#so many toku actors being in this series makes sense this is like the sentai of bl dramas

[c1nto]

🕺 zettai bl！🕺

[buildridernews]

[Review] Kamen Rider Build - Episodes 21-24

It’s the middle of the month, so it must be time for me to finally be caught up on last month’s Build episodes! My excuse this time is that I’ve been watching Sentai. I mean hey, it’s good to give all toku some attention. 

This is really neither here nor there, but I gotta say, I am impressed that Blood Stalk still has a voice actor and a proper actor as separate entities. With Wizard it was clearly a case of "Okay, we revealed his true identity, let's ditch the voice actor" but they are dedicated to keeping this guy around. I appreciate that for some reason.

Also highly unrelated to everything in this review... did... did Sawa just establish, 23 episodes in, that there’s a fictitious currency in this show? Like, it’s referred to as a “Doruku” which could be Dork, or Dolk, or Dollark as Over-Time chose to call it. Sure! That falls nicely into my headcanon that Build takes place in the future. 

So, without making jokes, I’ve gotta really start us off with the thing that’s most important in the first half of this month: The Hazard Trigger, and the surprising amount of forms used with it. 

RabbitTank Hazard Form receives an eerie introduction that’s beautifully shot, and not only does he start off punching everyone in sight, but he also does something that I did not expect to be such a major deal: He kills off the Stag Hard Smash; Aoba. 

I’m most certainly going to be wrong because I’m blanking on it, but in all the shows where humans turn into monsters, they never actually die, do they? At least not to the hero. Or if they do, they probably stopped being human along the way. Like in Gaim, for example. Of course I’m not gonna forget Gaim. 

But Gaim involved humans who have been mutated into something inhuman. Here, Sento very clearly killed someone who was still a living, breathing human with thoughts, ambitions, and fears. After so much dedication towards protecting humanity and undoing the deaths caused by his former Katsuragi self, blood was on his hands that he couldn’t wash away. 

This episode really puts an emphasis on that weight as Sento spends much of it in a slump, even when the government has decided to settle things by having a one-on-one battle with Grease VS one of the Riders of Touto. Sento can’t bare to take part because of what he’s done. 

I think the most stunning scene in this episode is when he’s giving his respects to Aoba and is being so haunted by the memory of the incident that he collapses and seems close to vomiting - kudos to the actor. It’s a great and unsettling episode, especially because it’s almost entirely devoid of music. 

This also features a nice contrast as Kazumi shows how he’s coping. Unlike Sento, he’s very collected and tells him how Aoba was knowingly a tool for war - he died knowing the risks. However, since Aoba was his friend, he promises to kick his ass for Aoba once their duel begins. 

Despite the state he’s in, Sento is the one who has to do it for Touto. And I’ve gotta lighten up this review now that the heavier stuff is behind us. 

In order to prepare him for the fight, Soichi dumps a bunch of Fullbottles into Sento’s inventory, among them being the RoseCopter Form pair! This form is not particularly interesting on its own, but it is within the context of what it was originally supposed to be. 

GoldScorpion Form was meant to be released instead according to toy catalog listings, but just before this episode aired, Bandai decided to swap this in. According to CS Toys, Bandai simply said they were going in a different direction. Gonna be honest, they probably found RoseCopter a lot more... easy to come up with a combat style for. RoseCopter does what you expect, it’s got vine whipping and a rotor weapon. I don’t know what you’d do with gold bars. That’s really my only theory. 

In any case, I’m glad Stalk made reference to how many reds and greens Build swapped through. Oh and I guess TurtleWatch Form is technically a show form now, if you wanna get into those semantics. It’s not. It’s a game form. Anyway~ 

What’s interesting about this first episode is that it ends with the implication that some time has passed before the big duel. This is where the YouTube spinoff comes into play, and I am actually gonna talk about that since both parts are out! If you missed it, they were subbed by Genm Corp, who I understand are fine if you can’t wait for a more accurate translation, and I doubt anyone else is gonna sub these. 

So the YouTube spinoffs for Kamen Rider have so far been pretty skippable. Ghost tried making them tie into the show... in a way that still doesn’t make sense even in context, and Ex-Aid’s is pretty fun but also very skippable. This time, they used it to tell some semblance of a story. 

In these episodes, Sento makes use of the Fullbottles he was given to raise his Hazard Level and become stronger. Utsumi helps him, surprisingly, and even fights as Night Rogue (clever clever) to help out. 

This is where we get what I had assumed would be exclusive forms, but PhoenixRobo appeared in the show in January and RoseCopter JUST premiered, so SmaphoWolf Hazard Form is our exclusive I guess. Then in part 2 we get ToraUFO, KirinCyclone and KujiraJet, which were all fun combos. 

I am pretty pleased at how these turned out. They only have enough time to provide some fun fights, but there’s a surprising amount of story as we see Utsumi testing out the Kaiser System (pulling back in a thing from the winter movie), and even a bit of info on how some of these forms work. At least for part 1. 

This is supposed to be a 3 part thing, and much like the last two series, part 3 will be on the DVD release - I hope it’ll at least be worth the wait this time. There’s at least gonna be an exclusive form. 

The duel begins. Build and Grease fight for an entire episode, which is pretty interesting as far as episodes go, though they do try to break it up by including some flashbacks to moments leading up to this. 

Particularly, we learn that Sento is so concerned with claiming another life that he gives Misora the job of detonating his gear if he goes too far, which is pretty unexpected. It... kind of fits him wanting to prevent more deaths I suppose, but I’m glad they saw it fit to send in Ryuga to punch him instead. It’s pretty manly. 

