Recap: Kamen Rider Revice, Episode 43 – The End of Eternity, Where Regret Leads

Gifu summons an army of Juniors and Giftarians. With most of them out for the count at the moment, Hikaru flies in to buy them some time to get themselves to safety. Hikaru manages to take care of Gifu’s army and hopes Papa Ushijima is watching him finally be of use to the cause.

With everyone gone, Gifu gives Akaishi some life. Akaishi is grateful for being resurrected, but Gifu says their contract is null and void. Akaishi will no longer oversee humanity’s regression.

At Happy Spa, Mama Igarashi and Vice wait for Ikki and Buu-san to arrive home and update them on Papa Igarashi’s condition. Weekend medical staff are taking care of him. He’s injured, but awake.

Buu-san asks if Daiji has come home yet, but Mama Igarashi quietly shakes her head. Vice wonders if Daiji feels guilty for getting rid of Kagerou. Ikki says it’s up for Daiji to forgive himself, like their father said.

Mama Igarashi says everything will be okay and they will once again fire up the sukiyaki hot pot when they are all together again. Vice notices Ikki seems to not know what his mother is talking about.

In the dining room, Ikki admits he doesn’t remember anything about family sukiyaki dinners even as Vice reminds him about the time they enjoyed such a meal when Daiji was promoted at Fenix.

Vice asks again if Ikki regrets forging a contract with him. Ikki says it’s been hard, but that’s not an excuse to stop fighting. Vice warns that Ikki’s memory loss is accelerating. But Ikki says the two of them are the only ones who can defeat Gifu.

As long as everyone else will still remember him, then that’s enough happiness for him.

Down by the water, Papa Igarashi’s words to Daiji replay in his head. Hiromi approaches him and says that it’s okay to fail. He knows from experience. What’s important is what comes after. Daiji asks what he should do and Hiromi says it’s up to Daiji to decide.

“We’re waiting for you,” Hiromi says.

Later, Daiji remembers Kagerou advising him to be more ruthless and commending him on becoming stronger. Daiji says he cannot turn back now, even for Kagerou’s sake.

Over at Weekend, the Gang talks about Papa Karizaki being in stable condition. George says he still has a lot to say to him, but Sakura advises that he go easy on his father.

Ikki and Vice arrive at Weekend and Papa Karizaki walks in behind them, saying he called them here.

Papa Karizaki tells his team to listen to his “final words” as he knows what his body is telling him. He admits that his life has been full of regrets, including injecting Genta with Gifu cells. Though he was able to save Genta’s life, every tragedy that has happened since all comes back to him.

Papa Karizaki says his biggest regret is transferring his own inner demon into George’s body.

Papa Karizaki says he was ready to die to help stop Vail. But he also feared the idea of never seeing his son ever again. He wanted to leave some sort of connection to George even if he died. George is shocked and storms out of the command center.

Papa Karizaki believes his demon has likely influenced George’s personality development which he recognizes he had no right to do. He asks them all to continue supporting his son.

Papa Karizaki also apologizes for the Weekend luring the downtrodden such as them into dying for the sake for the just cause he forced on everyone. Hikaru says they all understood exactly what they were getting themselves into. Hana says she is grateful he gave her a place to belong.

Just then, alarms sound alerting them to Akaishi popping up downtown. Hikaru wants to avenge his father.

Akaishi regretfully observes the happy people of Tokyo for a second before he blows everything up with his palm. Ikki and friends arrive just as Akaishi is about to choke a man to death.

Akaishi tells them that Gifu has finally lost any hope he had left for humanity and that the countdown to humanity’s destruction has begun.

Gifu suddenly appears in the sky portal and zaps Akaishi, forcing him to transform to a red Giffdemos. Hikaru wants to handle Akaishi himself. The girlfriends want to join him in his quest for revenge.

They all henshin. Ikki and Vice stops Gifu from floating away and everyone battles.

Akaishi admits he has given up his immortality in exchange for another chance as Gifu’s right-hand eyepalm. Hikaru asks the girlfriends to help buy him some time in order to get together his new genome mix and tricks he’s been working on and training for.

Daiji comes walking up. Akaishi calls him his successor.

Hiromi asks if Daiji has an answer to his question from earlier. Daiji says he does and asks them to move out of the way. Hiromi asks if Daiji understood what his father told him.

Daiji says him erasing Kagerou means he can no longer be like his father. But more importantly, he does not want what they’ve fought for so far to go to waste.

Daiji henshins and pushes forward past Hiromi’s bodyguards.

