Whoa, plot twist.

Or it could mean "This sure does bear a striking resemblance to Madoka."

Yeah, you totally have the wrong avatar to be taken seriously with that comment.

What does this even mean?

Your salt aside, it's more that it's standard for Kamen Riders' powers to be created by the bad guys, and "the hero was actually playing into the bad guy's hand all along" really is a fairly standard twist.

This. It's unoriginal alright, but I'm not complaining.
It wouldn't be a proper tokusatsu tribute without the villains getting some "keikaku doori" smug-faces in and the idiot heroes going "nani??!". Fairly standard stuff tbh.

Holy Cerebus Syndrome.

And so, this is the dreaded moment in which the silly comedy series tries to become dramatic. More often than not, the ending result of this shift is alienating the original audience while failing to catch a new one, resulting in lackluster endings or series becoming shells of their former selves at the midway point (looking at you, CLAMP).

Let's see how it goes with this one.

last edited at Nov 6, 2019 9:34PM

I doubt it's getting that dark. Makoto got shot in the shoulder, it doesn't look fatal at all. Sure, it looks bad to a grade schooler who might have never seen that much blood in her life, but unless Makoto takes some more bullets, I doubt she's dying. In addition to that, Hina seems to have absorbed Makoto so there will probably some weird recovery shenanigans going on. Even if one of them irreversibly transforms into an Antinoid (which I doubt is happening), so what? Honey Trap has not shown any difficulty adjusting to human life as an Antinoid.

I wasn't expecting such a serious twist from this.

Oh God damnit, it's Madoka Magica all over again.

And so, this is the dreaded moment in which the silly comedy series tries to become dramatic. More often than not, the ending result of this shift is alienating the original audience while failing to catch a new one, resulting in lackluster endings or series becoming shells of their former selves at the midway point (looking at you, CLAMP).

That's totally not how Rayearth played out. The dramatic shift made everything very heavy, made everyone's actions suddenly have weight.

...because why would anyone talk about any other CLAMP work?

One of the key themes of Kamen Rider has always been that the heroes uses the same power as the evil beings to stop them. In the very first Kamen Rider, the two Kamen Riders were humans that were captured and experimented on by the evil organization to be their ultimate super soldiers but escaped and opposed them.

Since then, almost every Kamen Rider has had this element in some way, including the heroes using the same power source as the evil beings, the heroes being the same race as the evil beings/halfbreeds, the heroes working together with the evil beings, the heroes becoming the same race as the evil beings or some combination. Some examples (with major spoilers) include:

Kamen Rider Ryuki: The Riders gain their power by making a contract with a monster and borrowing their power. Failure to fulfill their end of the contract means the monster will eat them
Kamen Rider Blade: The monsters (Undead) can be sealed into playing cards and the Riders use the power of the Ace Cards to transform and the other cards for special attacks/upgrades. One of the Riders is actually an Undead using the power of another Undead to pretend to be a human. Another Rider's powerup turns him into an Undead by the end of the show
Kamen Rider Faiz: The monsters (Orphenochs) are actually an evolution of humans. Humans who are capable of evolving become an Orphenoch after they die. The transformation devices are only designed to be used by the Orphenochs and normal humans can't use them. The Riders either are Orphenochs or got injected with Orphenoch DNA.
Kamen Rider OOO (probably resembles Hero-san and Former General-san the most): The Greeeds are the monsters and there are initially four of them. The Greeeds are powered by medals. One of them didn't trust the others and chose to side with humans, giving the hero the ability to transform into a Rider using the power of medals like the Greeed. Throughout the story, the hero gains a new set of medals that slowly turns him into a Greeed himself
Kamen Rider Wizard: The monsters (Phantoms) are beings that live inside certain humans. When the human falls to despair, their Phantom can break out and take over the human's existence. The Riders are people who managed to regain control after their Phantoms almost broke out or came to an agreement with their Phantom
Kamen Rider Gaim: It's a bit too much detail to go into the exact relationship between the Riders and the monsters here, but by the end of the show, two major characters including the hero himself become the same race as the monsters they fought. This also started off being a show about kids using Pokemon-like creatures to battle for territory to dance in.

What I'm trying to get at is that the latest chapter is a very typical Tokusatsu plot point and I doubt the existence of Madoka had much of an influence.

