[Magnugiga]

Well done! Lots of interesting things in the last several pages that I want to respond to, so I'll just cram everything here :v

On Episode Final: this was my very first KR movie ever, so I had a big soft spot for it. I agree that the Yui-Shiro/Mirror World was handled better here (I definitely connected more strongly with their story), it has terrific battle scenes, and Miho/Femme was one of its most memorable/best aspects.

I was super bummed out with Miho's eventual fate and how she couldn’t escape the Female Rider Curse, but in retrospect, (1) this is at least in a show where every Rider character dies (one way or the other), and (2) I like the way they kinda subverted the ‘Dead Girlfriend/Love Interest Club’ trope by not having her give final words of encouragement or being used as some sort of ‘power-up’ for a prominent male character. She exited as a character that has a lovely and cute romantic sub-plot (still my favorite pairing in KR, sadly), but she also went out on her own terms and gave us plenty to remember about beyond just her relationship with a male character. Those shots of Shinji’s smiling at his fixed shoelaces, followed some moment later by passersby walking past Miho’s body without a care… just yet another juxtaposition of the heart-warming and the brutal in a series that’s so full of them.

After my last rewatch, I actually did a bit of thought experiment to try to find a way to squeeze Femme, Verde, and Ryuga into the main series and have a proper ’13 Riders Show!!’ as advertised, while still maintaining the general essence and narrative beats of the show. That was a lot harder than expected. I figured you could have Verde as an early boss character in the vein of Scissors and Gai, making his mark and leaving in fairly quickly fashion (obviously Tezuka’s death should still follow the main series narrative, but because Verde’s Final Vent scene was by far the best thing from the Special, he still need to annihilate the hell out of somebody else). Femme could be introduced in mid-series and hang out until near the end, turning the core four Rider characters of Ryuki, Knight, Zolda, and Ouja into a core five. Ryuga would then appear in the show’s penultimate arc and got a bit more screen time than the movie, and after the conclusion of that, you'd proceed to the main series’ endgame.

Problem was, assuming you still have the regular episode count to work with, there’s a lot that need to be cut to accommodate all that. The Tiger and Alternative parts can probably be shortened, but then would you cut the filler/comedic episodes/all the ORE Journal stuff? In any other series, I’d do it in a heartbeat, but not in Ryuki. Those parts are way too good.

All in all, Ryuki is my favorite KR because it hit the perfect balance of comedic highs (low key it’s a supremely funny series), dramatic highs (so many memorable character arcs), and action highs (by far my favorite overall suit design, Rider line-up, and weapon gimmick. Fight scene choreography and music are also on point). For me, character overrides plot most of the time, except when the plot was so bad it actively derails character development—which didn’t really happen here. The flaws are mostly in structural and general world-building sense, and I can totally see how a viewer who’s more used to Heisei Phase II (only seen a few of those myself, but what’s immediately apparent to me is how it generally has more cogent world-building and plothole proofing compared to earlier Heisei ones) would be less tolerant to it. I myself would probably notice more of these in my next rewatch, but this thread also pointed out even more good things that I overlooked—so yeah, I’m pretty confident it’s still going to be my favorite KR after the rewatch.

Looking forward to the next threads—I just finished Faiz last year (and currently almost done with Blade and Hibiki), so I may have plenty to chime in. Congrats again on finishing this project, and thank you for maintaining such a fun and thought-provoking content, especially in this extremely tough time.