Black Hole Message is always on-topic.

Thank you Mariachi Band, very cool. I'll ask my friend to see if this lines up with his project on Black Holes and what comes out of them.

Not about Rider alone, but I recently learned that Kusaka Kaixa's actor played Bud Zyuohger and... the knowledge has done damage to me on all levels except physical.

Oh Kaixa, truly a despicable Rider if there's ever been one

Uh, I watched two entire OOO episodes about Showa-era Kamen Rider, so, pretty much an expert.

Meanwhile, I was calling him Kaixa Bird all the way through Zyuoh, and I haven't seen a single episode of Faiz.

This did remind me of how they roped in three Sentai members (well, two Sentai and a Kikaider) to play the future Riders in Zi-O. I still think it's a missed opportunity that they never came back in anyway, even just as suits in the final battle. Oh well.

The one that still gets me is that the pink Kiramager was Spectre's little sister on Ghost. At the risk of oversharing, I find her rather attractive on that new show and it makes me feel like the biggest creep.

Well, console yourself with the fact that, at your creepiest, you'll never be as creepy as Makoto having this dream sequence:

https://challengerscomics.com/images/kr/ghost/316.png

It's like they're well aware that Kamen Rider tends to have sister issues, so they just went ahead and make it borderline incestous lol.

And even funnier, this came after Drive! You know, the one series where brother-sister relationship is portrayed healthily?

Finished Ex-Aid last night. Fun series, good ride start to finish. Not my favorite series but one of the better ones I've watched

Oh god, I'd forgotten about that. Even by Ghost standards that was random and messed up.

Don't forget, she spends the first dozen episodes happily living inside her brother's pocket, soooo...

On a less squicky note, Ex-aid, it's real good.

I want to like talk about Graphite and how like he remains a bad guy despite being against the bigger bad, and how they turn his weaker points into strengths by straight up saying that what he wanted to do was be a boss monster and have a glorious fight to the death.

She was also an eyeball, it's not as weird as it sounds at first glance.

It's possibly weirder.

I'll agree with that. He was kinda generic for the first arc, but when they brought him back, and everyone else had grand plans and maniacal dreams, he was kinda lovable for just wanting to fight. It's what he was programmed for, after all. Plus, his final scene. Top quality stuff.

I feel like as a whole Bugsters were meant to be one note. Theu only know what their programmed to do. Race, be a battle robot, be a samurai(?) Graphite just wanted to be the boss of his game, be the ultimate challenge at the end.

It's something that show did really well, taking motivations that could seem one-note and just drilling into them until every possible facet had been explored. That made it so each Bugster's story or arc got to feel like it really valued them as a villain.

Okay, maybe not Salty. He never ever matters.

He's the starter boss, he's there to teach players how to play the game

Speaking of one note, due you think due to the convoluted way Kuroto came back is why he is extra unhinged when he's back as a Bugster

None of the taisen movies were very good, but I kinda miss having three Rider movies in a year.

Even if they suffered all the same problems of having superfluous cameos and making the sight of fifty suits fighting in front of explosions incredibly boring, there was usually some other fun thing going on like a movie-exclusive character.

I even thought that the Ichigo movie showed that they didn't -have- to be the shallow fightfests they all were up until that point (until Ex-Aid's movie the next year went back to their usual formula).

Maybe one day Rider will get big enough again to warrant one extra big budget feature in a year. Random cameo from Super Sentai optional, assuming Sentai is still around by then. ...Yeah, call me cynical but I wouldn't be surprised if the Sentai thirty-minute films one day just get moved to being direct-to-dvd specials so that the Rider summer films can be full length features.

So, I'm on my phone a minute ago, and there's a news story from Tokusatsu Network about a bunch of Sentai music getting put up on streaming music services like Spotify and Apple Music. (It covered here, too, but I didn't notice before.) "Huh," I thought, "I subscribe to Apple Music. It's too bad I'm not into Sentai. I wish they'd release some Kamen Rider music, but it's probably not big enough in the US for them to bother. I don't know, I'll check anyway, lemme just type in Kamen RiOH SHIT there's decades of music available!"

You all probably already know this, but I sure didn't, and now that I can listen to the Drive theme song everywhere I'm not sure I'll ever listen to anything else.

It got me curious, though, about how into the music of Kamen Rider other fans are. I don't really spend a lot of time listening to the fight songs or even most of the openings outside of the context of watching an episode. I like some, a lot, but it's not the sort of thing I listen to on its own. Maybe now I will?

(That said, I have fallen down a rabbit hole or two of watching YouTube videos of people covering Kamen Rider songs in weird ways, piano versions of rock songs, that kind of thing.)

How about you? Do you find yourself listening to Kamen Rider music when you aren't watching Kamen Rider shows? How often? Any unusual faves?

Rider music hell yeah I honestly believe that Rider has created some of the best music ever and been listening to OP,ED,Inserts,OST you name it every day for the last 5 years. As for any unusual picks the unused BeatChaser 2000 and the rarely used MACHINE TORNADOR makes me wished we still make inserts for the bikes themselvrs but with how little they used the bikes nowadays I guess they saw no point in it.

