Category: "tokusatsu"
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Kitaoka Shuichi video
[embed]https://vimeo.com/107975677\[/embed\] Always wanted to do a Kitaoka video with Queen's Who Wants To Live Forever. Finally did. Features Reiko and Gorou h…
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Oh hey, look, it's been almost a year since I posted here. :( I have no excuse, other than the usual: been busy. Moved to a different country to do a graduate d…
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My first impressions of (raw) Kamen Rider Gaim 33 under the cut. Spoilers, obviously.
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Thoughts on Kamen Rider OOO 32, and on the similarities between Hino Eiji and Kamen Rider Wizard's Souma Haruto.
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Episode 2 is the episode where Shinji decides to become a Kamen Rider, and it's also the true introduction of my favorite female character from Kamen Rider: Momoi Reiko.
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Thoughts on Kamen Rider Wizard episodes 14-19, particularly in regards to Nitou Kousuke, aka Kamen Rider Beast in 18-19.
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Episode 11 is the conclusion of Kizaki's (first?) arc, and episodes 12 and 13 are more about Shunpei, and his sense of worth as Haruto's self-styled apprentice... but I'm actually just going to focus on how they encapsulate the theme of Kamen Rider Wizard perfectly.
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I was a little bit behind on Kamen Rider Wizard, but yesterday I got caught up on episodes 6 through 9, and I have to say I'm really enjoying this year's Rider. Haruto's motivations have been nicely fleshed out, and the whole thing feels like it's coming together nicely.
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I've been swamped the past couple of weeks, but eventually I want to go back and touch on episodes 2 and 3. In the meantime, quick thoughts on episode 4:
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Well, nearly a week later and I'm just now writing that Kamen Rider Wizard first impressions follow-up post with my thoughts on Souma Haruto and Daimon Rinko (who I'm really excited about).
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It's time for a new hero again, and I have to say, after a year more or less away from the franchise, I have been really looking forward to Kamen Rider Wizard, since I first saw the suit design and started reading about the premise. So how did the first episode stack up against my expectations?
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I love these dudes :D
I love these dudes!
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Back to Den-O after a long long hiatus. For context, in case anyone should stumble upon this, I have not watched all of Den-O, so awhile back I decided to tackle it and blog about it. You can find my posts on previous episodes of Kamen Rider Den-O here. No, I never finished it before, I stalled right around the same eps as the first time I started to watch Den-O... I did watch the first 3 or so Yuuto episodes, but I never actually blogged about them, so I'm starting again from 17. Yes, I skipped 15-16. No, I won't ever blog about those two episodes, they were the original catalyst for losing my drive with Den-O twice already. And just to clarify, yes, I know who Yuuto is, and I know who Hana is, but other than a couple of very general things, I'm pretty much unspoiled, and these posts are pretty much safe for episodes beyond the ones each one is about. Anyway, on to 17 and 18. The plot thickens. And how.
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Thoughts about Shinji's character arc and the general storyline as it reflects in the first episode of Kamen Rider Ryuki.
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I was going through Google Docs and I found something I meant to post long ago but somehow never got around to. It was a little over two years, about a week after the final episode of Kamen Rider Decade. The caveat is this was before the 2010 movie, when those few seconds of teaser footage that were never actually used in the movie created a lot of false expectations about what the movie would be like. Basically what that timeframe means is that some of my opinions were rendered moot points once the real movie came out, and the movie did force me to change some of my perceptions (reluctantly, I might add). But I don't know, it's interesting to read this and put myself in that mindframe again. Kamen Rider Decade had a lot of faults, but I did love it. I have to love any show that makes me overthink it as much as this one did.
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Pirate Sentai Gokaiger is so insanely fun that it's really easy to forget that it can touch deeper topics, and that, in fact, most of the main characters have had fairly dark backstories revealed. Case in point, Joe Gibken.
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Work happened. Then vacation happened. The stuff I've gotten into in the past 3 months, and that I've been playing catch up with: Community, Mad Men, The Good Wife, Downtown Abbey, The Hour.
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Reverse/Re:birth PV
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5gp7-2UX8M I'm kind of really really behind on OOO (read that as in: I have no idea about Date's general state of well-being, i…
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Okay, seriously why is it that my favorite characters always seem to die or suffer horrible fates? I mean, well, okay, not always, not every one of them, but very very often.
