Hello everyone! I know I'm a little late to the party, but now that my aunt's visit is over, I can hopefully get to a point where I can watch these episodes sooner.
Well, I guess I was kind of right. Once Takuya saw the past play out for real, he understood that Yukihiro was not to blame after all. Oh, and that "Feel free to hate me if it makes you feel better" cliche again. Only in Japan do you see that.
Still, I can't help but feel like everything just sort of -happened- in this episode. The conflict was resolved, but not in a super satisfying, emotional way like what they were going for. Yuuto finally realized Sougo was a good guy, but the revelation wasn't some grand reveal, it just happened. Many of the beats of this episode were just very flat, not enough emotion or grandiose. Even Yuuto could see that Grand Zi-O was not the same Oma Zi-O he must have seen at some point, but instead of making that into a great moment between him and Sougo, Yuuto just waves it off with a "Oh, nevermind."
But regardless of the criticisms, I am beginning to really enjoy Grand Zi-O. Summoning Riders and their finishers is one thing, but using their weapons is awesome! I hope that means Zi-O can also summon and use their bikes if he wants, since he did summon the Suika Arms. And we may not have gotten to see regular Zi-O in Den-O Armor, but we still got to see Momo as Den-O before transforming into Climax Form. So that's something!
The hype for the next episode is real. Here's hoping it makes up for the otherwise lack of pacing in this episode.