[DreadBringer]

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

I mean, yeah, there's probably an element of Ren not wanting help, but I think he's way too emotionally shattered in this episode to care what Shinji thinks of him.

Actually, what Shinji thinks of him that time IS one of the main reason he's so emotionally shattered, being respected by someone like him. Shinji still didn't know about Eri yet, only vaguely checking a woman's ring, so he thought Ren should just quit fighting Riders and just beating monsters, how about your hypothesis of "winner gets wish" before Shinji? Oh right, I have to give credit to Shinji, forgot to cover this back on Scissors arc, for being the only one among Riders who thinks that Shiro may only manipulates other Riders, so probably another reason to him that killing other Riders isn't worth it and the war is pointless. As for his childish tantrum, I guess you cannot spell "children" without "ren"!

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Partially, for me, it's about economy of character usage. Like, Reiko's sort-of not doing anything in this episode, and Yui's kind-of hopeless at investigating (I guess being pitied is a viable form of leverage over others?), so putting the two of them together gives Reiko something to do and Yui someone to bounce off of. And, I don't know, I don't think Reiko'd have that tough of a time getting up to speed on the Rider/Mirror stuff? Seems like she could handle it.

Yui would be a total cheat-code for what Reiko's looking for. That the answer for disappearences is Mirror Monsters that can appear from reflective surfaces and eats people, but no one other than her or Rider Deck holders can see it, which is something she already knows. That is...if Reiko wouldn't act like Yui's childhood bullies about it (either Reiko would be one of the few to believe that given the tragedies of disappearences or she'd view Yui as another Shimada), which would add some difficulty. I meant for the last one, I'm not talking about Reiko getting to know about Rider/Mirror stuff and learning more about it, I'm talking about how the show seems to disallow anyone other than Riders and Yui to know anything about Rider/Mirror stuff for some reason.

Wdym for "being pitied is a viable form of leverage"? I feel that others just make it extremely hard for her regarding Shiro to investigate, everyone being totally secretive and extremely few access to him, but for investigating another topic, at least Reiko herself remarks that she's good, better than her opinion on Shinji.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Shinji has this... abrasiveness? I think his confidence, his decisiveness, his vigor, it has this way of sometimes pushing people away. It's a character flaw, but not a storytelling flaw, if that makes any sense. I like that even-tempered Tezuka can get briefly furious at some way that Shinji's been... less than diplomatic. It's not cheap drama to me, it's a real way that even heroes can quarrel, can disagree, can make their point badly. It's good writing.

Well for you calling Tezuka "even-tempered", I have to say you have to remember you consider him that, and look for a specific moment on a bit later part of the series. My point was that most of the feud moments like quarrel are the ones considered good like the only Shinji/Tezuka moment you cover here (I NEVER call this moment a cheap drama, I also think this is good for philosophy clash), but does that mean are conflicts the only good moment?

I also forgot to cover this. It's an interesting idea for Tezuka to try using prediction in combat, it'd be a big advantage if it works (making you untouchable), but unfortunately it's not for him. And can we talk again about yet another one of Shinji's unusual battle tactics? Using Raia's body as a leverage to catch an airbone monster. Shinji rubs off on Tezuka for this one by declaring him unpredictable, which Shinji uses to teach him that it's just how fate works. That aside, Shinji's now shown as someone who can fend off monsters outside Rider form, and Tezuka also cares about innocents (where you didn't mention in your Rider view before for Tezuka).

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

100% could not figure out why Tezuka slept over. At first I'm like, are they hiding out from Shibaura? No, they all just go about their lives the next day. Was Tezuka shadowing Ren, acting as his, like, sponsor? No, he's out fortune-telling on his own the next day. Super weird choice to have Tezuka spend the night and never explain why. My head-canon is that Tezuka was mildly pissed at Shinji's I Don't Believe In Fate stance, so Tezuka just raced upstairs, got in Shinji's bed, and shouted I SLEEP HERE TONIGHT IT'S FATE I GOT A VISION YOU SLEEP ON THE FLOOR and then pretended to be asleep until Shinji gave up.

Well yeah, I like to know about something like this. Though the one I'm asking was about Tezuka's daily life outside Atori like where does he live before this that he sleeps in someone else's place, is he homeless (unlikely), or living alone without family, in a house or apartment? For the reason he sleeping over there, it's probably easier to figure; my take is that he wants to work up against the Riders and it's easier to stay closer to them rather than tracking them repeatedly, he doesn't really care about personal space to do his job, then again he stays at someone else's place, how did he get Yui's permission for that? Speaking about hiding from Shibaura...you said you want to change every Rider's fate, what will you do to Shibaura, Tezuka?