Kamen Rider Z's episode 18 isn't the best episode
of the series so far, but it is the episode that
proves that Yuu Takahashi is one of the best
Kamen Rider writers that they've ever had. He
keeps coming back. That's one proof that he's
excellent. Another proof is that this show is
doing everything that it's doing. It's simultaneously
creating, in episodes 17 and 18, a jumping -on
point for new viewers. A great catch -up point,
you could say. Everything that happens before
still matters. The context still matters. And
it makes the experience richer for viewers like
me who have been following along for the whole
show. However, it still is a great place to start
because you know what Baku's about. You know
what Zets does. You know who his rival is and
some of the conflict that they have. And then
you very quickly learn about the... impurity
of code and how code is an organization who's
compromised you know about this change up in
the leadership and I mean going from zero to
three sounds weird but you know also accurate
and you get to see all this stuff happen in such
a short time frame and it's really impressive
to see the richness and the depth of the storytelling
that's being done here because you can just have
started watching this and you get what's going
on. You get the conflict, at least enough of
a handle on it to be satisfied and to be intrigued
and be drawn in. And then for people like me
who've been watching all along, even better,
you get this really rich experience where things
are changing. You have this Kureha coming in
who, uh, is, turns out, a veteran tokusatsu actress.
She played the, uh, Papillion from, oh, King
Oger. That's what it is. She was the butterfly
lady from King Oger, um, which I didn't really
recognize her, but then I just remembered right
now that her face is almost always covered, like,
with the hair, half of her face is covered. So,
how would you have known what she looks like?
But, um, anyway, you have this new lady coming
in, and she, comes with a very strong presence.
She has a very dynamic vibe to her. Nausicaa
is interesting because I like her as a character,
but the actress's portrayal of her, and I think
just the portrayal of the character, she's like
very subdued, very flat, very monotone almost.
She has these little moments where she gets upset
and she kind of panics and, you know, reacts
violently to things, including... kicking, uh,
Fujimi and doing other acts of, uh, violence
like that little, you know, jokey schtick kind
of acts of violence. Um, but she also like, Oh,
I didn't want to do this. You know, she does
that kind of thing. And, uh, Kureha doesn't do
that, but she has all this intensity. And I think
the actress brings a really great presence to
it. And I think in King Ojo, she was like super
subdued. This lady is not subdued at all. Like
Kureha is like a very, uh, switched on person
as far as, like, emoting and being angry and,
like, you know what she's feeling, which is really
cool to see. And... From her introduction, the
little line that Baku gave, which is the writing
of Takahashi, off to verify that this episode
was, in fact, written by Takahashi and not by
somebody else. That little line that I alluded
to was Baku saying... Kureha's name, even though
he shouldn't have known it. He even says something
like, Kureha, and I shouldn't know this, but
he knows it. And that's a little important clue
for what happens later on and what happened in
the past, I believe. Also, this episode was written
by Yuya Takahashi. As far as I can tell, all
18 episodes have been so far. While Kureha's
presence is remarkable, I also enjoy the fact
that her name, which sounds like Kuro, which
means black, in Japanese, means dusk, or... Something
like dusk. It's actually a homophone. It has
the same sound of the word dusk, but it's spelled
differently, which is pretty clever. Nox is night.
She's dusk, which I find to be pretty interesting.
Yeah, I said Nox is night. Not as in K -N -I
-G -H -T, but like the nighttime night, like
Nyx, the goddess of night from Greek mythology,
I guess, or whatever. Anyway, so I find that
to be interesting. I find that a very clever
move. Once again, that's props to you, Takahashi,
for being clever and doing fun stuff with the
writing. It's little things like that. It's that
kind of attention to detail. And it's that, I
don't know, way of making things just like a
little bit extra special that I really appreciate
from him. And I think from Kamen Rider in general,
I feel like it's pretty consistently on point
in that way. I say Tsuburaya with Ultraman is
classier than Super Sentai and Kamen Rider. And
I think genuinely that's true. And I think they
put together like a premium product for the most
part. I have a lot of affection for Ultraman.
It's also easier to watch an entire Ultraman
series because they're half the length of a Super
Sentai or Kamen Rider. But Kamen Rider also does
a lot of really good, like, deep thematic stuff,
at least on the surface. There's a lot of thematic
stuff that you can bite into and enjoy. Stuff
like that, like the Nox, the Kureha, Baku even
being Baku Yorozu, like his name meaning like
literally the stream meeting monster thing. And
like this thousand fold is what Yorozu means.
It's like a very interesting scenario going on.
But also that's possibly all the touch of Yutaka
Hashi, which I think he's the one who makes things
a little bit extra special. And I'm just a fan
of his shows so far. I think he, well, I haven't
seen everything that he's written though. So.
Zero one and X -Aid for sure. And now this, uh,
I think I'm missing. Didn't he do, or was the
ghost guy? Yeah. I don't know who did. I don't
know what his other show was, but there's one
other that I haven't seen yet. So I should probably
correct that problem. Oh, Keats. I think he did
Keats and I didn't see all of Keats only the
first quarter or so anyway. Uh, but yeah, this
was a really great episode. It's a great turning
point and it's a great launching point and it's
a great continuation point because so many great
things are happening and it's really interesting
to see the dynamics, how they're changing and
what it's. going to mean for Baku because it's
raising new questions it's raising questions
about code about the lady and the nightmares
and everything that's going on with them and
I'm just waiting to see what's going to happen
because it's so fascinating and I think Korea
is going to make a cool permanent addition to
the cast I would think that's what she's supposed
to be at least she'll be there for a little while
and do some interesting stuff give some interesting
backstory to the organizations because she doesn't
remember being an agent before but she was one
and now is she going to be again or is she going
to be something else I don't know and how many
other people can that happen to at least Five
others? Seven, six, yeah, five others at least.
I mean, three, he seems to be, it seems to be
clear what his deal is, but maybe it's not so
clear. Anyway, tell me what you thought about
the episode and check out the pinned comment
for more. This is MJ with Henton Inspection and
Writer Tears signing out.