The Weekly Ride Review with Ethan: Kamen Rider Gotchard Episode 9

We ride again! Join Ethan for this week’s Ride Review featuring Kyoto, UFOs and… is that a Gundam?

Summary

We open this week’s episode with Mr. Minato telling his regular school class that their school trip to Kyoto is coming up in a few days and that each group of students will be able to move independently. While there, they must keep to a research theme. Hotaro, Rinne and Ryo Kajiki, Hotaro’s long standing best friend, decide to team up and go with Kaijiki’s theme of researching UFOs. After Hotaro gets all caught up in his friends excitement for it, we then cut to Kyoto, later that night, where a man outside of a shrine sees a UFO. Back at the family restaurant, Kaijiki busts in to tell Hotaro all about, which then take us into the opening.

We rejoin the episode with Spanner investigating where he fought Lachesis in last week’s episode. As he looks for clues, the Abyssal Sister shows up and transforms into the Luckyclover Malgam again. After Spanner transforms in response, Lachesis uses the Junglejan Chemy to augment herself, becoming a more powerful Malgam Spanner responds in kind, quipping that Lachesis isn’t special because she can stack multiple Chemy powers, and uses two of his own: Gekiocopter & Gutsshovel. This causes Lachesis to retreat but not before dropping something. 

Following her escape, we see Lachesis talking to Atropos, who appears to be doing alchemy at the workbench from the opening. She tells Lachesis that Clotho has left for Kyoto because a level ten that had been avoiding them has finally appeared. We cut to our school trio getting off a plane and, as Kajiki runs off, Rinne goes to talk to Hotaro, who explains he left Hopper1 and all of his Chemies at home because it’s a school trip. Clotho, seeing them arrive, decides to deal with them before searching for the level ten and breaks two random criminals out of a prison transport. One of them smirks and leaves, while the other becomes the Junglejan Malgam.

The trio investigate the shrine from earlier. It’s here that Hopper1 reveals they stowed away in Hotaro’s bag. Running after Hopper1, thinking it’s a monster, Kajiki has a run in with a girl who is also into the occult, like him. The girl has even had letter published in the same magazine that Kajiki has. Eventually, she has to leave for work. The trio then head to Kyoto Film Studios, where she works, so that Kajiki can look for her at the historical theme park. Kajiki is all in and believes she may be the person of his dreams. Hotaro, happy his friend has found his gotcha, helps him to look for her. During a montage of the three exploring the park, they eventually reach a haunted house. Hotaro and Kajiki are very scared by the characters within but Rinne is laughing and smiling throughout the experience. Outside the haunted house, the trio are approached by the person they are looking for who says she would love to hang out more with Kajiki and arranges to meet up after her shift. He departs from Hotaro and Rinne to get ready.

Just then, Mr. Minato approaches Rinne and Hotaro and explains to them that Clotho has been spotted in the area and they need to be careful. Rinne reminds Hotaro about where his Chemies are right now and we get a fun show of Renge and Sabimaru hanging out playing with Hotaro’s Chemies. They get a call from him and the pair rush to Kyoto on Golddash to give him his cards. 

We then join Kajiki on his date. As the two connect and talk about how they fell in love with the occult, the lady gets a text and runs off. Thinking she was acting odd, Kajiki follows and sees her running off into the arms of the other criminal from the bus. Mr. Minato, doing some investigating on his own, finds Clotho and the two fight, with Minato animating the ninja mannequin props from the studios to attack her. As they are defeated, we cut to Hotaro and Rinne in full costume, taking pictures of Rinne, dressed in Shinsengumi gear. Since ditching Kajiki, Rinne has been dragging Hotaro around all of the Shinsengumi locations that she seemed excited to visit from the guide book she was reading earlier.

Hopper1 detects Mr. Minato’s fight and the three take off. When Hotaro and Rinne arrive, Clotho sets the Jungle Malgam on them, who right away turns giant. Lacking any of his normal cards, Hotaro borrows Yamibat and Renkingrobo from Rinne and turns into the Batkingrobo Wild Form to do battle. After a few really nice shots of the battle from other notable Kyoto locations, Hotoro is tied up in vines. Rinne reminds him he can fly and suggests he unleash his finisher beam. After this outburst, the driver on his chest starts flashing, signalling that he’s out of power. He detransforms and returns to normal size. The Malgam follows suit and continues attacking him but is interrupted by the arrival of Ringe and Sabimaru on Golddash, who save Hotaro and on the stairs. Facing down his foe, Hotaro finally transforms into SteamHopper and starts to do battle with the Malgam. This brings our episode to a close.    

My Take

Another week, another enjoyable Gotchard. Kajiki’s stuff was nice but feels like it’s mainly going to be dealt with next episode so I’ll talk about it more then. I really liked how this episode encompassed so many Kyoto locations. As someones that wants to visit Japan, it was nice to get to see many of Kyoto’s landmarks. Additionally, Batkingrobo is a form I’ve been hoping to see for a while and it did not disappoint! It’s probably my favourite of the Rider mechs we have gotten in recent years. Furthermore, getting to see the normally stone faced Rinne all excited and happy, enjoying the haunted house and telling Hotaro to do his special beam moves was just nice to see. 

The part with Spanner and Lachesis was very interesting, too. It felt very ‘we need to explain why future Malgams are stronger’ or ‘why the sisters’ Malgams are bigger deals’ to set up for future episodes. This is all well and good but I really hope we, instead, see them make their own Chimera Malgam rather than stacking Chemies like powerups. Regardless, it was another fun week.

As a reminder, Gotchard is taking a week off next week. Instead, the first episode of Gotchard VS Legend releases online and you know I’ll be covering that. Stay tuned for the special Weekly Ride Review!

What did you think of this episode? Are you a Gundam fan? Are you into the occult? Are you hyped for Legend?  As always, I’ve been Ethan, writer, Reviewer and sightseer for The Toku Source. Until next time…