Kamen Rider Zi-O Episode 4

I clearly don't understand the rules of the show. And you know what occured to me? The Timejackers should be called TimeJAKQ. :P

I thought I understood the rules in episodes 1 and 2.

1. TimeJAKQ goes back in time and makes Another Rider. The Rider ceases to have ever existed.
2. When the Another Rider is temporarily defeated, the Rider exists again, briefly.
3. When the Rider exists again, it can help Zi-O.
4. With the Rider’s help, Zi-O can go back to when the Another Rider appeared and kill it.
5. Zi-O takes the Rider’s power. The Rider ceases to have ever existed. Zi-O gives the Rider a black RideWatch to give him in the future.

…

But that isn’t what happened with Ex-Aid.

Ex-Aid simultaneously never existed and helped Zi-O physically fight Another Ex-Aid… and the timeline with the sick kid didn’t add up to me… if the "genius surgeon" was telling Zi-O and Tsukuyomi that the boy needed to come to him a year earlier for help with his cardiomyopathy, then whether that happened in 2018 or 2016 was irrelevant – unless the dad became Another Ex-Aid before the kid got sick… which he didn’t… because the TimeJAKQ gave him the Another Ex-Aid powers after the kid got sick and was being taken to hospital.

Can someone not just explain the rules to me, but explain how they worked for both the Build and Ex-Aid arcs?

I really like the special effects; I especially liked the nice touch where the "2016" from the back of Another Ex-Aid became the time caption. I'm also digging how Zi-O just... kinda... sucks at doing the Riders' hissatsu attacks. Oh well - he wins in the end.

Where did Zi-O get the thing he attaches the RideWatches to at home?

I adore Sougo. He's... like... the loveliest Rider ever.

I really like the show, but I'm struggling with the rules. Where's Kobayashi Yasuko when you need her? She'd make it all make sense.
 

Kamen Rider Zi-O 4.5

During the final battle with Another Ex-Aid in episode four, I actually wondered how the legend Riders keep track of what they do and don't "know" at each point.

So of course the "point-five" conveniently discusses it.

Having seen some Super Sentai and Kamen Rider scripts before (extras and minor staff actually sell them online!) I'm pretty confident what Emu handed Sougo was a real script. Good gosh, that would be tricky to follow.

I thought it may be easier if they filmed it in chronological order - the 2016 scenes, then 2018 - but that would just pass off the problem to the Zi-O characters.

Hiiro raised a really good point about how just because the timeline changed it doesn't mean his character's personality would, especially his character, for whom Rider powers were really just a tool. It would be slightly different for Emu, but not too much.

I didn't quite get the joke with "A Emu" and "B Emu", and Geiz's response rap was just absurdly silly, but I'm sure it was profoundly funny to those in the know.