Battle hymn for lonely soldiers: Ryuki 9-12
Shinji’s Arrested!? (Toshiki Inoue): Previously on Kamen Rider Ryuki: Super-lawyer Kitaoka joins the cast as a super-dick, Shinji and Ren become roommates at Atori thereby justifying any and all attempted murders, and Ryuki is attacked by the fourth Rider, Zolda.
The tone of this episode is…interesting, to say the least. The plot of this episode is very serious: Shimada is kidnapped and held for ransom, Shinji is attacked when he goes to deliver the money, a Monster eats the kidnapper, and so Shinji’s left as the only suspect (and we get back to what I said last batch about the perception of Japanese law as having a presumption of guilt, but again, I don’t know for sure). The tone, however, is comedic up until one point, and that’s a major contrast. Again, I haven’t seen enough Kamen Rider to know if this is a common thing in Toshiki Inoue’s episodes (my plans alongside the airing of Fourze are to make my way through Faiz and OOO before trying to tackle the rest of the Heisei era), but I do know that he does the same with episode 29, “Marriage Interview Battle.” So…yeah, strange, strange introduction to the new writer.
The humor starts immediately after Ryuki gets his ass kicked and his arm nearly broken in battle against Zolda. Turns out that Shinji is massively late both to help out at Atori as part of his deal to live there, and for work at ORE Journal, which prompts both Ren and Okubo to note his lousy sense of timing. We also get Shimada’s weirdness, where she counts down the seconds until quitting time…first in Japanese, then English, before bolting out the door to go to the amusement park. She wins a massive stuffed animal about her height and proceeds to take it on a date. Any comment I have to make on that subject will only lead to debate on a certain Japanese fetish/subculture/whathaveyou and possibly the production of a Lady Heather episode of CSI. Anyway, at this point, she gets kidnapped, where she tries to escape by biting the kidnapper’s hand (note: this is an important detail) but fails. After that, we cut to nighttime at Atori, where Ren is awake, thanks to Shinji’s snoring. Yeah, it establishes an alibi for Shinji (not that we really need one, given that we know kidnapping his insane coworker is out of character), but it’s not even used other than as yet another joke, when Ren comments that Shinji in jail means he’s going to get a good night’s sleep. Because it’s not like Ren can go five minutes without a dickish comment.
The humor continues when Okubo-in a massive lapse in logic-decides to put Shinji in charge of delivering the 30 million yen ransom to the kidnapper, rather than going with the cooler-headed and more reliable Reiko, who calmly sits by trying to figure out what’s going on while her boss and intern are freaking the hell out. When Shinji does get arrested, Reiko goes to give the Atori crew the bad news, leading to Sanako to lament how her Shinji couldn’t possibly do such a thing, and he was always so kind and gentle as a child, all to Yui’s disbelief. Reiko understandably assumes that Sanako is Shinji’s mother, but then she admits that only just met him, but her intuition is never wrong. Probably not a good idea to put her on the witness stand. Visitation is also comedic, with both Okubo and Reiko suspecting Shinji, who is freaking out more and more. First, Okubo points out that since he and Shinji go way back, maybe pent-up resentment built up over the years. It’s kind compared to Reiko, who seems determined to match the dickish guys by pointing out that if Shinji were the kidnapper, it would make a great scoop. Seriously, after that, Ren’s comment sounds tame.
Despite making Shinji cry with her undying loyalty, Reiko does do something good for him-she points Sanako out to a lawyer they can hire for Shinji, a very good one. Yes, you know where this is going. And this is where everything begins to become serious, and Kitaoka proves he’s a much bigger dick than Ren.
It starts with Kitaoka turning away a little girl trying to hire him. In the middle of this almost Dickensian display of dickishness, Goro proves to have a good heart and gives the little girl candy. As a note? This is an incredible way to introduce a character who, up until this point, was the kind of scary guy who acted as Kitaoka’s bodyguard and personal manservant. And it’s a great contrast with Kitaoka’s behavior. Ren also tries to hire Kitaoka, but Kitaoka turns him away too, this time because Ren doesn’t have that “filthy, stinkin’ rich” smell. And even Ren points out that Kitaoka is a terrible person, though he promises to get the money somehow. Here is yet another good character moment, given that it’s actually in Ren’s advantage for Shinji to rot away in jail; he respects the guy enough to find some way to pay exorbitant amounts of money for the best lawyer in the country to get him out of jail. But Reiko saves the day by telling Kitaoka that she’s also requesting he represent her coworker, agreeing to a propaganda article as part of the deal…though Kitaoka still wants the money.
The tone gets to its darkest when Kitaoka goes to meet Shinji and realizes that Shinji’s rubbing his arm in exactly the spot where Zolda hit Ryuki, and he begins his Sinister Plan (TM). He goes to Atori and starts harassing Ren for payment, pointing out that a waiter’s salary isn’t going to cut it. Sanako backs up her boarders by offering to put the shop up for collateral. At this point, Kitaoka goes way overboard with the dick act by acting skeevy in front of Yui, saying he wouldn’t mind having such a cute girl to himself. Now, yes, age of consent in Japan-including local ordinances-is lower than the age of majority. Still, it’s creepy that he’s in his thirties and saying this to a girl who’s still in her teenage years. Worse, he does this right in front of her motherly aunt and her brotherly friend, as a show of power-there is nothing Sanako or Ren can do to him because they need his help. Also, take note that at this point, Kitaoka doesn’t know Ren as anything other than “Ryuki’s roommate,” so as far as he knows, he’s harassing innocent civilians who have absolutely nothing to do with the Rider War, and he’s perfectly okay with this. Still, Ren pushes him against the wall and tells him to stop, so props to him.
The increasing tension of the episode reaches its climax when both Ren’s and Kitaoka’s Monster senses start tingling, and Ren realizes that Kitaoka is also a Rider. They run off and henshin, but Zolda doesn’t hesitate to attack Knight…
Knight’s Crisis (Toshiki Inoue): To be perfectly honest, I have no idea why they call this episode “Knight’s Crisis.” Ren’s problem is only in the first five minutes before they drop that element for Kitaoka’s development. Or hell, what about the part where Shinji’s in jail and that’s the driving force of these two episodes? Given the plot of the next episode, I’d expect that one to be called “Knight’s Crisis,” but I digress.