Oh fuck, so they've been killing innocent people this whole time probably, right?

That's messed up. Author's done a pretty good job of giving X a presence that dramatically switches the mood of the comic.

Oh fuck, so they've been killing innocent people this whole time probably, right?

No, Honey Trap said in chapter 2 that the kind they've been killing are artificially made. X and the Generals are the only one that have a chance of being former humans.

This just went from a normal hero show to Madoka Magica real fast.

last edited at Nov 7, 2019 2:11AM

As someone who really liked Kamen Rider OOO, I am fully on board with this twist!
Also, does this mean Honey was a human before?

X, you're just asking for comedy to happen to you.

One of the key themes of Kamen Rider has always been that the heroes uses the same power as the evil beings to stop them. In the very first Kamen Rider, the two Kamen Riders were humans that were captured and experimented on by the evil organization to be their ultimate super soldiers but escaped and opposed them.

Since then, almost every Kamen Rider has had this element in some way, including the heroes using the same power source as the evil beings, the heroes being the same race as the evil beings/halfbreeds, the heroes working together with the evil beings, the heroes becoming the same race as the evil beings or some combination. Some examples (with major spoilers) include:

Kamen Rider Ryuki: The Riders gain their power by making a contract with a monster and borrowing their power. Failure to fulfill their end of the contract means the monster will eat them
Kamen Rider Blade: The monsters (Undead) can be sealed into playing cards and the Riders use the power of the Ace Cards to transform and the other cards for special attacks/upgrades. One of the Riders is actually an Undead using the power of another Undead to pretend to be a human. Another Rider's powerup turns him into an Undead by the end of the show
Kamen Rider Faiz: The monsters (Orphenochs) are actually an evolution of humans. Humans who are capable of evolving become an Orphenoch after they die. The transformation devices are only designed to be used by the Orphenochs and normal humans can't use them. The Riders either are Orphenochs or got injected with Orphenoch DNA.
Kamen Rider OOO (probably resembles Hero-san and Former General-san the most): The Greeeds are the monsters and there are initially four of them. The Greeeds are powered by medals. One of them didn't trust the others and chose to side with humans, giving the hero the ability to transform into a Rider using the power of medals like the Greeed. Throughout the story, the hero gains a new set of medals that slowly turns him into a Greeed himself
Kamen Rider Wizard: The monsters (Phantoms) are beings that live inside certain humans. When the human falls to despair, their Phantom can break out and take over the human's existence. The Riders are people who managed to regain control after their Phantoms almost broke out or came to an agreement with their Phantom
Kamen Rider Gaim: It's a bit too much detail to go into the exact relationship between the Riders and the monsters here, but by the end of the show, two major characters including the hero himself become the same race as the monsters they fought. This also started off being a show about kids using Pokemon-like creatures to battle for territory to dance in.

What I'm trying to get at is that the latest chapter is a very typical Tokusatsu plot point and I doubt the existence of Madoka had much of an influence.

I've never watched any of this series so cool to know, thanks for the little summary!

....did this shit just get real or what?! I didn't think there would be any deaths in this manga.... My guess is its resolved in next chapter or so

Did the two sisters become one? Incest

Fuck, another character that referrers to herself in a third person

I kinda hope she dies

The writer of madoka worked on gaim too

Your salt aside, it's more that it's standard for Kamen Riders' powers to be created by the bad guys, and "the hero was actually playing into the bad guy's hand all along" really is a fairly standard twist.

This. It's unoriginal alright, but I'm not complaining.
It wouldn't be a proper tokusatsu tribute without the villains getting some "keikaku doori" smug-faces in and the idiot heroes going "nani??!". Fairly standard stuff tbh.

Honestly it's hard to come up with story elements that has never been done. I don't know how many times I came up with what I thought was an original idea, only to find out that it has been done before.

People pretty much ran out of genuinely original story bits already by the end of the Bronze Age tbh.

While this sort of thing is absolutely on brand for Kamen Rider, I do think the way this is presented is very Madokaesque, so I wouldn't be surprised if there was inspiration from that as well. On a similar note, magical girl shows, particularly Pre Cure, are sort of equivalent to Super Sentai, and it could be said that the dark magical girl shows are more akin to Kamen Rider, Granbelm is a recent one that really invokes Kamen Rider.

Well shit, we just went all Kamen Rider OOO up in here!

I like it