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Touma and Mei are scolding Yuuri for not telling them sooner about being able to separate humans from Megidos. It would’ve saved Yuki-san from all her suffering. Instead of listening to them, he is intrigued by Mei’s cell phone and tries to secretly swipe it.
Yuuri tries to distract them by saying they should also worry about the SoL in addition to the Megidos. He reminds them that the SoL allocated the Books and swords between the north and south. But with Sophia AWOL, the south is moving to collect all of it in order to restore the table of contents and gain the ultimate power to remake the world.
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Meanwhile down south, Reika continues to try brainwashing the defectors into hating Touma. She leaves and calls her friend on the phone to tell them about Touma gaining use of the Sword of Light.
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Alone at the southern base, the defectors hash out their feelings about Touma. Rintaro is the most conflicted, but Ren is 100% sure that Touma has sided with the people responsible for the death of his dear Kento. Ogami-san tries to calm them down and assure them that Touma hasn’t done anything wrong yet. He says their responsibility now is to stop Megidos and find Sophia.
Over at the mansion, Legeiel is enraged about their failure. Zooous says it’s alright since they’ve already infected many humans with Books already.
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Storious, in fact, has zeroed in on their next target: Kijima Shingo. Shingo has seen an article on Touma in a magazine and dreams of assembling a wonderful model/diorama like Touma has in his shop. Shingo is one of the Wonderworld-connected people and Storious pops in to force a Book into his body.
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Back at the shop, Mei suggests Touma get Rintaro and the others to help weed out the traitors within the SoL. Yuuri says they must steer the defectors back onto the right path. The traitor will show themselves once all the blades and books are gathered together.
Touma believes that will bring Luna back. He feels guilty about his dear friend Luna being sucked into a Book. He asks Yuuri if he knows anything about her. Yuuri whips out a Book that tells the story of a special woman who first connected the worlds. Touma remembers Kento’s father telling him about such a person.
Yuuri says the girl approaching Touma must mean he really is destined for a great power.
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Just then, Mei’s phone rings and she takes it back from Yuuri. There’s an alert about missing people downtown. But Yuki also calls and asks them to come down to the office.
The three of them head over. Yuki wants to write a bombshell article about her experience and asks Mei if she knows anything about what happened to her. Yuuri decides to erase her memory of it all.
Suddenly, Mei’s Book alerts them to the Ousama Megido downtown collecting cars and stacking them into a wall. Touma prepares to henshin, but the Megido tosses a car at him and slips away.
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Watching from around the corner, Storious says they don’t always have to battle.
Elsewhere, Ogami-san and Tetsuo are walking alone. Tetsuo tells Ogami-san about what Yuuri told him and Rintaro about the corrupt SoL. They both hate to think the SoL is anything but noble, but they would like to make sure. Tetsuo wants to find out himself.
Back at the shop, Shingo is waiting there hoping to meet Touma as they both share a love for dioramas and models. Shingo shows them the one he’s working on and says he is hoping to complete a model of the town of his dreams. Touma is excited to see it and says he also creates stories of dreams.
Suddenly, Shingo experiences stomach pains and he runs out. Touma and Mei chase after him.
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Touma is shocked when he finds Shingo and he morphs into the Ousama Megido. It proceeds to stack more cars and Touma henshins. Mei tries to get a preoccupied Yuuri to help.
Down south, Reika informs the defectors of the Megido. Tetsuo says he will go deal with it himself.
Touma is struggling against the Megido, but is determined to save Shingo. Mei drags Yuuri over, but he continues reading his comic book. He looks up and sees the situation, so he henshins. But Storious pops in, shoots Yuuri away and splits into three to take on Touma.
Yuuri flies in to poof the Storious clones away with his light. Storious is intrigued by his power and continues facing Touma.
Yuuri morphs into a Shadow form. But Tetsuo arrives and challenges him. Tetsuo recognizes Yuuri’s attack and is able to counter. Tetsuo turns his attention to Storious and demands they return Sophia. But Storious has no idea what he’s talking about.
Tetsuo insists that it was Storious and friends who kidnapped Sophia.
The Megido finishes his car wall. Before Touma can grab Yuuri to separate Shingo from it, Storious stops them. Tetsuo jumps in to try and destroy the Megido. Touma tries to tell Tetsuo not to attack. But Tetsuo doesn’t care and proceeds to brutally attack Shingo.
From deep within the Megido, Shingo cries out for help as he is in intense pain. Storious delivers a whipping attack, allowing him to whisk the Megido away.
Touma grabs Tetsuo by the collar and reiterates that the Megido is a human. Tetsuo doesn’t care and just repeats that Touma is wielding the Sword of Light to become all-powerful. Touma explains that the Sword of Light can save the human-turned-Megido and that he wants to stop Books from inflicting suffering.
