I'm not knocking it, it's definitely my own personal thing, but I must admit I'm getting a little burnt out from all the references and callbacks to other riders. We're at a point in the 40-year-old franchise where you can't do anything without it being a reference to something else. The lore is just that deep.

Pirate > has a hook on a hand > lets make it about Riderman.

Does someone in the show drive a stylized car? make it a tribute to Drive!

Its alright for anniversary seasons, but again, we're at a point where every year is a 5 or 10 or 15 year anniversary for something else and it must be referenced.

Anyway, I love trains so I'm excited but I hope they don't over do the Den-O references.

I think that while you don't have to watch previous shows to understand what's going on, there's nothing wrong with that. The main thing is that the creators do not forget that every rider is the first for someone.

It's even worse with Ultraman, at least from what I've seen.

This is true. It's been an Ultraman crutch since Orb.

To be fair, Blazar seems to be quite aloof so far. But back to the riders, if Gotchard is similar to Blade in that he's sort of built from pieces from 4 previous shows, then he should be followed by a Reiwa version of Hibiki to fill the desire for originality.

So are Gotchard's forms supposed to reference other Riders?

No, not really. I mean I wouldn’t call steam hopper a reference since so many riders have had the grasshopper motif that it’s just sorta intrinsically tied to the franchise itself & appareskebo is just a samurai, it’d be a stretch to call it a Gaim reference.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65_4DomkV2I

Pseudo rider confirmed?

is this our Secondary for the year?

There is no Gotchard, but there are questions for the tertiary rider. Although personally I think that "Decade" can simply mean the same ten