Knight’s side of the crisis comes when his battle with Zolda is ended by the time limit. As both Ren and Kitaoka return to the real world, Kitaoka reveals that he knows Shinji’s identity as Ryuki and taunts Ren for forgetting that Riders can’t coexist and it’s not something you should get into if you “pretend to want friends.” Ren tries to insist that he has to fight, but Kitaoka sees his ring and starts mocking him for fighting for a lover, saying he’s green. Ren returns home and sulks off to his room, haunted by Kitaoka’s words. When Yui comes in to treat his injuries, he tells her everything and says they need to find a new lawyer. He fears that Kitaoka’s plan is to let Shinji stay in jail so long that Dragreder will eat him before long, though he halfheartedly says that he wouldn’t mind that. Clearly, he does, or he wouldn’t have told Yui they needed to fire Kitaoka or be bothered by his comments on his and Shinji’s growing friendship.
With Ryuki’s crisis, Kitaoka is trying to entrap Shinji, asking leading questions that make him look guilty. When Yui and Ren tell him they need to fire Kitaoka-oddly enough, without explaining that he’s a Kamen Rider, which gets Shinji in trouble down the line-he suspects that Ren’s in league with the lawyer. Yui tries to defend Ren, but Ren himself says that Shinji still owes him money, upping the 30,000 yen debt to 50,000, then 80,000, and even 100,000. Good to know you care, Ren.
Shinji’s only hope is Shimada, who’s just gotten out of the hospital. She doesn’t remember much of the attack, but when she visits Shinji and sees him rubbing his bruise, she remembers that she bit her attacker. This leads to her freaking out before Shinji pushes up his sleeve and shows everyone that he’s only got a nasty bruise, not a bite.
But of course, the real crisis belongs to Zolda, as Goro and a little girl team up to guilt trip the hell out of him. Goro meets the little girl, Yukari, again when she gives him paper cranes as thanks for the candy from the previous episode. She really bonds with him and will only speak to him for most of the episode, and he repeats everything she whispers to him for everyone else. It’s really sweet and shows off Goro’s gentle side and how he’s got a truly and unabashedly good heart, which confuses the hell out of me two episodes from now. On top of that, Reiko, Yui, and Ren have ganged up on Kitaoka, demanding he give them the tape of that suspicious conversation. Hell, Reiko and Yui get in his face about it; Ren barely comes off as threatening at all-the two normal women seem more likely to kick Kitaoka’s face in. When Kitaoka tries to throw Yukari out of the house, they step in and join forces-Reiko, Yui, and Goro stand protectively by Yukari while Ren nearly fights Kitaoka, saying he never wants to see the guy’s face again. All four walk out of the house with Yukari, and Goro explains the truth of the matter: her father is the one who kidnapped Shimada as revenge against ORE Journal for writing an article that cost him all of his factory workers. He’d needed the ransom money to pay for Yukari’s mother’s surgery. Now that her dad’s vanished, she assumes that the police have him and wants Kitaoka’s help to get him out of jail. Between Shimada’s memory and Yukari’s testimony, they’re able to free Shinji.
Things get worse for Kitaoka when Goro treats Yukari to ice cream and completely ignores his master, who’s forced to join them in an attempt to try to get him to come back home. Kitaoka’s shocked when Goro passes on Yukari’s words that he’s an idiot and scum, though he tries to play it cool and laugh it off that Goro might be putting words in her mouth. Still, it’s nice to see that moment of him betraying himself and actually giving a damn. Even worse, when he asks where they should drop off Yukari, Goro says the hospital-her mother is hospitalized and those paper cranes she gave him were from the 1000 she was trying to fold for her. At the hospital, Kitaoka is visibly uncomfortable and notices the few cranes at Yukari’s mother’s bedside, so he finally walks out of the room to speak with a nurse before the three of them leave. Of course we’ve just learned about his condition, when Shimada runs into him when she’s checking out and overhears a couple of nurses discussing how his condition is now untreatable. Insert rant about doctor-patient confidentiality and privacy laws that at least exist in America and I’d assume exist in Japan and how the medical “professionals” in Ryuki are idiots.
Shinji, Yui, and Ren arrive moments after Kitaoka, Goro, and Yukari leave to hear how a mysterious benefactor has paid for the mother’s surgery. Out in the parking lot, Goro reveals his and Yukari’s suspicions that Kitaoka paid, but the moment is broken up by the Atori crew arriving. Ren’s still pissed at Kitaoka and assumes that he’s trying to mess with Yukari, so he tries to punch him. In probably one of the most awesome moments ever, Shinji catches Ren’s fist before he can strike, then punches out Kitaoka himself and says he never wants to see the guy again. Because he deserves to punch Kitaoka more. Yukari speaks up to someone other than Goro for the first time and tells Shinji to stop picking on him, and as an awkward silence starts to settle in, Kitaoka drives off. Yukari runs after his car, and because they’re not about to let a little girl get in trouble, Shinji and Ren take off after her. They catch up just in time to save her from the same Monster that killed her father, then go to fight it. But while they fight, Zolda appears and uses his Final Vent of overkill, not only destroying the Monster, but the surroundings as well. Knight and Ryuki are caught in the blast, as Zolda admits that just like they wanted, they’re never going to see his face again…
The Mysterious Empty Train (Yasuko Kobayashi): The story features an amnesiac Kamen Rider passing through, searching for his past, and getting into a bunch of fights along the way…seven years before Kamen Rider Decade. Now, I know that amnesia and Kamen Rider are old friends: in fact, the previous series, Agito featured it with their main character, as did the movies Kamen Rider J and the ZX feature Birth of the 10th! All Riders Together! But I had to make that Decade joke.
Three storylines hold this episode together: Ren’s amnesia, Yui’s quest for the truth about her brother, and Reiko’s investigation of disappearances on a train car. The story starts immediately after “Knight’s Crisis,” where Zolda blew up both Ryuki and Knight. Shinji and Ren are thrown back into the real world, hurt and with Ren unconscious. He wakes up, revealing a bad head injury, and staggers away from Shinji and Yui, not recognizing them. But the debilitating pain from his head wound stops him, and Shinji grabs him to keep him from…well, falling more than running off. The next day at Atori, Shinji and Yui explain to Sanako that Ren doesn’t exactly have amnesia, that the doctor said the head trauma “temporarily confused him” so he can’t remember anything that happened over the past year. Which sounds like the definition of amnesia, only very specific in timeframe. But hey, we established last episode that the medical professionals in this series are idiots. Sanako agrees, considering she regrets the hospital didn’t keep Ren a little longer. Of course, Ren sneaks out of the house to try to track down his memories, and Shinji catches him. Despite being annoyed at Ren’s attitude, which hasn’t improved with blunt force trauma, Shinji can’t leave him on his own like this.