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As far as I'm concerned, the important thing about these episodes is... Date backstory!! I mean, yes, there was all the stuff about Date's former colleague, and how she wanted to be pretty like her sister, and how the lesson is that about real beauty and being yourself, yada yada yada... I think it's fair to say that I have a lot more to say when the underlying theme is about how justice is subjective or the like than this, because... well, there's not much to say, right? Anyway, apparently Date was in some kind of Doctors Without Borders, and he was called The Fighting Doctor (so, not exactly Doctors Without Borders, probably). So, yes, I got it wrong, did not expect this, and I found it pretty interesting actually, that he used to dedicate his life to helping others while now his motives appear to be more selfish. Of course, by now the real reason he wants that money has probably been revealed, but at this point it hasn't, so there you go. Also interesting is how at the end Gotou asks him if it's okay to just let go of his former colleague like that, since she appeared to be into him, and he says rather matter of factly that has his hands full right now.
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Right. Been busy again, yada yada. But it doesn't feel right to just skip through, so I'll go off my notes for the episodes I watched (yes, I take notes while watching Kamen Rider, and yes, I realize what this says about me) but didn't get around to blogging about. Episodes 21-22 explore whether the desire to fight for justice can become twisted. The Yummy is born from a man who never passed the exam to become a lawyer, and was frustrated because he felt like a failure, and so he left his family. The Yummy initially targets criminals, and so the man accepts the Yummy as a way to punish those he perceives as wicked. From there, the show obviously moves to questioning whether this is really justice, and how self-righteousness twists a person's sense of justice so they become cruel themselves.
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Still playing catchup. These obviously deal with a whole more than just Date, but I'm really interested in him, so that's what this post will be about mostly. E…
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In which Date and Gotou's epic bromance begins, and Satonaka is total badass.
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If Kamen Rider OOO's episode 15 was about advancing the plot, episode 16 is about both that and also about advancing the mythology and the ideas behind the story.
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Catching up on blogging about OOO. About damn time! (I've actually watched beyond this point, but hadn't goten around to blogging). So episode 15 was basically set up for the events of 16. Notable (to me, anyway) things from this episode:
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It's interesting how much of a difference perspective makes. I never really appreciated Yaguruma as TheBee until he was no longer TheBee. I just rewatched the original 3 episode arc in which Yaguruma and Kageyama are introduced for the first time in a long time. It's really interesting to me to think back on my original reactions to the things that happen in this arc and contrast them with my reactions now. Originally, I kind of watched the whole thing with a gleeful sense of shadenfraude, waiting for the moment Yaguruma would inevitably snap; but now when I watch there is none of that, and although I do think Yaguruma was in large part responsible for his own downfall, I'm mostly left thinking that Tendou really had it coming, for being a very callous catalyst and for a lot of other things that have nothing to do with Yaguruma, but karma never caught up to him.
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This is an old LJ post from a couple of years ago. I've been thinking for awhile of bringing some of my (less sparkly-texty) posts over here, and I was thinking about the Hoppers today, and found this while going back through my old Kabuto posts, so I figured why not... And just in case: SPOILERS LIKE WHOAH So, Kageyama. It's really interesting how much he enjoys pulling the rug out from under Yaguruma. I mean... here's a guy who pretty much worshipped the ground Yaguruma walked on, and he is just so satisfied that he gets to betray Yaguruma. Specifically that he gets to tell him, "you can't a part of Shadow at all, you'd just bring disharmony". He's just gets so much glee over basically destroying Yaguruma... or maybe, over destroying the fiction Yaguruma built about himself. I mean, the thing about what Kageyama is you either believe he's just a total snake, with no real sense of loyalty at all, in order to turn around and betray his captain so completely (because it would be one thing for him to take over, what he did was quite something else), or you think there's more to him than that and you try to figure him out. And what I think about it is that it's all because of how disappointed and disillusioned he was. That's the only thing that I think can explain Kageyama's change in attitude towards Yaguruma.
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...We're just going to pretend that I haven't blogged about Gokaiger because I was purposely waiting to be two episodes in so I could have more informed opinions about the show and characters. :D
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One week to pirate shenanigans!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldAqzjzd5S4&feature=youtu.be Promo for the first episode and handoff, via fygoukai.
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Date Akira, huh?
Now THAT's what I like to see in my Kamen Rider. And I need to watch OOO faster. :D; (Via Silverwind)
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The Yummy from these episodes was spawned by a gifted surgeon who wasn't being allowed to do surgeries. Her pride led to Cazali using her to create a Yummy, and really, the point of these two episodes is about pride... or excess pride, rather.
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"I'm just trying to do what needs to be done." —Hino Eiji Firstly, yes, that is what Eiji does, and that's why he's effective, he just does what he ne…
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1. Ankh is being pwned by both Hina and Chiyoko, in very different ways. And by Satonaka, actually. So basically by any woman he meets. 2. Like I already posted, Eiji and Hina are adorable together. Him being instinctively protective of her is cute, obviously, but there's also the way she's coming to understand him, in particular how she realizes that Eiji is the man he is because of what happened in the village. And because of it, there's understanding and support growing there... it reminds me a little of Natsumi and Tsukasa before Hibiki world, before Yonemura made her more damsel in distress than supportive friend and partner.
