Series Review: Kamen Rider Zi-O

Kamen Rider Zi-O [2018-2019]

"Rider Time! Kamen Rider Zi-O!"

The closing chapter to the Heisei era is... an interesting one. While arguably Zero-One and Saber don't really do enough to deviate itself from the pack, no one can deny just how bizarrely weird Zi-O as a show is. While a fanfiction-esque storyline of "let's go through all the different worlds" have been done before by Decade, this time around the show really tries to commit to the franchise's history of some hundred-plus Kamen Riders, by basically making its twentieth Heisei show "Decade II, Electric Boogaloo."

Zi-O also has a special place in my heart for being the first Rider show that I watched weekly, and... and hoo boy, what an interesting one for me to start off, huh? Especially since in 2018, I haven't even watched some of the shows they are homaging, making it a bit of a bizarre run where sometimes it's a Zi-O two-parter that got me to check out the entire series in a month. I know that it's how I ended up watching Ex-Aid, how I finally watched Blade, and a good reason why I ended up watching Hibiki at all. 

And... and Zi-O is an utterly bizarre show, in that every two-parter is a dedicated attempt at being a homage to a different part of the Heisei era. The difference is that... they actually got a returning actor nearly every arc. It's just that it takes a while for the showmakers to really decide what they were going to do, and it ends up being a bizarre clusterfuck as the showrunners try to fit in the cameo roles based on previous actors' returning schedule, as well as an attempt at a cohesive narrative as our titular Zi-O (lit. Time King) is basically subjected to a reverse-Terminator plot. 

Because, see, our main character, Tokiwa Sougo, is just a bit of a loony high-school boy whose main goal in life is the vague dream of 'being a king'. And then suddenly, monsters show up in his life, two time-travelers (Myokoin Geiz and Tsukuyomi) show up screaming how he'll grow up to be the demon king/overlord of the future, Ohma Zi-O... and there's this glorious narrator man with an impeccable fashion sense, Woz, who goes around seemingly willing to shape history and basically be the biggest hype-man for his great overlord, rejoicing and bringing out transformation trinkets. 

The show, obviously, plays very loose with continuity, and even the supplementary specials have a tongue-in-cheek way of saying that 'just use time travel as an excuse for all the inconsistencies', but the show had an absolutely rough start. There was an attempt of making some sort of ironic power where Sougo's Zi-O power-ups basically comes from him 'taking' the powers of previous main characters, which means that for a good amount of time, a lot of the returning actors (Build, Ex-Aid, Faiz, OOO) just stood around in their civilian forms being confused thanks to all the timey-wimey nonsense, making their cameos feel forced for most and a slap to the face for some. Not to mention that two of the earliest two-parters very terribly shoved their concepts together and ended up in episodes that didn't make any sense at all (episodes 5-6, the Faiz/Fourze one; and epsiodes 9-10, the Genm/OOO one). The fact that the show itself is utterly rigid to its no-fun rule of "no riders can transform if their powers are stolen by Zi-O or by the bad guys" yet played so loose with continuity is also something that I'm glad that the show itself sort of ignored and handwaved aside. 

The show, however, surprisingly ends up picking up a lot of its slack when it starts to actually do its own thing. There is a neat stretch of episodes from around the 13's or so when the main focus isn't a barrage of poorly-implemented cameos, but rather an actual story as Sougo grapples with the potential that he grows up into a demon king. The show itself still features a traditional two-parter sequence, but they start fighting fake 'future riders' like Shinobi, Kikai and Quiz... which, in a fabulously meta way, all feature other Tokusatsu alumni, all the while the plot's mainly driven by Sougo, Woz and the utterly unexpected way they integrated Tsukasa "Decade" Kadoya into the show. The show still bills him as a special guest star, but for all intents and purposes Decade (and later Diend) basically serves as an asshole mentor and someone trying to save the world, actually making this an absolutely fantastic Decade follow-up in a way. I genuinely cheered in some of the times that Tsukasa makes a surprise appearance in a plot or two.

Honestly, I do think that Decade's inclusion -- both the character and his actor, the ever-amazing Masahiro Inoue -- ends up being the lynchpin that makes this show works at all. Decade being a character that's already famous in the fandom for being a dimension-hopping dude that's always a bit dickish and enigmatic helps to gel the show together, and being a pre-established former main character ends up making his inclusion in the show feel so natural. Kudos for Inoue for sticking around for so much of the show, too. 

The writing for the characters got a bit better, too. Tsukuyomi is criminally underused for a good chunk of the show, but she certainly has a whole larger presence than some of the other 'main' female characters in these shows. Sougo goes from earnest to angsty to earnest again, and while the show's writing certainly isn't consistent, there were a lot of great specific moments when they actually really portray him feeling the burden of destiny well. Geiz and Woz are probably the two most popular characters from the show and I can see why... Geiz is basically a character we've seen a dozen times over in the franchise, a bit of an angry jackass who has good reason to be angry at the main character, but ultimately warms up to him. And Woz? Woz is the best character in the show, being just the right amount of over-the-top hammy for this sort of plotline and his constant iwae and monologuing is absolutely bombastic and fits with the go-big-or-go-home attitude of the show. Again, while the show's early episodes are a bit rough, the four primary members of the main cast (five with Decade) really end up working very well, and by the time the show finally takes a breather from cameos to do more original stories, they really end up feeling like their own people. Sure, this does mean that the power-ups like Geiz Revive, Zi-O II or Zi-O Trinity feel like they're not quite as interesting as 'oh, there's the Decade form!' the special effects crew do truly end up making the debuts of these new forms to be pretty great. Special highlights go to the first appearances of Zi-O II, Geiz Revive, Ohma Zi-O... and, of course, who can forget Grand Zi-O with its five-minute jingle as it summons all 20 Heisei riders? 

