Kamen Rider Decade Episode 2: Kuuga's World

In the year 2000, Kamen Rider returned to the small screen after an extended hiatus, shortly after the death of original series creator, Shotaro Ishinomori. His concepts for a new Rider series, which he was working on prior to his death, were made into Kamen Rider Kuuga with the tagline, "A New Hero, A New Legend". It is only fitting that Kuuga is the first world Tsukasa visits, but the production team has to tackle a major problem.

The actor who portrayed Kuuga, Odagiri Jo, actually went on to be a successful soap opera star in Japan after Kuuga ended. As such, he looks back on the series as "that silly superhero thing I did before I was famous." There was no way they were ever going to convince him to come back for Decade, so they recast the character. But, he wasn't the only one. More on that later, but let's focus on Episode 2.

"I think I saw this in a Wile E. Coyote cartoon once."

Our episode begins with Kuuga leaping into the fray as the female officer from before, Yashiro, tells the other officers to leave him alone and let him fight off the Grongi for them. Kuuga exposits during the fight that this attack continues a pattern of the murder of female police officers by the Grongi.

After the theme song, Tsukasa screws around with his new police uniform. Bad idea, seeing as he could get arrested for impersonating an officer, but Natsumi sets him straight. They find a newspaper explaining that recently beings classified as "Unidentified Life Forms" have been attacking, and that scholars believe them to be Grongi, an ancient tribe of monsters.

The original Kuuga series was an interesting departure from most Rider shows, in that the police actively tried to fight the monsters. Mind you, they weren't very successful, but knowing this leads Tsukasa to belive that, since he's randomly been put in a policeman's uniform, he should be fighting the Grongi. As he and Natsumi exit Hikari Studios they find that the building has displaced a different building that had been there before.

As Kuuga fights, Tsukasa explains to Natsumi that Kuuga has the power to change into different forms that let him use different powers to fight the Grongi. Mighty for hand-to-hand combat, Dragon for speed, and Pegasus for long-range. Kuuga defeats the Grongi but the officer is still dead. Yashiro arrives and is frustrated that Yuusuke isn't taking things seriously, as Yuusuke rather blatantly flirts with her. This isn't the same Yuusuke as the original Kuuga, and typing AR Yuusuke is a hassle, so let's call him Yuseless. You'll find out why soon enough.

"Miming is the true expression of heroism."

At the police station, the cops discuss the "Grongi Game Murder Theory", the belief that the Grongi are following some sort of system of rules to their attacks. The scene helps illustrate the nature of Kuuga as a series. It was a superhero show, yes, but it was also a police procedural, and Yuusuke's most trusted ally was an officer who helped him fight the Grongi. Tsukasa arrives at the station and starts acting like he owns the place. When the cops are called about another Grongi attack, Tsukasa rides off to fight the Grongi. He fails to save the officer and inquires why the Grongi are doing this. However, the Grongi speaks in Grongi language, so we don't have anything to go on. There are ciphers online that can translate Grongi language into Japanese, so have fun with that, I guess. Tsukasa turns into Decade to kill the Grongi, much to Yashiro and Yuseless's shock.

Later, Yuseless and Yashiro arrive at Hikari Studios, as the Studio has taken place of a cafe, but Natsumi's Grandpa, Eijiro, is nice enough to make them some coffee anyway. Yashiro believes that Decade, despite being an "Unidentified Life Form", could help fight the Grongi, but Yuseless is hesitant. It's of note that Yuseless's name is Yuusuke Onodera, rather than Godai, and that Onodera was Shotaro Ishinomori's surname by birth. Yuseless rides off in frustration, but Natsumi asks him about why he's fighting for others. Yuseless denies it, but asks her in turn if there's anyone she's worried about.

Back at the station, Tsukasa notes to the cops that there's a pattern to the murders. The last number of the dead officers' birthdays are 3-7-5-6, which in Japanese spells "Mi-na-go-ro". As such, the next victim will have been born on the 4th, 14th, or 24th to spell "Minna goroshi", or "Kill Everyone". Meanwhile, the Grongi have a scene where they speak their own language, but it's clear from context that they intend to revive something.

Tsukasa returns to the Studio to develop the pictures he's been taking of Kuuga's World. However, they're just as distorted as the ones from Natsumi's world, indicating that Tsukasa is not from Kuuga's world either. Lacking any further ideas, he calls Yashiro and tells her he might have been wrong about the numbers theory.

Yashiro and Yuusuke meet Tsukasa near a moutain. Tsukasa reveals the scenes of the various murders have all been equidistant from this mountain and that he was lying about the "Minna Goroshi" theory. Turns out, Tsukasa speaks Grongi and got information off the one he killed earlier. As part of the Grongi ritual to resurrect the ultimate evil, they need to kill five female human warriors equidistant from the mountain, and Yashiro is now in place. The Grongi attack, but Tsukasa punches Yashiro, drawing blood. The other rule was that the women had to be killed without spilling any blood, so the ritual is over.

Tsukasa transforms into Decade again as Natsumi rushes to the mountain, noting that there is a distortion filter near it, like in her world. Decade beats one of the Grongi as Kuuga kills the other, only for Kuuga to start attacking Decade. Kuuga exposits that someone told him that Decade would arrive here and kill all the Riders, going so far as to call Tsukasa The Devil. He brushes this off, and assumes fighting Kuuga might help bring his memories back. Kuuga and Decade have a pretty even fight, but once Tsukasa starts using his Attack Ride Cards, Kuuga starts to falter.

Natsumi arrives and the fight causes her to have a vision. In it, she sees the end result of the Rider War again, but after the Riders are all supposedly dead, Kuuga stands back up, and enters his Ultimate Form to finish Decade once and for all. Ultimate Kuuga and Decade clash and the end result is unclear. Natsumi shouts for the two to stop fighting, both in her vision and in the real world, to no avail.

We see that near the battlefield there is a strange man in a trenchcoat muttering to himself how Decade doesn't belong in this world. A distortion passes through Decade and Kuuga, and they turn to see they are no longer alone. Kamen Riders KickHopper and PunchHopper from Kamen Rider Kabuto are here (voiced by their original actors, no less), and the episode ends as the two attack Kuuga and Decade.

"Kuuga's World" continues to set the status quo for the series following "Rider War". It's here we see that the merging of the worlds and stories of the various Rider worlds means things are not quite as they should be, with Kuuga and his supporting cast radically altered. I don't mind this as much, since the spirit of Kuuga is still alive, focusing on a hero who has little in the form of allies, and the police struggling to catch up. Decade is shown to be more effective at killing monsters than this new Kuuga, but given that this Kuuga has only fought 6 or 7 monsters up to this point, it's forgiveable in that this Kuuga doesn't have the combat experience of the old one. Yuseless starts out as a likeable enough character and is portrayed as a bit of a hotshot, which works. We're also introduced to the character who comes closest to being a main villain, though even to this day his goals remain somewhat unclear. The episode keeps up a steady pace, intoducing the concepts quickly, and then letting them guide our heroes through the story, which will reach it's conclusion in Episode 3.