Given that the last two episodes showcased the loyalty of Shinji’s friends, I’m glad that this episode showcases Shinji’s loyalty to a friend, especially when that friendship is just starting out. He doesn’t leave Ren’s side throughout this episode, at least, not until a battle he knows Ren is in no state to fight. When it turns out that Ren managed to piss off a lot of people the previous year and they’re now all trying to pick a fight with him, Shinji’s the one to grab him and run like hell. He’s sympathetic to Ren’s frustration at not being able to remember, but he warns him that if he keeps up the search the way he’s been doing, he’s just going to run into more “weirdoes,” such as the muscled guy with a tattoo resembling a Dark Mark popping out of nowhere and recognizing Ren. Didn’t know he picked fights with Death Eaters.
Yui decides to be more proactive in the story, heading to Seimeiin University to look up more information on her brother, since she fears that if she doesn’t stop him, Shinji and Ren will get killed before long. But a staff member is nervous at her questions, insisting that Kanzaki’s disappearance is unrelated to the school. Furthermore, nobody is left who knows what he was working on, though the guy is evasive on explaining just what happened to all the other students and staff who knew him.
Meanwhile, having blacklisted Kitaoka, Reiko is sent on a mission to investigate a mysterious train. One minute, there are passengers inside one of the cars, and the next, they’re gone-and all without the train stopping. But while investigating, she finds a crazy old man muttering to himself about how he wishes he could undo “it” and that “it” wasn’t his fault. She tries to ask if he’s okay, but at the next stop, he gets off, insisting he has to run. Reiko chalks up the disappearances to “Nobody wants to share space with the schizophrenic guy,” but while the train’s moving, everyone in the car next to her suddenly disappears, and a mirror left behind reveals the true culprit: a Monster.
Ren’s search for his memories carries over into the next episode, and it’s a great way to introduce his backstory. I’m a sucker for a good amnesia plot: Dillon in Power Rangers RPM, Ken in his backstory episode of Digimon 02, and even Ren’s little brother Ryo in the Digimon Wonderswan game Brave Tamer (note: Ren Akiyama and Ryo Akiyama are not actually related. But a family tendency for amnesia would explain things). It’s a great way to introduce backstory simply by having them search for their memories and realize what’s really important to them. The audience has a very intimate view of their self-exploration, and when it comes to Ren’s character, it becomes pretty important, when he later struggles between the paths he should take.
The rules of Ren’s amnesia are clear: nothing is erased past a year ago. So he remembers his name, he remembers where he came from, but he doesn’t remember becoming a Rider or meeting Yui or Shinji. And as such, no details about his past beyond that point are revealed. I’ll get into this more next episode. Plagued by vague, blurry flashbacks and the intense, debilitating pain from his head injury, he decides the only way he’s going to remember anything is to travel to places he does remember and see if it triggers anything. Which would be logical if not for the fact that he’s got that debilitating head injury, so it’s a damn good thing Shinji won’t leave him alone. And again, that friendship between them really starts to bloom. Shinji suggests that maybe wandering aimlessly in search of lost days isn’t helping, and Ren suddenly remembers a man handing him something, a creature resembling Darkwing, and a girl asking him for something. He insists that there’s somewhere he has to go in order to remember something important, and Shinji keeps following him. When the train with the Monster passes overhead and both Riders can sense it, Shinji promises a confused and somewhat frightened Ren that he’ll take care of things and tells him to hurry and remember that important thing. Yes, Shinji trusts Ren now-he trusts him to take care of himself, which is a pretty big amount of trust for this episode.
It’s Shinji’s henshin into Ryuki that spurs Ren’s memories more, and he’s able to focus enough to make them become clearer in his mind. We see that the creature attacking was in fact Darkwing, and Kanzaki handed Ren a blank deck-this is the moment when he became a Rider. Ryuki’s getting outsmarted by the Monster, but Shinji proves that he’s able to fight smart and pulls off a feint by summoning his Strike Vent and using it as a diversion while he goes to recover his sword, then destroying the Monster’s boomerang and pulling off his Final Vent unhampered. Yui discovers that there are no publications by Shiro Kanzaki/Takami, but there is a yearbook with a photo from 2001 of Ejima Lab, with Kanzaki among fellow students and staff. The photo shows Prof. Ejima, who happens to be that crazy old man Reiko saw on the train. Only he’s not quite so crazy-he’s using a Seal card to repel the Monsters pursuing him. Also in the photo is the young woman from Ren’s memory, the girl on the beach who promised to wait for him, his fiancée, Eri…
Ren Akiyama’s Lover (Yasuko Kobayashi): This episode splits its focus a little more down the middle between Ren and Yui as they both search for answers in the same place. I’m going to gloss over the rest of the ORE Journal investigation, since they spend the whole episode trying to use logic to explain what’s going on, only for Reiko to realize that logic can’t explain any of the disappearances, and she can only reluctantly accept Okubo’s insistence that they can only do so much as journalists.
I’ll start with Yui’s side, if only because I get a little longwinded about Ren-after all, it is his character arc that’s the main focus of these episodes. Yui learns from the librarian that Ejima Lab no longer exists, thanks to an accident the previous year. However, she’s new to the school, so she doesn’t know all the details. As she photocopies the picture from the yearbook, Yui admits to herself that she never really knew her brother after he grew up and that she still thinks of him as the Shiro who fought and pleaded with his relatives to stay with her. This, I think, is a major part of her character and why no matter what Kanzaki does, she can never hate him and always ends up forgiving him. A student notices her xeroxing the photo, and she recognizes him from the lineup as an Ejima Lab student, Hajime Nakamura. Remember this name. It will be important much later.
Nakamura is horrified to realize that Yui is Kanzaki’s little sister, and he’s confrontational toward her and bitter. He’s shocked that she doesn’t know anything that happened, but he refuses to believe it, demanding to know what the lab was experimenting on that day and why it was torn apart. He doesn’t want anything to do with her, and he hints that somehow, the experiment had something to do with her. Yui promises to try to fix things, which is another important point of her character-she’s desperate to make amends for her brother’s sins. But Nakamura argues that it’s too late; everyone in the lab was sacrificed, and one was nearly killed. He insists it’s Yui’s fault.
Moving on to Ren for a moment, he starts to leave as Shinji returns, revealing that he remembers something about Seimeiin University as his only clue to his lost memory. Shinji asks if it means Ren went to college, though he says that’s not it; either way, he has to go. But while riding to Seimeiin, Ren gets caught up in a car chase, and Shinji is amazed at his mysterious ability to piss people off wherever he goes. When cornered at a red light, Ren’s confronted by the drivers, since he caused them to wreck their cars. The drivers plan to fight, and he just backhands one guy. Shinji steps in, planning to intimidate them with his editor-in-chief’s reputation, and he tells Ren to go and use his second chance to change his attitude. This is a very good moment for Shinji, compounding his loyalty and trust from the previous episode. It’s clear that no matter how much Ren pisses him off (though, to be honest, he now knows that he’s not the only one Ren pisses off), he still cares about him and wants him to be okay. He takes care of him and tells him to start trying to become a better person. I argue that this plays a very big part of Ren’s characterization later on. But unfortunately for Shinji, Okubo’s name carries no weight, and he’s dragged into a fight.
