Sakuya Tachibana

"It's because of this rushed Rider System, that my body...is falling apart!"

- Tachibana's infamous quote from the series

Sakuya Tachibana (橘 朔也) is Kamen Rider Garren (仮面ライダーギャレン), the second Rider to appear in the Kamen Rider Blade series. Sakuya was the second wearer chosen by the BOARD organization to use the very first Rider System they created, transforming him into Kamen Rider Garren. The first was his senior, Kiryu.

Personality
Sakuya Tachibana is at heart, a kind and well-meaning person. Though somewhat serious and stern at times, if slightly awkward, Tachibana is shown to be truly determined in helping those in need. When BOARD had suddenly collapsed though, along with being tasked to use a prototype Rider System, Tachibana became riddled with doubt and fear, convinced that the Garren Buckle was causing his body to slowly break down. This had caused him to become somewhat bitter and cynical. Tachibana did however continue to fight against the Undeads whenever he could, feeling compelled to protect the innocent.

Eventually though, upon learning about the true cause of his body's slow breakdown, Tachibana tried to quit being a Kamen Rider all together. When realizing this cannot be done, he then resorted to using a special drug to calm his fears. This resulted in Tachibana becoming highly aggressive and addicted to the drug. When Sayoko Fukasawa (Tachibana's girlfriend) died at the hands of the Peacock Undead though, Tachibana realized that he had been blinded by his insecurities. Filled with remorse, Tachibana faced his fears head on, defeating the Peacock Undead and avenging Sayoko.

Though having conquered his addiction and previous fears by then, Tachibana was still shaken by Sayoko's death and felt unworthy to be a Kamen Rider. However, when his senior Kiryu went berserk as Kamen Rider Leangle, Tachibana decided to use the Garren Buckle once more to stop him. Kiryu, when fatally wounded by brainwashed Undeads, convinced Tachibana in his dying breath to continue protecting others as Kamen Rider Garren.

Later, as Tachibana continues to fight alongside Kazuma Kenzaki/Kamen Rider Blade, Hajime Aikawa/Kamen Rider Chalice, and Mutsuki Kamijo/Kamen Rider Leangle, he shows a more concerned, nice and friendly disposition, qualities that he had always had within himself but were initially suppressed. His love towards his friends and people in general become more pronounced, as his growing courage.

In the novel Kamen Rider Blade: Twilight, Tachibana is revealed to have become the head of BOARD, now using the company's resources to help others. According to the author of the novel, after the events of Kamen Rider Blade, Tachibana became determined to help Kenzaki regain his mortalty, going far as voluntarily experimenting on his own body, which turned him into a psuedo Undead. Depite decades having passed, Tachibana is still concerned about his friend, continuing his experiments with Undead D.N.A and keeping tabs on Kenzaki whenever possible.

Biography
Tachibana was originally a researcher of the Humanity Foundation who graduated from the Sazahaibu University and was selected to be the user of Rider System 01 after Go Kiryu was found to be incompatible with the system. By the start of the series, Sakuya begins to suffer a form of cellular breakdown with only sealing the Undead slowing down the process. That, combined with his feelings towards Kazuma being his backup when he can't manage it, Sakuya blames Karasuma for his condition. When he attempted in vain to seal the Locust Undead, Sakuya is forced to abduct Karasuma just prior to the Undead attacking BOARD. Though he intended to get the answers he needs, Karasuma was in a coma and put on life support with Sakuya safeguarding him until Hirose finds him. Though he leaves Karasuma in her care, it was revealed that the "Karasuma" he safeguarded was only a decoy. After his doctor and dear friend Sayoko Fukasawa relays Karasuma's message, that his subconscious fear is causing the breakdown, Sakuya encounters Isaka, the Peacock Undead, who personally attempts to retrieve him for his Leangle project. After escaping Isaka, Kotaro manages to talk Sakuya to not to let his fear control him though Sakuya denies that. He arrives to save Blade from the Trilobite Undead, however Garren's fusion rate goes down during his fight with the Undead. After being saved, Sakuya begs Karasuma for a means to be free of his fear, but Karasuma say he can't.

Though Sakuya attempts to resume a normal life by dating Sayoko, the Zebra Undead forces him to reveal himself as a Rider in front of Sayoko before vainly fighting the Undead before Blade arrives to aid him. In spite of Sayoko asking him to leave with her, Sakuya turns her down. While at BOARD's original location, Sakuya vainly battles the Peacock Undead, who defeats Garren and takes him with the intent to have Sakuya work for him by removing him of his fears with exposure to Schuld Kestner seaweed, an extinct plant that intensifies the aggressive nature of the subject. Though he became more aggressive and worked under Isaka for more of the seaweed, Sakuya was unaware of the eventual damage it would do to his nervous system. Though Sayoko warned him in vain, Sakuya shrugged it off until he learned that Isaka had murdered Sayoko for meddling in his affairs, defeating the Peacock Undead and sealed him. Later, as his way of repenting for being manipulated by an Undead, Sakuya takes Mutsuki under his wing.

