I gotta be honest, I entirely forgot that Ikki was losing his memories until this episode dredged it back up again. The fact is handled with so little consistency and weight, on top of the show trying to juggle 50 other things, that it just completely fell by the wayside. It feels a bit emblematic of Revice as a whole.


I do still rather like Daiji's ridiculous mental breakdown across these episode though. The dude is just so unable to cope with everything, and even the show itself is calling him out for how ridiculous he is being. It's painful, but in a good way? Definitely awkward at parts, I feel like the whole "You killed Akemi" part could be entirely left out, since it feels so forced. The bit of the episode with Hikaru was... a nice idea in concept, even if once again it is a little hard to take the implementation serious since they haven't leaned into the fake family thing for a long while. I keep thinking this, but Revice simply tries to do too much. I feel like they cram enough concepts into the show to create two entirely different shows!

I find it funny that you're saying Revice is doing too much, when in reality, it's just really, really bad at handling multiple storylines.

It just brings up one story thread, then kinda just drops it for numerous episodes at a time.

I'd be fine with this if Daiji were built up more instead of the writers just having him sit in a corner

that and as I said they wrapped up ALL the interesting plotlines halfway through leaving us with the WORST VILLAINS I NTHE FRANCHISE (Ikki's an alright protagonist but like with Touma you need a compelling villain to make him interesting/make me root for him) and considering the fact that This is the same franchise with Adel from Ghost in it that's saying something (at least with Ghost my excpectations were LONG gone by the point he was relevant)

The public gets more spotlight this time. And this ends in a cliffhanger.

As expected, Daiji's the one that is blinded, instead of the others, because he'd still be fixated to ARARAT's cause and vehemently rejecting any other solutions or views. Though to be fair to him, Akaishi still acted smug after Ultimate Revi/Vice's appearence. Previously Daiji's still acting like edgy secondary Riders, but now he had started to commit actual villainy, using brutal methods to get rid of any obstacles in his cause, like beating up Tasuke (he's a shithead here, but the reason is unrelated to that), siccing Giff Juniors on the humans (that's some Baron level crime), and of course what he did to his siblings, even more that he tried to pull a gun on unmorphed Ikki or Sakura. While Daiji wants to prevent bodycounts, he ironically would potentially cause more of it. Early on Daiji's someone who's characterized as being insecure, and after his persuasion is denied by the citizens, he blames everyone else but himself, and I wonder if this is also more about Daiji trying to prove himself 'right' instead, which'd be actually selfish. Which if it is, this is one of the most disastrous consequences of middle child syndrome. A sliver of hope would be that Daiji still being disgusted at Vail, someone purely malicious.

George meets up again with Hiromi and the mass production Demons is teased... a̶n̶d̶ ̶D̶e̶m̶o̶n̶s̶'̶ ̶p̶o̶t̶e̶n̶t̶i̶a̶l̶ ̶n̶e̶r̶f̶. I like that George's atrocities before isn't forgotten with Hiromi being suspicious of him at first. Like if Hiromi finally had the higher ground on his bullies (and George was). Though as George stated before, he'd try to help him if he can, and apologizing to him though not expecting to earn it. R̶e̶g̶a̶r̶d̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶S̶p̶i̶d̶e̶r̶-̶M̶a̶n̶ ̶s̶t̶u̶f̶f̶ ̶h̶e̶r̶e̶,̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶s̶'̶d̶ ̶r̶e̶m̶i̶n̶d̶ ̶m̶e̶ ̶a̶ ̶b̶i̶t̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶S̶a̶n̶d̶m̶a̶n̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶ ̶e̶x̶p̶e̶c̶t̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶b̶e̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶g̶i̶v̶e̶n̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶S̶p̶i̶d̶e̶r̶-̶M̶a̶n̶ ̶T̶r̶i̶l̶o̶g̶y̶,̶ ̶m̶i̶n̶u̶s̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶g̶l̶o̶o̶m̶y̶ ̶d̶e̶l̶i̶v̶e̶r̶y̶. Hiromi at the end almost punched George, but later fist bumps his chest instead, signifying that George had both committed despicable actions in the past, but now has been redeemed. George wasn't a case of turns out he's good though (also in his apology), he probably was evil in the past before changing.

The people here surprisingly had steadfast belief on Kamen Rider, to drive Daiji away when he tried to influence people into giving up on despair, despite the edited footages that made Weekend looked actually villainous. Still if they're using actual footages in their schemes, I'd like if footages are used in Weekend's plan, though Genta stated Ultimate Revi/Vice's fights are uploaded.

Regarding the fights in this episode, I'm relieved that Ultimate Revi/Vice still walks through Hell Giftarians easily, despite a bit struggle against the mooks before. And after all the jokes about Jeanne performing better than Holy Live, now Holy Live is the 'unstoppable' berserker here, swatting away the girl Riders and holding his own with Ultimate Revi/Vice. As said above, Ultimate Revi/Vice is still consistent against Hell Giftarians, and at the end, Ultimate Vice defeats Holy Live by reflecting the attack back to him. So perhaps it's about Ultimate Revi/Vice holding back, for obvious reasons. Again like before, I kinda wish that the Rider and fighting part would be addressed more like explaining how Ultimate Revi/Vice can hold back Giff beam, for example.

For the remaining parts in this episode, though Daiji had a case of this before, now it's infuriating to set up a story for someone, but continue it later in half-assed way.

Ikki losing his memory about his family, the onsen moment, is a throwaway here just to show how dire the current situation now that they need to fight harder. Though appreciate Vice's method of trying to get to know if his memory loss is getting worse. Unrelated is about Vice's solution to co-exist with Giff peacefully, that's ironically Vice following Daiji's footsteps, though Vice may be proposing about befriending him instead of letting Giff rule over them. I have to say I kinda like that Genta's more active father of his family now, after stop acting like Junpei, other than just doing some (in-universe) asinine gags before, including at Vail Legacy part 5 before.

