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03-22-2020, 09:12 AM | #151 |
Ex-Weather Three leader
Join Date: Jan 2012
Posts: 10,506
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Yep that too.
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03-22-2020, 10:03 AM | #152 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
Join Date: Aug 2019
Location: Chicago, IL
Posts: 6,159
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I'm getting Scissors flashbacks here! I spend a minute talking about some neat new Rider, go to bed, and wake up to folks being very excited about the new Rider. I think that's great. I think it's super encouraging, as a fan, that the Kamen Rider franchise has so many compelling characters in it. Something to keep looking forward to!
I get it, though, with Quarter. He's exceptionally fully-formed in his first appearance. Right away you get a sense of how he's going to fit into the narrative, you get to see him try and win over his opposite number, you get his human side and his Rider identity and he just... he immediately feels like he belongs in this show, that he's somehow been a part of the fabric of it for the last twelve episodes and those scenes just kept getting cut. And the performance is strong, too, this messianic empathy mixed with world-weariness, someone who's trying and failing to make a difference. It's all very evocative, full of little ideas I can't stop thinking about.
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03-22-2020, 10:27 AM | #153 |
Showa Girl
Join Date: Jun 2018
Posts: 9,064
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He's also the first in a long line of Riders to not be some sort of asshole -- Scissors was a straight up murderer, Knight is aloofiest aloof lone wolf ever and Kitaoka is... well. Kitaoka. So having a Rider that's actually somewhat heroic is strangely a break from the usual.
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03-22-2020, 11:01 AM | #154 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
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Quote:
He's also the first in a long line of Riders to not be some sort of asshole -- Scissors was a straight up murderer, Knight is aloofiest aloof lone wolf ever and Kitaoka is... well. Kitaoka. So having a Rider that's actually somewhat heroic is strangely a break from the usual.
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03-22-2020, 12:06 PM | #155 |
The Immortal King Tasty
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Location: Every diner you've ever been to.
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Man, and you're saying that about them after one episode, and before they've even met. The way Shinji and Tezuka are similar without at all being the same is absolutely fantastic, and you've only scratched the surface so far.
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03-22-2020, 12:25 PM | #156 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
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Location: Chicago, IL
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The show does this great thing of contrasting them by running them, separately, through the exact same conflict. They don't have to give a thesis statement to each other about their own But Why Heroism, because we get to see how they live those virtues. It's show, don't tell, and I always love it when shows can deliver that.
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03-22-2020, 02:55 PM | #157 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
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Location: Chicago, IL
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MASKED RIDER RYUKI EPISODE 14
Visually, this is another killer episode. Tonally, uh... it takes some big chances. There's once again a lot to recommend about how this one was blocked and shot. It's some little stuff, like the reflection of Darkwing in the glass door that Ren walks through in the building lobby, and some big stuff, like the Knight emblem (I think) burning on the lantern or literally all of Shinji's Dark Night Of The Soul. That whole sequence, of Shinji just losing his sense of self when he thinks he killed Zolda, it's a really nice collage of effects, heightening the disorientation Shinji feels, rendering both him and the viewer adrift. It's... this whole episode is full of shots and angles and edits that solidify everything the story's trying to do and say. Looks great, and does an amazing job. My compliments to the director! It's just, the setup for this episode is asking a lot of the viewer. Maybe too much! In order for both halves of this story to work, you have to a) empathize with Shinji, feel his despair as he's taken a life, something he swore he'd never do, and b) know that he's being tricked by Kitaoka and think it's hilarious. That's a huge ask of a storyteller. If you care too much for Shinji, every cutaway to Kitaoka gloating over his deception is like