During the final few episodes, Kamen Rider Garren came face to face with the Category King of Diamonds and battled it out with him. The Undead told him that if he was sealed, Joker would be declared winner and that all of humanity would suffer because of his choice. Garren discarded this and answered, "I will believe in my friends." The battle ended with Garren nowhere to be found and the King Undead sealed leaving the Joker as the winner however, it would cause an unintentional death of billion species due to Joker's uncontrollable Undead nature. He is found upon the arrival of the Chief telling Kazuma that he was saved because of him. He arrived and assisted an unarmed Blade King Form, finished off the remaining Black Roach Undeads with the King Rouzer, and wished him good luck against Hajime. Due to his Rider system still being broken, Sakuya fought multiple Black Roach Undeads alone as a normal person while waiting for Kazuma to stop Hajime's suffering. After all Black Roach Undeads suddenly disappear, he and Mutsuki went to the forest where Kazuma and Hajime fought, only to find Hajime alone who is trying to follow Kazuma but lost track of him. They soon realized that Kazuma has become an Undead and disappeared in order to prevent himself from fighting Hajime in person again. After Kazuma's disappearance, Sakuya sees a photo of Kazuma together with him and remembered their good times, prior to Kazuma becoming an Undead.

Missing Ace
In the alternate final episode, Kazuma Kenzaki seals Hajime Aikawa, he and Chief Karasuma decided to put away all the sealed Undeads after they discover all Category King cards combine into a Vanity Card as the second Joker existed. As they were transporting the sealed Undeads away, they got ambushed by the Albino Joker. Just as Chief Karasuma tries to escape with the cards, the Albino Joker kills him as he unseals some of the Undeads. Four years later, he hires Junichi Shimura, along with Natsumi Miwa and Shin Magaki to reseal the Undeads as he can't rehire Kazuma and Mutsuki due to the fact that some of the unsealed Undeads are Category Ace of Spades and Category Ace of Clubs. Sakuya later fights the Spider Undead and reseals it as Mutsuki regains the ability to transform into Kamen Rider Leangle. Later, Sakuya orders everyone to work together to reseals all the Undeads much to Natsumi's and Shin's chagrin.

Later, Mutsuki tells Sakuya that he suspects something strange about Junichi as he communicates with the Giraffa Undead with a strange language. But he declines it as Sakuya tells Mutsuki that Junichi learned to speak foreign languages from abroad. Later, he is shocked to discover that both Natsumi and Shin were killed by the Albino Joker as he realizes that the Joker is among all of the riders. When Amane is being targeted by the AlbiRoaches, Sakuya brought her to safety as he reveals that her father opened the Relief's Stone Door moments before he died. Due to this, she was targeted by the Albino Joker as her dad's replacement for the Relief's sacrificial lamb in order to gain it's power. Kotaro reveals to everyone that Junichi himself is the Albino Joker as both of his victims hold the cards 4 and Jack (both of which are a pun of his name (i.e. "Jack" and "Shi")). After Albino Joker kidnaps Amane and traps her into the vanity card, Sakuya and the others fight Albino Joker in Jashin-14 form. Sometime after Jashin-14's defeat, he and the others celebrates Amane's birthday at the Jacaranda Cafe.

Day After Tomorrow
It has been a year since Kazuma Kenzaki transformed into Navy Joker and everyone is throwing a graduation party for Mutsuki and Nozomi. It was supposedly to celebrate them for getting into university but Mutsuki didn’t. All of all sudden, Blade bursts in from the front door and attacks Hajime.

Everyone is confused but then Garren shows up in the window and starts firing at Blade. He explains that he and Chief Karasuma were conducting on a research on how to turn Kenzaki and Hajime into humans by unsealing the Chameleon Undead, an Undead with similar powers to the Joker allowing it to copy the form and ability of anything it sees, and tries to copy this ability to the Jokers. However, it escaped and transforms into an imitation of Kamen Rider Blade by using the the BOARD data that he had stolen while chasing after Hajime due to his nature of being a Battle Fight competitor.

Tachibana hands over Hajime and Mutsuki’s cards and the Leangle Rouzer as they fight the fake Blade, but it transforms into Jack Form. Mutsuki remains useless as none of his powers grants him the ability to fly.

Tachibana warns Hajime as the Chameleon Undead has all of the BOARD data making it easy for him to fight. The Chameleon Undead transforms into King Form and finishes off the Riders. As the Rider about to finish Leangle, Joker steps in and takes the blow. At first he thinks that it was Hajime/Chalice but it has no slash mark and he was lying after sustaining the damage on its chest. Tachibana quickly tosses the Joker the Blay Buckle, Rouze Absorber and the Suit of Spades Rouze Cards in understanding. After the Chameleon Undead has been defeated and sealed, all of Blade's items were left neatly on the floor. Nozomi arrives late for the party, and tells Mutsuki that a letter arrived written that he did manage to get into university after all.

