Welcome back to my ongoing recap series for the second Heisei era Kamen Rider show, Kamen Rider Agito!
This week we once again open the episode with a short recap of what happened last week. So the important bit according to Agito was just watching Hojo chicken out and flee from the fight with the Octopus Unknown the first instant it got difficult. They barely cut a single moment of the fun watching Hojo whimper like a little baby as he abandons his duty shamelessly.
And I highly concur! If there was a high point last episode it was definitely getting to fully savor his absolute low point. 
Also the show really goes out of it’s way to remind us that the Evil Man has a weird tattoo on the back of his hand. He was born with it though so I guess you might call it more of a birthmark? Whatever it is it has glowed sometimes when he does stuff and since he keeps changing actors I guess they figured they really wanted some kind of identifying mark the audience could use to pick him out… I mean… oooh it’s mysterious and has mysterious purposes probably not at all tied into the idea that viewers are goldfish! After the credits we get a brief comedy bit where Mana wants to take a picture and there’s some painfully unfunny jokes where the Professor and Taiichi wonder if she wants to take their pictures so that they can be models but it turns out that Mana just wants a picture of Shouichi. The part that’s notable about this whole thing is that Shouichi is busy cleaning a glass door and Mana just opens it while he’s braced against the glass which causes him to fall over and injure himself and she can not even be bothered to care about his pain and suffering.
It should also come as no surprise that the rest of the family completely ignores his tumble and declarations of pain. It helps to remember that Shouichi just got out of police custody a day prior after being wrongfully accused of murder. No breaks for you Shouichi, neither from housework or mistreatment at the hands of the Misugi family. Such is the life of a comedic amnesiac house slave.
And speaking of mistreatment… 
Yeah police chief, what are you saying Hojo isn’t qualified to be a superhero just because he fled like a little baby coward from a fight? That’s discrimination against all wimpy, weak willed men! Also look at how sad Hojo looks there. Awww… poor Hojo. Not really. But come on we can totally enjoy that puppy dog look he’s trying to wear.
This whole scene is great. The police brass inform Hojo that he’s no longer the G3 pilot because both Ozawa’s and Omuro’s reports point out that he retreated against orders at a point when the G3 suit still had plenty of operational power left for combat. Which of course Hojo blames on Ozawa and Omuro by claiming that he would have died if he hadn’t run away which makes me somewhat question whether Hojo understands the whole point of the polices investment in the G3 system. It’s not like a person tasked with fist fighting monsters is expected to have total safety on the job.
Hojo tries to pull out the Akatsuki-gou incident again as blackmail only for the police brass to inform him that they had actually picked him based on his supposed talent and that if he tried to blackmail them that’d just make them less likely to pick him as a user. It’s hard to tell if that’s how they really felt or if they’re just covering their asses after making a poor choice in putting Hojo in the pilots seat but I can appreciate him being shot down either way and it makes their motives somewhat murky at best.
Hikawa is going over the details of the murder case and still can’t shake the feeling that he knows the victim Miura but he has to put his investigation aside when he gets a visit from Mana. Mana is looking for info about Miura herself since she wants to see if she can track down anything about Shouichi’s past while Hikawa takes the chance to try to ask her a bit more about her psychic powers.
Mana has been hiding her abilities from her Uncle and everyone else, leaving Hikawa as the only living person aware of them because of the necessity of the investigation. Of course that means Mana gets to constantly watch her Uncle proudly proclaim that there can be no such thing as psychic powers and base his whole life and career on disproving them when she could have let him know long ago that he’s wrong which does make her kind of a jerk? We also learn that Mana has repeatedly attempted to use her powers to get info on Shouichi but it never works for some reason and that she has little control over her powers. Lucky for her they kicked in to get vague evidence last week huh?
Ryo and his uncle are having a walk and talk about Ryo’s dad where his uncle just muses on how weird his behavior had been, disappearing after the Akatsuki-gou incident and never contacting anyone for months up till when he was found dead a half year later. Ryo shows his uncle the notebook his father had left behind but none of the names jump out at him as familiar, however the camera is quick to find an important one as it zooms in nice and tight on Shinohara Saeko’s name. I’m sure that won’t be important. Mana also goes out to track down Miura’s best friend to see if she knows anything about Shouichi and I’m positive there’s no way that’ll turn out to be Saeko. I mean what would be the odds right?
There’s a quick interlude as some random dude jogging through a car park for some reason (I would think there would be better jogging locations) and he completely misses an Unknown walk right by him and then he stumbles on a desiccated corpse in a car and soon enough the police investigators are on the case, which now means both Hikawa and Hojo are on the scene thanks to Hojo’s being taken off the G3 System and put back in investigations.
