[Kamen Rider Die]

KAMEN RIDER ZI-O EPISODE 43 - “2019 - TSUKUYOMI CONFIDENTIAL”



Honest question: does anyone care about Swartz’z reveal here?

The absolute best part of the episode for me was when Tsukasa claimed that all of this Time Nonsense family drama was very easy to follow, leading to Geiz’z accusatory demand to explain it if it’s so simple, only for Tsukasa to pivot to it not really mattering beyond Swartz being the Big Bad. It’s funny, but it’s also clear that even the writer of this episode isn’t prepared to answer any of the myriad questions that spring up from this episode’s It Was Swartz All Along reveal.

It’s a smart move for the episode, but a dumb move for the series. The only thing that really matters in this episode is that Team Zi-O needs to defeat Hiryuu to get the world back to normal, and then take on Swartz. The why/what/how of Swartz’z plans and backstory are, in the moment, completely irrelevant. He’s just one more obstacle, the end. Spending even a single solitary second trying to understand anything Swartz tells Tsukuyomi is time that’s better spent on defeating their immediate foe.

But it’s all so dumb. It doesn’t make sense for Swartz to share his power with Heure and Ora, since he was always going to need it back and they contribute nothing of value to his schemes. It doesn’t make sense to leave a fully-powered Tsukuyomi alive in an alternate timeline, when he wanted her dead and needed her power. It doesn’t make sense to do all of the Another Rider schemes, since Swartz wanted the throne for himself this whole time. The idea that Swartz wants to be king is fine. The thought that he’d make his move now is reasonable. The reveal that this is all proceeding according to his design is a massive distraction, and a really disappointing plot development.

…Which only really matters if you care about the plot, and literally no one in this story does. It’s incredibly weird to have a dumb plot development - that’s going to make me less enthusiastic about this series in my memory going forward - occur in an episode that still manages to be entertaining. Such is the magic of Heisei Kamen Rider! It’s an episode that colossally bungles its series arc, but still concludes this three-parter with an enthusiastic focus on meat-and-potatoes tokusatsu storytelling and exhilarating character reunions. As dumb as the Swartz stuff is, the scene of Woz trying to make Geiz think that he worked under Woz as Zi-O’s servant was worth a hundred of those idiot reveals. Stuff like that is what I look for in a Kamen Rider series, not some tightly-woven series plot. That would be nice! But it’s not ruining my day if ain’t here.

It’s going to be a thing I bring up a lot in the future when I talk about Zi-O, though. It’s so dumb. I don’t care about it. Does anyone?