I've seen worse in Kamen Rider. Example: Kuuga had decapitation and it wasn't a dream.

It's been done, but only in Decade and only for a short time.

As this is the first KR title I'm following on a regular basis, is ep. 9 the earliest that a Rider uses a power-up in a series? I had gotten used to seeing Super Sentai getting power-ups in at least the mid-20s.

That was good, I like how he couldn't use the ring right away and had the talk to WizarDragon, which was pretty awesome in itself that the dragon has a personality. Haruto also showed some great emotion in this episode, and the dream he had I actually thought was real

i love dragon
dragon is talking too

I actually really liked that the dragon approachaed Haruto while looking just like him. It really shows that these Phantoms aren't just monsters that kill you and take your skin. They are a part of these people. The Dragon IS Haruto as much as Haruto himself is. And this has kind of an awesome Naruto feel to it. Giant evil monster that lives in the body of the hero. And said hero can tap into evil mosnters power but at a cost.

Good episode, Flame Dragon Style, Water will look better, blah blah blah. Am I the only one who thought WizarDragon and the White Wizard had the exact same voice?

This.

Yes.

Here's the voice actors for the 3 I've seen talked about in this thread.
White Wizard: Toshitsugu Takashina
Wiseman: Toshio Furukawa (The annoying narrator from Dekaranger!)
Wizardragon: Ryūzaburō Ōtomo

This episode was further proof that dragons make everything better.

So weren't some people weirded out by how early the Dragon forms were coming? Because this episode has the feel of the episode in the 30-38 range of a series where Riders get their final toy. I'm honestly kind of worried Wizard will stop being able to top itself at some point, because this was straight-up epic.

This is probably my favourite episode of wizard so far.