Who is the Wheelchair guy in Alice in Borderland Season 3? Details of the character explored 

Ryuji Matsuyama is one of the new faces who shape the story in Alice in Borderland Season 3, and his arrival changes how the season opens and what the first few episodes focus on. The show brings him in as a scholar who has studied near-death reports and dreams tied to the Shibuya meteorite event.

Since the season premiere on September 25, many viewers have been asking the question of 'who is the wheelchair guy in Alice in Borderland Season 3?'

Ryuji Matsuyama, played by actor Kento Kaku, is shown as an assistant professor working on reports of shared dreams and experimental near-death incidents; that work links directly to the season’s main mystery about why people keep waking with the same memory images.

Early scenes make clear he is not a passive observer; his past and the choices he has made push him into the same life-or-death space the main cast knows well.

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Ryuji Matsuyama’s background and why he matters

Ryuji is introduced as an assistant professor in psychopathology at a university, where he studies survivors who claim to have dreamt the same deadly games. The character has a history that includes a failed experiment involving a student and a later car crash that left him using a wheelchair. Those details are shown through flashbacks and dialogue, and they shape how other characters of Alice in Borderland Season 3 see him, sometimes with suspicion, sometimes with sympathy.

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How did Ryuji enter the Borderland and his first game?

Alice in Borderland Season 3 opens by placing Ryuji in a tense setup. He takes part, unwillingly or by design, in an early Borderland challenge (the premiere frames this as a card-style game). That first game pushes him into direct contact with players and figures who already know the rules, including Banda.

His win or survival in that opening test serves two purposes on screen. It proves he can play under pressure, and it brings him into the orbit of Arisu and Usagi.

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Key interactions and scenes that define his arc in Alice in Borderland Season 3

On several occasions, the show pairs Ryuji with Usagi and other returning characters in scenes that test trust and motive. In one scene noted by reviewers, a phone call or meeting pulls Usagi into Ryuji’s story, then sends Arisu back into the Borderland to follow her.

Those moments give Ryuji conversations that reveal his motives. He is driven by a need to explain why people share the same visions, and by a personal guilt tied to his past experiments. These exchanges are where the scripts turn his academic notes into visible stakes.

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What does Ryuji add to Alice in Borderland Season 3’s themes?

Ryuji’s presence shifts the season from pure survival puzzles to questions about memory, guilt, and choice. As written, he is both a catalyst, the scholar whose work reopens the old wound and a participant who must face the same tests as those he once studied from afar.

Calling him simply “the wheelchair guy” misses that the show uses his backstory to connect the Borderlands games to real-world experiments and to give Arisu and Usagi a new emotional center to act around.

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So who is the Wheelchair guy in Alice in Borderland Season 3? The answer to this question unfolds across the first few episodes. He is a researcher with a troubled past who steps into the games he studied.

The role played by Kento Kaku ties the season’s mystery threads together and gives the premiere a clear, plot-driven reason to bring familiar characters back into danger. For viewers tracking motives and who benefits from each action, Ryuji’s scenes are some of the most revealing in early episodes.