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Eiji and Hina in ep 9
Aww, that's cute. And really really blatant ship-bait. :D; Have I mentioned how happy it makes me that Eiji is an attractive young dude as opposed to a waify pr…
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Wanting things isn't bad in and of itself. What's important is what you do with those feelings. 1. I like Eiji more and more. I like how he doesn't judge anyone…
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So I'm thinking I've reached the point in OOO in which it hits its stride and characters and dynamics start to get interesting. I still don't really OOO's various suit designs, I'm not really into the whole props during battle aspect of the action (particularly the mantis appendages/weapons), but the underlying Buddhist theme makes it very interesting, Hino Eiji is quite likable, Ankh is fascinating, and at this point characters I knew I'd like are starting to get more screentime... and characters I didn't expect to care much about one way or the other have snuck up on me.
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Hello there, Gotou's BFG
This makes me think perhaps I should be catching up on OOO.
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And so, Kamen Rider OOO catch-up begins! I'd actually already watched episode 4, but never posted about it/kind of forgot, so I rewatched. Very quick thoughts t…
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My top 5 Kamen Riders
Kitaoka, Yaguruma, Hajime, KaGAAAmi and Hikawa.
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No computer, can't watch stuff as often as I'd like, much less blog, yada yada yada. But I did catch up on last week's Os! The episode starts off where ep 2 left off, with Ankh encountering Hina, who is the younger sister of the cop whose body he's taken over. The little encounter serves to drive home, again, just how inhuman Ankh is. He basically coldly considers the situation, accessing the cop's memories of his sister to figure out why she's run to hug him, and once he understands their relationship, determines that because she cares for his brother, she will be in the way and the easiest thing will be to kill her and be rid of her. Eiji tries to stop him, and the point is made that without the belt, Eiji doesn't stand a chance, and would be unable to stop Ankh from doing anything he pleases. So he uses his only leverage, which is to threaten to throw the belt in the river, which effectively stops Ankh from killing Hina. So once again, the pull and push between Eiji and Ankh is brought to the spotlight, and this conflict is clearly going to be the central focus of the series... at least until Ankh starts developing more of a conscience. Which I am assuming will happen at some point. And again, I really like this dynamic.
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First of all, I am really liking Miura Ryosuke as Ankh. Awesome job. :D For some reason I didn't expect Ankh to openly show his true colors to Eiji this quickly, and yet it makes perfect sense. Eiji is perfectly aware, having heard it from his mouth, that Ankh doesn't care at all for human life, it's all a game to him, all about collecting medals, and Eiji himself is just a tool to that end. A tool that Ankh can choose to use how he pleases, when he pleases, or so Ankh believes.
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Watched Os 1 with subs. Still don't like the OP. :D In general terms, there's not that much I actually missed when I watched the raw. One thing was that Eiji sl…
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And so it begins. Watched episode 1 raw, so obviously I will have missed things. :D The first episode kind of already confirms the impression I got from the press releases and character descriptions: that many elements of Os are very obvious nods in the direction of past Riders. To be fair, Kamen Rider is a franchise that relies on a specific, limited set of tropes; but what I'm talking about isn't that exactly. A trope is an archtype basically, something honed down to its basic elements; what I'm talking about is the specific ways in which those archtypes are explored. That's not necessarily a bad thing, particularly if one liked what is referenced, and it's all revisited in a way that revamps the ideas.
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Kamen Rider Os promo
Totally forgot that by now there'd be Os promos after Double. :D; Anyway, posted on YouTube a week ago, although I imagine everyone's seen this already: Miura R…
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So again, kind of filler episodes which mostly serve to reinforce what we learned about whichever Imagin was just introduced; in this case Kintaros. I wasn't really all that interested in the story itself this episode, because the plights of a pre-teen girl idol/model really just don't interest me very much (it's a matter of demographics, really). Things pick up in episode 12 when it becomes less about the modeling and more about an estranged father/daughter relationship. The second episode also revisits the problem of creating paradoxes by changing the past, which I find very interesting.
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And so we get to Ryutaros. I'm not really sure how I feel about him. Sometimes he can be fun(ny), and certainly liking puppies and kittens is cute, and his color is purple, but the fact that he's a willful brat means that ultimately I tend to find him very tiring and frustrating, sometimes outright annoying. :D;
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One of my favorite things about the Kamen Rider franchise, beyond the great characters and often campy fun, is the way it tackles in a very tangible way issues that, when you think about it, are very philosophical and/or existential in nature. It's really cool that what is first and foremost a Sunday morning kids' show, whose purpose is largely to sell toys, is so good at tackling questions such as what is the true measure of being human; or to what extent our circumstances or fate determine who we are and what we do. I was going to say it's a little amazing, but it's really not, when you consider that at heart, this is exactly what the very first Kamen Rider was about, decades ago (full disclosure: I haven't really seen any Showa yet, although Black in particular is definitely on my list of stuff to watch). Kamen Rider can be about the suits and the fights and about heroes of justice kicking ass; but if you let it, it will also make you think. It tends to sneak up on you, too, and that's what happened with these two episodes.
