Recap: Kamen Rider Saber, Special Issue (Episode 48): A New Page, Opens
The Gang is enjoying a relaxing day at the beach… inside the Northern Base. Everyone is watching with bated breath as Rintaro tries to feed Mei some shaved ice. But Mei seems uninterested.
They catch up on what they’ve been doing since the season finale. Sophia says the youngins are still working on finding the rest of the missing Ridebooks. Ogami-san says he has other things he wants to do while Tetsuo says he will be returning to being a swordsmith full time. Sophia adds that they will discuss what to do with the SoL once Ren returns from his shirtless training. Yuuri wants to focus on taking care of his bonsai.
Rintaro gets up and tells Mei that he has something we would like to say to her. Everyone sits up in attention, but the Shindai Sibs interrupt the moment when they come in. Ryoga challenges Rintaro to a duel. Mei is confused as to why they are about to fight. But Reika says her brother is weird and to just go with it.
Meanwhile, someone in the city has summoned a Deadman.
Touma signs an autographed book for a young fan. The fan says his friends will be jealous he met Touma since they are all big fans of his. Touma says to bring them along next time. Kento notices a change in the young fan’s expression.
The duel is over and Ryoga says Rintaro deserves to be the next Master Logos. Rintaro says they should all work together to decide on the SoL’s vision moving forward. Most especially taking care of their loved ones. Both Rintaro and Ryoga turn to Mei and smile. Reika is jealous and burns with anger.
Mei takes Rintaro and Ryoga’s hands so they can shake on it. Reika slaps Mei’s hand and says not to touch her brother without permission.
While Touma and Kento think about Luna, they hear the screams of a young girl being terrorized by the Deadman. They quickly henshin, but a curious fellow comes running in.
This interesting character is Vice and he apparently smells horrible, especially when he farts.
Vice accuses Touma and Kento of stealing his prey. But another curious looking guy comes running in to calm Vice down. This pinkish fellow is Ikki, also known as Kamen Rider Revi.
Explaining that a demon lives in every human, Ikki dehenshins and Vice (his demon) returns into his body. Ikki and Vice introduce themselves before running after the Deadman.
The young girl that was being chased after, Fumi, turns out to be a fan of Touma’s and they bring her back to the shop to take care of her scrapes. Fumi knows Mei is Touma’s editor and says she is gorgeous. Mei tries to humbly say she isn’t, but Rintaro says she is quite beautiful.
Fumi says Touma inspired her to become a writer as well. And she and her friends planned to meet at the special tree that is such an important part of his novels. She shows them a photo of her two friends, Takuto and Junpei, who turns out to be the young fan from earlier.
Fumi is not sure why the monster targeted her. But neither Takuto and Junpei got back to her since they made plans. Touma and Kento go to look for them to make sure they’re okay.
Touma finds Takuto who asks if Fumi is alright. When Touma says she is, he excuses himself to go home and says he wasn’t planning to meet his friends today. Touma asks about the promise he made. But Takuto says meeting them today will only make him feel lonelier as he is leaving for a sports exchange program abroad.
Kento finds Junpei who says it would be awkward if they met today. While Takuto dreams of playing soccer and Fumi has dreams of becoming a writer, he has none and feels like he’s getting left behind.
Both Touma and Kento tell Takuto and Junpei that they should always keep their promises. And even if they are far apart, their hearts will still be connected. They are childhood friends after all.
Takuto thanks Touma and hurries to see Fumi.
Junpei, however, recalls being approached by a monster who offered him a Stamp that would wash away his worries. He hands the Stamp to Kento and asks to protect his friends.
Back at the shop, Rintaro is about to say what he’s been meaning to say to Mei. But Fumi suddenly runs out to make sure her friends are okay. Mei and Rintaro run after her.
Touma and Takuto arrive at the special tree. But the Deadman appears. Touma tries to take it on as the others arrive as well.
The three friends happily reunite as Touma and Kento henshin.
But Mei and Rintaro are surprised when Ikki comes running in, henshins and splits into two. Revice Driver creator George Karizaki pops up and excitedly records the scene while also describing the new season.
Mei does color commentary as Ikki and Vice use Stamps to uphenshin. After they wear down the Deadman, Touma and Kento swoop in with the finisher.
Later, Junpei gives Takuto the Touma-autographed book as his going away present. Fumi says she was going to get one for Takuto too. They laugh as they reiterate that their bond will always be strong no matter the distance between them.
Ikki approaches Touma and Kento and asks if they’ve seen a Vistamp anywhere. Kento hands him the one Junpei handed him earlier and Ikki hands it to Karizaki-san.
George says this Hopper Stamp is nice, but it’s not one of the ten Vistamps they will be looking for in the new season. George says they are counting on Ikki to find them all.
Vice comes out of Ikki’s mouth to complain about having to find the Vistamps. The others are confused to see Ikki seemingly talking to himself. But Yuuri appears and Vice is shocked that he is able to see him.
Ikki invites them to come to his family’s bathhouse, Joy Springs.
Ikki hurries back home to heat up the baths and Rintaro feels this is finally the time to tell Mei what he’s been meaning to say all this time.
“Please… become part of my family,” Rintaro says.
“A bit late for that since we all already became a family a long time ago,” Mei answers.
“That’s not what I was trying to say,” Rintaro replies.
Anyway, Touma continues writing his wonder story as all the many, MANY characters of his life move on to their next chapters.
That includes the Sword of Logos moving from being under the rule of one master to a collaborative council to ensure peace. Ogami-san will get his teaching license, Tetsuo will work on a new Seiken and Ren will go on an adventure
Ryoga and Mei smile at each other. Reika burns, literally, with rage.