a knife in the heart. Similarly, if you don't care about Shinji enough, every sequence of Shinji giving up, longing for death, that shit is laugh out loud funny. So, like, you've got to care about Shinji just enough to feel his pain, but still be able to laugh at how melodramatic Kitaoka's fake mourning is. I don't... I don't know if the episode totally lands that plane. I think it works better in the second half, where we get to see Shinji's pain separate from the deception. (If you're asking me to not cackle like an asshole when Kitaoka is crying fake tears and exclaiming that even he, a brilliant attorney, couldn't frame Shinji for this murder, I feel like we don't know each other at all.) The resolution, with Shinji being so glad that Goro's alive and so glad he didn't murder him, it's very sweet and welcome. I like that Shinji's so caring that he didn't think to want to murder Kitaoka (reasonable!) until after he was relieved that Goro was alive. Like, some of it's the relief that he's not a murderer, but a lot of it is that a human being is alive. That's very sweet. But I'm not sure if the beginning part of the story, the shell-shocked Shinji stuff, I'm not sure that works as well as the conclusion. Just a little hard to forget that Kitaoka is (beautifully, hilariously, gloriously) tricking him. So great to have Kitaoka back, though, and I love how his plan is yet again Maybe Shinji Will Get Eaten By His Monster. It's kind-of a thing running through this episode, that these dudes who like to paint themselves as killers, ready to go all pro ice on another Rider, they maybe don't actually have the stomach for it. Kitaoka keeps trying to get Dragreder to finish Shinji off, and Quarter (not in this one a lot!) sort-of has Ren's number re: probably not a killer. Like, Ren has that cool exterior, the motorcycle and the black leather and the scowl, and he's constantly telling people It's Kill Or Be Killed, but, y'know, sort-of hasn't walked that walk yet. Seems like a lot of big talk, thus far. Even Scissors, who's the only Rider yet to get killed onscreen, his contract monster is really the one who finishes him off. Ren puts Scissors in that position, arguably, but he doesn't actually kill him. Could Ren really kill someone? I like that the show leaves that question hanging. It's cool to have Ren's version of himself be challenged by Yui and Shinji's version of him, their belief maybe overcoming his self-deception. Great story across this two-parter. The Kitaoka/Reiko/Goro stuff is relentlessly hilarious (I would 100% put up that 24" x 36" picture Kitaoka sends Reiko, it's magnificent), the Shinji despair stuff gets where it needs to by the end of the episode, Quarter is awesome, and it's a great dive into the stakes of the Riders fighting each other, how their dedication to winning is maybe more boastful than they'd want people to know, or what the consequences might be for trying not to fight. There're four Riders in this story, and the fact that they each have individual viewpoints, goals, limits, it's really fun to watch.
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03-22-2020, 03:22 PM | #158 |
Showa Girl
Join Date: Jun 2018
Posts: 9,064
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Quote:
Quote:
So great to have Kitaoka back, though, and I love how his plan is yet again Maybe Shinji Will Get Eaten By His Monster. It’s kind-of a thing running through this episode, that these dudes who like to paint themselves as killers, ready to go all pro ice on another Rider, they maybe don’t actually have the stomach for it. Kitaoka keeps trying to get Dragreder to finish Shinji off, and Quarter (not in this one a lot!) sort-of has Ren’s number re: probably not a killer. Like, Ren has that cool exterior, the motorcycle and the black leather and the scowl, and he’s constantly telling people It’s Kill Or Be Killed, but, y’know, sort-of hasn’t walked that walk yet. Seems like a lot of big talk, thus far. Even Scissors, who’s the only Rider yet to get killed onscreen, his contract monster is really the one who finishes him off. Ren puts Scissors in that position, arguably, but he doesn’t actually kill him. Could Ren really kill someone? I like that the show leaves that question hanging. It’s cool to have Ren’s version of himself be challenged by Yui and Shinji’s version of him, their belief maybe overcoming his self-deception.
Either way, yes: what I love about this is that somehow the creative team perfectly creates this sense of a ruthless, everyone-for-himself killing game with no holding back... and yet simultaneously are able to perfectly portray the characters as not quite up for it as you said. Usually in cases like this one of those would work really well, and I'd congratulate the writers on it; but then sadly have to say that it unfortunately contradicts the other and they really should have just gone with one or the other. But Ryuki nails them both! It's so strange yet so fantastic and I just have to commend it.
