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Wednesday, July 2, 2014

Kamen Rider Gaim Episode 28 Review: The Sweet Smell Of Betrayal (Major Spoiler Alert!!!)

For this episode of Kamen Rider Gaim, Takatora is starting to be more positive and putting more work into the Overlords, but will his team actually help him out in the end? Also Kouta looks for a job...
The beginning with Takatora was absolutely my favorite part of this episode. It's amazing how much knowing about the Overlords has cheered him up. For a long amount of time, he has thought sacrifice was the only way to save humanity and he easily backed up his ideals. Thanks to Kouta giving him some new hope, he starts to put more efforts in catching the Overlords. What's great is that we still see Takatora telling his team about the information in the usual way that we have seen before. He is still strict and forceful as it reminds me of a serious worker more than anything. What really helps though is that we got to learn about him and now seeing him a new light really makes him more heroic than how we saw him before as he fought Kouta. Takatora even says that Kouta is not their enemy as this could have been the end of Yggdrasil fighting the Armored Riders, but sadly all good things must come to an end.
Ryouma finally decides to betray the man he has stuck with since the beginning of the project. What's interesting is how Ryouma tried to hide his true feelings when being told about the Overlords. He knew this information for a while and is trying to seem skeptic about the whole thing. Takatora is even surprised as he would think a man of science like Ryouma would be amazed right now. This really shows how much Takatora didn't know Ryouma's true intentions as he couldn't he even read his personality. It really makes you think of how these two even knew each other? How much did Ryouma have to deal with a man who had opposing views and how hard it must have been to keep things a secret? So Ryouma has Sid and Yoko attack Takatora during a search for an Overlord and Ryouma himself appeared. He transforms and attacks Takatora while the man is confused and angry. He just realized his own people have been betraying him and now even Ryouma who started everything with him is trying to kill him. Takatora yells out that he thought Ryouma wanted to save humanity as Ryouma replies that Takatora never did know what he really wanted. Ryouma is a man who is just aiming for the forbidden fruit and only one person can have it and sadly Takatora was a hero and not someone who wanted to gain great power.
What happens afterwards really starts to highlight that with Takatora gone there is going to be less control around Yggdrasil. Micchy takes his brother's belt and Sid goes on his own. It's amazing to see how the real evil starts to appear after they think Takatora was killed. It's more messed up with Micchy because this was his own brother he saw get killed. Even Sid has to say that Micchy is screwed up for just standing around after seeing his brother die. Micchy easily puts an act for Takatora as he tells his younger brother that he should save the world with Kouta as Micchy acts sad seeing Takatora in peril. With him gone though, Micchy picks up the Genesis Driver and just has this dark and blank look in his eyes. It's like he wanted this to happen and yet still feels despair for what he has done. This is easily a stepping stone for Micchy as he continues to do what he wants and with Takatora's driver he transforms into Zangetsu and decides to get some personal favors done with it.
Another surprise in this episode was at the end since Sid has started his own betrayal. Without Takatora around, Sid has no fears anymore since Takatora was his greatest threat. Sid attacks and kills many men near the Crack as he destroys everything. The man even step into the forest by himself and with what he has done causes the Crack to vanish. What's really funny is this happens after Ryouma says that the forbidden fruit can only go to one person and Sid knew that already. This really made Sid look like a villain since he never really did care about Project Arc or anything of that sort. Sid was just around just to find the forbidden fruit as he betrays both Takatora and Ryouma. Sid is even crazy enough to enter the forest by himself and have one of his only exits vanish. Sid easily got a major step ahead of everyone now, but I do have to wonder how the Overlords will react to him?
A strange thing in this episode then had to do with Kouta as he tries to find a new job. Kouta starts to realize that his sister is having tough time getting money as he needs to start helping out. Thanks with Takatora being on his side now though, he can start to relax a bit more and actually look for a job. Sadly the duty of a hero calls first as this ruin his chances to get a job. Luckily, Kouta gets a job at the cafe; I do hope this means we get more scenes with Bandou! A trap is set up for Kouta though as he delivers a fruit basket to a barren area as Zangetsu appears and attacks! Kouta is shocked to see Takatora attack him an Kaito comes to fight and protect Kouta, but he cannot deal with the fighting starting up again. Kouta thought things were going to get better, but the fighting never ends and now Yggdrasil doesn't even have Takatora anymore so what is going to happen? At the very least, Kouta got a job... I will say it was an odd plot point to have what seemed to be Takatora's death, but I guess this shows how Kouta can be too trusting at times. Even Kaito says that Kouta is too trusting and that is going to get a knife in his back someday. Which is funny, because Kaito knows a certain someone who would put that knife in his back?
Back with Micchy, he tries to silence Kaito by himself, but Kaito says there is no point in this. Kaito tells Micchy that Kouta would never believe a word he says if it's about Micchy. Kouta has been friends with Micchy for a while and Kaito is easily not a friend. Micchy tries to tell him that Kouta his is enemy, but again Kaito tells him off like he did in the previous episode. I will say having Kaito not even going to bother telling Kouta about Micchy is easy plot convenience. Still, it does fit the characters well though since Kaito tells Kouta that the only way to learn from his mistakes is to have something backfire at him. Then with Kouta that weakness is his trust in people as one of his closest friends is trying to kill him! The best part about this though is that the people who got to be riders first now all have upgraded powers. Kouta has been getting powers like Jinba and Kachidoki, but both Kaito and Micchy have Genesis Drivers now. So the main three riders have their own things as this could lead to more happening with them. This is easily one of my favorite character paths as these three are progressing differently while at the same rate.
The action in this episode was mostly good, I will have to say Kouta's fight with the weak Inves was pointless since the comedy bit at the end wasn't that good. The more impressive fights were with Takatora. I loved how it began as Sid just surprises him with an attack. Again the audience knows that Takatora is really the only one who wants to help humanity so seeing him being trustworthy in his team is sad since we know what's going to happen. I just stumbled onto something here now, Takatora trusted his team and that ends up being his fault and now Kouta is having the same problem. Again Takatora and Kouta are similar to each other as both of their progress shows traits in both of them. Back to the action, Marika appears and does the same thing Sid did to Takatora. We then got a nice far away shot of the three riders fighting each other as the energy arrows fly around and even Takatora was having trouble. He got hits here and there as he tries to dodge attacks while blocking others. Ryouma then appeared and performs the finishing blows. The fight later on then wasn't much, but this is the first time we have the three upgraded riders fight each other. Also the place looks similar to when Kouta and Kaito first met Takatora with his Genesis Driver.
Episode twenty-eight had an interesting idea with dealing with Takatora's downfall since there was Kouta who was just trying to get a job. Personally the whole job plot line seemed a bit like filler since the major meat of this episode was Takatora and his team. With that in mind I do love how betrayal continued on after the big betrayal. There is Micchy who is trying to kill Kouta because he sees that he is ruining great people and Sid who is out for the fruit for his own. Still with some odd scenes regarding the whole job thing, I would give the episode a B+
Next Time: Ruler of the Overlords?

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