Meanwhile, Touma says he will continue to write his stories and he hands over his Seiken to Sophia.
Back at the shop, Kento tells Touma that he wants to bring stories from around the world to Japan and Touma’s stories to the rest of the world. Kento asks if he can work here and Touma says of course.
Kento says he already has some new customers for him and he lets in a group of excited kids.
Kento is surprised to see Mei and Rintaro walk in with matching outfits. And together, they all introduce the children to the wonderful world of stories.
Episode Thoughts
Perhaps Ikki and Friends helped to make things different and refreshing. But I enjoyed this episode of Saber more than most of the season, to be honest. lol
So I actually hadn’t seen anything about Revice before this episode. So I went to watch the Revice introduction video first to make sure I at least got a sense of who our new friends are when they popped up in this episode.
Looking forward to the new season, I guess it just kept me in a good mood watching this final episode of Saber. Epilogue episodes are alright, even though crossovers between the two seasons have always felt too forced.
Still, meeting Ikki and Vice was fun and has me even more excited about the new season. They gave a great first impression. And the introduction video teased a lot of likeable things. So I have positive expectations for Revice. Though the farting is a bit concerning. This isn’t Saban Brands/Hasbro producing this upcoming season, right? lol
But anyway, this is still a Saber episode. So let’s talk about them instead. The biggest thing I got from this episode was how I legit felt more of a bond between Fumi, Junpei and Takuto than I ever did with Touma, Kento and Luna. Seriously! I felt their friendship stronger in the couple of minutes screentime they got than whatever we got for the storytime tree trio.
The next biggest thing from the episode was Rintaro’s big, but not really confession to Mei. They played it off as a joke, even if we’re led to believe they live happily ever after with matching couple outfits in the end.
Honestly though, it feels like they merely used the Mei-Rintaro will they-won’t they tension to further the odd Shindai Sibs dynamic. First of all, Ryoga having eyes for Mei is not a thing. And second, I’m not even going to talk about whatever Reika feels for her brother. You could think of it in an innocent way, but you just know a Toei toku production wants you to also consider the gross interpretation as well.
So let’s just move on. 😬 lol
They wrapped up some things I didn’t even think were actual things such as reforming SoL leadership or the fact that there’s apparently more Ridebooks out there. What?
Anyway, Saber is officially over. And again, thanks and congrats to the entire cast and crew for all their hard work this past year. Especially in such uncertain times.
But I am definitely ready to move on. Bring on the anniversary season!
P.S. Check out these teaser videos for an upcoming digital photobook of the cast of Saber.
Robin Furuya (Storious) was a videographer and the editor of the videos and they look great.
Watching these videos and remembering this awesome photoshoot:
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
And these IG pics:
Oh? OH! OOOOHH!!! What show is this?! I want to see this romantic melodrama version of Kamen Rider Saber please. Where can I watch?! I want it nao! #仮面ライダーセイバー #nitiasa pic.twitter.com/nMUVszyDE7
— DryedMangoez (@dryedmangoez) January 24, 2021
Man, Saber could’ve been something totally different (and better!). Oh well.
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While the main plot ended on previous episode, this serve as epilogue which was interesting.
Nice to see everyone with sunglasses and summer outfit relaxing, which I find it cute.
I find it weird that Rintaro and Ryoga duel again each other for Mei, which came out of nowhere and felt awkward; when did Mei became interested with Ryoga; I guess 1 year blank must have changed her taste of male or something. It’s also weird that Reika is very jealous for Mei, which felt weird and out of character, but it’s an epilogue/special, so who cares.
Despite this is an epilogue, it’s also a quasi-crossover introduction for Revice.
Revice itself is a pretty interesting design, where it’s Human (Revi) and Demon (Vice) Double Rider Duo, which is refreshing for 50th anniversary series. While I didn’t have much issue with Ikki/Revi, Vice seems bit annoying for initial impression, but we’ll he how he turns out in actual show.
At the end, Touma returns his sword (and belt) and going back to normal life… until he returns for inevitable future crossovers and V-Cinema special.
I find it interesting that better episodes of Saber comes from special/bonus episodes, whether it’s crossover with Ghost (and Specter), Zenkaiger, and epilogue.
I personally think Fukuda is more suitable for sub-writer than headwriter, especially since he barely wrote 1/3 of the series and less than he did for Ghost (which is better show).
As for series overall, I mentioned many times before that it’s a big waste of potential and misstep of the franchise. I haven’t seen show like this in a long time.
This is not coming from someone who’s a die-hard Rider fan, but even average tokusatsu fan, it felt flat, which is such a shame, since I had some hope for Fukuda, despite Ghost lackluster reception.
But alas, it was not meant to be.
It also doesn’t help that this year (2021) has been somewhat lackluster year for tokusatsu (at least in first half; January~June) and Kamen Rider Saber is definitely the weakest of the bunch.
The best things that came from this show is probably the suit design, which looked fantastic; every single one of them matched the tone and theme of the show, and from what I gather, Figuarts for Saber has been selling pretty well. Some of the action wasn’t that bad either.
While I’m not fan of music for this series, it was nice to see ED song back for EVERY episodes, which hasn’t happened for 20 years since Kuuga.
That’s all I have to say about Saber.
Here’s my final thought of the show; Kamen Rider Saber is Kamen Rider Sa-BLEH!
lol XD
Yeah, the Ryoga feelings for Mei made zero sense. But what else made sense on Saber, tbh.
I’m just happy Saber is over.