It turns out that Shinji’s concerned words spurred Ren’s memory again, and he realizes that Eri used to say the same thing to him all the time. He’d pick her up after class, and she always knew when he got into a fight. She guilt-tripped him over fighting, but despite her disapproval of his lifestyle, she genuinely loved him for who he was. Also, she wore that ring that he now keeps around his neck.
It’s odd that Ren’s backstory begins with Eri. We don’t know where he came from, whether or not he’s got a family, or anything else about him before that point. Hell, for all we know, he really could be the older brother of Ryo Akiyama from Digimon, and just transplant all of the Wonderswan game backstory there to justify why he doesn’t have a past until then. No, I’m not writing a fic. Why do you ask?
But it’s appropriate at the same time: Ren defines himself by his promise, his wish to save Eri. He is nothing without her; this causes massive problems for him down the line. I even said in my review of 13 Riders that he considers himself worthless if he can’t be a Kamen Rider. So, naturally, this is his most important memory and the only point in his past that matters in his mind. The entity known as Ren Akiyama is intrinsically tied to Eri Ogawa and thus becomes Kamen Rider Knight. It’s impossible to tear that part of his existence away, and so his past before Eri is inconsequential.
And that brings me to another point. The Japanese title of this is “Akiyama Ren no Koibito,” which I used the Wikipedia translation of above. The writers are oddly careful not to put a label on Ren and Eri’s relationship; it’s all handled implicitly, and people are cut off before actually giving a word to define how close they are to one another-if they’re simply dating or what, though it doesn’t seem like they’re married. In my reviews and editorials, I refer to Eri as Ren’s fiancée. This mostly stems from the fact that when I saw her ring on her left finger, I assumed it was an engagement ring. Then, realizing that it was very America-centric of me to assume ring on left hand = wedding/engagement everywhere, I did a Google search. I discovered that in Japan, there is something called a couple or pair ring-which Kitaoka actually refers to Ren’s ring as when he first sees it in “Knight’s Crisis.” It’s kind of a pre-engagement ring: boyfriends and girlfriends from around their teenage years to about Ren and Eri’s age will buy a pair of identical rings-hence the name-to symbolize their love. But here’s the thing: it’s a pair. One for the girlfriend, one for the boyfriend. Ren wears only Eri’s ring around his neck. It’s a symbol of his promise to save her-“ yakusoku no ring,” as he refers to it in his image song (seriously, that song pretty much says it all on his devotion to her completely overriding his own life; it’s appropriate his Rider name is Knight, given that his quest wouldn’t be out of place among the stories we expect from knights of legend). And in any case, Ren is wholly devoted to her as if he were already married. Hell, if they didn’t end up together after this, I’d probably be prepping a massive rant right about now readers of my Ben 10: Ultimate Alien reviews can vouch for how ranty I can get. So, why not “fiancée”? It’s really the only word that seems appropriate to define their relationship.
Anyway, while on a date at the beach, Eri confessed that she was scared of what Ejima and Kanzaki were up to in the lab, saying it was some kind of secret work. Eri was not only a student at Ejima Lab, but Kanzaki was her upperclassman-trusted enough to run a secret experiment alongside the professor. Since the next day was her birthday, she asked Ren to pick her up early from the lab, though he refused. So she pleaded and promised to wait for him. In the present, Ren is sure that he did as she asked, but something went wrong. Still, his memories of the incident are vague: Kanzaki giving him the deck, Darkwing hovering, and windows exploding throughout the lab.
The story all comes together as Ejima loses his Seal card and flees, crying for Kanzaki to save him. Yui heads to the lab, having learned from Nakamura that last summer, Kanzaki was experimenting in Room 401, though he doesn’t know what that experiment was-only Kanzaki and Ejima did. This matches perfectly with Ren’s memory of Eri’s fears. Whatever happened, Kanzaki and Ejima disappeared after the experiment, though Kanzaki said that it was a success for his little sister. However, one student was sacrificed that day.
She arrives to the chained-off lab to see that the lock is open, as if someone had just been there or wants her to see it. Despite the windows being shattered, Room 401 is filled with mirrors of different shapes and sizes. There’s also a chair sitting alone in the middle of the room, with a strange pair of glasses resting on a table nearby. As she begins to investigate, Ren arrives to Room 401, certain that he’s on the right path, and he opens the door to his memory: the screech of the Mirror World as Kanzaki looks up at him in shock, Ejima horrified, and Darkwing flying in the room, knocking over equipment. Wearing the glasses, Eri looks over in terror to see Darkwing, and she tries to escape. The glasses fall off of her as she’s attacked by some invisible force, finally collapsing. And then Kanzaki asks Ren to choose between killing him in revenge or fighting, giving him the deck. Ren becomes the first Kamen Rider, and standing up to tradition, one of the first monsters he faces is a bat; it matches well with Shinji, the main Rider, first facing off against a spider-the first two monsters that the original Kamen Rider fought.
Yui is surprised to see Ren at the site of her brother’s experiment, and holding back emotion, Ren takes out his ring and looks at it for a moment before admitting that he remembers. I really have to credit Satoshi Matsuda for this moment and the very last scene of the episode. He really nails the subtle expression of emotion that Ren needs-it’s facial expressions, body language, and tone of voice playing softly in order to convey emotion. He does very well with these introverted moments, though later down the line, I’ll have a few things to say about his more extroverted performances.
Shinji arrives, beat up and confused to see Yui at the exact same place where Ren needed to go. He’s grateful that Ren remembers, and he comments that his work is done. At this point, Ejima stumbles into the hall, pursued by a Monster. Ren and Shinji sense it and fight it off, though it does manage to hurt Ejima. When the Monster flees into the Mirror World, they henshin and fight while Yui tries to help the professor. He says that he “didn’t want to die,” possibly hinting that he agreed to the experiment to find a new life. Recognizing Yui, he wishes she’d never existed, then dies of an apparent heart attack. No, that’s not traumatic at all.
