the show, where it's going.

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It's going really interesting places. And I think it has something really interesting to say.

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And that's, you know, part of what I appreciate, appreciate from it so much.

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Although, you know, they did the Shining Fingers before.

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And I believe Zet has held Yoko in a mecha once already.

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And I might have brought up that it reminded me of G Gundam there.

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But definitely there is that moment in G Gundam towards the end when spoilers happen and Doumun holds Reign inside of another mech.

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They're both in Gundams and he holds her in one. And it reminded me of that.

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And I really like the subtle, like, I mean, I know it's because he's her friend and they like to care about each other.

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But the little subtle romantic things between Yoko and Haruki really make me happy and are a lot of fun for me to see, especially when they have to be G Gundam references.

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Oh, and I can't believe that they kicked out the standard storage people, that they fired them.

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I mean, I guess it does make sense, but it's also kind of crazy and it's a very bold move I wouldn't have expected necessarily.

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So anyway, this is a good show. It's very exciting.

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Even when I'm having issues with it, I'm still thoroughly entertained and am happy with how it continues to be interesting and provocative and cool all at the same time.

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So anyway, with that, this is MJ hoping that you would be well and I am signing out for now and I ask that you look forward to the next one.

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I hope you enjoyed that. Go to MJMunoz.com to leave any questions, comments or other feedback you might have.

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There you can find all of my analysis, art and fiction.

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I cover books, tokusatsu, comic books, anime and more.

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Look around, you're sure to find something else that you'll enjoy as well.

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