Kamen Rider Revice E22-23 Review: Comedy Duo

Kamen Rider Revice, Episodes 22-23:

Episode 22: Slam-Bang Kuki Kaidan

After the huge status quo shaking episode 21, we... take a break by having a wacky-hijinks two-parter. These two episodes kind of highlight how everyone's sort of... dealing with their own problem? Kagerou and Vice are acting up in their own ways -- albeit a bit more non-maliciously in Vice's case. Aguilera seems just lost and shoos poor Julio away while she's trying to figure herself out. There's a neat little showcase of how our heroes don't quite forgive George just yet, although they're nice enough to take into account that George is paying respects to his allegedly-deceased dad on the one-year anniversary of his death. We also get some scenes in the middle of the movie of Daiji and the lady-doctor kind of mourning Hiromi's death, which I thought was pretty nice. 

Aguilera ends up meeting Olteca and teaming up with him, and I do like that the show makes it kind of clear that Aguilera drove away Julio to essentially protect him. Julio ends up working in the Happy Spa and hanging out there, because... he just doesn't have anywhere to go? 

But all this ends up being secondary to the two-parter's plot to show up, and... it's typical tokusatsu fare. People from a certain occupation show up as they're being terrorized by monsters, and our occupation-of-the-week is a comedy duo. Very Aruto ja nai to. I miss Kamen Rider Zero-One. 

...I don't really have much to say about the actual sequence of them investigating the comedy duo. There are some expected gags, there is the obligatory red herrings, and both Ikki and Vice are energetic enough to work for the cringe-comedy. They're no Hiden Aruto, of course, but Aruto stands on a different pinnacle of comedy. I guess I just really don't quite care for the guest star comedians to be really invested in the story? 

The action scene has our heroes fight against some retooled Deadman suits -- a hammerhead shark and a regular elephant. After a showcase of some of the other forms, this ends up being the showcase of the Zero-One based Neo Batta form, which... okay, the fact that Vice has halves of Zero-One's mask as gauntlets is really distracting. We even get a Zero-One style final finisher subtitle. We get to see more Vice spasming as Gifu continues his resurrection. And then Ikki gets his next upgrade item, the Rolling Vistamp... from someone that's definitely not George. George himself gets absolutely bamboozled when he sees that item being used later on. 

As we continue our investigation and we get the third-act fight against the Deadmans, Vice conitnues going into convulsions and Ikki uses the Rolling Vistamp... and they transform into a brand-new form... the first form where they kind of combine, leading to "Jack Revice". And... it's a pretty cool form! I always love these evil, 'Hazard Build' esque darker forms, and I do like the sheer brutality as all sorts of ink just splatters all over the place. And, of course, when Jack revice de-henshins, he turns into Vice instead of Ikki.

Episode 23: Vice Takes Over... Betrayal After All?

...we have established that Vice isn't evil at all, though, so despite the brutality that we saw Jack Revice unleash upon the Deadmans, we know that Ikki himself isn't really in danger. It's played up more for gags, though I do like that there's a bit of seriousness with Daiji being concerned about Vice taking over the body. Again, we do get some pretty fun sequences of Ikki being the ghost talking to Vice, but Vice ends up seemingly going into rampage and buggering off. 

As Vice-Ikki buggers off, this all essentially leads to George realizing that there's a third party being in contact with the Igarashis. And, well, the Weekend family ends up coming to Happy Spa in their civilian guises, and essentially leak intel to them. Daiji and Sakura end up fighting Olteca and Aguilera... and I do like the little bits of Aguilera being actually happy that Julio is basically being taken after by Sakura. Olteca-Demons is still basically overpowering everyone, knocking around poor Daiji and Sakura. Kagerou ends up manifesting to protect Sakura from Olteca, or, ostensibly, to protect Sakura's curry-making skills. It's a nice little return of Kamen Rider Evil, while also building up the fact that the demons are essentially getting a bit stronger as Gifu gets more powerful. 

Their little discussion about how Julio is being thrown aside 'on purpose' gets Daiji thinking and realizing that Vice is basically doing the same thing, and Vice is basically protecting Ikki from Fenix. All this 'everything we do is protecting those that is precious to us' ends up being the clue for the rest of the comedy duo plot-of-the-week, because the contract holder turns out to be the lady that's a huge fan of the constantly-failing comedy duo team, wanting to get rid of their competition to protect their reputation and employment. With Vice back to his goofy self, we get him destroying the two deadmans and the contract holder is arrested, but Vice still remains in control of their shared body. 

The episode ends with Sakura confronting Weekend, coming to the right conclusion that they're the ones behind the Rolling Vistamp, and that they are trying to do something. Sakura ends up coming face to face with Weekend's leader... a masked man with a black-and-white Deathstroke mask who introduces himself as "Karizaki". 

Ultimately... not the strongest two-parter, I feel. I really do like the debut of Jack Revice, but I guess a combination of the rather bland, formulaic plot-of-the-week does make this two-parter feel a bit weaker. I also felt like Vice 'going on a rampage' felt a bit forced and episode 23 kind of drags on a bit thanks to that. I did really like Jack Revice going on a rampage at the end of 22, and Kagerou/Evil's unexpected return in 23, but ultimately it's clear that this is just a bit of a breather while we build up both Weekend and the demons going a bit crazy. 

Random Notes:

• The Kuki Kaidan is an actual Japanese stand-up comedy duo. I am completely unaware of who they are, though, and I feel like their presence doesn't really add too much to this two-parter. 
• Episode 22 has a brief showcase of George giving Ikki the "Neo Batta" stamp, which apparently debuted in the Beyond Generations movie. We even get a brief shot of 'future fossil Kari-chan', which I assume will show up in that movie.
• In retrospect, episode 22 showing George talk about his dead dad is kind of a dead giveaway that said dead dad would actually appear in the show, huh? For whatever reason, I thought that Deathstroke-mask Karizaki is a clone or some sort of future time-traveling George Karizaki. 
• The shadowed mannequins where Olteca and Aguilera meet is kind of simple, but pretty creepy. I approve. 
• I don't quite get the gag for the 'rolling' vistamp. There's normally some sort of pun involved in these things. 
• "Hashtag Nice Vice!"