Though they defeat the Monster together, Ren stops Dragreder from taking the energy, feeding Darkwing instead while refusing to explain himself to Shinji. The trio returns home, but Ren excuses himself to take care of something. Shinji tells him not to make any more enemies, prompting them to stare before Ren turns that into a glare and rides off. He arrives at the hospital and a lonely room, where Eri is in a coma and hooked up to life support. Darkwing appears in the mirror, threatening, and Ren shatters the mirror with a punch to scare it off. His hand bleeding, he takes out his ring, holding to his silent vow…
The tone of this episode is…interesting, to say the least. The plot of this episode is very serious: Shimada is kidnapped and held for ransom, Shinji is attacked when he goes to deliver the money, a Monster eats the kidnapper, and so Shinji’s left as the only suspect (and we get back to what I said last batch about the perception of Japanese law as having a presumption of guilt, but again, I don’t know for sure). The tone, however, is comedic up until one point, and that’s a major contrast. Again, I haven’t seen enough Kamen Rider to know if this is a common thing in Toshiki Inoue’s episodes (my plans alongside the airing of Fourze are to make my way through Faiz and OOO before trying to tackle the rest of the Heisei era), but I do know that he does the same with episode 29, “Marriage Interview Battle.” So…yeah, strange, strange introduction to the new writer.
The humor starts immediately after Ryuki gets his ass kicked and his arm nearly broken in battle against Zolda. Turns out that Shinji is massively late both to help out at Atori as part of his deal to live there, and for work at ORE Journal, which prompts both Ren and Okubo to note his lousy sense of timing. We also get Shimada’s weirdness, where she counts down the seconds until quitting time…first in Japanese, then English, before bolting out the door to go to the amusement park. She wins a massive stuffed animal about her height and proceeds to take it on a date. Any comment I have to make on that subject will only lead to debate on a certain Japanese fetish/subculture/whathaveyou and possibly the production of a Lady Heather episode of CSI. Anyway, at this point, she gets kidnapped, where she tries to escape by biting the kidnapper’s hand (note: this is an important detail) but fails. After that, we cut to nighttime at Atori, where Ren is awake, thanks to Shinji’s snoring. Yeah, it establishes an alibi for Shinji (not that we really need one, given that we know kidnapping his insane coworker is out of character), but it’s not even used other than as yet another joke, when Ren comments that Shinji in jail means he’s going to get a good night’s sleep. Because it’s not like Ren can go five minutes without a dickish comment.
The humor continues when Okubo-in a massive lapse in logic-decides to put Shinji in charge of delivering the 30 million yen ransom to the kidnapper, rather than going with the cooler-headed and more reliable Reiko, who calmly sits by trying to figure out what’s going on while her boss and intern are freaking the hell out. When Shinji does get arrested, Reiko goes to give the Atori crew the bad news, leading to Sanako to lament how her Shinji couldn’t possibly do such a thing, and he was always so kind and gentle as a child, all to Yui’s disbelief. Reiko understandably assumes that Sanako is Shinji’s mother, but then she admits that only just met him, but her intuition is never wrong. Probably not a good idea to put her on the witness stand. Visitation is also comedic, with both Okubo and Reiko suspecting Shinji, who is freaking out more and more. First, Okubo points out that since he and Shinji go way back, maybe pent-up resentment built up over the years. It’s kind compared to Reiko, who seems determined to match the dickish guys by pointing out that if Shinji were the kidnapper, it would make a great scoop. Seriously, after that, Ren’s comment sounds tame.
Despite making Shinji cry with her undying loyalty, Reiko does do something good for him-she points Sanako out to a lawyer they can hire for Shinji, a very good one. Yes, you know where this is going. And this is where everything begins to become serious, and Kitaoka proves he’s a much bigger dick than Ren.
It starts with Kitaoka turning away a little girl trying to hire him. In the middle of this almost Dickensian display of dickishness, Goro proves to have a good heart and gives the little girl candy. As a note? This is an incredible way to introduce a character who, up until this point, was the kind of scary guy who acted as Kitaoka’s bodyguard and personal manservant. And it’s a great contrast with Kitaoka’s behavior. Ren also tries to hire Kitaoka, but Kitaoka turns him away too, this time because Ren doesn’t have that “filthy, stinkin’ rich” smell. And even Ren points out that Kitaoka is a terrible person, though he promises to get the money somehow. Here is yet another good character moment, given that it’s actually in Ren’s advantage for Shinji to rot away in jail; he respects the guy enough to find some way to pay exorbitant amounts of money for the best lawyer in the country to get him out of jail. But Reiko saves the day by telling Kitaoka that she’s also requesting he represent her coworker, agreeing to a propaganda article as part of the deal…though Kitaoka still wants the money.
The tone gets to its darkest when Kitaoka goes to meet Shinji and realizes that Shinji’s rubbing his arm in exactly the spot where Zolda hit Ryuki, and he begins his Sinister Plan (TM). He goes to Atori and starts harassing Ren for payment, pointing out that a waiter’s salary isn’t going to cut it. Sanako backs up her boarders by offering to put the shop up for collateral. At this point, Kitaoka goes way overboard with the dick act by acting skeevy in front of Yui, saying he wouldn’t mind having such a cute girl to himself. Now, yes, age of consent in Japan-including local ordinances-is lower than the age of majority. Still, it’s creepy that he’s in his thirties and saying this to a girl who’s still in her teenage years. Worse, he does this right in front of her motherly aunt and her brotherly friend, as a show of power-there is nothing Sanako or Ren can do to him because they need his help. Also, take note that at this point, Kitaoka doesn’t know Ren as anything other than “Ryuki’s roommate,” so as far as he knows, he’s harassing innocent civilians who have absolutely nothing to do with the Rider War, and he’s perfectly okay with this. Still, Ren pushes him against the wall and tells him to stop, so props to him.
The increasing tension of the episode reaches its climax when both Ren’s and Kitaoka’s Monster senses start tingling, and Ren realizes that Kitaoka is also a Rider. They run off and henshin, but Zolda doesn’t hesitate to attack Knight…
Knight’s Crisis (Toshiki Inoue): To be perfectly honest, I have no idea why they call this episode “Knight’s Crisis.” Ren’s problem is only in the first five minutes before they drop that element for Kitaoka’s development. Or hell, what about the part where Shinji’s in jail and that’s the driving force of these two episodes? Given the plot of the next episode, I’d expect that one to be called “Knight’s Crisis,” but I digress.
Knight’s side of the crisis comes when his battle with Zolda is ended by the time limit. As both Ren and Kitaoka return to the real world, Kitaoka reveals that he knows Shinji’s identity as Ryuki and taunts Ren for forgetting that Riders can’t coexist and it’s not something you should get into if you “pretend to want friends.” Ren tries to insist that he has to fight, but Kitaoka sees his ring and starts mocking him for fighting for a lover, saying he’s green. Ren returns home and sulks off to his room, haunted by Kitaoka’s words. When Yui comes in to treat his injuries, he tells her everything and says they need to find a new lawyer. He fears that Kitaoka’s plan is to let Shinji stay in jail so long that Dragreder will eat him before long, though he halfheartedly says that he wouldn’t mind that. Clearly, he does, or he wouldn’t have told Yui they needed to fire Kitaoka or be bothered by his comments on his and Shinji’s growing friendship.
