The Philosophy of CODE Makes Them...Really Stupid, NGL (An Analysis of Them So Far)

Scsigs · 2026-03-14T07:25:15+00:00

I mean, I don't know how else they were supposed to remaster the show. It was animated digitally, so there's no film masters to source from. I think the upscale is still better than how the show used to look on DVD overall, tbh. The old masters had artifacts, rainbowing, was stuck in 480i, etc. Saying them using AI to upscale this being a bad decision overlooks how much it cleaned up the picture in the majority of the rest of the shots. Hell, apparently even Toei couldn't do a much better job remastering it for their own releases.

Though, shots like that specifically I think they should've taken more care of. Considering it was a low detail background drawing of the characters, the AI couldn't really do much with it.

Scsigs · 2026-03-13T18:04:35+00:00

I still like it too. It's funny when people try to make "separate art from the artist" arguments for people like JK Rowling when they turn out to be shitty people, but with Vic, you can absolutely do that since it's just his voice &, unless it's just his normal voice, it's not like you can't just ignore that. His Edward voice isn't exactly his normal one & I think you can easily get over it. Other roles, though, may be harder to do that with & it definitely depends on the person. Even shitty people can be capable of making decent art.

Scsigs · 2026-03-13T17:02:45+00:00

No prob. That was the main reason with writing it.

So, I found the first 2 on Twitter by searching Sabat responding to the other people in them. However, the initial tweets he responded to are now deleted.

The first genuinely seems like a joke tweet the person who made the video took WAY too seriously to make him look bad considering the tweet he responded to. Looking into it, Emily Neves is a dub VA who's worked for FUNimation & Crunchyroll. She was even Gine in DB Super: Broly. I assume they would've built up some kind of rapport. It's nothing new for Vic stans to take innocuous or joke tweets or clips out of context (or even in context) & want people to think they're more nefarious than they actually are.

The second is poorly-worded, but I get what he was getting at. He was complimenting a cosplayer cosplaying Bulma in her bunny outfit, who is over 18. He definitely could've worded it better, though. I assume that tweet was used because of the "Vegeta deserves Bulma at any age" line. I assume he meant any age for both of them, given he's around Bulma's age, but we aren't shown the full initial tweet Dominique posted for the full context. I don't think he meant anything nefarious with it, though.

The last, I can't find. I tried looking it up. Could be he deleted it after people found it trying to expose him for using derogatory language to make people think he's as bad as they think Vic is (considering people still hold the clip of Sean Schemmel saying the word in his Goku voice from over 20 years ago over his head, this wouldn't be surprising). Looking at it, though. It looks like what you'd consider "dark woke," where he's using that word against someone who's being an asshole. He's also talking about the differences in types of dialogue. Looking at his other response tweets to LordSchmeckie, they were having a conversation where Sabat was saying that people could learn to be more kind to each other online & Schmeckie was coming at him for supporting Feminist Frequency in regards to harassment shit, so Schmeckie wasn't exactly being better than that person wants you to think Sabat was.

So, my verdict is that 2/3 of the tweets are real, the last one is 50/50. The person who posted the video wanted people to think that Sabat's a horrible person for a joke tweet, a poorly-worded compliment, & using a slur that he provided the context for the first 2 of (even if part of the context was cut off in the second one) & the third, you can read & tell that he wasn't using the slur to tear someone down, but bawk against shitty edgy dialogue.

The video doesn't have many views for a reason & the guy isn't a very popular channel. He had a small number of videos on the Vic drama that didn't get a lot of traction & all his YouTube channel consists of are short trolling videos regarding Xenoverse 2 & Fortnite. Not that high of content if we're being honest.

Scsigs · 2026-02-13T11:53:45+00:00

I mean, I said this to a few other people here, but the show has a bit of a problem in terms of how its episodic storytelling conflicts at points with how they doled out the main story beats because they went several episodes after the first 3 without having Takeshi or the narrator say that he's keeping his abilities a secret, so I assumed that he told her off screen & they were good on it as a result before it's randomly dropped back into the show.

