The Director's Cut of Megamax is still probably my favorite of the crossover movies, even as someone who was pretty neutral towards Fourze.

I love Ultimatum because it's crazy action-packed fanservice. But still, the crossover films of the Generations series are on a completely different level of storytelling and are very good.

Ultimatum is my favorite KR crossover for sure!

I have started rewatching Saban's Masked Rider. That is all I'm going to say for now.

Why would you watch that once, much less again?

Power of Ferbus compels you, I guess.

To make it sound better than what it is: Research purposes.

I haven't seen this show since I was a little kid, and had barely remembered anything about it outside of not really caring for it much.

Plus, I'd been meaning to rewatch all of the non-Power Rangers toku from Saban for awhile now; I'd just been getting sidetracked by other things. Did manage to rewatch Mystic Knights of Tir na Nog a few years ago though, which to my surprise I ended up liking a fair amount. So who knows, maybe Dex and his fish out of water story will manage to win me over in the end.

Aren't some episodes of Masked Rider unavailable?

Florida Scrubs has the complete package. Or at the very least I don't immediately notice any missing.

New mutation enabled?

Okay not that one.

It would've worked plot-wise, but it would be more sensible for a studio to just dub it outright. I’m already doing some reshooting in my series, since I’m introducing original Riders.

I am currently 14 episodes into Saban's Masked Rider and I...

I...

https://i.imgur.com/e4jXXZB.png

I think I actually kinda like this show?

Maybe it's just me being a nostalgic old man for the time this show aired, but you genuinely don't really get Toku shows like this anymore(atleast in the US).

There's just this air of wholesomeness and fun all throughout every episode, and the farther I go in the more I end up surprised as to just how much effort actually did go into its production despite how very obviously low budget it is.

Stuff like very closely matching the outfits Kotaro wears in the episodes they pull stock footage from, or how much consideration the script gives as to the internal logic of each of its characters; Answering questions like "Why don't the bad guys just nuke Dex from orbit?" "Why don't they just send an army of monsters?" and so on.

But really, I think the biggest draw for me so far is actually Dex himself. He's a genuinely good character played by a very likable actor! He's awkward, he's weird, he's a bug alien, and his quirks are played just as much for character development as they are gags. And surprisingly funny gags too!

There's also a surprising amount of world building going on in regards to both Leawood, the town the show takes place in, as well as Edenoi, the planet that Dex comes from. For example, Dex's' people evolved from insects, so not only can he talk to insects, but stuff like bug spray actually makes him sick. It's alot of little things stretched out over the run, but it's all so endearing in its own right. And again, solid character humor comes out of it too.

Having also now seen Black RX, it is actually interesting to me in the ways they repurposed alot of the footage. Sure, a good chunk of it ain't handled the best; Like how US censorship presents Masked Rider from impaling his opponents with his Electro Saber, so he just kinda shoots an energy bolt at them and they blow up, but other ideas are rather interesting like reframing Robo Rider and Bio Rider as different upgrades for the Masked Rider powers, given that Dex isn't a cyborg like Kotaro is.

My good time so far with the show of course lead me to wondering why little me wasn't as into it, I think I might've pinpointed why: Pacing. Now, the pacing isn't bad, I've experienced far worse, even from other Kamen Rider shows, but Masked Rider doesn't have the breakneck "go so fast you don't even have time to think" pacing that classic Power Rangers does, instead slowing things down a bit; and that kinda bites it sometimes? There have definitely been a few episodes so far that felt a bit longer than they actually were, and that's likely where the show lost my attention as a kid.

But, yeah. I'm not gonna claim whether the show is "objectively" good or not, but so far I'm honestly having fun watching it. It's given me alot of laughs both genuine and ironic, and that's alot more than I can say about some of my more disliked Toku shows such as Decade and Build.

You can call it stupid, but atleast it's stupid in the fun way.

Revice's second V-Cinema, Kamen Rider Juuga vs Kamen Rider Olteca!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNe3Bo5Z6JY

Love how it's been half a year and we still only get breadcrumbs on Olteca's new form.

Looks like it'll be a fun TTFC Special though.

Not a V-Cinema but looks terrifying nonetheless

Started watching Kamen Teacher. Not sure if it's Kamen Rider or even tokusatsu, but still the logo is written in the same font as the title of the original 1971 show; the mask of the protagonist, although it represents a slightly more advanced motorcycle helmet, but personally reminded me of the V3; motorcycle disappears after the first episodes :) ; at Tocuzilla the show was also in the rider section (probably because of the Kamen in the title), so I think it's okay if I write about it here. I like that the protagonist not only sticks to his principles, but also what is shown:
a) Why they appeared and are important;
b) How much easier it would be to give them up.

The fight scenes are a delight, and so far the show has been very good at avoiding repetitiveness by introducing new elements like interesting locations or the use of weapons. The dramatic component, albeit predictable, is also catchy. It is clear that in the end all the bad kids will improve, but it is still interesting to watch how the reasons for their behavior are revealed. Opening is awesome. In general, I advise all lovers of dramas, fights and school subjects. But of the costumes, there are only helmets, and there are no monsters at all, so again, classifying this as a tokusatsu is very problematic.
https://tokuzilla.net/wp-content/upl...teacher-01.jpg

Not really. It's just a school action drama manga by the same man who brought us GTO adapted as a live action drama and the protagonist happens to wear a space sheriff-looking helmet when dealing with delinquents.

