Kamen Rider Gotchard Reviews

Gotchard Episode 34 Review (Draft)

Following the last episode, we get Legendary Legend debuting right at the beginning. Completely understandable while people would be upset last week ended with his debut and not doing much. At the same time, it's not a big deal. This has happened before but with various circumstances. Ghost's final form didn't have the suit debut in it's first episode so they were forced to use CGI. Geats debuted Ace's incomplete final form, a rarity within the franchise, only to debut his true final form at the end of the Desire Grand Prix arc. Given that Kaguya isn't the protagonist, thirty three was jam packed enough as it was, and we had three insane ongoing fights, it's completely fine for it to go ham, when it's the culmination of the buildup from the past episodes.

Legendary is Kaguya's final form, and to put it up against Dark Kiva, who through discussions, was so powerful and dangerous it could kill any non Fangires after enough usage, and the Wake Up Three was rumored to potentially be a self destruction attack with the power to wipe out...anyone, it's cool they did that. It shows the people who haven't seen Kiva the dangers and scope of the major antagonist, while also serving it as a solid challenge for Kaguya.

From research, found that Dark Kiva's got three different Wake Ups. The Wake Up One is the Darkness Hell Crash, a Rider Punch. King's Burst End, Wake Up Two, is the Rider Kick, and King's World End Three is what clashes with Kaguya's abilities. The Legend Riser undermining it might seem like a bad thing, but given Hundred was after it to gain it's power, it's fitting irony Saigetsu gets defeated by it.

That being said Saigetsu getting berated by the Hundred leaders threatening to execute him is generic, but the idea of a terrorist's organization's generals not even being the actual heads: actually makes sense. There's a risk to be done in not showing them, but it presents Hundred as a force that can continue to co-exist by finding new generals to replicate Dark Kamen Riders on their quest for global domination. 

It was also very adorable to see Rinne, Sabimaru and Renge all dressed up by Kaguya's will to make their appearance elegant and gorgeous to him: though it definitely would've been fun to see Spanner and Minato entertain the notion.

While Spanner naturally would dismiss the opportunity, it was nice to see Rinne mistaking Butler for Kajiki and Kaguya mistaking Kajiki for Butler.

So the Aurora Curtains malfunction: this one has gotten some sort of criticism, but dimension hopping constantly has its own risks in other stories and given the overuse of an invasive army, it's honestly reasonable here.

That being said, poor Sabimaru: Minato has to help Kyoka deal with Lachesis, Rinne and Butler partnering up makes sense given they have the most common sense in the room, Renge's got her part time job now that she's graduated, and Houtaro's got his remedial English classes because they actually remembered that his educational intelligence is very faulty. Food for thought in the future. So Sabimaru and Spanner have to serve as his retainers for now. And it goes exactly how one would expect.

But before that, the sight of Kaguya upset Hotaro wasn't able to remember is going to be a big talking point for this episode and the next one to come, but it does lead into an argument about his character for later, depending on how you see Houtarou.

But to its credit, Kaguya shows up willing to defend their friend in a certain way. Remember when back in episode 13 for UFO-X's debut, the Three Abyssalis Siter outright murked their English professor? Yeah, he never came back, so Kaguya trying to teach him and Kajiki English is actually wholesome when you take out the absurdity of him rolling into school and getting the new student transfer association so much he's able to get his own fan club.

Though it was worth a chuckle seeing Spanner have to smile and get irritated dealing with Kaguya's shenanigans. We don't see Kamen Riders be officially outing themselves to the public unless their identity is meant to be commonplace to the world: think Aruto from Zero-One and Ikki from Kamen Rider Revice technically, so it was funny to have Kaguya try to do so based on the logic of his world. Based on his actions, you can already infer that in his world, everyone knows and treats him like a celebrity. And given he spent his life as an orphan who eventually developed the technology to become his world's savior, it makes sense to him that he would act that way.