My phone playlist used to be filled with every rider opening and a whole bunch inserts. I shifted to a new phone and currently only have all the Build songs, but it will all come back eventually...

It's been a long time since I listened to it, but I had Black's soundtrack (aka the best Rider OST ever) as part of my work mix several years ago.

Even worse with Gamedeus, as he's programmed to be a little more than a generic video game final boss with standard villain banters. Probably it's more due to Masamune handling that, where it shows how little Masamune is invested to the games compared to Kuroto and only used Gamedeus to spread pandemic.

While I don’t listen to it that often, I’m in the camp that thinks Kiva has the best soundtrack of any Heisei Rider show.

Yes! Basically all the time! I've never been a big music person to begin with, which for whatever reason resulted in toku songs filling that void hard. Memorizing the lyrics to Rider openings and insert themes was legitimately a huge part of how I started learning Japanese.

As for the "unusual faves" bit... I'm not totally sure any of my real favorites are that unusual, so here's Micchi singing a catchy jingle about how all his actions are totally justified and also how empty he is inside instead.

I love Rider music, though what tracks I like shifts around a lot. ... good thing there's a lot of Rider music to choose from! I can't really get bored when I'm going between Build's soundtrack and WBX and Ghost's phenomenal emotional score and Zi-O's vocal tracks and Kuuga's subtle beats. It's such a wonderful selection and I'm so into it

I've got a ton of Kamen Rider music on several of my playlists on Spotify. There's a ton of stuff available on Spotify, if you know how to find it. Mainly insert songs and openings/endings, but I've also found a few soundtracks. Build's in particular I adore

"Gekitou" from Kuuga is my favorite BGM from the series, so it's part of my massive playlist. And to anyone who's heard Gekitou and played the game I'm about to compare it with, just try telling me it doesn't sound like a song from Legend of Dragoon.

Is Izu really that popular in Japan? Other than Kuroto Dan I don't think there has been this push for non-Rider character in merchandising form let alone a female non-Rider character!

I feel like it might be as simple as a shift in their way of doing things. Maybe in general there's been fan demand for merch of non-rider characters and they decided to start doing it with Zero-One; I wouldn't be surprised. Heck, it coincides with Seihou SHFs of Ankh and Momotaros getting released, so there seems to be something to that!

The only thing that I don't like about the 1971 Kamen Rider show is some of the sexism. I know the show is a product of its time, but I still don't like it. Something can be a product of its time and still be great, but still have bad subtext and imagery to them (As seen in movies like Fantasia and the original King Kong).

Oh yeah totally, you can still dislike something while understanding that it was like, inevitable for the time and we should do better now. Like, I take vitamins every day because I have to for my health; but it sure as heck doesn't mean I like the taste -- they're awful! Haven't had a single good-tasting vitamin in my life.

So, I don't know why I thought of this, and I don't know if this is even the right thread to bring it up, but here goes:

Can we talk about having snacks while watching Kamen Rider?

I don't usually snack when I'm watching subbed shows. I get scared I'm going to turn my head to grab a handful of snacks and I'm going to miss some crucial piece of dialogue, then I'll have to skip back to see what I've missed. That, or I have to pause it every time I want to have a snack. It's weird! I'm weird!

What about you, though? Do you snack when you're watching Kamen Rider? If so, do you have a go-to snack? Even better, do you have specific snacks for specific series? Mayo on everything when you watch Wizard, for instance?

I'm super curious about what you all are eating when you watch Kamen Rider! Because I'm weird!

Not typically no. I tend to get way too engrossed in whatever I'm watching(KR or otherwise) to consciously reach for anything to snack on, lol.

That said, I always have a drink on hand. I'm a thorsty boi in general, so I tend to sip on fruit juice or whatever pop I'm feeling that day during my binges. And ESPECIALLY when watching with friends.

Looking back, not really. I'm don't really snack very often, so the only time I might be eating and watching kr is probably dinner. Even then, if its a new episode I probably wouldn't want to eat anything anyways, likewise out of fear of missing something important. If I'm rewatching something and its dinner, then maybe I'll have something "soft" as I wouldn't want any crunch sounds getting in the way of the ost.

My pot sticker intake generally increases anytime I've been watching a lot of Ryuki.

I'm not sure you'd call it a "snack," but Daimajin Kanon sent me off on a reasonably lengthy quest to find jasmine tea. It took awhile, but it's become my go-to ice tea ever since I watched that show.

Probably not because snacking can affect my focus while watching, and it's confusing searching what suitable snacks anyway. I have to keep my hand clean too if I wanted a quick rewind/pause in an episode in case I missed something.

I apparently take this far less seriously than other people, because I used to watch an episode of Kamen Rider Blade with lunch when I was working from home. Although that was only a sandwich and yoghurt. Otherwise, nothing specific, I don't prep snack specifically to watch stuff.

I definitely snack while I watch. While the snack varies a good degree between chips and jerky to actual lunch foods, I can eat and drink while watching a sub. Doing so during the comedic moments helps since those jokes tend to go over my head anyway