With Ryuki’s crisis, Kitaoka is trying to entrap Shinji, asking leading questions that make him look guilty. When Yui and Ren tell him they need to fire Kitaoka-oddly enough, without explaining that he’s a Kamen Rider, which gets Shinji in trouble down the line-he suspects that Ren’s in league with the lawyer. Yui tries to defend Ren, but Ren himself says that Shinji still owes him money, upping the 30,000 yen debt to 50,000, then 80,000, and even 100,000. Good to know you care, Ren.
Shinji’s only hope is Shimada, who’s just gotten out of the hospital. She doesn’t remember much of the attack, but when she visits Shinji and sees him rubbing his bruise, she remembers that she bit her attacker. This leads to her freaking out before Shinji pushes up his sleeve and shows everyone that he’s only got a nasty bruise, not a bite.
But of course, the real crisis belongs to Zolda, as Goro and a little girl team up to guilt trip the hell out of him. Goro meets the little girl, Yukari, again when she gives him paper cranes as thanks for the candy from the previous episode. She really bonds with him and will only speak to him for most of the episode, and he repeats everything she whispers to him for everyone else. It’s really sweet and shows off Goro’s gentle side and how he’s got a truly and unabashedly good heart, which confuses the hell out of me two episodes from now. On top of that, Reiko, Yui, and Ren have ganged up on Kitaoka, demanding he give them the tape of that suspicious conversation. Hell, Reiko and Yui get in his face about it; Ren barely comes off as threatening at all-the two normal women seem more likely to kick Kitaoka’s face in. When Kitaoka tries to throw Yukari out of the house, they step in and join forces-Reiko, Yui, and Goro stand protectively by Yukari while Ren nearly fights Kitaoka, saying he never wants to see the guy’s face again. All four walk out of the house with Yukari, and Goro explains the truth of the matter: her father is the one who kidnapped Shimada as revenge against ORE Journal for writing an article that cost him all of his factory workers. He’d needed the ransom money to pay for Yukari’s mother’s surgery. Now that her dad’s vanished, she assumes that the police have him and wants Kitaoka’s help to get him out of jail. Between Shimada’s memory and Yukari’s testimony, they’re able to free Shinji.
Things get worse for Kitaoka when Goro treats Yukari to ice cream and completely ignores his master, who’s forced to join them in an attempt to try to get him to come back home. Kitaoka’s shocked when Goro passes on Yukari’s words that he’s an idiot and scum, though he tries to play it cool and laugh it off that Goro might be putting words in her mouth. Still, it’s nice to see that moment of him betraying himself and actually giving a damn. Even worse, when he asks where they should drop off Yukari, Goro says the hospital-her mother is hospitalized and those paper cranes she gave him were from the 1000 she was trying to fold for her. At the hospital, Kitaoka is visibly uncomfortable and notices the few cranes at Yukari’s mother’s bedside, so he finally walks out of the room to speak with a nurse before the three of them leave. Of course we’ve just learned about his condition, when Shimada runs into him when she’s checking out and overhears a couple of nurses discussing how his condition is now untreatable. Insert rant about doctor-patient confidentiality and privacy laws that at least exist in America and I’d assume exist in Japan and how the medical “professionals” in Ryuki are idiots.
Shinji, Yui, and Ren arrive moments after Kitaoka, Goro, and Yukari leave to hear how a mysterious benefactor has paid for the mother’s surgery. Out in the parking lot, Goro reveals his and Yukari’s suspicions that Kitaoka paid, but the moment is broken up by the Atori crew arriving. Ren’s still pissed at Kitaoka and assumes that he’s trying to mess with Yukari, so he tries to punch him. In probably one of the most awesome moments ever, Shinji catches Ren’s fist before he can strike, then punches out Kitaoka himself and says he never wants to see the guy again. Because he deserves to punch Kitaoka more. Yukari speaks up to someone other than Goro for the first time and tells Shinji to stop picking on him, and as an awkward silence starts to settle in, Kitaoka drives off. Yukari runs after his car, and because they’re not about to let a little girl get in trouble, Shinji and Ren take off after her. They catch up just in time to save her from the same Monster that killed her father, then go to fight it. But while they fight, Zolda appears and uses his Final Vent of overkill, not only destroying the Monster, but the surroundings as well. Knight and Ryuki are caught in the blast, as Zolda admits that just like they wanted, they’re never going to see his face again…
The Mysterious Empty Train (Yasuko Kobayashi): The story features an amnesiac Kamen Rider passing through, searching for his past, and getting into a bunch of fights along the way…seven years before Kamen Rider Decade. Now, I know that amnesia and Kamen Rider are old friends: in fact, the previous series, Agito featured it with their main character, as did the movies Kamen Rider J and the ZX feature Birth of the 10th! All Riders Together! But I had to make that Decade joke.
Three storylines hold this episode together: Ren’s amnesia, Yui’s quest for the truth about her brother, and Reiko’s investigation of disappearances on a train car. The story starts immediately after “Knight’s Crisis,” where Zolda blew up both Ryuki and Knight. Shinji and Ren are thrown back into the real world, hurt and with Ren unconscious. He wakes up, revealing a bad head injury, and staggers away from Shinji and Yui, not recognizing them. But the debilitating pain from his head wound stops him, and Shinji grabs him to keep him from…well, falling more than running off. The next day at Atori, Shinji and Yui explain to Sanako that Ren doesn’t exactly have amnesia, that the doctor said the head trauma “temporarily confused him” so he can’t remember anything that happened over the past year. Which sounds like the definition of amnesia, only very specific in timeframe. But hey, we established last episode that the medical professionals in this series are idiots. Sanako agrees, considering she regrets the hospital didn’t keep Ren a little longer. Of course, Ren sneaks out of the house to try to track down his memories, and Shinji catches him. Despite being annoyed at Ren’s attitude, which hasn’t improved with blunt force trauma, Shinji can’t leave him on his own like this.
Given that the last two episodes showcased the loyalty of Shinji’s friends, I’m glad that this episode showcases Shinji’s loyalty to a friend, especially when that friendship is just starting out. He doesn’t leave Ren’s side throughout this episode, at least, not until a battle he knows Ren is in no state to fight. When it turns out that Ren managed to piss off a lot of people the previous year and they’re now all trying to pick a fight with him, Shinji’s the one to grab him and run like hell. He’s sympathetic to Ren’s frustration at not being able to remember, but he warns him that if he keeps up the search the way he’s been doing, he’s just going to run into more “weirdoes,” such as the muscled guy with a tattoo resembling a Dark Mark popping out of nowhere and recognizing Ren. Didn’t know he picked fights with Death Eaters.