We also learn that Kazumi’s amnesia was actually all a hoax! Which is a nice little twist that isn’t toooo surprising but it adds some nice depth to him. He just wants his bros to do better by being a tsundere. 

Even though Build won the duel against Grease, a wrench has been thrown in their civil plans. Seito has declared war, and they’re doing so with their own weaponized humans: Remocon Bro and Engine Bro. Yes, Bros or Bro’s is the proper spelling but the plural nature of that word is bugging me on a grammatical level. 

These two make a nice pair of badasses, but I hope they matter by the time they eventually get defeated, because as is they are pretty hard to consider as anything but a duo. I mean, I guess the Hard Smash are a trio of a similar nature, but they at least have more distinct personalities. 

Regardless, they cause trouble in Hokuto and Kiba of Kazumi’s gang is trying to stop them, only to get mercilessly trampled. It’s at this point I realize this episode is almost entirely just a Kazumi episode, as we see how he struggles against these bros and how much his own bros are also suffering. Even after a narrow rescue, Kiba dies, bringing us to just one more Hard Smash. 

And then there’s THIS asshole. 

Okay but seriously, can we just... admire how much of an edgelord Gentoku has become as of returning? In what seems like a relatively short time since he left the show, he’s back with a new Rider title, and a badass jacket draped over his shoulders that goes perfectly with his evil facial hair. He really embraced how much of an obvious villain he is. 

I dunno what the fuck happened but I guess that’s a good teaser for the Rogue blu-ray spinoff. Based on what we get to see I kinda wonder how much more of a twisted guy Utsumi is. He got his sweet catharsis here. 

But also as a nice detail I once again did not foresee, Kamen Rider Rogue is actually Namba’s “Make our own Kamen Rider” project, and it’s been made for Seito, which means we now have Riders for each nation. That’s pretty dope, tying that all together. 

It seems that Gentoku has really become a much more interesting and vague person now that he’s become a Rider. He’s putting aside revenge so that he can crush Touto and protect the country... which seems a lil counterproductive but I’m gonna guess he’s not quite right in the head right now, so I’ll give him a pass. 

All this means that Kazumi and Akaba have no choice but to join the heroes, but it feels like they’ll actually blend in, potentially. I mean, it seems like Kazumi has learned to admire the passion Sento fights with, and even admits to being inferior because of it. So I’m pretty happy to see them working together, as opposed to going “Okay, we’re doing this trope”. 

They need to stick together if they stand a chance against Rogue. Always on the move, Pandora’s Box has made its way to Rogue, and he intends on opening it once he defeats Build. But with how much he overpowers him even with the Hazard Trigger, what’s stopping him?! 

Oh. That’d do it. 

So that’s one hell of a cliffhanger to end this review on. What’s going on with Misora?! I’m not even gonna watch episode previews for this one, I wanna see what the show does firsthand! See you again soon for another Build review! 

[gameridernews]

Ex-Aid review: Choh Superhero Taisen

Ex-Aid's spring movie, from a distance, just looked like the familiar Rider/Sentai crossover format doing its usual thing. But recently, a producer at Toei has confirmed that they will no longer be doing crossover movies in the spring, meaning that Ex-Aid - turns out - has given us our final "so-called spring movie" experience.

In this world where weird and questionably written crossovers may cease to exist, let's see if it at least went out with something akin to a bang. 

Choh Superhero Taisen is a bit of a silly name. I mean, it implies this is a SUPER version of the usual spring movie crossover, but to be a little more accurate, this movie is... kind of like a better version of the first couple swings they took at the Rider VS Sentai angle.

To recap, we got a Fourze-era crossover that did not really give a good first impression, then a Wizard-era crossover I can't remember a single thing about except Space Shocker. Gaim and Drive went the route of Rider VS Rider, both in kinda interesting but shaky executions, and Ghost had a focus on the original Kamen Rider making a modern day appearance.

Oh and just to quickly establish the timeline here, Maximum Gamer premiered in the show and Kuroto got what he deserved. Bit of a shame since I’m sure he’d have a lot to say about the kid in this movie. Anyway, let's begin!

The movies opens up in Korea being attacked by the game Xevious. The Kyurangers send all of their attack stock footage at the invaders, which you would think the Cyber Rescue Center would know about but they are instead dealing with a strange patient who apparently has a tail. Oh hey, Zyuoh Tiger!

The way the movie plays out beyond this point is really weird. It feels like when Inoue wrote the OOO portion of Movie Taisen Core - things are oddly slow and somber for a series known for being bright and peppy. 

It’s uncanny. Hiro literally proclaims he will operate on Zyuoh Tiger even if she's an animal and no one bats an eye at that comment. That’s how weird it is. And when they see the Kyuranger mech land in the middle of the city, it’s treated as a quiet ominous moment like something bad is about to go down.

Okay, to be fair, that part is ominous because the Kyurangers are here for Poppy since they think this video game character is linked to other video games attacking reality - I guess since they have a lot of research at their disposal, because they know what Bugsters are!

But just as the Ex-Aid VS Kyuranger stuff begins, it quickly ends once Shishi Red... decides Kamen Riders are heroes because there's a game called Choh Superhero Taisen that Riders and Rangers are both part of. I mean, he's not wrong?

So yeah, that's a thing! Choh Superhero Taisen is a game that’s invaded this world and challenges Ex-Aid. Among its returning Riders/Rangers is an alternate version of Hiro, transforming into Kamen Rider True Brave. 

I was VERY interested in learning the backstory of this character - is it an alternate universe thing, or what? Turns out, he's a video game character... and for story reasons, it’s a Hiro who took a different path in life. 

It sorta makes sense, I promise.

