A_Fine_Egg

Rider, you are the Fighter!

Black RX is a notable change of pace from Kamen Rider Black. Black RX is overall more child-friendly and episodic than Black, which can make it a bit less captivating. It does have its moments, including several twists that happen during the last two episodes, but again, these are saved until the very last two episodes. Kotaro continues to be a strong protagonist, but the explanation of Black becoming RX as well as the eventual changes to Bio and Robo Rider feel sudden and strange. One of the interesting aspects of Black RX are its villains - they're not incredibly compelling seeing as how most of the time they just end up twirling their mustaches talking about how "we're definitely gonna get him this time" meanwhile sending a giant friggin RC car to kill Kamen Rider. But their interactions, bickering, and interpersonal relationships can be fun to watch. The suit designs are pretty solid for the most part, I think Robo Rider is probably my favorite. I do like RX's more buglike silhouette compared to Black, I will give it that. But I'm getting off track. Overall, the less focused and personal story of Kamen Rider Black RX compared to Black leaves me a little disappointed.

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The show that stumbles during its walk to surpass god

Kamen Rider Kabuto has a lot of potential when it starts. It has an exciting, suspenseful premise, fun and strong characters, *stellar* suit and monster designs, and a great gimmick in the Cast Off and Clock Up mechanics that lend to some impressive and awesome fights. Unfortunately, at a certain point the director of the series changes and with this change comes a change in tone, direction, plot, and characterization. This leads to the series dropping a large majority of the interesting original concepts of the show for a large majority of its runtime to focus more on sillier concepts until the end of the series when the plot picks up. It actually kind of reminds me of Kamen Rider Black, but for some reason Kabuto's execution of the concept makes me a little more disappointed. I suppose it's because it comes up with a lot of concepts that they end up resolving or executing with far less potency than they could have.

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̶S̶o̶ ZO Good

With its beautifully designed suits, fun to watch practical effects including moments of stop-motion, and foreboding atmosphere, this really feels like it hearkens back to the feeling the Original 13 episodes of classic Kamen Rider Ichigo. I love the tone of this one - the unsettling atmosphere and the insurmountable feeling of the main villain of this special gives it a action-horror feeling all to reminiscent of 70's anime OVAs. There's a single-take action shot in this movie that's done beautifully. The soundtrack is energetic when it needs to be and really exciting. I really wish that this movie had a longer run time, just because I'd like to have had some more opportunities to see the main character's struggle. However, what's here is a good and classic Kamen Rider feeling movie with an added grittiness in a short burst.

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A Kamen Rider Carrying Anno's Spirit

Shin Kamen Rider is a flawed but incredibly fun movie. The info dumps that come with the story structure can hurt the pacing - Hideaki Anno seems to love scenes of characters explaining powers and lore in long-winded explanations, detailing all the little bits of science that go into his concepts. The structure is also very much akin to Shin Ultraman, feeling like an homage to several episodes in one movie rather than being a movie with a single plot line throughout. However, the music is stellar - either one-to-one pulls or fantastic remixes of songs from the original 1971 Rider series. The fight choreography is fun and exciting, the designs of the villains and the redesigns of Ichigo and Nigo are brilliant. The characters have fun chemistry and all work well together. It is an exciting homage to the franchise.

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Kamen Rider 1971 - An Aged Titan