I’m not sure that was the best shot to demonstrate the scene but I just cannot get enough of Hojo looking crazy. Especially since he always does it when he’s super confident for some reason?
Anyway Hikawa doesn’t seem all that concerned about Hojo’s demotion until Hojo blames it on Ozawa. Hikawa is quick to defend her as being absolutely flawless. Which is probably a little overboard but hey it’s nice to see Hikawa grow some backbone when one of his team members is insulted since he usually lets Hojo directly taunt him all the time. Hojo does vow to prove himself once again so he can take over the G3 system while Hikawa seems just more interested in actually solving the case they’ve got. Silly Hikawa doesn’t he know police work is all about politics?
We also get a short comedy bit where it turns out Kouno is ditching work for a long lunch at his favorite ramen stand . He’s actually avoiding the crime scene in hopes it’ll make Hojo and Hikawa work better together but he makes an analogy about oil and soy sauce mixing when it doesn’t and it’s moderately funny in a lighthearted kind of way. It gives Kouno something to do other than be just the nice older detective and it’s good that he’s getting something of a mentor figure like character.
Oh and Mana got Miura’s best friends name and it’s Saeko’s. I know, I’m completely shocked at this unprecedented turn of events. Who could have seen it coming? Shouichi wants to put off visiting with Saeko because he’s still afraid of facing his past when Professor Misugi actually provides the real shock of the scene by having good advice.
He also affirms for Shouichi that just because Shouichi might find out who he really is doesn’t mean he’ll lose his connections to the Misugi household. It’s all surprisingly sweet coming from a guy who is usually a total jerk. I mean he’s even eating the snack that Shouichi prepared too! Maybe this is all just some elaborate setup to be even more of a jerk to him later… Maybe by going back on his word and throwing him right out of the house the moment he finds out who he is?
Ryo is the first to meet up with Saeko but isn’t able to explain what he’s after before she quickly walks off forcing him to follow her. With Shouichi and Mana showing up a bit later the two pairs cross each other and the music builds up like this is the most TENSE THING EVER.
Just imagine that with swelling drum beats and creepy thrill music and you can be exactly as confused as your humble recapper. The music even sheepishly cuts out when Saeko gets to her car and nothing happens, leaving Ryo to tail her on his bike while Shouichi and Mana stop off at her house. Shouichi and Mana meet up with her brother there and we learn that unlike Ryo they had the common courtesy to call ahead, but they had gotten her brother on the phone rather than her. He knows that Shouichi has amnesia but hasn’t gotten any info out of his sister whether she knows him or not and asks that they wait to catch her when she gets back.
Oh and we find out that she’s been digging out busted and broken earthenware from a nearby lake… as people are wont to do. In fact she’s out there scubaing at that very moment with Ryo creepily stalking her as she dives. But while she’s digging up new old pots Shouichi takes a look at one of her old old ones and comes across a pretty startling find.
Dun dun dun! For some reason Saeko has tagged her pots with the mark of Agito! Over at the beach Ryo has been waiting all day for her to finish her diving and helps get her stuck car out of the sand so she agrees to talk with him, but there’s far more dangerous things afoot than beach side murder investigations (where’s David Hasslehoff when you need him) when Hikawa runs across this weeks Unknown!
I want to make a crack about it being a Trojan Horse but it’s actually a Zebra Unknown so the show has robbed that option from me. Also they’ve introduced Zebra’s for some reason and put them in roman gladiator armor so… sometimes I just don’t understand what you’re going for when it comes to Kaijin designs Agito…
We get enough context to know that Hikawa was staking out the previous victims wife who Hojo had said there was no reason to bodyguard since she wasn’t a blood relative, but while he’s there watching her it’s clear she’s pregnant and so that’s likely what the Zebra Unknown is after. Also does that mean that I can claim Hojo has royally screwed up again? Man this is just being a banner week for Hojo ineptitude!
Saeko brings Ryo back to talk and finds Mana waiting for her, but Shouichi has already run off to go deal with the Unknown himself. Oh and I should note the Zebra Unknown does that horse thing where it snorts but in a jowly sort of fashion like it’s shaking it’s cheeks… if you know what I’m talking about? If you do then you’ll realize that using it to try and make the Zebra Unknown sound scary is one of the most ridiculous things Agito has tried to do yet.
Hikawa’s guts are no real match for a bulletproof murder monster but he is able to get the woman to flee to safety while it pretty handily tosses him about before G3 shows up on the scene. Despite Hojo not having authorization to deploy he begged Ozawa to launch the G-Trailer since protecting lives was more important than protocol and she reluctantly agreed. Of course I should probably not have to point out it’s likely Hojo doesn’t give a crap about innocent lives but hey he still has a point.