Things get interesting once Ex-Aid and Poppy enter the world of Choh Superhero Taisen, which is more or less a bunch of Toei's usual filming locations but with returning actors accompanying them!

The first being Kyoryu Gold from Kyoryuger, Utsusemimaru - or Utchy for short. I watched at least half of Kyoryuger so I can appreciate his cameo. He does his Brave Daze thing and he gets some good action. 

More importantly, you can't have a bunch of returning actors without Toei proving they can somehow keep getting all of the Imagin from Den-O. And I can understand someone being sick of them by now, even if you were a fan before, but the scene where Ex-Aid has to pick his team makes me smile. Although... considering ToQGer's premise, should Urataros really be flirting with one of the girls? 

MOVING SWIFTLY ALONG, Emu chooses a "Gorider" team, with Momotaros being Pink - it's a pun. Ex-Aid uses Robot Action Gamer to cheat his way into the Red slot, which I kinda wish someone called him out on.

Ao Ninger makes an easy return as Blue, providing a nice callback to Ninninger as he basically takes charge and tell's Emu to pick his master, Magi Yellow, who taught him magic - but ends up calling Beet Buster from Go-Busters instead, because same actor. That was cute.

Lastly, filling out the team’s Green slot, the out-of-nowhere return of Zolda from Ryuki! I... y'know, it's best they didn't address his cancer since this is supposed to be the "game world" Zolda. Instead, they lean into his lawyer-ness - it felt very appropriate for him to dismiss the Gorider thing and only take part if they signed a contract. I also enjoy how he keeps referring to Momotaros as Goro-chan. It’s cute. I don’t have the heart to tell him Goro is in Zawame. 

With a team decided upon, this starts to feel like an entirely different movie with Riders VS Rangers. My only gripe here was I could've used at least one more fight. You get a nice tournament chart that shows you all of the different fights happening offscreen, and to be quite honest I needed to see the Dandy team in action.

Right, so I should talk about the kid now. There's a patient Hiro was responsible for, who made the Choh Superhero Taisen game and disappeared afterwards. This is where things get interesting because Hiro has this logic of "I won't perform surgery on a patient unless they want it", which was used well in the show. Hiro presented the kid a chance to be cured, and he said no, so Hiro reluctantly accepted the kid’s choice. 

Essentially, Alternate Hiro was made in this kid's game world as a personification of Hiro's guilt, and acts as his aide. It kind of works. But it kind of doesn't? Which is really a good way to describe spring movies as a whole. 

However, I dig the alternate Hiro in concept. He isn't an evil version of the character like you'd expect - he has some sense of justice to him, he's protecting this kid after all, it's just that he's wrong in the eyes of the actual Hiro because it conflicts with his own ethics. This may be the best part of the movie, or at least the part with the most depth.

Oh right, so Ex-Aid and the others on his team become Kamen Sentai Gorider... which is a combination of the original Sentai and the original Kamen Rider... and it's about out of place as it sounds. 

It feels right at home with all this chaos, I guess. But I don't have much to say about it beyond that. I still gotta watch the actual Gorider special.

Not a shocker for something to feel out of place in one of these movies. You know what’s also out of place? Shocker! Yes, the original villains are back again, and this time-- they don't have a different name, but I'd like to call them Game Shocker, because it implies they're living on in yet another form.

They also have a new young leader, Shocker Leader III to be exact, which I was admittedly interested in learning more about. The actor made a big deal about how he thinks of Shocker as a group that admires the Kamen Riders, quoted saying "I want you to understand Shocker's feelings".

In all honesty, though, the character doesn't stand out to me as being any different than a generic Rider movie villain, and would have probably been better off in a different movie. A shame too, because I love the idea it sounded like he was hinting at.

The movie is all over the place, and there's some things I wanna talk about but feel like I don't need to dedicate a whole screencap to. Let's go through these real quick...

Among the many cameos, we get the Kamen Rider Amazons crew, which includes Alpha, Omega and the then-new Neo! I haven't seen Amazons and this cameo taught me... they fight aggressively. I’ll be honest, I really felt nothing from this cameo. But I can appreciate how they added the dramatic lighting Amazons is known for. And Ex-Aid cleverly added some game logic to the fight by looking for a hidden power-up. He probably connects all of the pork chops in Castlevania. 

The Zyuohgers make a cameo! That's pretty fun considering this is one show later. Unfortunately this cameo also made me realize Amu really did not have much to do with the story. I legit forgot about her while writing all this.

Brave uses Galaxian Quest Gamer, which wins the award for most pointless and rushed movie form debut. Like, I think he put on the armor and fought some dudes real quick and you never see it again. Galaxian played some part in the game world destruction earlier, but now that I think about it, you could replace that with Shocker to make them fit in better...

To end on a positive note, Ex-Aid uses a special giant Energy Item with Maximum Gamer to grow to Sentai mech size and fight alongside the Kyurangers' mech, which was a very fun visual since it involved a unique transformation in which Ex-Aid grows in size as the armor builds around him. This felt like a "They knew this was cool and wanted to take it a step further" moment.

Since I sped through all of that, let's get to the ending.

There's a nice moment with the kid and Naga from the Kyurangers, as they both share the inability to properly express emotions, and I can appreciate how they made use of Naga even if I have little exposure to Kyuranger - that was nice and heartfelt.

Through a combination of Ex-Aid's previous efforts and Brave's current efforts (pretty cool having both of them involved there), the kid is saved, everyone who got sucked into the game world is back out, and the status quo returns to normal.

The credits roll with a nice collection of cards based on all the characters in the movie.