The villains of the show are... pretty underwhelming. The 'Time Jackers' mostly just hang out and be enigmatic, and while there were signs of promise that the two younger Wuhl and Ora were going to have something to them, they were sort of just there, and main villain Swartz ends up kind of feeling generic and any depth he has ends up being shoehorned via a rather odd backstory. 

That said, though, the Another Riders of the show? The show sadly probably went over-budget with random main character forms with Build last season, so not every single Heisei rider got an 'armor form' for Zi-O (the toys and video games do show what all these forms look like, though) and it's a bit of a shame that especially in the second half, the collectible ride-watches aren't even used to make finishers or new forms anymore. But the villains! The villains are called 'Another Riders', and I could do a whole article about them dissecting just how much thought are put into them beyond just being distorted versions of the main 20 Heisei riders. The Another Riders are, honestly, probably my favourite Rider show enemies ever. The sheer amount of creativity that went into designing the suits (both Another Riders and the Future Riders), especially when eagle-eyed fans realize that some of them are retooled versions of older suits, is a pretty great one. 

The second half of the show, on the other hand... is wildly praised for good reason. After taking some time to really hammer home our main cast's characterizations, all the tributes from episode 30 onwards ends up being actually far, far more respectful to their predecessor shows, and even makes use of specific moments of characterization to build up the Zi-O's cast, as opposed to the vague "you're heroic, do some heroic things" of the first dozen or so episodes. Also, it's a small thing, but the simple fact that the returning riders are allowed to transform, with their own themes? This is what the inner fanboys within all of us want, to see the new rider on the block transform into their Zi-O Trinity form right as Tsugami Shouichi walks up with the Agito fight theme blaring as he transforms into Agito Trinity, all while they are fighting against an army of Another Agitos. Or to have the Hopper Hell Bros face off against our main cast, all the while Kagami Arata finally gets recognized by the Kabuto Zecter to finally become Kamen Rider Kabuto? The Blade, Agito, Hibiki and Kabuto episodes are noted in many discussions to be the highlight of the show's homages, and I definitely have to agree. Den-O, already itself a show that is easily adapted into spinoffs and crossovers, has crossovers both in the show and one of the movies, and the Imagins' antics are incorporated well. 

Not to mention that all of the future-riders episodes were an absolute delight, and even the show's recurring villain in "Another Zi-O" is a pretty simple but fun little addition. Near the end, we even get an utterly unexpected return in OOO's own future rider, Kamen Rider Aqua, who very easily shoots up into becoming one of my favourite supporting characters in the show. Again, another pretty fun sequence was a plotline near the end when the villain just plucks specifically 'movie villains from timelines where they won', allowing for some delightful random cameos from characters like Kamen Rider Eternal. Or when Zi-O himself gains the ability to summon any random Rider from any random part of history, getting us hilarious moments of him pulling out Pine Arms Gaim alongside a bunch of other final forms. 

It's just that... well, with such a heavy concept that's probably taxing in the show's actor management process, some things end up faltering. Tsukuyomi and the Time Jackers, while certainly well-acted, end up feeling very static throughout the show and by the time we get the rushed backstory behind them, it feels like they could've done more. 

And let's not even mention the surprisingly large amount of cameos even in the specials of the show! The first movie, "Heisei Generations FOREVER", is easily my biggest guilty pleasure of any of these Kamen Rider movies, with a lot of great action sequences and a surprise cameo from Takeru "Den-O" Satoh. The solo movie, "Zi-O: Over Quartzer", has a bit of a questionable first part, but the villains in this one are fun. The web-movies "Geiz Majesty" and the four-part "Rider Time: Ryuki" all feature a lot of surprising returning actors and characters, although those two don't really add a whole ton to the show as a whole.

Overall, Zi-O ends up being a show that's incomprehensible without seeing at least some of the previous shows. But even then... the acting of the main cast ends up surprisingly well done as it carries the show, and the remarkable improvement of quality in the second half of the show ends up making this an earnest love letter to all the Rider shows of the past. Well, most of them. (Fourze, Kuuga and Double feel pretty under-represented; and I'd argue that OOO, Kiva and Faiz got the short end of the stick, too) It's a show that literally requires you to shut your brain down a bit and just enjoy the random cameos and the utterly glorious flashy effects. It's a show that perhaps struggles a bit too much with consistency and its large-scale story... but as a final celebration of the Heisei era, and as an unapologetic love later to the fans? Zi-O ends up working as an enjoyable show where it counts. Perhaps not the best show out there, but in terms of scale as a show featuring a record number of returning actors? It certainly ranks pretty highly as one of the most entertaining ones.