Akaishi completely wrecks the girlfriends, forcing them to dehenshin. Hikaru’s not done with his genome mixing though. He is about to jump in to protect the girls, but Ikki steps in to fight Akaishi and tells Hikaru to finish what he needs to do.

Hikaru calls on his mother and father to give him the strength and he is finally able to get his mix just right. Hikaru delivers a Demons Requiem attack on Akaishi and dedicates every hit to all the people that’s died under Akaishi’s corrupt leadership. The attacks, however, take a toll on Hikaru and he is forced to dehenshin.

Akaishi cannot believe a human could have so much power over him. Ikki commends Hikaru on a job well done.

Daiji turns his attention to Akaishi and knowing what he is about to do, Hiromi tries to stop him. Daiji shoves him aside and approaches Akaishi.

Akaishi reaches his hand out to Daiji. But Daiji points his blaster at Akaishi’s head and shoots him point-blank.

“You can’t save humanity,” Daiji says.

Akaishi acknowledges that and hopes they can meet again. Akaishi is finally dead as he disintegrates.

Daiji turns to Gifu and proposes they form a contract.

Episode Thoughts

Okay, so Daiji’s acting out because he feels guilty about killing Kagerou off? Huh? I mean, it’s not his fault. All the fault is with the writer’s room for their inexplicable story decisions this season. But I digress.

I suppose last week’s episode inadvertently raised my expectations again. But I definitely did not feel the same good vibes after this episode as I did last week.

Again, there’s some good destination points on Revice. But the roads getting to those points are just nonexistent or rough as hell.

So which is it? It’s all about life’s regrets? Daiji’s hopelessness drove him to despair? Or he feels guilty about getting a new toy by way of getting rid of the demon that was terrorizing him, ruining his life and trying to lock him away in the depths of his soul?

When Kagerou “died,” I talked about how the 180 in his personality was kind of nonsense. He went from potential Big Bad to a comic relief character to some kind of caring, father/brother-like figure for Daiji. And ultimately, he became a plot device to give Daiji his new power-up and fans a new S.H. Figuarts to buy.

I can’t buy Daiji suddenly feeling remorse over the loss of Kagerou when the show literally stopped mentioning him once Holy Live debuted.

Whatever it is Daiji feels guilty for, he feels guilty enough to sacrifice himself?

Like, I like the desperation aspect for Daiji. If only to see the wonderful moment his family pulls him from the brink. Because, as I’ve mentioned over and over, Revice is at its best when it’s about the Igarashis. Or at least, about “family.”

Hiding Papa Igarashi away again after trotting him out as a plot device really just highlights how they’ve mishandled the season’s plot and just thrown away much of the great potential and actual good foundation they had already established.

After feeling weirdly hopeful last week, I’m back to how I felt the week before. That is, I would like to see everything go to hell courtesy of Daiji. Just go wacko. It’s the least they can do.

That said, I think I applauded Daiji finishing Akaishi off. I will quote the wonderful Bernice Starnes once again:

I’m supposed to feel sorry for that bitch? I don’t! an old lady in a wheelchair getting interviewed by the news & not feeling sorry for that bitch reaction video meme pic.twitter.com/1RAxWHJpT7

— all reaction videos (@allreactionvidz) September 22, 2020

Good riddance Akaishi. And thank you Daiji.

Elsewhere, Ikki’s memory loss/existence erasure continues to be a bit convoluted. He’s getting erased from photos, but they will still remember him? That doesn’t make sense.

Either he fades away and it’s almost like he doesn’t exist. Or he is slowly losing himself until he disappears, but he would still have existed as a person. So he just basically dies. Does that make sense? It makes sense to me.

What doesn’t make sense is the show’s odd rules for this fading away stuff. And the fact that it only gets throwaway lines every couple of episodes instead of being a major plot point with actual development really is just another perfect example of what’s wrong with the season.

Finally, where is the announcement for a Karizaki Family TTFC miniseries? Come on now.

I would’ve liked this “Papa Karizaki demon affecting George” thing if they had continued with George’s eccentric, sketchy, sus personality instead of turning him into this nice, helpful guy overnight. Giving George actual story and stuff to do including being jealous of the Igarashi’s family dynamic or resenting his father of leaving without knowing the real reason or his obsession with experiments or Kamen Rider toys, etc. That would’ve been such a great story to tell. But oh well.

Overall, it was a meh episode. I enjoyed last week very much. But I’m back to rolling my eyes and sideeyeing and chuckling and being careful not to have WTF or Huh? expressions frozen on my face.

https://www.redbubble.com/people/dryedmangoez/shop