OK guys can we have a truce on Kabuto for a page or three? It's turning into a race towards invoking Godwin's Law.
Then we got Blade.
Series and gadgets were great but the ending, sheesh.
"I will become another Joker so you don't have to destroy the world when every other Undead is destroyed."
Seriously, are there people that noble these days?
I guess it depends on your views about the people who work in the emergency services or armed forces. But as far as the show goes, we are talking about superheroes here. Nobody ever asks why Spiderman keeps saving people even though it often screws him over personally. We just accept that he is that giving/noble/whatever-you-want-to-call-it. The "with great power comes great responsibility" stuff only applies if you're the kind of person who's willing to put your life on the line for those beliefs.
I never understood the Blade movie though. It's just one big plot hole. You sealed Hajime in order to stop the world ending? He was still the winner of the Undead battle. There was no indication that being the last to be sealed is different than being the only one unsealed. But after going to great lengths to explain that it does stop it ending, they then introduce the albino joker. So...shouldn't the world have been ending all this time? Hajime's sealed. He's the last Undead. Anyone? Hello?
Then Hibiki never had a proper ending.
The ending in the movie, he turned to Armed Hibiki and then the ending came.
In the series, the fight was hanging halfway and got fast forwarded to the ending where Hibiki lectures Asumu for the last time. What the heck happened during the second portions of the battle?
I was really annoyed with the way Hibiki ended when I watched it, because it was SO obvious that it should have ended with Asumu becoming an Oni and full sidekick for Hibiki, and because they did wuss out of showing the big final battle that they had been building up for ages. But, as someone who prefers the pre-retool Hibiki episodes, I can now look back and see that the show is more about how Asumu's life was changed by meeting Hibiki. He's Asumu's father figure, his teacher, his friend. Even though Asumu didn't accept "the call", he's changed, grown and found his real calling, all thanks to Hibiki. Asumu always was more like a real (if somewhat idealised) kid than a superhero. It would have been way beyond character derailment to turn him into one. Maybe that's a bit twee for some people. I agree with Switchblade that the end of episode 29 did feel like a series ending. If they'd killed the show right then, it would have ended on a real high. Those episodes in the mid-twenties are some of my favourite episodes of KR ever.
Having said that, Hibiki's World is one I think Decade really did well with. The Oni combining their powers into an instrumental song to kill the monster is how I'd imagined the final battle in Hibiki would have gone, and Hibiki being killed and Asumu taking on the title would also have been a good bittersweet way to end the series.