Yui decides to be more proactive in the story, heading to Seimeiin University to look up more information on her brother, since she fears that if she doesn’t stop him, Shinji and Ren will get killed before long. But a staff member is nervous at her questions, insisting that Kanzaki’s disappearance is unrelated to the school. Furthermore, nobody is left who knows what he was working on, though the guy is evasive on explaining just what happened to all the other students and staff who knew him.
Meanwhile, having blacklisted Kitaoka, Reiko is sent on a mission to investigate a mysterious train. One minute, there are passengers inside one of the cars, and the next, they’re gone-and all without the train stopping. But while investigating, she finds a crazy old man muttering to himself about how he wishes he could undo “it” and that “it” wasn’t his fault. She tries to ask if he’s okay, but at the next stop, he gets off, insisting he has to run. Reiko chalks up the disappearances to “Nobody wants to share space with the schizophrenic guy,” but while the train’s moving, everyone in the car next to her suddenly disappears, and a mirror left behind reveals the true culprit: a Monster.
Ren’s search for his memories carries over into the next episode, and it’s a great way to introduce his backstory. I’m a sucker for a good amnesia plot: Dillon in Power Rangers RPM, Ken in his backstory episode of Digimon 02, and even Ren’s little brother Ryo in the Digimon Wonderswan game Brave Tamer (note: Ren Akiyama and Ryo Akiyama are not actually related. But a family tendency for amnesia would explain things). It’s a great way to introduce backstory simply by having them search for their memories and realize what’s really important to them. The audience has a very intimate view of their self-exploration, and when it comes to Ren’s character, it becomes pretty important, when he later struggles between the paths he should take.
The rules of Ren’s amnesia are clear: nothing is erased past a year ago. So he remembers his name, he remembers where he came from, but he doesn’t remember becoming a Rider or meeting Yui or Shinji. And as such, no details about his past beyond that point are revealed. I’ll get into this more next episode. Plagued by vague, blurry flashbacks and the intense, debilitating pain from his head injury, he decides the only way he’s going to remember anything is to travel to places he does remember and see if it triggers anything. Which would be logical if not for the fact that he’s got that debilitating head injury, so it’s a damn good thing Shinji won’t leave him alone. And again, that friendship between them really starts to bloom. Shinji suggests that maybe wandering aimlessly in search of lost days isn’t helping, and Ren suddenly remembers a man handing him something, a creature resembling Darkwing, and a girl asking him for something. He insists that there’s somewhere he has to go in order to remember something important, and Shinji keeps following him. When the train with the Monster passes overhead and both Riders can sense it, Shinji promises a confused and somewhat frightened Ren that he’ll take care of things and tells him to hurry and remember that important thing. Yes, Shinji trusts Ren now-he trusts him to take care of himself, which is a pretty big amount of trust for this episode.
It’s Shinji’s henshin into Ryuki that spurs Ren’s memories more, and he’s able to focus enough to make them become clearer in his mind. We see that the creature attacking was in fact Darkwing, and Kanzaki handed Ren a blank deck-this is the moment when he became a Rider. Ryuki’s getting outsmarted by the Monster, but Shinji proves that he’s able to fight smart and pulls off a feint by summoning his Strike Vent and using it as a diversion while he goes to recover his sword, then destroying the Monster’s boomerang and pulling off his Final Vent unhampered. Yui discovers that there are no publications by Shiro Kanzaki/Takami, but there is a yearbook with a photo from 2001 of Ejima Lab, with Kanzaki among fellow students and staff. The photo shows Prof. Ejima, who happens to be that crazy old man Reiko saw on the train. Only he’s not quite so crazy-he’s using a Seal card to repel the Monsters pursuing him. Also in the photo is the young woman from Ren’s memory, the girl on the beach who promised to wait for him, his fiancée, Eri…
Ren Akiyama’s Lover (Yasuko Kobayashi): This episode splits its focus a little more down the middle between Ren and Yui as they both search for answers in the same place. I’m going to gloss over the rest of the ORE Journal investigation, since they spend the whole episode trying to use logic to explain what’s going on, only for Reiko to realize that logic can’t explain any of the disappearances, and she can only reluctantly accept Okubo’s insistence that they can only do so much as journalists.
I’ll start with Yui’s side, if only because I get a little longwinded about Ren-after all, it is his character arc that’s the main focus of these episodes. Yui learns from the librarian that Ejima Lab no longer exists, thanks to an accident the previous year. However, she’s new to the school, so she doesn’t know all the details. As she photocopies the picture from the yearbook, Yui admits to herself that she never really knew her brother after he grew up and that she still thinks of him as the Shiro who fought and pleaded with his relatives to stay with her. This, I think, is a major part of her character and why no matter what Kanzaki does, she can never hate him and always ends up forgiving him. A student notices her xeroxing the photo, and she recognizes him from the lineup as an Ejima Lab student, Hajime Nakamura. Remember this name. It will be important much later.
Nakamura is horrified to realize that Yui is Kanzaki’s little sister, and he’s confrontational toward her and bitter. He’s shocked that she doesn’t know anything that happened, but he refuses to believe it, demanding to know what the lab was experimenting on that day and why it was torn apart. He doesn’t want anything to do with her, and he hints that somehow, the experiment had something to do with her. Yui promises to try to fix things, which is another important point of her character-she’s desperate to make amends for her brother’s sins. But Nakamura argues that it’s too late; everyone in the lab was sacrificed, and one was nearly killed. He insists it’s Yui’s fault.
Moving on to Ren for a moment, he starts to leave as Shinji returns, revealing that he remembers something about Seimeiin University as his only clue to his lost memory. Shinji asks if it means Ren went to college, though he says that’s not it; either way, he has to go. But while riding to Seimeiin, Ren gets caught up in a car chase, and Shinji is amazed at his mysterious ability to piss people off wherever he goes. When cornered at a red light, Ren’s confronted by the drivers, since he caused them to wreck their cars. The drivers plan to fight, and he just backhands one guy. Shinji steps in, planning to intimidate them with his editor-in-chief’s reputation, and he tells Ren to go and use his second chance to change his attitude. This is a very good moment for Shinji, compounding his loyalty and trust from the previous episode. It’s clear that no matter how much Ren pisses him off (though, to be honest, he now knows that he’s not the only one Ren pisses off), he still cares about him and wants him to be okay. He takes care of him and tells him to start trying to become a better person. I argue that this plays a very big part of Ren’s characterization later on. But unfortunately for Shinji, Okubo’s name carries no weight, and he’s dragged into a fight.