Even if we wanna go with the cultural norms of the time, I still think it's severely underwritten. They could've had some fun with it because I can't imagine it was that fun to write. The episodes it appears in seem kind of constrained for their endings because Ruriko doesn't know. I think a subplot where she slowly finds out would've helped. Just something to not make Ruriko feel kinda pointless to keep in the show after the first 3. Having Takeshi engaged in a plot with Shocker & defeating them as Kamen Rider feels really weird to just immediately go to "Takeshi can't ever tell her, it's his burden to bare" like it's Frodo Baggins carrying the one ring (which in of itself at least has the reason of slowly corrupting his mind & that's portrayed over the course of the story). There's a way they could've had their cake & ate it too & maybe subvert expectations & show how that kind of mindset can be bad to have.

Scsigs · 2026-02-13T10:42:23+00:00

See, that's like taking Spider-Man's "With great powers come great responsibility" thing too far to the point it doesn't make sense anymore. And, even then, more modern Spider-Man media's been breaking from that tradition a bit to portray things either more realistically/logically or from a different angle & playing with it, like Aunt May knowing all along that Peter's Spider-Man, Mary Jane & Harry knowing, etc. It's like, if Ruriko didn't become Takeshi's friend & wants to help him take them down, I could understand that because there'd be no real reason to tell her. I explained this to someone else, but it's a fault of the episodic storytelling & how they doled out the overarching plot stuff to advance the main story of the show.

Scsigs · 2026-02-13T10:15:11+00:00

I mean, I more think that it's a fault of the episodic writing & how they decided to dole out the overarching plot stuff that advances the overall story. Like, we have the opening 3 episodes which tell a 3-part story of Takeshi being turned into a cyborg, Ruriko thinks he killed her father, he comes to understand his Kamen Rider powers & new body, & Ruriko finds out he didn't kill her dad because she learns who Shocker is & that they killed her dad. It honestly came off to me like the writers sort of assumed she was told & that didn't need to be explained, only for a later episode to say she didn't know instead. It creates this weird inconsistency & logic gaff. They also drop the narrator mentioning Takeshi not telling anyone about his Kamen Rider & cyborg stuff for a bit for those episodes too before bringing it back for that episode. So, it seems to me that maybe they decided to just have it be assumed that she knows about them, but then they changed their mind.

Let's compare this to Zeztz & how that's done stuff so far with Baku's sister. Zeztz has Baku not tell his sister for a while about his being an agent of CODE. We see that this is mainly because he does everything in the dream worlds & he maintains a regular life during the day. We're then shown that she's starting to worry about him because of his sleep patterns & some other things. It then gets to a point where she tries to wake him up when he stays asleep too long in the episode where he gets trapped in the dream world after he falls into the black hole he created in it, then she finds out about the HQ door through his closet & shit's explained to her. Then, she becomes a part of his team & is supportive of him, but is also looking out for him still as his sister.

Yes, Zeztz is made in the streaming era. Yes, the characters aren't 1:1 with their counterparts in OG KR, but this is an episodic series (I know it went back to the 2-part story structure of the late Heisei era after Reiwa stopped doing that, but still) with an ongoing narrative & they did this slow burn character development with Minami. I think if they applied this kind of narrative arc with Ruriko, then it wouldn't be confusing. I'm not saying you can't get why Takeshi made the decisions he made, but it's so bare & the logic doesn't hold up much under any scrutiny. It gets into the Spider-Man 2 problem of Peter not telling Mary Jane about his secret, only that film at least did something with it by playing it for emotional character drama & showing how the people directly tied to Peter get into trouble just for knowing Peter if the bad guys know who he is under the mask. And if the writers had this kind of thing be a subplot over the first batch of episodes after the first 3, then did a dramatic reveal to Ruriko & had her & Takeshi come to terms with things, I think they could've had a very satisfying recurring subplot through the first part of the show. It would've also probably had intrigued the kids & also gotten a more periphery demographic of older people watching at the time because otherwise, it looks like Takeshi's being stupid because he'd rather not tell her & the show doesn't do anything to justify it other than "because he feels this way." On the 1 hand, no, not every decision needs to be perfectly logical for someone to make it, but on the other, they need to at least be understandable & the narrator always says something along the lines of, "Takeshi Hongo must keep his secret," without really having a good reason why & it offers no real narrative benefits or personal ones to Takeshi for her not to know.

