[DreamSword]

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

Definitely for the worse! I'm not sure it'd feel like a better tribute to Ryuki if ORE Journal was a hollowed-out newsroom run by Venture Capital jerks who are outsourcing all of their investigations to aggregation sites and making everything a slideshow! Feels like it'd be more of a bummer!

Beyond that, a chunk of this story is about dealing with emotional setbacks and trying to find a way forward. I'm not sure that works for Shinji if ORE Journal is a thriving enterprise? It needs to be imperiled in order to be saved, you know?

Not really what I was getting at, but sure. This is all hinging on this being Shinji's' story anyway when it so isn't by comparison. Even then though, getting rid of a major part of Ryuki isn't exactly a necessity to pull a tale with this theme off.

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Well, things are heightened for the sake of this episode's story. I don't think we're supposed to believe that Sougo is constantly racked with homicidal whims or suicidal ideation, but won't let it show. It's that Sougo isn't an all-the-time happy good guy like the Time Orphans assume, because no one ever is. It's a story that's partially about them making assumptions about Sougo, not about them missing clues or anything. If he'd been Nearly Evil a bunch of times but overcame it, I'm not sure the Time Orphans could make a great case for trusting Sougo implicitly.

I'm not even asking for it be some constant thing he had to deal with in a ton of episodes. Just show it off like, once or twice. Then atleast there's some foundation for Mirror Shinji to stand on, rather than it being some informed thing that the audience is meant to accept and/or to appease the people who don't like Sogo.

And if the story is really meant to be about "assumptions" towards Sogo, not only has that already been done much better(see: almost the entire rest of the show), but it also feels like a backhand to the audience who was jiving with him: "Oh what, you thought Sogo was an all around decent person because he showed you words and actions that made you think he was? Ha HA GOTCHA!" Heck, even in-universe it falls flat. Geiz and Tsukuyomi should be the last ones at all surprised about Sogo acknowledging he has a dark side, considering Oma Zi-O is the entire reason they're time traveling to begin with.

It rubs me the wrong way.

Yes, there are sides to people we can never truly know. But when we're talking about characters in a story, it's atleast nice to have something to point towards what you're getting at, rather than just pulling an idea out of left field for the sake of it. A line, an action, a dream sequence, a facial expression... something!

That's just my feelings on the matter anyway.