[Fish Sandwich]

Hey everyone, guess what time it is!



What!? No, it not time for- I mean I know you wanted to do the whole mirror match thing but- I just got done talking about how cool it was Sougo was only using Zi-O II! Another Zi-O even has two swords and can see the future, so there's even less excuse! I can't even be happy the default form showed up because it was just a second or two of CG! Everything about this is wrong!!!

Although, when that's my biggest problem, you know the episode has gotta be good. This is another one where there's actually a lot to digest so I'll probably forget to mention something. There's an insanely high level of cool stuff going on here. The overall dynamic of the main characters here was super fresh, first of all. Sougo and Woz have great chemistry together, so seeing Woz in a more active sidekick role is awesome. Geiz's strained relationship with Sougo was also surprisingly well conveyed just by simple stuff like him walking off after the mid-episode fight. After half a series of these guys constantly being around each other, the changes to the status quo lately really do stick out. It actually feels like everything is building to a breaking point.

Naturally I'm also excited to see what the deal with Another Zi-O turns out to be. The Time Jackers are still Boring (with a capital B, you'll note), so any villain who can provide some proper intrigue is more than welcome.

There are tons of minor things I love about this episode too. Mostly bits of cinematography that stuck out for whatever reason, like Sougo's dream (even if seeing a Rider protagonist fight someone knee-deep in water always reminds me of OOO), or even just seeing him and Woz watching that magic show (which mostly comes down to having more moody lighting than usual). I felt the background music here was used really effectively too, which I suck at describing, but it didn't feel like the total cacophony I often find modern Rider episodes border on.

Forget all that though. Obviously the only part of the episode that matters is that Sougo's parents dying in 2009 means it's legitimately plausible that this is somehow Decade's fault.