[DreamSword]

Gonna be that guy and say that I didn't like this two-parter much at all.

Remember how I felt that the four-parter was trying to juggle way too much as once, and thus the focus really suffered? Same deal here.

There are so many things going on in this two episodes: Geiz and Woz coming to terms, Kenzaki and Hajime's' reunion, White Woz's' whole... thing, Zi-O Trinity, Diend's' return; And none of it feels properly fleshed out and feels very rushed.

Two or three of these aspects I could see working out, but them all at the same time made the whole thing feel really disjointed to me. Heck, alot of it doesn't even make any sense. For example, if the actions of White Woz cause him to poof out of existence, then so too shouldn't the Time Note and the BeyonDriver?

Heck, even ignoring that, why does he even get erased to begin with, considering it was already established that he came from an alternate timeline anyway? This is starting to become less and less "the rules have changed" and more of Decade's' "there are no rules" and for me, that's not a good sign! Especially if I'm not having fun!

And then there's my biggest point of contention: All of the stuff relating to Blade. I already talked about how I don't like that they got rid of the "erased show" aspect of the plot, as I felt they lead to really interesting stories, but there's a budget to contend with, I get it. Doesn't mean I can't dislike all the other changes that shouldn't really be concerned with that though. For example, as interesting a concept as Amane as Another Blade is, she doesn't at all inhibit being the opposite of Kenzaki like the other Anothers did.

Finally, there's the way this all ends up really undermining Blade's' ending. Not only does Kenzaki somehow make it right to where he needs to be in an impossible amount of time for this conflict to happen(and in a very out of character way, mind you), but again, it's all really rushed for what should otherwise be an incredibly huge moment for both characters. Then there's the fact that Hajime wasn't a human originally, and yet he gets "cured" the exact same way as Kenzaki, which makes no sense. And last in all of this is how easily the Sealing Stone gets erased, which was established as being impossible in Blade proper.

Everything here just felt incredibly phoned in to me, and I was having basically none of it.

Know what I never felt was phoned in though? The arc of my favorite character from Blade.

Kazuma Kenzaki, one of my favorite protagonists in Kamen Rider.

Kenzaki had everything I needed to love him. A great arc, plenty of charisma, a cool fighting style, and, atleast the way I read him, he presented a lesson that I wish alot of other protagonists I've experienced did, which is: "Be kind, but don't be a pushover." Dude was never afraid to stand up for himself and to push back against those he felt was trying to take advantage of him.

And what can I say, that ending was absolute perfection, which made it double sting that it was handled so lightly in these episodes.

Wonderful protagonist all around.