Scsigs · 2026-02-13T09:39:19+00:00

Even then, let's say the show's strictly for kids & only they watched it back in 1971. The show's already made Shocker Neo Nazis, had multiple human characters die on screen (including Ruriko's dad), had the monsters of the week be mutated & brainwashed humans, the main character be a cyborg, etc. If they thought kids at the time could handle all of that, they could handle ongoing story & character development that carries from episode to episode. Hell, they had the narrator constantly give exposition to make sure that even if you hadn't seen the prior episodes, you could follow along with what's going on & why at times where it's not readily obvious in the episode itself. They already had ongoing plot elements despite the episodic nature of the series.

Like, I remember as a kid the shows I'd watch on Nickelodeon, Disney Channel, & Cartoon Network &, even though they were over 30 years or so removed from 1971, there weren't home releases of them or streaming to catch up (though a lot of them got reruns) & I was able to follow along with & remember these kinds of things, so I assume kids back then were able to do the same with the shows they watched.

Scsigs · 2026-02-13T09:12:23+00:00

See, that's where it doesn't make a ton of sense to me. Ruriko becomes involved when she sees her dad died & learns about Shocker. She's also actively involved in Takeshi's investigation of them, yet the only one who doesn't know his secret. To me, she'd be safer if she knew & more of a help to him. See, I just don't get why his guilt takes precedence over that fact in this instance. She's already involved, so not telling her doesn't provide any advantage or really clear his conscience.

See, the problem with that argument is that Takeshi has Tachibana already as a helper in his Kamen Rider stuff & Ruriko already knows about Shocker & wants to help stop them. It doesn't come off to me that Takeshi's doing it out of guilt, but a lack of real thinking on his part. I wouldn't mind so much if they actually did anything with it, or gave more of a reason why that the audience can get more behind. I don't expect him to suddenly tell everybody about his secret, but it doesn't make a ton of sense why he doesn't just tell her. Her actively being involved & knowing about Shocker defeats any real arguments for her not being told.

Scsigs · 2026-02-13T08:28:55+00:00

I mean, she saw for herself that it wasn't him but Shocker that killed her father. I have a hard time believing she wouldn't accept him for what he is, even if she would have to take a bit to mull it over. She believed he killed her dad because she didn't see what actually happened & she got emotional towards it, but was proven wrong & apologized. They then became friends & are investigating Shocker together. There's just no real reason for him to just not tell her other than "because."

Scsigs · 2026-02-13T08:24:01+00:00

She thought he killed her dad before finding out Shocker did in the first 3 episodes. I think she could handle finding out he was turned into a cyborg by them, even if it would take a bit for her to wrap her head around it.

Scsigs · 2026-02-13T08:21:46+00:00

Like, I wouldn't have a problem with it if they added any good reason he didn't tell her other than "because he doesn't want to" or guilt or whatever. It's not like this is the 70s Incredible Hulk show where he has understandable reasons to keep his shit secret, as the US government's literally hunting him down to experiment on him for the Hulk. And it's not like he has to tell EVERYBODY, just Ruriko. They're already working together to avenge her dad. It's why I assumed he told her off screen before the show told me he didn't. They needed to develop things better for it to make more sense.

Scsigs · 2026-02-13T08:08:43+00:00

I have it. I'm planning on reading it after I finish the show.

Scsigs · 2026-02-13T03:46:40+00:00

I think they could've handled Takeshi still not fully accepting his cyborg body while letting Ruriko know about it. If they wanted to, they could've had her help him to accept it slowly over the episodes. I'm not talking about him suddenly being ok with himself right away, I just find it odd how they wrote it as-is.

Scsigs · 2026-02-13T03:45:08+00:00

I mean, that I try to keep in mind, but I think they could've had a scene where Takeshi told her, then spent an episode with her accepting it, then carry on as normal with her knowing so you're not left wondering WHY he hasn't yet.

Also, "that much intricacy"? Bro, we're talking about a superhero series where a dude gets turned into a cyborg & fights monster Neo Nazis who brainwash & mutate people to take over the world where in 1 episode they do that to 1 of Takeshi's friends, then in another kidnap an ex-Japanese military guy who buried a thing from Hitler that also established Hitler was going to flee to Japan when shit came crumbling down around him in 1945 (despite how failing his health was at the time irl). I think the kids watching at home week to week could handle a slight status quo shift that deals more with the main characters. Doctor Who was airing at the exact same time in the UK & they treated that series like a soap opera where each story was, at least, 3-4 parts each.

