[Kamen Rider Die]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Switchblade

When I heard who Zi-O was bringing back for its Agito arc I had one very specific thing that I needed to have included. It's a small but very important detail. I needed to hear Rina Akiyama say "Shouichi-kun." It was about 20% of her dialogue on the original series and it would have been an absolute failure on Zi-O as an anniversary show if it had been left out. Thankfully, the writers knew better and, while it's not the main contributing factor, it is definitely still part of why these two episodes are basically tied with the Blade arc as my favorite tributes.

I think I squealed in delight when Shouichi said "Mana-chan" with a big smile on his face. It's not even, like, a catchphrase or anything, it's just him saying Mana's name with an honorific. But that relationship. Eighteen years later, she's still like a little sister to him. That's great. (And they both look great!)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Switchblade

I loved this about these episodes. As much as I generally give, at best, zero fucks about Tsukuyomi, it was really nice to see the writers recognize the parallels to Agito and use them to not only pay tribute to the original show, but to also help move this show's story forward. You really get the sense that the writers have been doing their homework on the older shows and it pays off with some really great moments (including, in the next episode, my single favorite moment in all of Zi-O).

I don't know if they always had Tsukuyomi Might Be A time Jacker in their back pocket, or if they did it because of this Agito story, but the opening credits thing makes me think it's the former. If that's the case, I can't imagine the amount of effort the production team went through to make sure these actors were all free for these weeks of filming. It's nuts, the degree of difficulty to get that all to line up.