I recently came to that exact realization. Last night, actually, while watching ToQger.

I'm really loving ToQger so far, especially Episode 2. I'm also really loving Gaim, but they're drastically different shows.

Which made me ask myself, "self, what would be different between your ideal Super Sentai show and your ideal Kamen Rider show?" And I came to the same conclusion.

My ideal Sentai would have a heavy emphasis on character and intra-team relationships. The overarching plot would never overshadow the characters' relationships. And the show would tackle weighty issues like death and betrayal, but in a lighthearted way that introduces those concepts to kids, almost like in a fairy tale.

On the other hand, my ideal Kamen Rider would have a much heavier emphasis on story and conspiracies that explore the moral gray areas between good and evil. There would be strong characters, too, but they'd be used in service of a larger story-based agenda.

It's funny that sentai has more characters but less character focus than Rider. You think that since Rider has less people on screen it could put more more into fights, but then nope, it's the other way round. A big reason why I love Rider so much more than Sentai is because it feels like an actual show, where plot and character are actually important, rather than just after thoughts like they often are in sentai.

That is probably a huge reason why I loved Goseiger, it was nowhere near perfect but every member of the cast was fleshed out, they each had a purpose and the show dedicated a huge amount of time to character focus. Similar to Go-Busters, in many ways Goseiger felt a lot closer to Rider than it does to its super sentai brethren, I think they got around that by having a ridiculous overkill mecha gimmick. It is a far cry from the likes of Dairanger, a show with so little character focus even the Red vanished in the background.

I find the best sentai shows do have a strong character emphasis. Gokaiger, Jetman, Dekaranger, Goseiger. And even Magiranger, now that it's starting to get good, is heavy on the character development -- even if those characters are still pretty annoying.

Wait, there was character focus in Gokaiger? When did that happen?

Every episode that wasn't a tribute episode. And... a lot of the tribute episodes.

This question is sort of baffling to me. I think the Gokaigers are crazy well drawn.

I don't. I honestly felt that the Gokaigers were some of the least developed characters we've had. We had glimpses of their backstories, but the only ones who developed beyond one episode were Don and Marvelous (Joe had a story arc, but it did fuck all for his character).

Nah the Dairangers are the least developed ever.

I only got to, like, episode 5 of Dairanger before dropping it, so I can't really comment on them.

I think Luka is really the only one who didn't have much of an arc. They all go on a journey from specifically unheroic to heroic.

But maybe even if they don't change a ton over the series, I think they were so strongly conceived to start with that maybe they didn't need to. IMO, their personalities were incredibly clear from frame one, and their unique perspectives influenced everything they did.

This and this.