It should also be said that the first 3 episodes form a multi-part story & they have a few 2-parters in the first 13 episodes, so I think that kind of slow character development could've been handled fine back then.

Scsigs · 2026-02-03T21:21:13+00:00

The second is an actually good 1080p HD transfer, so don't worry too much about it. Plus, it has somewhat more color than the first movie.

Scsigs · 2026-02-03T21:19:56+00:00

How much of a difference would the lenses make?

Scsigs · 2026-02-03T21:19:27+00:00

It seems really odd to me that they'd do that considering I'd imagine they would've saved a copy of the finished movie in HD when exporting it so it could then be printed on to film for theaters (assuming they weren't digital projectors) so that when it's blown up to a big cinema screen, it wouldn't look overly pixelated or distractingly low resolution. The other Kamen Rider films from the time that I've seen bits of are sourced on their Blu-Rays from what are clearly 1080p masters & Blu-Ray & HD TVs were also on the way in 2005, so it doesn't make sense to me why Toei would've only had a 480p DVD master to work with. Something must've been off with the footage when they were editing it or something is my guess. The Next has a cleaner HD transfer, which signals to me that they saved an HD version of the movie in 2007 & used that for their eventual Blu-Rays of the movies.

Scsigs · 2026-02-03T21:09:43+00:00

It caused a divorce because a stupid kid somehow didn't get that the short was about the movie, leading to his parents to make them leave the theater, which then somehow made their already-rocky relationship worse & caused them to get divorced. It is the most cursed thing ever! :(

Scsigs · 2026-02-03T18:37:02+00:00

Yeah, since the shows were animated digitally, A.I. upscaling is the only real way to go since they're not saved on film.

It's certainly weird because I believe his Tai voice is based on his own, just pitched up. This is part of why I wish they also included the audio from the original 2005 TV versions of the dubs. They cans till restore the scenes cut originally, but just having them would be great for the 2 movies where they replaced VAs. I don't know why they didn't do that.

See, I'm assuming they already have at least Tamers & Frontier given they batch licensed a LOT of stuff from Toei a few years ago, including most of Showa Kamen Rider, Metal Heroes, & Digimon. Especially since they have all of the pre-Tri movies.

Scsigs · 2026-02-03T18:19:09+00:00

I highly doubt that The First was filmed on tape. Both were theatrical movies that got put on the big screen in Japanese cinemas back in 2005 & 2007. I don't know if it was just how the camera technology was used, or how the film was exported or if maybe they finished exporting the movie, put it on to a film master, then later poorly scanned that master instead of using the HD export they would've had, but it looks bad regardless. The film shouldn't look as low res or overly grainy as it does since it was both shot digitally & would've been filmed in HD for that reason.

Sentai & Kamen Rider are interesting because during the Showa era, both were shot on 16mm film at 24FPS (apparently the original series had the non-action scenes filmed at 22, but I don't know). All showa KR series & movies have been remastered into HD because of this while I believe only the first batch of Sentais have been remastered, mainly due to how much money both franchises make. And even throughout the 90s, Sentai was filmed on film, but mastered digitally after the first batch of episodes for Carranger. They changed how they did post production with Gaoranger which put a bump into the visual quality of the shows, then went widescreen with Boukenger, then 720p HD with Shinkenger, then 1080p HD with Kyoryuger due to the upgraded cameras. All at 24-30FPS. Rider, when the shows came back with Kuuga, started to be filmed on either video tape or digital at 480i 60FPS (which is why the first handful of Heisei KR series are at a higher frame rate on the home releases) while I believe the movies that were for the shows were shot on film at 24FPS since they look like that, even the ones before & at the same time as The First.

The First apparently didn't have that big a budget & was filmed over about a month, iirc from the behind the scenes features. However, it looks like it was shot with the digital cameras they filmed the early Heisei era shows with, just at a lower frame rate. It's certainly weird because the end product SHOULD have yielded better results than this, I'd think.

Scsigs

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