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Tetsuo says Touma must prove it through a duel.
Yuuri says this is a waste of time and that Tetsuo should just believe Touma. But Touma says he’ll do it. He will prove he is right.
Touma and Tetsuo battle. Touma goes King Arthur and then Dragonic Knight. But Tetsuo is able to counter. Yuuri is amazed.
The Book alerts Mei and Mei alerts Touma and they hurry over. Tetsuo says he didn’t hear anything.
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Episode Thoughts
Not as good as last week, but still some good things to appreciate with this one.
I liked the story with Shingo. I think this season has been lacking the MOTWs which includes having regular people being affected by the villains. The cases of the week with a different guest star hasn’t been possible of course when the show has to juggle 121 different characters. So again, there’s another positive to limiting the focus to just Touma and not on the others.
Seeing Touma connect with Shingo, albeit in a very short amount of time, was nice. It’s good to see them working on filling out Touma’s character more. Even though they had to throw in Luna again. I seriously yawned when he brought her up. Like, I don’t really care about the grand Connector of Worlds at all. Lol
The fact that they remembered Sophia exists too. Really, again, I didn’t care for anything that involved the Southern Base. Tetsuo and Ogami-san’s little walk in the tunnel was odd too since in the next scene, they were back at the base. What was the point? Very odd.
Even more annoying was Tetsuo interrupting the battle between Touma, Storious and the Megido. Like, you really had to insert yourself into that situation? You let the Megido get away just because you wanted to duel? Okay. Thanks. Your curiosity can wait.
I don’t feel much about either Tetsuo or Ogami-san trying to get through to Touma. It really should just be Touma and Rintaro since they’re the one with the actual bond and connection. They’re the ones in the ending dance, after all. lol So when all this is eventually hashed out, it has to be Touma and Rintaro. Until then, anything Tetsuo, Ogami-san and especially Ren does is just uninteresting to me.
Yuuri’s shtick is also not really amusing. Like, he a kleptomaniac? He is in awe of electrical devices and appliances? He likes good comics? I don’t get it. Nor do I really enjoy it. Him not helping Touma is just dragging things out and makes it seem like the show has nothing else to fill the episode with.
What’s so weird about Saber is that I’ve enjoyed everything else about the show except for the actual show itself. Like, I love this photoshoot from a few weeks ago that made it seem like Saber was some cool, slick drama:
How did they make Kamen Rider Saber look more badass than it actually is in this article's photoshoot? They look good here. I want to watch ~this~ show instead. lol #仮面ライダーセイバー – https://t.co/0edqUkDCFw pic.twitter.com/P4J5dbscVp
— DryedMangoez (@dryedmangoez) January 11, 2021
Then there’s this post from the Saber Instagram that makes it seem like Rintaro, Mei and Ren are part of some Korean melodrama love triangle. (A show I’d actually watch, tbh!)
And finally there’s Furuya Robin’s social media where he’s been very active with fans and updates. He tweeted this today:
Thank you for watching Kamen Rider Saber today.
We started shooting the series in July 2020 and it’s been half a year already.
I hope you guys are enjoying so far. From now on, things will be moving faster, so don’t miss it.
thank you for supporting us.#kamenridersaber pic.twitter.com/zuvzRps5eE
— 古屋 呂敏 / Furuya Robin / ロビン (@mynameis_Robin) January 24, 2021
It really makes me feel bad about not enjoying the show more than I am. I feel like there is so much potential, especially with the Megido3, for some great story and moments. But the show has not given them that opportunity.
Ah, the story of Saber the season. So much potential. But wasted. So far, at least. It’s only Episode 19 after all.
I agree with you, especially regarding the Megido3. They’ve been so two-dimensional compared to Zero-One’s villains, which is a shame since the actors seem like they have the chops to do greater. This could have been fixed earlier by establishing their relation to one another, the most compelling choice being perhaps to make them brothers. Or they each could have had a different motive for wanting to remake the world that leads their goals to coincide. Overall, they’ve just been very underdeveloped for a series almost 20 episodes in.
Absolutely agree. I think the three actors could do amazing with better material. Their dynamic I feel should be like Heart, Brain and Medic in Drive. They should be much more involved by now and not just pop up to dispatch monsters every week.
Personally, I enjoy Saber but I do agree with you that the show could be so much more.
It is not “it’s only just 20 episodes”, but much more like “it’s already 20 episodes and we are getting nowhere”
That’s true also. With toku though, for me, shows with great starts can completely collapse in the 40s and ruin the entire season for me. Some shows start off meh and start blowing me away in the 30s. So, I can’t completely write Saber off yet. But it’s certainly struggling.