Man, was the Hibiki guy that forgettable for you too?
Oyassan... Kuuga's cast got so big I barely remember him doing anything aside from making up a weird new kind of curry now and then, and I might be fanonizing that just to make him seem more important. He was alright.
Sanako always felt like she should have been in things more heavily. Did Shirô forget about her or something?
Riku is the man, but only became remotely memorable later on. I barely remember him in the first half of the show and for all I know, him and Mishima were the same guy. Once Kabuto's writers just threw up their hands and wrote whatever they felt like, and we got the dancing fool that babbles on about Voltaire and rats (or mice or lemmings, depending on what the translator thinks "nezumi" means) he got awesome.
Owner bugged me early on because it seemed like Kobayashi was actually hinting at something darker (his matter-of-fact way of talking about time and throwing people off the train came across that way to me.) At the same time though, we get the pudding-eating goofball routine. Gradually he leaned more towards the latter, maturing into the overtly comedic and always trustworthy nutball with a heart of gold. I'd make some Doctor Who analogy about that, but it's likely been done. Like much of Den-O, I like him, but he's at his best in movie form.
Ultimately I went with Eijiro, who I really liked even if you put aside the Shinigami thing. Admittedly he's locked up in the Photo Studio for most of the show, but whenever he's onscreen he made me laugh. I think it's just the fact that he takes everything in stride. Realism is not something Decade cared much about and it's all the better for it I say.
As for his "secret identity", I'm of two minds on that: it's a hilarious non-sequitur for a celebratory movie, and also the biggest dropped ball of the entire series. Yes, really. With almost anything else, if Toei got a hard enough kick in the ass and the budget, I think they would have gone for it. Old actors? No problem. Competent writing? We can do that. But having the comedy old guy turn out to actually be the Riderverse's equivalent of Faust? That's heavy duty stuff and I was not all that surprised to see them go back on it during the credits, though I was disappointed. That's the kind of twist you play for real. Admittedly, it would have clashed with the mood... on the other hand, who the hell knows what timeline All Riders is part of anymore, so kill him off I say. The comic version did it!