Decade
to be added

OOO, Den-O, All Riders: Let's Go Kamen Riders
Sakuya Tachibana returned as Kamen Rider Garren, making a brief cameo appearance in the film, teaming up with Hajime Aikawa and Mutsuki Kamijou, as well as the rest of the Kamen Riders.

As Garren, Tachibana was also part of a group of reinforcement riders led by Akira Date/Kamen Rider Birth to aid the primary riders in defeating the Rock Great Leader. All the Kamen Riders got on their bikes and performed the All Rider Break attack which destroyed the Great Leader.

Sakuya was found to be cruelly ambushed by Hajime as Chalice. After being saved by Kyoichiro, he revealed that his cover to attack Shocker alongside Kenzaki was blown and was being attacked so they would become a full fledged Shocker Riders. Asking for Kyoichiro for help, he alongside Go and Yuto moved to save Kazuma. But it was all a ruse to capture Go and Yuto instead as Sakuya, and Kazuma had been brainwashed from the start.

But later, he aided the Riders against Shocker after they despised how Shocker acts and also freed from the remains of Shocker's brainwashing inside them after Takeshi Hongo alongside Hayato Ichimonji broke free from Rider Robo.

Surviving the onslaught of the History Modifying Machine, Garren fought and destroyed Shocker's Marshal Machine with the Burning Smash shortly before the Rider Robo was destroyed along with the machine by. Among the remaining Riders who witnessed the farewell of Kyoichiro Kuroi as the perversion of history was reversed, Garren's place in history was restored.

Kamen Rider Blade (video game)
Kamen Rider Garren, with Blade, Chalice, and Leangle, is playable in the Kamen Rider Blade video game.

Kamen Rider Battle Ganbaride
Kamen Rider Garren appears as a playable character in this video game Kamen Rider Battle Ganbaride.

Kamen Rider: Battride War
Kamen Rider Garren appears as a Second Rider in the video game Kamen Rider: Battride War. In the level Double Jokers, which took place during the final episode, Sakuya somehow knows Blade's plan of turning himself into Joker in order to put the Battle Fight and stops Blade worrying of losing his friend, only to be defeated.

Kamen Rider: Battride War II
Kamen Rider Garren appears as a Second Rider in the video game Kamen Rider: Battride War II.

Kamen Rider: Battride War Genesis
Kamen Rider Garren made his playable debut in the video game Kamen Rider: Battride War Genesis. His models has been upgraded with Rouze Absorber to match the appearance of his only TV series/movie's final form in this game. Garren is mostly suitable as a long-range character. Like Blade, Garren uses a Rouze Card points via attacks, but unlike Blade is that Garren's boost-up (Bullet Armadillo) is much safer without having this effect removed after Garren riding his bike, and Garren's Jack Form is his only for final form as of Garren's last TV series appearance. Yet, Garren's Jack Form is lack of Rouze Card points, as Garren has less Rouze Card based attacks.

Kamen Rider Buttobasoul
Kamen Rider Garren is a playable character in Kamen Rider Buttobasoul.

Equipment

 * Garren Buckle: Garren's transformation device
 * Rouze Absorber: Used to access Jack Form
 * Rouze Cards: Allow Garren to perform special attacks
 * Garren Rouzer: Garren's personal weapon
 * Red Rhombus: Garren's Rider Machine

Portrayal
Sakuya Tachibana is portrayed by Kousei (Hironari) Amano (天野 浩成). Amano later portrayed Kouhei Hayami/Libra Zodiarts in Kamen Rider Fourze. As Kamen Rider Garren, his suit actor was Yoshifumi Oshikawa (押川 善文).

Memes

 * The scene in the first episode wherein Garren spied Blade fighting Locust Undead from afar was made into various comedic situation where fans would place either Garren in other images peaking another character or parodying it in somewhere else. This scene is memorable as "Why are you just watching!!" (なぜ見てるんです!!), which was the line delivered by Blade before he enacted the infamous Ondul meme.
 * As mentioned above, the quote from episode 3 when Tachibana proclaims how the Rider System damaged his body has become a viral meme in the Japanese fandom, due to the way he delivered the line: "My body is falling apart!" (俺の体はボロボロだ!). This line was also self-referenced in one of the ending bumpers for the  programming block.
 * Tachibana is perhaps most infamously known for the final scene of episode 7, where the camera zooms in onto him screaming for his life as the Trilobite Undead approaches him.
 * In episode 15, just before delivering the Burning Divide attack towards the Peacock Undead, Garren shouts out the name of his girlfriend, who was killed by said Undead. This scene has been parodied within the Japanese fandom.
 * There is a running joke among Japanese fans where he is associated with a type of food known as Kara Miso (辛味噌), due to the last line of his insert song, Rebirth, has the chorus (Gotta be strong) sounding similar to the name of said food.