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03-22-2020, 04:42 PM | #159 |
Kamen Ride Or Die
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Quote:
....that said, Raia? No thanks, hard pass, Kamen Rider Quarter forever. Quote:
Either way, yes: what I love about this is that somehow the creative team perfectly creates this sense of a ruthless, everyone-for-himself killing game with no holding back... and yet simultaneously are able to perfectly portray the characters as not quite up for it as you said. Usually in cases like this one of those would work really well, and I'd congratulate the writers on it; but then sadly have to say that it unfortunately contradicts the other and they really should have just gone with one or the other. But Ryuki nails them both! It's so strange yet so fantastic and I just have to commend it.
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03-22-2020, 05:56 PM | #160 |
The Immortal King Tasty
Join Date: Jan 2012
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In all seriousness, though, I just sincerely hope this thread continues to have the effect of getting you to realize you like Ryuki more than you thought, because you've said before Kobayashi shows have had a tendency to become your favorites only after some distance. And the thing is, I totally get that. Not only did it take me way too long to realize just how special OOO is, but reading your post after you finished Ryuki about how maybe she just hadn't figured out her style yet, which I instinctively disagreed with, got me thinking back on her first head writer credit, Gingaman, a show that left me underwhelmed enough when I had finished watching it, I think I called it my least favorite Sentai. Having that occasion to think back on the kinds of characters in that show, and the way their flaws and conflicts were constructed, made me realize just how much of that identity was there right away. The thing that I think most defines Kobayashi's tokusatsu work, besides the humanity anyway (that was there too though), is how she loves to subvert normal aspects of the genre, without necessarily being overly critical or deconstructive, but still asking the viewer to consider things they might not have thought of. And Gingaman, I realize now, was a Showa throwback that had plots that occasionally played out in ways almost antithetical to how a Showa series would handle them. So everything that makes her a great writer, I mean, I still haven't seen Timeranger, but I'm pretty sure even by Ryuki, she knew the kind of stories she wanted to write. I won't blame you if you don't internalize this information right away (I didn't start remembering director names myself until only like a year ago), but for the record, 13 and 14 were by Ryuuta Tasaki, an insanely prolific director for almost the entire Heisei era. You have seen/are seeing/will see his work a ton. I'm not sure he has a particular "thing" the way some others do, but he's certainly got plenty of talent. It's worth noting his first work on Rider was Agito's premiere, which prompted you to specifically comment on how much nicer it looked than a lot of Kuuga. That stylish shot of Shouichi and Ryou brushing past each other? That was him. Quote:
Other people've mentioned it, but this story really lays out the advantages of the shades of grey the show is painting with, story-wise. Maybe it's just watching society collapse around me in real time whenever I read the news these last few days, but Ryuki's playing the There Are No Good Choices card a lot so far. There's this real sense that show isn't explicitly judging Ren or Kitaoka any more than it's judging Quarter or Shinji. Things like Hope and Survival and Desire and Freedom, these things transcend "good" and "evil". It's more fulfilling, more complex if a show can grapple with competing wants and needs, rather than simplistic morality. There's a lot more stories you can tell if everyone's some degree of screwed.
The thing is, producer Shinichirou Shirakura didn't go along with it, realizing that going that direction would basically be saying "the justice you kids believe in is fake, and we know what real justice is", which would just be problematic. He then proceeded to expand on Agito's theme of exploring that everybody has their own idea of what's right, this time tossing in a bunch of extra Riders so that, unlike Agito, viewers couldn't simply come to the conclusion that "Kamen Rider is right". At least I'm pretty sure I'm reading all that correctly? Someone correct me if I'm wrong. This is all news to me too (I only went and checked because I remember hearing the 9/11 thing once), but it does seemingly confirm what I've suspected forever, that Ryuki was the first Heisei show to call the Riders "Kamen Rider" in-series specifically because it wanted viewers to think about what that meant.
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