REVIEW: Drive 40
So you know how I said last week that it was a pretty good episode for one that opens an arc? You also know that I find episodes that close arcs tend to be much stronger right? So that means this episode was absolutely fantastic.
Starting exactly where we left off last week, the episode begins with Shinnosuke being found not only by Gou, but also Heart. However before we get to the meat of that great scene, we catch up on the rest of the cast: the rest of the SCU are found by Rinna in a wrecked Drive pit, Tornado again escapes with Kiriko after Chase is able to track them down and we see Banno alter and copy Mr. Belt to not only create Gold Drive, which debuts next week, but to also “leave a little surprise” in his programming. Apart from the scene Banno, I feel the moments I just briefly described really did not add to the episode. They just kinda felt like they were there for padding the episode out.
However, in the following scenes we get the true gem of the episode: Heart’s backstory. We learn that Banno, before he became an iPad, forced Heart to copy the form of a businessman who refused to fund him. By doing this he was able to take his revenge by torturing Heart, which leads to Krim breaking their partnership; thus Heart kept the form to take an ironic revenge on Banno/humanity. I love this so much. It is soaking in pathos and sympathy towards Heart and explains his goals so very very well. It may be a stereotypical Riku Sanjo villain, but that’s what makes it so great: Heart makes sense and is fleshed out. That’s what I think makes a great villain: an understanding of why they do what they do.
This all of course breaks Gou as not only is a Roiimude made sympathetic, so much so that even Gou has to feel sorry for Heart, but it’s also further shown to him that his father is evil; Which of course leads to some even more great acting from Inaba Yuu and also furthers Gou’s complex and great characterisation, who if anyone says isn’t a great character I will fight. With this Heart leaves and Shinnosuke is left to consul Gou. This is also a wonderful scene as it brings Gou out of his slump since Shinnosuke tells him that Gou is a Kamen Rider and encourages him to fight. I like this so much since it shows Shinnosuke’s caring and heroic side, it closes Gou’s character arc that started when he called himself a Kamen Rider that destroys, furthers the two’s relationship and it gives weight to the name of ‘Kamen Rider’.
That last one is quite important since I feel that the name has lost its significance, not culturally, but within each show. For a while I’ve felt that it was a bit of an empty title that loosely tied some, admittedly unique, concepts for heroes together to make a franchise. That is fine and all for a while, but it makes what a ‘Kamen Rider’ is sort of empty. But with Drive I definitely feel they were reaffirming what a Kamen Rider is, namely a masked hero who fights for justice. Again nothing against the previous shows, I do enjoy them a lot, but it’s nice to get back to basics and show a new generation what a ‘Kamen Rider’ is.
Thus Shinnosuke rushes to Banno’s evil lair to rescue Mr. Belt where he is met by Roiimude 004. The two have a short scuffle but Banno escapes in his new Dark Drive Driver form. We also get a cute scene between Shinnosuke and Mr. Belt where Shinnosuke reaffirms his trust of Mr. Belt since he has such a sense of duty to right the wrongs of his previous life. However, it does feel a little out of place since the two have never really fought much and Mr. Belt himself doesn’t get that much screen time to develop as a character himself.
We return to the Drive pit where we learn that the human Tornado copied, through Kyu going IRL to find a magazine, George Shirogane, wanted to marry the girl who wore the most beautiful necklace the best, thus revealing Tornado’s intentions with Kiriko. Now I did say I like the ‘mystery’ of this week since it’s so simple, but I don’t really like how trope-y and clichéd it is. We’ve seen this kind of story a million times in tokusatsu before, plus it reduced Kirkio down to a damsel in distress. It’s simple, thus allowing the superior over-arching plot to have time, but it reduced one of the show’s strongest characters down. I mean, it is sort of a trend I’ve noticed with her treatment recently that she has been reduced to just eye-candy and being a plot device. She started off so well, but I suppose Riku Sanjo giveth and Riku Sanjo taketh away. It’s still not a good thing though.
So Shinnosuke saves her and wards Tornado out of the church they were in, where Gou saves him and the two fight together with Chase’s eventual back up. It’s a great fight since we see the two working together again and complimenting eachother’s strengths and weaknesses, thus defeating Tornado. So the episode ends on a sweet moment where Gou, Shinnosuke and Kirko have a group hug, which Chase avoids so he can wax poetic about the nature of family and states that that is what he wants to protect. Finally, the one minute story has Eiji fighting off Roiimudes, being chased by Dark Drive and falling into the time road. Nothing overtly interesting, but next week’s should be fascinating since Eiji is now travelling to the past.
Despite some grievances with the pacing along with the treatment of Kiriko, this was a great episode. It really showed the, well, humanity that the Roiimudes can have and also that villains aren’t always necessarily bad, a lesson which I think is great to have within a kid’s show. Plus we got some great acting from Tomya Warabino, Inaba Yuu and Takeuchi Ryouma. All in all it was a great episode.