So how did this one turn out? Well, as a movie, pretty awful. As a toku movie, not great. As a Kamen Rider spring crossover movie, it's a'ight I guess? I feel like I'm a lot more forgiving of these than others - even though I'm not opposed to making fun of things like Tsukasa's bad hair day or Space Shocker, I do get something out of these, so that's why I watch them.

With the idea in mind that this is the final spring crossover movie we'll get out of Kamen Rider and Sentai - as the upcoming spring movie is gonna be about Amazons instead and the future beyond that is uncertain - I think they could have ended on a far more typical clusterfuck note. Arguably, they did? But I think among the far-too-many ideas this one had, some of the ideas were good. And for a movie trying to make heroes fight other heroes, it's doing so in a fun way by making use of Ex-Aid’s game motif.

I'm gonna miss these movies. They weren't great, but they were fun eye candy. I'm gonna be interested in seeing what they do with that spring movie slot - will Amazons be the last spring movie entirely, or will it be Toei's go-to for "We just wanna make some kind of thing" movie projects? Only time will tell!

I think you know what comes next, right? I’ve got the first winter movie reviewed, now the spring movie - so obviously spinoff material next. Or the summer movie! Whichever happens first. 

[firebirdsdaughter]

Still watch Chou Super Hero Taisen RAW...

... And, unfortunately, still haven’t become fluent in Japanese.

(spoilers? ish? gonna do a read more since this gonna be super long...)

(AND I DO MEAN LONG)

Still not sure where the real world is.

Okay, it feels kinda like they just remembered the Kyurangers existed.

Come to think of it, whatever happened to the other Kyus? Where are Lucky, Garu, and Hammy? Where’s the Aibous (even though I don’t think they’d become Aibous yet when this came out)? Much as I love Balance and Naga... I’d love to see the others, too.

Wait... Is this Hiiro’s house?

Did Amu follow him? I still don’t get why she’s here... Though I’m glad she’s taking care of the Hiiro-wrangling (because this is before the majority of his development, I think... Though I’m pretty sure it was after he discovered he’d accidentally started caring about Emu).

Okay, why don’t I just admit I don’t remember where either of these shows were when this film came out?

Come to think of it... Did Hiiro see a kid get sucked into a game and nots ay anything? It’d probably be less confusing if I knew what was being said.

Also, Tokusatsu suit actors are all bloody gifts to this world and should be cherished. Their physical and silent acting is positively charming and magnificent.

Oh, god, he did the surgeon hand thing. That means shit’s about to go down. Not sure if he said one of his catchphrases, but the hand thing is the equivalent of the hat turning around for Hiiro.

In other news, Seto is so pretty. Just getting that out of the way. No one wants to hear me gush about it, probably.

On a technical level, I’m super curious how they filmed this scene. I mean, it’s Seto talking to himself, and then fighting himself. You can do camera angles for the conversation, but it’s pretty cool they made it look like he was getting kicked through a wall by his doppelgänger.

Also, I detect an error. Taddle Legacy is higher than Lvl 50. Alternate Hiiro, you lie!

Though, no way around it, I still love Brave’s henshin jingles. All of them.

It was the real Utcchy! Wait, it was? Then why was he in the game thing before? Was Candelira/Torin’s ghost just like ‘whoops, shit’s happening in this game! Utcchy! Handle it!’ and dropped him in?

Oh, whatevs. He’s still a good little muffin.

Announcer does unnecessary but still wonderful ‘A-MA-ZON’ style proclamation for Amazons Amazon. And this after we saw original Amazon. Except he wasn’t actually... Oh, forget it.

Actually, what happened to the rest of the GoRiders? Did I miss it? Since Jin’s very dead, that wasn’t actually them anyway, I guess. Maybe. I DON’T KNOW.

SO MANY AMAZON.

Slightly disappointed by the loss of the scarf. I liked Amazon’s scarf.

Emu shows off his need to say ‘Dai Henshin’ with multiple ‘Dai’s whenever he Henshins these days.

So... The kid is the villain?

HOW DARE HE HURT TWO OF THE WORLD’S MOST PRECIOUS CINNAMON BUNS!

I found the other Zyuohgers! Though... I’m pretty sure their lines are prerecorded. Oh well, nice to know they came.

STOP HURTING NAGA YOU HORRIBLE LITTLE BOY!

Okay, this faux, alternate Amazons gang up on Emu has gone on far enough.

Also, I love Emu, he’s a precious baby, too. Especially in that form. And, of course, why wouldn’t he stop the battle to explain to the Amazons how a game worked! (I think that was what happened? They certainly all paused)

I feel like Hiiro is saying friendship words, but I can’t understand him, so I don’t know.

WHO IS THE RED HAM MAN?

Oh... Hi... Drive-Spectre? WTH? And... Is that Necrom? No, it’s not Necrom. He hasn't got a hood, but... Yeah, I have no clue who y’all are.

YOU MONSTER CHILD HOW DARE YOU MAKE NAGA CRY! BALANCE COME KILL HIM RN!

NOTE: I do not condone killing children in any way. Please do not quote me on my emotional outbursts.

CTTOI... What is Balance doing?

And... The Hiiros are still throwing each other through walls... At least the originals seems to be winning...

Think he’s saying friendship or something cool again, but I don’t know. Actually, knowing Hiiro, it’s probably meant to be cool, but is actually dorky.

Hiiro’s like ‘yup, just killed myself. That was awkward.’

Naga is now saying friendship words! But... clue what they actually are.

Wow, Emu! You beat all three of those fake alternate Riders I couldn’t identify! I’m so proud!

Wait... Why are the other Zyuohger just showing up now? Like, if Yamato saw or Sela heard Amu being taken to a hospital, wouldn't they come running? And if not, shouldn’t they have been looking for her?