The original Kamen Rider 1971 cannot be understated as an incredibly important pillar of pop culture in Japan and beyond. The series that truly started it all. With its iconic design of the original Kamen Rider (referred to as Ichigo) and the subsequent second Rider (referred to as Nigo), it paved the way for a founding father in the tokusatsu genre. However, it's a difficult beast to talk about, because while charming, it is incredibly flawed. The series starts very strongly, with a lean towards horror. It was always monster-of-the-week, but what made it interesting early on was how it leaned into the fear of everyone involved. Even the main character, Ichigo, has internal fears that are set up early on. However, as the series progresses, in order to stay on the air it had to be changed to be more lighthearted. Unfortunately this drops a lot of the overt story of Kamen Rider 1971 and ends up making it an incredibly repetitive watch, as plot only truly progresses about once every thirty episodes or so, and with it being the longest Kamen Rider series on its own (not including sequel shows like Black & Black RX or Kuuga & Agito) it can sometimes be a gauntlet. Make no mistake, this show is NOT made to be binged AT ALL. And while it feels unfair of me to review a show made 52 years ago as if it was made in the modern era, we have to concede that our perception of these things, including the very way in which it is viewed, has fundamentally changed since its creation. We have to acknowledge the way that these things change, and that includes the franchise itself as it progresses. At this point, while this is the originator of all Kamen Riders, I would in no way say it is a good first show to watch for inquisitive minds interested in the franchise due to its inability to be enjoyably be watched in succession like some others. It is an entertaining watch in short bursts, but mind-numbing when watched too quickly. If you do watch it, try not to binge it to get through it. Take sips, don't chug. Enjoy the fun and crunchy practical effects and the inventive ways they get around having zero budget. The camp can be fun, the designs can be silly, and it can be a series that gets a good laugh or two, even if unintentionally. But if you are tempted to watch it quickly to get to some of the other stuff in the franchise, it will become a difficult watch as the formulaic nature of the series turns your brain into putty.

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An Unfortunate Diagnosis

It is with a heavy heart that I must say I was a little disappointed by Ex-Aid. I had heard it lauded as one of the greats of the franchise alongside favorites such as Build and OOO. Unfortunately, I could not find myself to become as attached to this one. Ex-Aid has some truly terrible costume designs. A large majority, save maybe 1 or 2 suits, look pretty bad. The general gimmick of this season is one that takes a *lot* of watching before you finally get over the hurdle of how dumb the idea of a "Doctor who saves with the power of Gaming" is. The series can feel a tad repetitive at times, especially due to how often suits tend to be reused. The belts themselves have a really odd, clunky, ugly design. Overall, it's just a series that isn't pretty.

Thankfully, partway through the series, the story has ways of exploring themes that could only really be seen in a story like this, with such an odd and honestly dumb concept. It leads to a story that has a majority of its runtime being bogged down by a plot that's difficult to connect to with characters you don't really want to see in action, but has some shining moments of interesting writing and characterization. Overall it's an odd beast to say the least.

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LONG, LONG AGO, SHOWA ERA

Kamen Rider Black is, overall, fantastic. It may be a great introduction to the series as a whole. The suit designs are great, the stunts are exciting, Kotaro's transformations into Black might be one of my favorite Henshins in the series. It also has a great end credits sequence - the single, isolated Kamen Rider Black marching ever forward. It's a great way to summarize the show in general. It carries itself with a distinct tone - it is dark, and at times perilous, but at the same time it still has moments and episodes of more wild, silly concepts for episodes. While it can sort of effect the tone of the overall series, it also stands to show the humanity that Kotaro wants to keep dear. It isn't perfect, because some of these episodes can really mess with the overall tone of the series, but it's not to a grueling extent like the OG 71 series could be at times. It's not my absolute favorite but it is definitely high up on the list.

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Real Clever, No Time to Deliver

This one has a fun concept - a movie with a looming threat that is literally counting down in real time with the movie's duration. I really like that concept! Unfortunately, it means that we don't really get much of a chance to get to know about the villain in any way that isn't uninteresting or rushed. This is also the movie where Zero Two makes its appearance, which I think is a really neat suit. Action is fine, story is a bit rushed but that's to keep it in time with its original concept so I kinda forgive it? Overall with an interesting concept it didn't really have the time to grip me or keep me thinking about it after I was done with it.

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A Tragic Tale

Kamen Rider Saber surprised me. I had heard that this series in particular wasn't one of the well-loved, and for some reason that made me want to watch it more, see if maybe people were overreacting about its quality. At first, if I'm to be totally honest, I was in the same boat. The first dozen or dozen-and-a-half episodes are rough, slowly paced, and feel aimless. The main gimmick of books feels sort of oddly put into the setting, and the Belt Sounds are just... So annoying. But after that point, the story hits a high point, being interesting and compelling and heartfelt. And then it goes back to being just okay with a very meh ending in my opinion. It feels like a roller coaster, easing you into and out of the interesting parts of the story. The suit designs start off as being a bit clunky but turn really good! The fight choreography is overall good as well! I also like the OP, and absolutely ADORE the Ending Song. Also, Touma's got fantastic outfits all throughout the series.

