[DreadBringer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER REVICE EPISODE 5 - “WORLD-CHANGING RIDER! WHO’S THE TRAITOR!?”

Its structure does it no favors, that’s for sure. We’re immediately neck-deep in Fenix drama, despite a) Fenix being nothing more than a SHIELD knock-off that’s primary mandate is to hector and belittle Daiji, and b) our main Fenix character for the story being the guy who gets knocked out in Episode 1 and hasn’t appeared in a substantial scene since. There’s no way into this story for Ikki – the main character of the show, who we actually care about – and not even that much for Daiji, someone we’ve grown to enjoy seeing hectored and belittled. Fenix isn’t anything to value yet, so why should we care if it's under siege from spies and saboteurs? Daiji’s story ostensibly is that a workplace can become a pseudo-family, but there’s no warmth or support in Fenix to see it as anything other than a gigantic hassle for characters we actually want to see succeed.

Kamen Rider Evil's identity heavily leans between 2 of the Fenix members; either it's Hiromi who stole the Lion and Kong ViStamps. Or it's Daiji, who is seen having more pragmatic ways in accomplishing the job such as using the (now-redeemed) Masao as a bait. It probably explains how he's hesitating to henshin into Revice before, and his paranoia seems to be right that he probably won't be able to control his demon either. Though the new scans show Wataru Hyuga in black outfit at that time. George stays shady, though consistent, he's been shown as chaotic person in ep. 1 when Revice appears, but now he's exhibiting insane behavior just like Kuroto or such, wanting to snap the traitor's neck with much joy. About a guy who gets knocked out in episode 1, you refer to Hiromi? In Kinoshita's (the writer) tweet, Hiromi was actually intended to die in episode 1, but the actor's performance impressed to have them keep him.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

And the story around all this… it’s not much? Ikki chafes under helping people with their problems, which is unique for a modern-day Rider, but sort of a bummer for an episode that desperately needs a bit of heroism to invest in. I generally like that Ikki’s stories and motivations are so hyper-focused on Protecting Families, but it’s all vaguely unappealing when there’s more story to tell than that. Masao could possibly be a nice way to talk about how heroic motivations take different shapes, and a focus on them to the exclusion of basic empathy is a danger, but Masao isn’t enough of a character to spark a debate around. He’s a prankster who’s allegedly trying to bring attention to corporate malfeasance and mistreatment of workers, but he’s also filming a YouTube prank show where he lets a Deadmans rampage through a lobby? And we have no idea why this means anything to Masao in the first place? He’s just doing murder-pranks, and then realizes that his grandad misses him, the end. It’s a story that never starts anywhere, and never goes anywhere.

The victim of the week Masao, is made as an antithesis to the ViStamp featured in this week Lion which has Kuuga motif. Masao is a dark take of Yusuke where both wants to make others smile, but Yusuke actually has proper moral compass to go through it, while Masao isn't, only having the intention. He seemingly only targets slimy bastards with Lion Deadman, which for some people, they can think it'd be good to target deserving ones for murder-prank. Fortunately, Revi had it easy for redeeming him, Masao seems to be someone who doesn't know better (he's so young), instead of a self-righteous radical believer that is much harder to convince, so some explanation would quickly make him realize. As Yukimi says, good intention doesn't matter if they take things too far, which unfortunately a good number of people justifies someone's questionable or outright evil action if they have good intentions, and I've been saying similar thing as Yukimi to them as well. As they also say, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Ikki seems to generally use family prioritizing as a way to set others straight. I guess a good implementation of something that can be potentially a bias, where family prioritizing taken in dark take would be them being either apathetic to non-family, or worse, screwing others for the sake of their family. Ikki reprimanding the company executive also shows that one party being at fault doesn't mean the other party is blameless, either have their portion of their blame as well. So apparently Sakura's way of "acting cool" as Ayaka (Imoto) claimed is reacting negatively to almost anything around her and even quite agreeing with Masao's actions (edgelords can also justify someone's dubious actions)... she also really needs Yukimi's guidance just like the other child. She did show genuine concern over Masao's grandpa though.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Even the fight at the end is this weirdly perfunctory Revice Vs Giffamilia thing, where we know that the kaijin aren’t the culprits, but we have to get through the fight anyway. (Also, the plan to flush out the traitor is both incredibly stupid – everyone in Fenix knows this plan is to flush out the person in Fenix who’s a traitor – and somehow maybe actually effective in its goal. It’s stupid, but kind of commendable in its stupidity.) It’s a fight that’s not furthering the story even a little, since the culprit – Kamen Rider Live or Evil, I don’t know which one is which yet – is just going to show up at the end regardless. It’s boring, just waiting for the conclusion.

The Deadman uppers is completely detached of human morals, only being concerned about Masao being too weak to be given ViStamps, and only complains about how Masao loses quickly against the Riders. And like usual, some infighting between the Deadman uppers continue with the blame game (Julio primarily). They value ViStamps much more though that Masao attempting to destroy it is enough to bait them.... which leads to them being scapegoats to Ikki. The Lion Genome, it's clawing instead of blunt force which wasn't what Kuuga Mighty was (and for others, Kuuga has weapons), reminding me more of OOO LaToraTah instead... I guess the flaming part is what relates to Kuuga Mighty? The Revice combination, there's a comedy moment of Vice forming a cat instead, but I'd like to see the cat one being used for more than one-off gag. The actual Lion other than having lion movements, it has a roar that can affect physical things as well. Olteca and Julio takes an interest on Evil too before escaping, who had good showing of his power being superior to Revice like the strike that sends Vice bursting through the roof. It'll be probably powercreeped though.