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As is probably obvious, my response to Den-O eps 7 and 8 can best be summed up thus: LOL, Smart Lady! Or Shimada Nanako, whichever you prefer! Also! Urataros comments on the unfortunate length of Momotaros' pole. And then Momotaros takes offense... when he figures out what Ura means, at any rate. 8D/ (For a kid's show, they sure get away with Urataros implying an awful of lot really horribly badwrong stuff).
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Now, if one is identifying common tropes that Kobayashi likes to revisit, wouldn't it be fair to say that Urataros is probably the closest Den-O has to one Kitaoka Shuichi? :D Probably, and this would explain why I like Urataros so much. I mean they're both full of it, they're both smooth with the ladies (well, Kitaoka supposedly is, we don't see it work in Ryuki because it's always directed at Reiko), and they're so much smoke and mirrors around their motivations that it's very hard to tell just what there is underneath it all... except for the fact that one suspects they're really not bad, underneath it all, just selfish, opportunistic and self-serving. But quite charming, really! Especifically with Urataros, there's the mystery of why exactly he's doing what he's doing, why he's possessing Ryotaro knowing the limitations of possessing a singularity point (which at this point... haven't exactly been explained).
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Watched Den-O 3 and 4 yesterday, but didn't get around to blogging about them then, and then today at noon I was distracted and so this post is going to be shorter than it would have been. :/ I wanted to bring up two things. The first is Momo, and it's possible I may be be thinking too much about a character that is, again, a "hooligan who likes pudding" and wo we're probably not supposed to look too deeply at. But I can't help it. :D
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So quick thoughts, because of the time: → First instance of Hana beating up Momo! → Again with Ryotaro's ingrained kindness: wanting to give the keyholder back to the bully, because it was the right thing to do. → First glimpse of That Guy (spoiler!) → Momo saves a little boy, aww. Again, Momo was always decent, under the hooliganism.
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So, starting with the Den-O (re)watch. Personally, I didn't realize before the link between Den-O and Ryuki, but now I do, and Ryuki being my favorite it's inevitable that I'm going to be drawing conclusions, the first of which involves Ryotaro himself and the ways in which he is like Shinji, and the ways in which he's not. Obviously, they're both "Fail!Riders", but their attitudes are very different. Ryotaro is resigned to be bullied, both by other people and by the universe itself, really, while Shinji kind of... just creates his own shenanigans, but meets everything with what can only be called feistiness. But really, even in this first episode, the real similarity between them is their drive to do the right thing. Shinji gets involved in things that are not his business out of his sense of justice, and Ryotaro, even when kicked to the curve, is always all about doing the right thing... to the point protecting those that have wronged him. And there's kind of an innocence, I think, in that, in their overpowering goodness.
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So Kate (greatfountain at LJ/ @yanasoro) and I have been thinking about doing a Kamen Rider Den-O rewatch (rewatch for her, half rewatch for me, since I actuall…
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I haven't really kept up with Kamen Rider Double since very early on in its run; since October, I think it was. My excuse has been that it didn't quite grab me, and that in general I have to be really into something to actually put in the time and effort to follow it week by week. That it's not that I don't like Double, I just don't love it that much, and I'd just catch up at some point.
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So they've done the press conference announcing the next Kamen Rider series, in this case OOO or Ozu (yes, like Faiz). I kind of bailed early on in Double due to lack of interest and just not really getting into the story at the time, and I never did get caught up, but now I'm... let's say cautiously excited for the new installment. The main reason is that the main writer is Kobayashi Yasuko, who is responsible for Ryuki (my favorite Rider series), Den-O, Shinkenger (which I love), and Timeranger (which I haven't seen but have heard great things about). I'm not crazy about the suit design, but it looks better than the initial magazine scans led us to believe, so we'll see. And obviously, the cast was announced, the characters introduced, etc, and here I'm intrigued by a couple of things.
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Fighting Guys in Keitai Sousakan 7
I really meant to make a more in-depth post about this, but the past week has been really hectic. In any case, Keitai Sousakan 7 is a tokusatsu series by Miike …
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Allies of Justice FTW
ETA: This was meant to be a test post but got comments, so it's just staying up. G3-X and Gatack are EPIC together anyway.
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