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A Good Entry, Despite Flaws

Geats is a clumsy story, but a fun one. With a great OP and an interesting concept, relating to winning a sort of Death Game to get a wish, it ends up being a very interesting form of Kamen Rider as they combat each other for the sake of winning. However, it doesn't stick with this concept the whole way through the story and ends up changing to focus less on the aspect of a battle royale and more like a standard Kamen Rider story. This ended up disappointing me somewhat. Characters have decent chemistry, though at times it can be somewhat flat and businesslike for a large majority of the series. Suit designs have great potential to be interesting as it begins with the concept of item pickups akin to a video game, but again it ends up being tossed aside for the sake of consistent, merchandise-worthy forms. Not bad forms, but considering what the series started out as, it ended up disappointing me a bit. Fight choreography goes really hard sometimes, especially when they use the show's gimmicks to set up specific opportunities that would not have been available in other stories. Overall, a story with a lot of potential that does unfortunately fumble the bag.

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Imperfect Allegory Against An Imperfect World

Kamen Rider Black Sun is a work I highly admire, despite the issues it has. The story is intense and gritty, and it's very admirable of them to go so hard into the ideas of prejudice, classism, racism, and social justice. It feels like an important story to tell. However, at times it can get a bit lost in the weeds when it comes to its storytelling, with frequent timeskips and issues with pacing in its 10 episode run. There's some reveals later on that can lead to the story feeling confused, but still holding the spirit of wanting to fight against social injustice, which is good. The suit designs tend towards the positive - most of them look very cool, with some looking kind of goofy and pulling me out of the general dark feeling the series tended towards. The action, while sparse, is very impressive, and the gore and blood throughout is shocking and a fresh change from the mainline series only showing blood via makeup for the most part. The main theme can get a bit tiring to hear repeatedly, but it's a cool song and it still does feel satisfying to hear during certain moments. This is one of the series that feels least like it's trying to sell me a toy, that's for sure. It feels mature, but a bit uncoordinated.

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Frustrating Series With Amazing Designs

Kamen Rider Agito is a very hard watch. It sets itself up well enough, with mystery and intrigue surrounding it, a STELLAR opening song, and overall several very well-designed suits for the main Riders. However, what ends up happening is that the series meanders for a majority of its run time. It feels like very few of the characters in the series have actual agency - they are moreso waiting for any big events to happen and then reacting to them. In the case of the main character he feels so detached that he barely seems to do anything related to the main mystery for a large portion of the story and is essentially just pulled towards every fight. Its predecessor Kuuga also has a mystery, but what makes it compelling in Kuuga is the main characters actively researching the mystery at hand and actively going to defeat the monsters of their own accord. Agito makes these characters do so seemingly out of instinct instead, being far more passive characters, whose interpersonal drama is overall pretty bland and uninteresting for a large majority of the run time. Not to mention only one of the three main characters really seem to do any research into the main mystery and their progress is quite slow and brooding. The show drags its feet quite often. It's a very mixed bag.

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Zero One By Itself Doesn't Actually Mean Anything In Binary

Kamen Rider Zero One is charming. I really like the acting, and the suit designs tend to be consistent enough for me to not have any issues with any of them in particular. However, I have quite a few issues with its story. It is pretty strangely paced, and on top of that the morals seem to be mixed in what they're actually trying to tell you - unlike a lot of KR shows I've watched that are very explicit in their message, Zero One says one thing while showing another. It shows you that you should "follow your dreams" and "do what you want", but when someone wants something that isn't explicitly their core function it is seen as wrong. Aruto wants to be a comedian, but always fails. All of the Humagears that reach sentience want to pursue their dreams, but their dreams are only in relation to continuing to do what they have always done. It feels contradictory to itself throughout its entirety. The main characters for the most part have good chemistry, though, and it made me so happy to see a nonbinary character have a main role later in the series. The action is pretty good, though.

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