Ah, drama on roof tops at night. That’s all I got, folks. No idea what’s being said, though I did hear ‘intern’ in there, so I guess Hiiro’s being Hiiro? Meaning uninformative, aloof, introverted, and incapable of normal social interaction without offending others.

Oh! Wow, he punched Emu, that’s new! I guess fighting an alternate version of yourself to the death makes you a little emotionally volatile?

Alternate thought is that he’s doing it to force even heartless monster boy that made Naga cry to see that people care about what happens to him? ‘Cause I can see Hiiro identifying with that view because he’s a big self-loathing little baby. If that made any sense.

Or maybe he knows something they don’t? He and his doppelgänger were talking and fighting, so the alternate may have said something. Then again, I have no clue what anyone is saying.

Good to know Hiiro is still super parkour surgeon!

It was really whacky when he broke that out all of a sudden. It was like, whoa, okay! Hiiro just ran up a wall! Out of suit!

Also, I think Hiiro just made a Vulcan call--lives of the many.

Mr RED HAM is upset and taking it out on Utcchy. Someone please kill him. I don’t even know who he is or what he’s doing here, but he’s hurting my children so shoot him!

Holy fuck, are those... Are pincers coming out of his eyes? WHAT IS THIS MOVIE?

No, seriously, what happened to the other Kyurangers?

Nice line up, kids. Good to know we can all put our differences aside to form a Sentai line when necessary.

IT WASN’T THE REAL UTCCHY?

What happened to the Kyurangers, AGAIN? (Oh! There’s Balance!) But this is more like a Zyuohger/Ex-Aid crossover...

Welcome to Taisen, pause the music while everyone takes a brief glance at each other’s Henshins!

Poor Parad. I almost for got he was here. Taiga too, honestly. Sorry guys!

We have Kurous, but no ToQgers...

FURY!

Hey, there’s the rest of the GoRiders! I’d watch a whole series with those five, they’re a good mix.

SUDDENLY JARK MATTER.

Another reason Toku suit actors aren’t paid enough; those falling in shots.

RIP everyone.

OH, THERE THEY ARE! What, could they not get the actors for more than the opening?

I’m assuming that’s what happened w/ Kiriya, since I know for a fact Hayato is working on other things as well.

GIANT SUPER SPRINGY EX-AID MAX ROBOT HEAD THING!

Finally some other folks!

Did ToQ Ichigo just hit his hand w/ his sword?

Glad too see you again, Marv! Even if it is just a fake alternate version and you have no lines. Same goes for you, Decade. And Diend, from earlier.

MISAO! Baby, I wish you coulda been in more of this!

Brave, WTF is that Gashat? That’s... I don’t even... Take it off. NOW.

Ex-Aid baseball?

God, the fireball and his eye on it!

RIP Red large ham man whose name I’m not sure we ever learned.

Where’d the rest of the Zyuoghers go all of a sudden?

Dramatic lineup!

So... How do Hiiro and this kid know each other, exactly?

They seem to have a sort of ‘we’re isolated geniuses who have trouble interacting with others and believe no one cares about us/we don’t deserve to be cared for’ bond going...

Now, we all talk to an evil demon child through a game screen!

I can see why a small, very intelligent, super introverted and social-awayness lacking child would look up to Hiiro enough to have him as a sort of ‘guardian entity’ being a game/world he made... Then again, I am none of those things.

Oh! Lucky’s back! And... Hiiro is confused by him.

I feel like we’ve mentioned Saki, like, twice in this film and I’m not sure why.

Now they’re still alive? WTH? I find it real interesting that the people the kid choose to put into this game thing were Utcchy and Hiiro. Those two are pretty different, if you ask me. And how does he even know Utcchy?

Aw, Naga awkward smile is back!

Awwwwwwww, it’s a socially awkward trio shot! (meaning Hiiro, Naga, and little evil demon boy)

Hiiro just looked at Lucky like ‘why are you touching me?'

Actually, now that I think about it, if I go w/ my theory that the boy did this/started this because he was a lonely, socially inept genius kid, I can see why he’d go with Utcchy. God knows that man is socially inept. Still don’t get how they knew each other. If anyone actually read to the end of this, have an imaginary cookie!

[tokupedia]

Kamen Rider 45th Anniversary File: Gaim

*ominous chimes sound followed by the sound of marching drums* ♫ Got it, Move~ Wooow~ ♬

2013

After a long hiatus with clipshow series to tide fans over, Tsuburaya finally creates a brand new Ultraman Series and Ultraman to celebrate the company’s 50th anniversary: Ultraman Ginga

Neo Ultra Q bring the original Ultra Q concept into the modern day as its “second season” and airs on satellite  TV.

Kyoryu plus Humans! After almost a decade, the fandom’s favorite motif of Dino Sentai returns! HEAR OUR ROAR! The invincible superstars of the 37th Sentai, Zyuden Sentai Kyoryuger debut! Perfect-de gozaru!

DokiDoki! PreCure runs alongside the Strongest Braves and Armored Riders as the Pretty Cure series of that year.

Garo: Yami o Terasu Mono debuts on TV and stars a new Makai Knight: Ryuga Dougai.

Kouga returns for one last outing as the original Garo in Garo: Soukoku no Maryu. This film takes a more dark fantasy approach akin to 1980s Jim Henson as it is less about the scares and boobs and more of a gothic Wizard of Oz/Alice in Wonderland tale that the whole family can enjoy with only a little blood here and there.

Gatchaman becomes a live action movie....with disappointing changes made to the source material that upset the fans, resulting in a box office flop as it made it to #6 on the charts for only its first week and then fell hard straight to the bottom in the following weeks. Fans consider it one of the top 10 worst live action adaptations of an anime. 