And the G3 ah… doesn’t fare much better.
G3 does manage to keep the Zebra Unknown distracted at least, but it seems to mostly be shrugging off G3’s blows while the Zebra’s… claws? It seems like it has claws. I’m not sure why a Zebra would have claws but hey that’s less ridiculous than some of the stuff Unknown’s have been known to have power wise so we can roll with it. Anyway it keeps tearing out chunks of sparks from the G3 until finally the G3 collapses from excessive injuries. Wait that doesn’t seem right… shouldn’t Hojo have run away and peed his pants like a little baby coward before that happened?
Hikawa stands up unarmed to take on the Zebra Unknown once more but is thankfully saved the embarrassment of that eventual (note: likely very quick) defeat when Agito arrives on the scene. But before he can clean up the trash we get a quick cut of Saeko refusing to answer Ryo’s questions, feigning ignorance but clearly enough hiding something as she runs from the room.
Agito meanwhile is having an easy enough time with the Zebra Unknown until a new Zebra shows up by popping out of the ground and grabbing his ankles. This one is white colored compared to the black one we have been seeing and rather than snort this one makes high pitched trilling whinnies all the time which somehow makes it even less threatening than it’s partner!
The White Zebra is at least a lot more recognizably Zebra even in the dark lighting. They don’t seem to have any particular special combat oriented powers or anything but Agito is clearly having some trouble dealing with the pair when Hikawa reclaims the GM-01 Scorpion that was knocked aside in the earlier fight. Despite his injuries he attempts to level the gun to take a shot at the White Zebra when it has Agito pinned down only to have the massive kickback throw off his aim.
Hikawa opts to then brace himself against a nearby wall and ignore his injuries entirely as he fires recklessly as many times as he’s able to.
We’re shown that trying to shoot the gun while freestanding without the G3 armor to boost your strength almost knocked him over, and since he’s got injuries heavy enough that he’s having trouble just standing it’s likely that every shot he takes while holding himself up against the wall is putting him through massive pain. He’s able to land enough shots that he distracts the White Zebra but finally the force proves too much for him and with a last shot he’s knocked aside and passes out unconscious from his now self inflicted injuries… and that’s the cliffhanger!
So, Final Thoughts?
More great Agito this week! And this time they actually managed to make the fight scene work, but not by necessarily making a better fight scene. No they actually took one of Agito‘s real strengths, its drama, and worked it into the fight itself.
Having Hikawa take on an Unknown alone without the aid of the G3 unit is of course very in fitting with his character as we’ve seen and a great way to show that he’s going to be heroic no matter what position he’s given, and after Agito himself shows up Hikawa is willing to do whatever he can, even putting his own body on the line to try and help take down the Unknown. The show is pretty great about not making this too overt either by having it specifically called out or anything. It just lets the acting and the visuals tell the story for us.
As always Agito loves its mysteries and this week is no exception with the introduction of a new character clearly holding some baggage of her own. But since they’re using her to actually pull Ryo into the main story-line I certainly can’t complain as he’s been sitting on the fringe of the cast for way too long for one of the main heroes of the show. Saeko hasn’t had much time to do anything on screen but she’s been good as an enigma. She’s hiding things for her own reasons clearly but she has something to do with Ryo’s investigations and with Shouichi’s lost memories which provides a good hint that there may be some unknown connection between the two.
The police politics play out pretty well this week as well as they’re a bit less childish than they have been in the past. The police brass come off rather vague and it’s hard to tell whether they’re really acting in the best interests of the people or not but that makes them feel at least somewhat multifaceted and pretty well reflects how the real world works. Or the real world would work with weird psychic hunting monsters about. After all there were compelling reasons to put Hojo in the G3 even without the blackmail he’d cooked up.
As always Agito is a bit more forthcoming with new mysteries than it is with explanations, but this is the kind of episode that really makes you want to tune in next week. And speaking of…
And now, on the next episode of Kamen Rider Agito!
Saeko has been researching an ancient civilization! Hikawa thinks the Unknowns fear humans! Agito and the Zebras fight on top of a cop car! And Gills is back once again, appropriately fighting at a lake!
Can Gills breathe underwater? Do the Unknown really fear people who can do cheap parlor tricks? Find out next time in Kamen Rider Agito Episode 12: The Crash in the Lake!
Kamen Rider is Copyright Toei Company, TV Asashi, and Bandai. The Subbed version recapped in this article was produced by the wonderful folks at TV-Nihon.
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