[Sh Ranger]

I'm opening my eyes for the epilogue of Faiz. You guys didn't think I'd miss it, right?

BTW, Die has now passed the halfway point on his rewatch list.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

D-VIDEO SPECIAL: KAMEN RIDER 4

But, it’s more nuanced than that. A death can be a gift, a way of treating a life as something to be shared with those whose stories keep going. Takumi’s second life was lived in paralysis, haunted by ghosts and guilted by survivors. His second death was a reclamation of his heroism, a chance to make his life more meaningful and valuable by his ability to hand it over for the future of others. In his death, he finally got to live his dream of a clear sky and a brighter future. It’s not a tragedy that he died; it’s a tragedy that it took him so long to truly live.

I watched this special only a few months after watching and falling in love with Faiz for the first time, so I was surprised to see this stealth epilogue to the show appear out of nowhere to remove the ambiguity of Takumi's state in the finale. It hit pretty hard actually, even though it was heavily implied that Takumi was living on borrowed time, that it was finally confirmed that he really did die at some point in the last decade of the original timeline. I was also younger then, so my philosophy of mortality was more like Kaido's here. Being too focused on the loss rather than the legacy that loss leaves behind for others. But sometime after, I did start to appreciate Takumi's final message, about the value of life being dependent on how that life is used. Something that Ghost would later make me appreciate even more. It's like Takumi's declaration to Kiba after the latter accelerated his decay, that becoming a full Orphenoch isn't the same as living. To live for the sake of it, is a waste. To live for dreams, for friendship, even at the cost of hastening the end, that's what it means to live honestly. So Takumi wanting to preserve his death and the smile he had at that time, yeah, I can understand that now. Cause that was his death and the symbol of how he chose to live in the end.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Like, I forgot Kaido was in this?! I don’t know that I’d’ve picked him to be the one trying to keep Takumi from sacrificing himself, but it works. It works great. Kaido’s strength as a character was always how the actor played the self-deprecating aspects as a thin mask over endless oceans of bitterness and grief, so it’s the perfect way to incrementally refocus the story on Takumi’s death(s). Kaido gets to defuse the tension just enough to make the conclusion the spotlight, while still weaving in the appropriate melancholy of his and Takumi’s reunion scenes. It’s so great to see them together again, but you can feel how fleeting it is.

It makes a lot of sense for Kaido to be the viewer perspective, as the one desperately trying to "save" Takumi from his destiny. I feel like, when Takumi is talking to him here, he's talking to us as well, asserting his intention to return to being dead since he's already lived. Kaido seldom fought and therefore didn't have to suffer any of the decay, but the downside of that is that he had to watch all his friends die around him instead and now that Takumi is back, he doesn't want to lose him a second time. While Takumi learned too late to appreciate his own life, Kaido learned too late to appreciate the people in his life, so Takumi has to use his own experience to help him to move on and continue to live as a human, by following Takumi's and Kiba's example. That's why I think having this epilogue, over a decade after the show ended and focusing on the development of these two specific characters with similar problems was such a clever way to highlight the morals that the show left on, about protecting dreams and finding hope even in the darkest of despair. For Takumi, that hope was the smile as he died and he wants to give some of that hope to Kaido before leaving once more.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

It’s there in the use of the hill, and the screen, and what they represented in the finale. The hill was his new start; the screen was what was holding him back. Having the screen on the hill is the movie saying that Takumi’s new start is maybe what’s holding him back now, his possible future keeping him from dealing with his past. Staging his acceptance there, in that way, was such a love-letter to Faiz fans. It’s not just reused iconography and unearned nostalgia; it’s recontextualized history, the language of landmarks. The whole sequence was a beautiful return to the way Kamen Rider 555 would pose tricky questions about how best to live in a world that might not have place for you, and I couldn't be more grateful that they got it right.

It's such cool imagery they brought back from the finale and it's symbolic of Takumi once more resolving to live the only way he can for his final hour. This special really shows how much he has matured, in contrast to his character development kind of getting ignored in KRW. It feels like this is a more Complete (haha, get it?) version of Takumi, who has been through all the tragedies and he's not running away anymore. He knows he's still a flawed person, but he's content with who he's become and he finally found the acceptance he always wanted. I'm proud of Takumi for that and in the end, he really was the protector of dreams.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

But that’s all beside the point, really. It’s a story about Faiz. It’s hinted at in the title, a subtle reference to the 4th Heisei Rider. As a Drive project, it’s not the best. Too slow, which is antithetical to Drive’s storytelling. But as a Faiz project? It’s a bittersweet tribute to one of my favorite shows, and it's a worthy end to one of the best Heisei Riders.

Very glad I rewatched this today.

I'm glad you got the reference to Faiz being Heisei Rider 4! The number 4 is relevant in other ways as well, like the date of the time loop being April 4th. Kamen Rider 4's army consisting of dead Riders and also Sasword who must be back from France. The cycle of death with Gou and Takumi. Since 4 can be pronounced as "shi" which also means death. Nothing to do with Riderman or Kuuga though, who are also numbered 4.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich

Mouri seems to make working with other people's shows his specialty, so that's probably a huge reason this gets as close as it does to capturing more than just the surface level of Faiz. He's writing a belated epilogue to OOO now too, a show he actually DID write for originally, so thinking about it, this kind of makes me more hopeful that V-Cinema is going to turn out to be a worthy addendum in its own right.

Based on the quality of the content he's written for OOO, Ghost and Zi-O, I'd even go as far as saying his specialty is upstaging the head writers! He really takes the time to get inside the characters' heads and understand the world of a story, like he has a respect for the work and wants to maintain the authenticity while adding his own flair. It's crazy that Toei have only given him the head writer role once!