Another dud was the film re-imagining of the 1960s hero Tiger Mask starring Eiji Wentz.

On the more raunchy side of things, Hentai Kamen debuts on the silver screen.

Koichi Sakamoto does two solo film projects: Travelers, a sci-fi action flick starring Nao Nagasawa and Ayumi Kinoshita and 009-1, a movie that commemorated the 75th anniversary of the birth of Shotaro Ishinomori (And haunts my nightmares!)

Nuligumar Z, something that slipped past even my radar. It is a film about a Magical Girl henshin superheroine who fights zombies!

When it came time to plan the next season, Producer Naomi Takebe had an interest in breaking away from the formula a bit as the Kamen Rider series had fallen into certain patterns such as only 2 or 3 heroes each season. The first idea that came about in the Toei studio was that there would be more Riders, akin to Ryuki. The next idea was that each would have a motif unique to each of them, at first the team passed around the idea of birds and insects but Bandai suggested something completely unorthodox: Fruit.

Naomi loved this idea as it was something that was never done before and would give a unique look to each Rider to match their personality. The Toei staff test marketed kids to find out what kinds of fruit they liked, with the most popular being oranges. So they decided to make an orange fruit samurai as the main lead! 

In terms of music, Avex got a band outside their record label, reggae group Shonan no Kaze, to perform some of the songs of the show and movies with the actors who play the main heroes doing their own themes. Ei Ei OH!

As for the trinkets, the staff wanted it to be like OOO where the device was easy to swap out. (And because OOO was the highest selling Kamen Rider toys on record to date and they kept trying to get those numbers again despite OOO being a lightning in a bottle happenstance.).

Naomi had one idea about “unlocking potential” and after some brainstorming, the staff came up with the idea of using padlocks as a gimmick and enhance it with the fruit motif. But the staff decided it needed a bit more pizazz so they chose to set the show it in a “Sengoku-like setting”, thus the concept of armors came about. To add more flavor, no pun intended, they chose not just armors from ancient Japan, but ancient China, European Knights, Norse Vikings, ancient Arabian archers and a Roman gladiator!

To add to the sheer bizarreness of this mixture they added a guy famously known for a show about killing young girls in a dark deconstruction of the magical girl genre as its head writer:

Gen Urobuchi, dubbed by fans of his work as “Gen the Butcher” or “The Urobutcher.” A self proclaimed nihilist in terms of his dark style of writing, Gen’s involvement caused quite a stir in the fandom and excitement built up. This happened because the voice of Kivat the 3rd from Kiva, Tomokazu Sugita, worked with him previously and introduced him to Naomi Takebe.

Despite seeming out of place for this type of thing, Gen was a huge fan of Kamen Rider, having read Ishinomori’s Black manga when he was a teen and favorites like Ryuki (which may or may not have inspired Puella Magi Madoka Magica) as well as universal fan faves like the Kamen Rider Black TV Show.

Gen also saw this as a challenge, as he had been in a rut doing nothing but anime for a while and needed a change of pace. He was instructed to make the series like “Early Showa Era” Kamen Rider, which only made fans want to see it more.

Then we saw the costumes.....and the fandom had a schism form as some thought Kamen Rider was “ruined 4everz”.

But Gaim is now one of the more highly praised Kamen Rider shows of recent memory. Many enjoying it for going into darker territory at times, having characters you root for, a few deaths and a genuine sense of danger if the heroes fail in the later parts of the season. Also, a plot that neatly threads together (more or less).

Granted, it also had a few hiccups, like the summer 2014 film that was more or less a forced tie-in to the 2014 FIFA World Cup, Kamen Rider Taisen’s plot and the awesome but forced and disrupting-a-story-arc Kikaider crossover episode to plug the movie Kikiader Reboot.

The praise was so high for the show that internet geek fan website Den of Geek proclaimed it as the best tokusatsu show in years. (I’d like to think Garo deserves that title at least once in a while and every toku franchise has its day when it hits it outta the park, but I’m just a Fox with opinion) I’d say go into Gaim with expectations leveled, as you are automatically setting yourself up for possible disappointment if overhype clouds your judgement.

If you think it is as great as everybody says, great! If you don’t like it, there are (currently as of this post) 27 other shows of varying styles and tone you can try out or other franchises of the toku genre that may be your cup of tea.

But enough yammering...It’s Lord Kouta’s stage now! ORAAAAA!

(Mr. Kazuraba circa 2013)

Real Name: Kouta Kazuraba

“Pluck the fruit of Heaven. That the world may be dyed in your image. Is that the glory you seek? Is that burden one you can bear? Know this. The lives of men are not ours to control, not even our own. We cannot defy the inexorable current of fate that carries us. But what if fate itself were to call you... To change the world? To turn the course of the future? You cannot defy your fate. But the fate of the world is in your hands!”

In a bustling planned community called Zawame City, the Yggdrasil Corporation provides everyday needs, from healthcare to housing to schools. Zawame used to be a small town, but Yggdrasil moved in and made it a pet project. With a large corporation running everything, people in Zawame feel it is like a “castle town” of the Sengoku Era of old.

And in this town, they call home, everyone hails to a Beat Rider song. Beat Riders are special dance groups that lift the spirits of the citizens. Beat Riders also engage in competitions for turf with other Beat Riders dance groups in Pokemon-like battles using Lock Seeds to summon monsters from another dimension called Inves. One former dancer is Kouta Kazuraba, who has given up his life as a member of Team Gaim and fun to basically adult. (I know that feeling all too well). This has caused a rift between his friends such as Mai as he no longer has time for them and after spending time with Team Gaim’s leader Yuya, goes back to his adult life.

