Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die (Post 821464)

There?s a fight where it looks like Fourze cycles through all 40 Switches, which is nuts. I expect some form changes in a movie, but to use literally every suit and power-up? Between both of the show?s Riders? In one extended fight scene? Crazy. Completely over-the-top!

Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich (Post 821480)

Meteor told him not to arbitrarily call himself a Kamen Rider! Haruto is just being a good listener, Die!

Originally Posted by DreamSword (Post 821481)

The action in the movie was good, but overall I didn't care for it too much. As the one guy who is dead neutral to Fourze, the ending to both this and the TV show felt really hamfisted and undeserved.

Originally Posted by Androzani84 (Post 821492)

Let?s face it, one of the issues with featuring a character before their series has begun airing/production/writing is that there?s bound to be a few things that don?t seem off when you get to the series proper (Eiji carrying his own Core Medals, Gaim doing a Rider Kick, Takeru being essentially a floating zombie and that?s just some notable Rider examples)

Originally Posted by Androzani84 (Post 821492)

Let?s face it, one of the issues with featuring a character before their series has begun airing/production/writing is that there?s bound to be a few things that don?t seem off when you get to the series proper (Eiji carrying his own Core Medals, Gaim doing a Rider Kick, Takeru being essentially a floating zombie and that?s just some notable Rider examples)

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die (Post 821490)

The bit in this movie where Gentarou is in tears because he accidentally caused a computer he was trying to befriend to commit suicide... I can see that not working for some people! It's a very big swing, even for Gentarou. I loved it for its simplicity (Gentarou doesn't want anything bad to happen to his friends, no matter what they are), but it's weird for how little presence XVII has in the actual narrative by this point. Fourze's all big emotions! Like teenagers!

Originally Posted by Switchblade (Post 760666)

Kamen Rider Fourze: The Movie: Everyone Translates The Catchphrase Differently!

In which Gentaro does the friendship handshake with a space station.

So, complete honesty time here. This movie is one of the main reasons I wanted to rewatch Fourze. I first saw it months after the show ended and it really drove home for me how much I liked all of the characters (which, considering I watched it while Wizard was airing, hit extra hard). I haven't watched it again since then and there are a lot of details from it that I kinda halfway remembered. I knew that a bunch of characters threw Astro Switches for Gentarou, for example, but I couldn't remember if that happened here or on the show proper. Ditto for seeing a lot of the other teachers again (Nao Nagasawa, Alternative Zero, etc.). Other parts, like the fight that uses all 40 switches, I do remember clearly.

Seeing the movie again, the first thing that struck me is how this is pretty much the textbook Koichi Sakamoto film. If I ever wanted to teach a class on his style, I could just show off this film: crazy action scenes, lots of wire work, vehicle chases, swooping cameras, Nao Nagasawa and/or Ayumi Kinoshita, and at least one sexy lady doing martial arts (in this case the film's two biggest guest stars: Mikie Hara). That's not a critique, necessarily, especially since he was already Fourze's main action director and the movie gave him a bigger budget to blow up CGI with. At the same time, though, it does feel a little familiar given how much Sakamoto has worked on tokusatsu shows in the last couple decades.

As for the story, this is where I find myself a little conflicted. The movie is a lot shorter than I remember it being - only a little over an hour - and the pacing is pretty weird. Parts of it rush by really fast - I was surprised to find that we were already up to the Wizard cameo after just 25 minutes (the early Rider cameos always surprise me, even when I know they're coming - they always feel so random and forced). Other parts of the film just crawl, though. The returning character/Switch montage was really cool but it felt like it dragged on forever (as a side note, I swear there was at least one totally random new character in there that I do not remember from the series). The overall story was relatively straightforward, though, with a pretty decent plot twist going into the third act.

The villains were a little flat as characters, but they still bear a specific mention. There's this thing that Fourze did with this and the Wizard Movie War that's both pretty cool and really weird at the same time. This film's villains are reimagined versions of the heroes from an old Ishinomori tokusatsu called Kyodain. Other Kyodain designs are used for the good aligned robot and the little security drones inside the space station (I think the station is also from something, but I'm not 100% sure). Toei would pull a similar trick with Inazuman and Akumaizer 3 in the Movie War. I still think it's a neat use of older concepts from shows that will never get a follow-up, although it's a shame that most were used as villains.

We also got the Fusion States suit, which is both incredibly ugly yet not as bad as I remembered. At least it didn't have skis.

Your drinking game for this movie is any time Miu says "Oops" or Shun's twinkle sound effect plays.

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die (Post 821494)

Oh, for sure. I'm not mad about a completely different creative team getting minor details about a character wrong, especially when that character's actual creative team is still nailing down those minor details. There's a bit of guess-work that comes with an Early-Bird debut, and I'm okay with that trade-off.

Still, it's funny to get a look into the, like, embryonic versions of these characters. Funny to see how it's just that little bit wrong.

Originally Posted by Frontier (Post 821495)

Random thing I remember is Cosmic States (or was it Meteor Fusion States?) riding Fourze's bike. Like, how often do we actually see the Rider, in their Final Form, ride the bike?

Originally Posted by Frontier (Post 821495)

The scene of everyone coming together to help Gentaro reminded me a lot of when the W supporting cast/past cases cheered on Kamen Rider and that gave W their new power up to finish Eternal. You might not remember some of the characters who they show, but you can still appreciate the sentiment.

Originally Posted by Switchblade (Post 821499)

Gentarou is absolutely the kind of dude who would have an emotional breakdown from a five-second commercial. It is physically impossible for him to not get immediately emotionally invested in everything.

Originally Posted by Sylarking (Post 821501)

Never liked they old superheroes into villains. Its disrespectful.