It turns out that Shinji’s concerned words spurred Ren’s memory again, and he realizes that Eri used to say the same thing to him all the time. He’d pick her up after class, and she always knew when he got into a fight. She guilt-tripped him over fighting, but despite her disapproval of his lifestyle, she genuinely loved him for who he was. Also, she wore that ring that he now keeps around his neck.
It’s odd that Ren’s backstory begins with Eri. We don’t know where he came from, whether or not he’s got a family, or anything else about him before that point. Hell, for all we know, he really could be the older brother of Ryo Akiyama from Digimon, and just transplant all of the Wonderswan game backstory there to justify why he doesn’t have a past until then. No, I’m not writing a fic. Why do you ask?
But it’s appropriate at the same time: Ren defines himself by his promise, his wish to save Eri. He is nothing without her; this causes massive problems for him down the line. I even said in my review of 13 Riders that he considers himself worthless if he can’t be a Kamen Rider. So, naturally, this is his most important memory and the only point in his past that matters in his mind. The entity known as Ren Akiyama is intrinsically tied to Eri Ogawa and thus becomes Kamen Rider Knight. It’s impossible to tear that part of his existence away, and so his past before Eri is inconsequential.
And that brings me to another point. The Japanese title of this is “Akiyama Ren no Koibito,” which I used the Wikipedia translation of above. The writers are oddly careful not to put a label on Ren and Eri’s relationship; it’s all handled implicitly, and people are cut off before actually giving a word to define how close they are to one another-if they’re simply dating or what, though it doesn’t seem like they’re married. In my reviews and editorials, I refer to Eri as Ren’s fiancée. This mostly stems from the fact that when I saw her ring on her left finger, I assumed it was an engagement ring. Then, realizing that it was very America-centric of me to assume ring on left hand = wedding/engagement everywhere, I did a Google search. I discovered that in Japan, there is something called a couple or pair ring-which Kitaoka actually refers to Ren’s ring as when he first sees it in “Knight’s Crisis.” It’s kind of a pre-engagement ring: boyfriends and girlfriends from around their teenage years to about Ren and Eri’s age will buy a pair of identical rings-hence the name-to symbolize their love. But here’s the thing: it’s a pair. One for the girlfriend, one for the boyfriend. Ren wears only Eri’s ring around his neck. It’s a symbol of his promise to save her-“ yakusoku no ring,” as he refers to it in his image song (seriously, that song pretty much says it all on his devotion to her completely overriding his own life; it’s appropriate his Rider name is Knight, given that his quest wouldn’t be out of place among the stories we expect from knights of legend). And in any case, Ren is wholly devoted to her as if he were already married. Hell, if they didn’t end up together after this, I’d probably be prepping a massive rant right about now readers of my Ben 10: Ultimate Alien reviews can vouch for how ranty I can get. So, why not “fiancée”? It’s really the only word that seems appropriate to define their relationship.
Anyway, while on a date at the beach, Eri confessed that she was scared of what Ejima and Kanzaki were up to in the lab, saying it was some kind of secret work. Eri was not only a student at Ejima Lab, but Kanzaki was her upperclassman-trusted enough to run a secret experiment alongside the professor. Since the next day was her birthday, she asked Ren to pick her up early from the lab, though he refused. So she pleaded and promised to wait for him. In the present, Ren is sure that he did as she asked, but something went wrong. Still, his memories of the incident are vague: Kanzaki giving him the deck, Darkwing hovering, and windows exploding throughout the lab.
The story all comes together as Ejima loses his Seal card and flees, crying for Kanzaki to save him. Yui heads to the lab, having learned from Nakamura that last summer, Kanzaki was experimenting in Room 401, though he doesn’t know what that experiment was-only Kanzaki and Ejima did. This matches perfectly with Ren’s memory of Eri’s fears. Whatever happened, Kanzaki and Ejima disappeared after the experiment, though Kanzaki said that it was a success for his little sister. However, one student was sacrificed that day.
She arrives to the chained-off lab to see that the lock is open, as if someone had just been there or wants her to see it. Despite the windows being shattered, Room 401 is filled with mirrors of different shapes and sizes. There’s also a chair sitting alone in the middle of the room, with a strange pair of glasses resting on a table nearby. As she begins to investigate, Ren arrives to Room 401, certain that he’s on the right path, and he opens the door to his memory: the screech of the Mirror World as Kanzaki looks up at him in shock, Ejima horrified, and Darkwing flying in the room, knocking over equipment. Wearing the glasses, Eri looks over in terror to see Darkwing, and she tries to escape. The glasses fall off of her as she’s attacked by some invisible force, finally collapsing. And then Kanzaki asks Ren to choose between killing him in revenge or fighting, giving him the deck. Ren becomes the first Kamen Rider, and standing up to tradition, one of the first monsters he faces is a bat; it matches well with Shinji, the main Rider, first facing off against a spider-the first two monsters that the original Kamen Rider fought.
Yui is surprised to see Ren at the site of her brother’s experiment, and holding back emotion, Ren takes out his ring and looks at it for a moment before admitting that he remembers. I really have to credit Satoshi Matsuda for this moment and the very last scene of the episode. He really nails the subtle expression of emotion that Ren needs-it’s facial expressions, body language, and tone of voice playing softly in order to convey emotion. He does very well with these introverted moments, though later down the line, I’ll have a few things to say about his more extroverted performances.
Shinji arrives, beat up and confused to see Yui at the exact same place where Ren needed to go. He’s grateful that Ren remembers, and he comments that his work is done. At this point, Ejima stumbles into the hall, pursued by a Monster. Ren and Shinji sense it and fight it off, though it does manage to hurt Ejima. When the Monster flees into the Mirror World, they henshin and fight while Yui tries to help the professor. He says that he “didn’t want to die,” possibly hinting that he agreed to the experiment to find a new life. Recognizing Yui, he wishes she’d never existed, then dies of an apparent heart attack. No, that’s not traumatic at all.
Though they defeat the Monster together, Ren stops Dragreder from taking the energy, feeding Darkwing instead while refusing to explain himself to Shinji. The trio returns home, but Ren excuses himself to take care of something. Shinji tells him not to make any more enemies, prompting them to stare before Ren turns that into a glare and rides off. He arrives at the hospital and a lonely room, where Eri is in a coma and hooked up to life support. Darkwing appears in the mirror, threatening, and Ren shatters the mirror with a punch to scare it off. His hand bleeding, he takes out his ring, holding to his silent vow…