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01-13-2024, 07:54 PM | #21 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
Join Date: Aug 2019
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Trivia about Watcherman. He's portrayed by comedian/actor Nasubi who became famous after appearing in an experimental reality TV show in 1998, a very real-life Truman Show type of show at that. An unknown comedian at the time, he had to live in isolation, with no clothes on and no communication with the outside world, in an unknown house somewhere in Japan and live off of the prizes won from sweepstakes.This bizarre show went on for about a year. What's insane was that the whole thing was streamed online at the time.
After his run on it ended he went on to pursue stage acting and be a tv personality in variety shows and stuff.
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01-13-2024, 10:11 PM | #22 |
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Gotta love the annual "We dumped two months' budget into this to show off all of the toys you can go buy at your local toy store" episode. I didn't mind it too much, personally, although I've never been a huge fan of the giant dinosaur head monster suit. I can appreciate an unorthodox design (it's the main reason why Pestar is one of my favorite Ultraman kaiju), but this one just doesn't really do it for me. It's a bit too far on the goofy side of things.
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-Show is super-duper into all of Double?s toyetic gadgets! It?ll be a constant presence through the first half of Heisei Phase 2, and it never did anything for me. (Fourze? not looking forward to those Happy Meal toys!) I find it a little cluttered, as an aesthetic. There?s the superhero, and the toy accessories, and the multi-change bike? I don?t know, feels a little busy for one episode.
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01-13-2024, 11:00 PM | #23 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
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Gotta love the annual "We dumped two months' budget into this to show off all of the toys you can go buy at your local toy store" episode. I didn't mind it too much, personally, although I've never been a huge fan of the giant dinosaur head monster suit. I can appreciate an unorthodox design (it's the main reason why Pestar is one of my favorite Ultraman kaiju), but this one just doesn't really do it for me. It's a bit too far on the goofy side of things.
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As a Hibiki stan, I'm predisposed to liking the spiritual successors to the disk animals. I like W's, in particular, because they all have a secondary feature besides being little robot buddies. I won't stand up to defend Fourze's version, though, because they were both deeply silly and entirely incongruous with the show's space theme.
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01-14-2024, 10:38 PM | #24 |
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KAMEN RIDER W EPISODE 3 - “DON’T TOUCH THE M: HOW TO GET INTO HEAVEN”
Solid episode! It’s kind of the archetypal Double Mystery, you know? The first two-parter felt a little rushed and uneven, but this one? Exactly what I want in a Double adventure: colorful guest-stars, neat supporting cast, great trio storytelling, and a bit of long-form build. Can’t think of anything I’d change about it! Normally, this is the paragraph where I’d undercut that by listing the things I’d change about it, but no! Genuinely thought this one worked all the way through. Yuuko’s whole disobedient daughter thing was a neat way into the theme of Family, and her money-warped personality change was a fun foil for our half-boiled team of Akiko (terrible at this in a really charming way) and Shotaro (just hopelessly outclassed by Akiko’s stubbornness at every turn; perfect). The beats of the mystery both play fair – the bus in the first disappearance scene – and feel clever in their deployment. It’s not a huge, twisty story or nothing, but the incremental search for the Million Colosseo makes for a solid first half of this mystery. The rest of the episode is spent on world-building and the mystery of Philip’s memories, and I found the former more appealing than the latter. Both are good (mostly in how Philip’s missing memories directly impact Double’s superheroic effectiveness), but the continued development of the citizenry of Fuuto is always going to land better for me. Watcherman returns for a bit of banter with Akiko, but it’s the time spent with the Fuuto police detectives that was most entertaining. Makura and Jinno, I just like their vibe with Shotaro. Makura hates him, but Jinno… Jinno doesn’t like him, exactly, but he sees the ways they can help each other. It’s a kind of lazy pragmatism, where Jinno’s fine letting Shotaro go off and solves crimes while he just shows up at the end to slap on some cuffs. Jinno comes off like a good cop that’s okay letting someone else do the hard work, and that’s such a fun change from the usual Kamen Rider options of Tough Cop Who Hates Heroes and Tough Cop Who Loves Heroes. Jinno’s just, like, cool with some freelance guy saving him some headaches. It’s so specific to this show, and I love it. The Wakana/Sonozaki family stuff… it’s coming together? This is the story where Wakana starts to interact with Team Double, where Kirihiko sees Double in action for the first time, and where the Sonozaki family start to understand what’s happening in their city. The way the show portrays them less as a cabal of Dopant supremacists, and more as a basic Crime Family, it does a lot of heavy-lifting for making them compelling to watch. They’re a fun group of affluent criminals who also happen to be rubber-suited monsters. Seriously, solid episode for me. Nothing to really gripe about, and everything worked fluidly. Nice reminder of peak W! — DIE-A MEMORIES -Philip’s memories start to show up! Nice to see how much this show is already laying down tracks for the eventual reveal, by elevating this part of the plot in the same episode where Philip is inexplicably fascinated by Wakana. -I don’t think we’ve gotten a full Form Change from Double yet? It’s all CycloneMetal or LunaJoker or whatever. Weird! -Yuuko’s parents instantly defer to Akiko’s self-given authority, and that’s so fun for me now. Why was I ever not into her schtick?!