Yuya later talks to a Lock Dealer named Sid, who offers him something to turn Team Gaim’s luck around after their loss to Team Baron...

Kouta later gets a text from Yuya, telling him he found “something good” with an image of a strange device sent as an attachment. Mai and Kouta then encounter a dimensional tear and go inside it, After Kouta picks some strange fruit from the dimension, a larger Inves appears and attacks Mai. They find the device lying on the ground and no sign of Yuya anywhere. Kouta puts on the device, as it looks like a belt buckle and it causes the fruit he was carrying to transform into Lock Seeds. The Inves finds them and chases them again back into their world, and after distracting it, Kouta uses the belt and a Lock seed to become what would later be dubbed an “Armored Rider”.

During his battle with the Inves, a mysterious blonde woman appears to warn Kouta that what he chooses next will determine the course of his fate. If he continues to continue, he will be forced to fight until the very end. Kouta kills the Inves and then goes down a winding path of mysteries, alliances, betrayals and revelations of the dark truth of both Yggdrasil Corp. and the Inves.

Looking back on it, that was when the gears were just starting to turn. But, we didn't realize anything at all. We didn't know that our fates were already written in stone. We just wanted the power to reach our dreams. We thought that helped shape us. That's what we all believed. In the endless war that was yet to come. We would discover that for ourselves.

-Kouta Kazuraba

During one adventure, he met his predecessor Kamen Rider Wizard, who bestowed the title of Kamen Rider to him and the two fought an evil sorcerer alongside the other Heisei Riders.

Gear:

Sengoku Driver

Lockseeds

Lockseed Holder

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Lock_Vehicles

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Armor_Parts

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Musou_Saber_Holster

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Musou_Saber

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Daidaimaru

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Ichigo_Kunai

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Pine_Iron

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Suika_Sojinto

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Sonic_Arrow

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Genesis_Driver#Genesis_Core_Unit

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/DJ_Gun

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Senyo_Joint

Powers:

Enhanced Strength from the various armors, skilled weapons user with various weapons at Gaim’s disposal which is further enhanced by his final form.

The Jimber Forms give Kouta a specific enhancement: Super Hearing in Jimber Peach, Super Speed in Jimber Cherry and Enhanced Power in Jimber Lemon. Kachidoki Arms generates fire from the war flags that Gaim carries and has an AWESOME Gun that turns into a Zanbatō!

When the “Madoka moment” happens in the show, Gaim basically becomes a demi-god. He has florakinesis, teleportation, spirit mediumship, telepathy, attack nullification, exorcism, healing powers, dream walking, reality warping, time travel (by way of the golden fruit), portal creation, resurrection ability and a healing factor. Kouta also possessed the power to terraform an environment as large as an entire planet.

Even if his Lockseeds are damaged, Kouta can regenerate them to working condition as long as he is alive and bears the power of the fruit.

Kiwami Arms can summon multiple Arms weapons which Kouta can manipulate via telekinesis to attack his opponents (as seen in the game All Kamen Rider: Rider Revolution).

Weaknesses:

Before the “Madoka moment”, all one needed to do to defeat Gaim was destroy his driver as he was an ordinary human or swipe away all his Lockseeds. He also was susceptible to mind control and “Dark Henshin-ed” once in to a black version of Gaim.

As a demi-god, it is shown that while Kouta is a formidable opponent, certain beings can drain his power away rendering him human again and thus able to be killed (Ex. Megahex). If the “back-up” of his genetic data inside the Kiwami Lockseed is destroyed, then Kouta would be dead and gone forever as he would have no means of reviving.

He also can be overpowered by stronger beings, though ones of such god-like cosmic threat level are few in the Kamen Rider universe.

Given his near God-tier status now though, it is a difficult task to even make a dent in him for the average Rider.

Enemies:

Inves

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Inves

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Advanced_Inves

Inves are beings from another dimension who at first are like Pokemon to the people of Earth, a fun harmless pet they could summon to fight battles in called the Inves Games from Lockseeds. However, it becomes apparent after the first episode that they are far from innocent, as they are wild beasts who feed on the fruit of the Helheim Forest/Lockseeds to grow even stronger and evolve into larger monsters and attack people. However, despite seeming to be mindless, there is a dark secret as to what exactly they are.

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Over_Lord_Inves

Some of the Inves posses sapient-level intelligence and these are classified a the OverLord Inves. They command the feral and savage members of their race.

Yggdrasil Corp.

(Riff: Yggdrasil, a subsidiary of EvilCorp Conglomerates United and Amalgamated Cheese.)

http://kamenrider.wikia.com/wiki/Yggdrasill_Corporation

Yggdrasil is a major multinational corporation run by the Kureshima family. They set up their new HQ in Zawame seemingly out of interest in a city development project, but have a more serious ulterior motive in stopping a mass outbreak of the Inves that they believe will wipe out humanity.

Despite this seemingly noble goal of saving humanity, Yggdrasil’s means of doing so are morally questionable at best and outright horrifying at worst.

Word eventually gets leaked that they were going to let 6 billion humans die as they could only save 1 billion in the event of mass outbreak if the Helheim Forest spread. They are then labeled as terrorists by the UN and after a domino effect, including a siege of the Zawame Branch by the Inves, the company went into bankruptcy.

However, its former CEO does try to repent for his company’s sins by helping rebuild Zawame and protecting it in Kouta’s absence.

(Though the Melon Lord wasn’t a bad guy to begin with, just a bit arrogant and misguided in believing there was no other way to save humanity and things went out of his control as the series progressed. Kouta eventually got through to him and the two became friends.)