After getting little focus, albeit she gets more lately, Kimiko is finally killed, and this weighs on Hikaru despite that the family is fake. This does show more about the remaining 2's characters, that Hikaru seems to have no one else than the Ushijimas and thus is lonely, which probably would mean Hikaru got hit by tragic circumstances regarding his real family, and that Tasuke is someone rather cold and ruthless in his cause as well, the type to degrade emotions and feelings as 'naivety' (albeit Hikaru really got slowed down by his feelings there). Previously, he's surprised at Masumi's unethical practices, but now, Masumi's the one that called him harsh. But the Ushijima family being fake was also only a throwaway line when the cast joined Weekend, and it was never elaborated on how a fake family live together, compared to real family like the Igarashis (harmonic) and Karizakis (dysfunctional), just like the missed chance to flesh out the Hell Bros in Build as child soldiers, even if Sakura had dope words for Hikaru that fake or real doesn't matter in a family.... like adopted kids, and ironically, most KR series use the 'fake' family type in the main cast's circle. If only the previous KR reference (perhaps with George) is still there as a potential 4th wall breaking material too.

While obviously Giff is a bad business, it seems that Giff is never about killing everyone. Living under his rule would suck, but tyranny isn't killing the inhabitants (or not mainly about that, there won't be anyone to live yet). There are villains who are actually just that but don't assume any villains as someone like that. Other than someone that probably made the footage, Fenix was also actually mostly good, outside of Akaishi who happened to find the organization however, the other members there mostly joined there due to being heroic with good intentions, including Hiromi, Wakabayashi, Akemi. George was the sole exception, and he too was like a plague among Fenix, but now he's redeemed.

Vice ironically suggested what Daiji is doing currently, to have Giff being unopposed so the humans would be at 'peace' without fighting Giff that would just get them killed due to Giff's unbeatable power. About Giff being an alien, that'd be actually prejudiced view to suggest that different species are incompartible with humans. There are previous series that has good monsters that get along with the heroes, like Cubi or Burgmon, though of course some of them are killed. Prejudice fueled some of the villains' goals in some previous Rider series, against the human's favor ofc, like Negishi from Kabuto who had to turn every humans into Natives for 'peace'.

This is a good explanation about how Daiji is 'pure' after getting rid of Kagerou, not necessarily about moralit, he's cleanly on the order side without any compromise and too much of that leads into an extremely rigid approach to get the job done.

Tbf, other than some miscommunications, Ikki's by far the most reasonable here. He's trying to not scream at Daiji for being an idiot, he tries to reason with him and isn?t slapping him across the face with final form, actually for before he's even actually letting him speak his piece before (miscommunication happened, but that'd be not being busybody). While Daiji got too caught up by emotions by all the deaths, riling him up and taking it out on anyone else he can like Ikki or Sakura, somehow blaming them for the shit Akaishi did, and at this point he's barely able to speak to others without getting into fights. And while Sakura had good reason to stop him, even she's also unreasonable in dealing with that, berating and attacking him isn't gonna make things better, you can't punch a person into no longer believing the accusations they hold on you. Daiji calling Sakura a murderer and her calling him an idiot as they punch each other is probably gonna make things worse. Which was probably why Ikki's the one that has to settle this next.

About being a 'realist', he technically also had a blind faith to Giff, just believing any of his words like that humanity would survive, but the truth is, he isn't being told everything. It'd be ironically 'naive' that Daiji would trust a demonic entity like that without second thoughts. He's similar to the sheeps eating up the promises from crooked company or politicians, moreover if he blindly believes the edited footage. Actual dictators and tyrants (pretty much what Giff does) are also occasionally use peacekeeping intentions as their excuse to rule. And for what he pulled in this episode, it's unknown too if Daiji would be potentially a hypocrite as well that he can create more casualties and excuse them as "necessary" for the desirable goal or something. More like in this situation people are gonna likely get hurt no matter what Daiji does.

true can't rule over the human race if everyone's dead

I feel like Daiji's actions are actually fairly consistent with what we've seen from him as a character, albeit manifesting in a more extreme and destructive way.

Daiji is basically middle-child energy personified. Old enough to feel the burden of guilt and responsibility, but young enough to still feel like the "baby" (even though Sakura technically is). The latter part is what resulted in Kagerou, who represents the built-up resentment Daiji has towards his family, most notably his older brother. Kagerou wanted to step out of Ikki's shadow by eliminating him, but what's most important is that since Kagerou didn't have any of the moral hangups that Daiji has, he was actually willing to act on his goals. Remember that Daiji's Rider career didn't even start of his own accord. Kagerou was the one being active, making all of the plays while Daiji was in the passenger's seat of his own body. Even when Daiji became Live, it was because Kagerou posed an immediate danger to everyone around him, and the only one who actually could stop Kagerou was Daiji gaining control of his own body. It's been said before, but Kagerou, for all of his faults, was the fire Daiji needed to kick his ass into gear, and he doesn't have that anymore.


And now, Daiji continues to have some major middle-child energy, but it's recontextualized. He's still wracked with guilt and responsibility fueled by moral obligation, but he's now reverted back into a passive role because of that guilt. There is no Kagerou to take over his body, get in his head and force him to stir the pot (for better or worse). All he's left with is his guilt and his righteousness sense of justice, no rebellious spirit to kick his ass into gear.


I've actually quite enjoyed the arc Daiji has been given here.

RIP Weekend Mom. You died as you lived: with almost no dialogue.

Disagree. Kai from Den-O is the worst villain in the franchise. But yes, Giff and Co. also dangles somewhere at the bottom.