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01-14-2024, 10:41 PM | #25 |
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I've always been of the opinion that, with how they're structured, W's' two-parters are better treated and viewed one big episode, rather than two separate ones. And rewatching episode 2 tonight only reminded me as to why I felt that way. Because really, I almost feel like episode 2 makes for a better introduction than the first one does, though both are necessary to grasp the entirety of what W is going for.
The first episode is primary about introducing you the world that is Futo, while this one is much more about showcasing the dynamics, traits, and interplay between the characters. Which is much more up my alley. And thankfully, in all of that, our two leads in Philip and Shotaro take center stage here, with Akiko getting far less focus and is much less annoying as a result. The dramatic spat between Philip and Shotaro not only makes sense in context, but showcases their primary traits and functions. Philip is the brains; Primarily using logic and probabilities without much in the way of tact. Whereas Shotaro, despite him trying to emulate the man he admired, is the heart. He's got alot more emotional intelligence than Philip does, though that often gets him into acting what many would see as rather naiive. The two both contrast and compliment eachother perfectly, to the point that they both form a big W with their arms when they Henshin. Ontop of that, the action this time around is alot more fun. All of the stuff with the T-Rex Dopant is way more involved than the Magma one. From Shotaro smartly utilizing his tech to outsmart a stronger opponent, to the chase sequence across town, to the really cool roar effect on the T-Rex itself, the episode is very high energy for most of it, making it alot more exciting and engaging. Especially when coupled with the character stuff mentioned above. We also get to see the Heat and Metal Memories! Even if Metal doesn't get to do too much other than utilize the Memory Break for HeatMetal. The overarching plot with the Gaia Memories gets its foundation here too, and I always dug how it was a very obvious parallel to drugs. I really do wish the show had aired as 40-minute episodes instead of the standard 20. The show is already an affectionate parody of Detective Serials, so why not lean into that even more? Not like kids shows haven't done that before. But, even with the format we got, I still found alot to enjoy regardless.
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01-14-2024, 10:46 PM | #26 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
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I really do wish the show had aired as 40-minute episodes instead of the standard 20. The show is already an affectionate parody of Detective Serials, so why not lean into that even more? Not like kids shows haven't done that before. But, even with the format we got, I still found alot to enjoy regardless.
I'm glad Episode 2 worked for you, though!
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01-15-2024, 03:46 AM | #27 |
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So fun fact, around this point, Wakana’s “Healing Princess” radio show got defictionalised and released in audio format online (the first episode has Wakana note the show has some new listeners due to going online). There’s not much in terms of content. They have Wakana discuss recent events in the show, play an out-of-universe insert as a real song and then go through 4 features: Mijiki Ecology (Miji-cology), which I didn’t quite get the intent behind from re-listening to the first episode, Cat Senryu, which is funny poems about cats, a segment where Wakana tries to “heal” people’s love problems and “Wind Fortune Telling”, which is an astrology segment.
As for the episode, all I can say is… a villain made of coins motivated by greed. Inspired stuff. |
01-15-2024, 12:21 PM | #28 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
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Sometimes it's okay to be direct!
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01-15-2024, 03:50 PM | #29 |
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I think W has probably my second favorite* storytelling engine of all the Kamen Rider shows. The detective angle is always a good reason to pull the characters into the Monster/Victim of the Fortnight plot and does so in a way that sets up some kind of mystery at the heart of that plot. There are definitely shows that used the same two-part story structure that could be much clunkier about finding a reason for the Rider to be a part of the story.
So in regards to Makura and Jinno, we're seeing another instance of the show really embracing the tropes of the hard-boiled detective genre that inspired it. We have the cop who considers the detective to be an unwanted presence and the cop who respects the detective and relies on their ability to look into crimes without the restrictions of conventional law enforcement. We're just missing the corrupt cop who's in league with the criminals (for now). I really like how W both uses classic detective tropes (so many femme fatales) but is also willing to put its own spin on things (Akiko is aggressively unwilling to be a classic secretary). *The #1, of course, is Kotaro Minami hearing random snippets of a conversation and correctly assuming that it's tied to a Gorgom plot. |
01-15-2024, 03:59 PM | #30 |
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One of my favorite non-musical things about W's opening credits is the bit where we see the difference between how Shotaro sees things (cool, respected by his partners) and how things really are (definitely neither of those!), all separated by a pinwheel. It's this perfect encapsulation of the show wanting to be a detective show, but sort of take the piss out of detective tropes.
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