Kamen Rider Kuuga 02 - 20th Anniversary
On this week’s Kuuga, the threat of the Unidentified Organisms is slowly made a little more clear, as one disguises himself as a human, and Godai has to make a choice whether to fully commit to fighting or not, because previously he was holding himself back out of fear.
Episode: Kamen Rider Kuuga 02 - “Transformation” Original Air Date: 6 February 2000 Plot summary: https://kamenrider.fandom.com/wiki/Transformation
Importantly, as far as the police know, the fight that Ichijou witnessed wasn’t between a hero and a monster, it was between two monsters. Ichijou deduces that the white one was Godai based on the thumbs up gesture, and Godai confirms this in person, but in future firefights the police will not discriminate between him and the Grongi. When more attacks start occurring that don’t match the MO of the Spider Grongi, Ichijou realizes there’s another one out there, acting like a vampire.
Interestingly, Godai is still getting visions about his powers, and in his visions, his body is red rather than white. He tries to convince Ichijou that he can fight, but Ichijou tells him this is police business. Godai’s conflict continues to stew within him, but after seeing a schoolgirl cry at the wake of one of the deceased excavation team members, Godai’s mind is made up, and when he confronts the bat Grongi in a church, he is finally able to transform into a red bodied form with longer horns, his Mighty Form. Mighty Form is very strong and excels at hand-to-hand combat, but Godai still struggles when the Spider Grongi resurfaces during his fight with Bat and they tag-team him. Ultimately, a beam of light causes Bat to flee, and he drags Spider outside where he unleashes a powerful kick that winds up destroying the monster for real. After the dust settles, Godai comforts a wounded Ichijou on his shoulder.
As I said last week, Godai unlocks his powers piecewise. He has no instruction manual, just some vague flashes in his head from the belt, so he has to figure out how to access various abilities. In this case, he can’t progress beyond Growing Form because of his uncertainties, but seeing a girl cry whom he could have protected is enough to make his decision and unlock his major transformation.
I really appreciate a lot of things about the Bat Grongi and his fight. First of all, it’s the first indication that the Grongi can appear outwardly human and interact with people. They can’t speak Japanese yet so keeping their mouths shut is probably advisable. And then, during the big fight in the church, the other thing I appreciate is that they bring back the Spider Grongi, who apparently has als been hiding in the church. Since we didn’t see it get properly destroyed last time, it’s good to follow up on that, and a chance to show off Kuuga’s kick strength. However, the Bat Grongi got away to fight another day, and that will come back to relevance later as well.
Lastly, the bond between Kuuga and Ichijou is beginning to take hold, even though the latter maintains that fighting the Unidentified Lifeforms is for the police. He still runs interference when needed, firing mostly ineffective bullets at Grongi when Godai is in a pinch to give him just enough time to turn the tables.
The translated Grongi dialog gives us some more insight into their historical relationship with Kuuga, but I won’t say more than that. Also, Godai sacrificed his bike for this, so RIP to the “ride” portion of Kamen Rider..... except that the TRCS2000 was namedropped and will be here soon.
Next week, we start to see the scale of the Grongi invasion, and the police force’s attitude towards Unidentified Lifeform #2 and #4, AKA Kuuga Growing and Mighty Form. CHOU HENSHIN!