That’s all for now, I leave you to bask in the metal mustachioed glory that is Kachidoki Arms!

#RiseUpYourFlag!

[fighterxaos]

Happy Wednesday Club Members! Right now the one and only Sharivan Spark and myself are teaming up against Foundation X. So grab your belt and “Henshin”.

1. What were you like growing up? What were some of the things you were into as a child/teenager? It was hard because a lot of people have forgotten about tokusatsu and what is Kamen Rider or sentai, Ultraman or even metal heroes. During the 80s and 90s were the boom of Tokusatsu here. I was fond of tokusatsu during the early years even through my childhood and teenage years heck, even the present time. Growing up? It was challenging I mean life is hard it has it’s ups and downs. Lots of people leaving and staying but you still have to keep it real and move forward. Not to mention during my childhood years I was a fan of super robots like Great Mazinger, Getter Robo, Grendizer to name a few.

2. Did those things influence who you’re today? To be honest yes. A lot of things from being the person that I am today.

3. You cosplay a lot of Tokusatsu characters. What made you decide to focus solely on them when it comes to the cosplays you made. To be honest I focus on their personality and their armor designs. Not to mention their sole purpose of heroism and justice. Take Kamen Rider Drive for example, his sense of justice and heroism aside from his awesome armor design made him my favorite from the show. I did cosplay 2 villains. 1 of them is Black Beet from Juukou B-Fighter. He was a sole villain with a purpose of fighting and defeating his arch-nemesis to prove himself to whom he is. I wanna focus on other cosplays actually I wanna try mecha as I mentioned early maybe 1 day I can try cosplaying Getter Robo or Great Mazinger etc to name a few. But for now, I wanna focus on tokusatsu cosplay as it is my forte. 4. What is your favorite suit you’ve made so far? To be honest I have top 10 armors here is my list so far. Kamen Rider Drive Type Tridoron SyncRedder Kamen Rider Drive Kamen Rider Accel Trial Goseiknight/Roboknight Blue Beet/Super Blue beet KnightFire SolBraver Bull Black/Black Knight Hyuuga/Magna Defender Winspector Fire

5. What costumes do you plan on making this year? To be honest I really don’t know what plans I have but mostly gonna focus on armored sentai heroes. But I wanna focus on doing some other forms of Drive to be honest.

6. Off topic, favorite food? Grilled foods and some sushi. Grilled baby back ribs and some steak alongside vodka or “lambanog bubblegum flavor” I’m not sure what it is called on US terms,  though.

7. Any advice you can give someone starting out when it comes to making Toku suits?

It takes time effort and A LOT of tears and blood but if you ever wanna start on making one never ever forget to remember why you wanna do a toku suit of your favorite character. Let’s admit it Toku cosplaying is quite expensive since sometimes you gotta buy some foam, DX gadgets and many more materials. It might take some months or heck even years but trust me once you’ve finished it. The money, effort, blood, sweat and hardwork you have added in making your toku suit will be worth it. You can also try pepakura there are lots of tutorials on youtube and lots of free pepa files on google you can download.

8. Off topic, what do you think of this years Tokusatsu shows? I’ve been really enjoying Ex-Aid so far. I have yet to check out this year’s Sentai and Ultraman. I’ve really enjoyed Ex-Aid so far. I wasn’t sure about it 1st because I can’t judge a show just because of their wacky suit designs and TBH I really really wanna buy Ex-Aid’s gamer driver belt but I solely wanna collect more transformer toys this year and less tokusatsu toys haha. The previous sentai was Zyuohger. I wasn’t really fond of the whole animal cube motif but it grew on me as the show became great and even better than Ninninger. The new sentai is Kyuranger which is a space motif sentai with the most plenty of core members so far since it consists of 9 core rangers as opposed to 5. Kyu means 9 in Japanese so it figures. For Ultraman however, I really enjoyed the recent Ultraman Orb. It’s another anniversary series as his motif is using cards and using the powers of 2 past Ultraman. The show didn’t also rely much on special teams that have high-tech gadgets and vehicles so that’s why it’s unique to me. There’s an upcoming movie for Orb this march.

9. What conventions are you going to attend this year? Too many events to see but I might attend Ozine Fest for April. Toy-con and lots of major events here. Hopefully, my wallet can take it since I have lots of transformers to buy this year haha.

10. Do you plan on making costumes outside of Tokusatsu characters? I did before a comic book character named “Boy Bakal” or in English it means “Boy Steel” a Filipino comic book character inspired from Marvel’s Iron Man. I plan to make other non-tokusatsu characters to cosplay as I wanna move to mecha cosplaying soon.

11. What is a convention you’ve dreamed of attending? It already happened back then Toku Spirits. Four Toku actors from our childhood returned to take a visit. Even if the event did not require tokusatsu cosplayers the whole premise and feel of the event was just glorious!

12. Final question, anything you want to say to your fans? Never give up on what you wanna do, accomplish and achieve! Hard times might take on your from all sides but if you keep your head high and know to stand up again after countless mistakes, bloopers and misunderstandings. It’s never too late to rise up again!

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As always Foundation X got away but none the less the day was save. Thanks to Sharivan for coming through. I’ll update this once I get his Social Media page if he has one.

Coming to the Cafe next is…..

Utahime Cosplay makes her debut. Until next time, I’m still XBen3000 and I’m out!

  Cosplay Cafe 10: Sharivan Spark

Happy Wednesday Club Members! Right now the one and only Sharivan Spark and myself are teaming up against Foundation X.

Cosplay Cafe 10: Sharivan Spark Happy Wednesday Club Members! Right now the one and only Sharivan Spark and myself are teaming up against Foundation X.