Kamen Rider Revice Birth of Chimera and Battle Familiar

In preparation for King-Ohger tomorrow, I'm watching the Summer Movies and associated spin-off today!

I already knew Jiraiya's actor was going to be portraying the main villain, Kamen Rider Daimon, but I was pleasantly surprised to see Sasuke's and Tsuruhime's actors and Takaiwa Seiji as well. As a Kakuranger fan, I loved this partial reunion!

Despite my apprehension, the movie was pretty decent. It cleans up all the loose ends for the show's Gif plot, or rather the plot, since those last 4 episodes didn't really go anywhere.

We learn that there was a second person who made a deal with Gif. Unlike Akaishi, Azuma seemed more sincere in his devotion to humanity's moral development, than sucking up to some space stone devoid of charisma. He's a solid movie villain, bringing back Jiraiya's use of English to add some flair to his performance and his cynical philosophy of prioritizing the many over the few is an apt contrast to Ikki's Ultimate Busybody behavior of wanting to help everybody.

For a Revice movie though, the latter half of that name sadly doesn't get much focus, unlike his brief development in Beyond Generations. The final battle is between Revi and Daimon, while Vice just sits it out. He doesn't even get a chance to resist the brainwashing, which is completely unaffected by his tight bond with Ikki. Their partnership is irrelevant in this movie, which seems weird considering other movies like Gaia Memories of Fate and Be The One, which strongly emphasize the power of those partnerships.

I enjoyed the Deadmans reunion. Even though Tamaki regrets a lot of his past, it was sweet that he still fondly recalls his time with them enough to have kept their old outfits for such an occasion. It's the closest we've seen him get to Olteca since their divide without trying to punch him, so maybe there's some hope for them to make up someday.

Although I'm not sure why Olteca even agreed to help clean up George's mess in the first place, as George said that even with the reduced sentence, it's still longer than his natural lifespan. Maybe that'll come up in the Juuga VS Olteca special we're getting soon. Nevertheless, it was nice to see Tamaki, Olteca and Aguilera working together again.

Pretty cool how the inner angel theory finally got confirmed here, with Yukimi awakening her power to return the brainwashed devils to her kids' side. It's thematically appropriate that she'd have the angel, being the heart and MVP of the family and the one who previously saved Genta's soul in the Vail series. Yukimi may not have power like the devils and devil-humans, but her love for her family and desire to protect them can also create a strong miracle like this.

Even though this movie isn't written by Takahashi, it still does the thing where someone comments on Geats' fox motif. Some things never change, huh?

I liked the song that played during Kamen Rider Igarashi's fight scene. It sounded like the usual background instrumental music for the show, but now with added lyrics.

Overall, not a bad movie, definitely better than I was dreading, definitely a lot better than RealTime, but didn't blow me away like Book of Ruin did with its more focused approach to that show's themes. As a Summer Movie, the first of its kind to actually be released in Summer since Over Quartzer, I think Battle Familiar accomplished the minimum of what I was looking for, which is fair praise for my otherwise low standards of Revice.

I wasn't lying! I have infact been watching Stronger!

Just got done watching episode 13, which marks the end of the first "arc" if you could even call it that.

And this show is uh... interesting. I kinda called it in that it sure as heck is simplistic, but also fun! Probably most uniquely for basically every toku show I've seen so far is that Stronger kinda doesn't have a plot.

I don't just mean an overarching plot either. I mean you're lucky if even individual episodes have stories outside of "watch Stronger clown on some Black Satan fools utilizing the lowest budget that Rider has ever had." The closest we get is Shigeru's' backstory, which is hilariously info-dumped in like three sentences.

Speaking of Shigeru, this dude has to be the template for the a-hole Riders we'd see in the future, right? He has so many moments of just being a total showboat-y jerk, but his actor is so charismatic that it comes across more comical than it does malicious. Though I could easily see modern viewers having a problem with the way he treats Yuriko half the time.

As for Yuriko, I do respect that she's (arguably) the first female hero/Rider in the franchise, but man, I feel so bad for her. Her track record is terrible -- so far having only two definitive wins in terms of fights, and alot of times serves as the jobber of the cast. And like I said, Shigeru treats her pretty poorly, like the time Tackle fell off a cliff and he didn't even care! He just left her there! I like the duo as characters but jeez man!

But speaking of characters, I gotta know, is it a standard for pre-Super-1 Showa Rider shows to get rid of their extremely cool second-in-command villain to be replaced by a way lamer one? First it happened with General Monster in Skyrider, and now here with Mister Titan. Mister Titan is so cool! His design is simplistic but effective, he has cool powers, and the actor they got for him was charismatic as heck! Dude also had some legit smart plans, to the point that he almost won in his final bout with Stronger.

Sure, the show is very bare bones and basic(and the shoestring budget really shows), but I am having fun with it so far. My biggest question being: What's with the rose motif on Shigeru? Seems kinda weird given Stronger is electricity based, but whatever, it's cool I guess.

At least that's exactly what happened at Amazon. In general, changing enemy generals is a normal practice for many tokusatsu shows, as constant failure deprives the villain auri of threat. Plus, in some cases this serves as an excuse to change the tone of the show, change individual details, take into account the wishes of the audience, in a word. But sometimes it turns out to be a bad decision.

I think Stronger got, er… stronger near the end, when they replace Black Satan with the Delza Army. Having some recurring villains with an ongoing power struggle made for more engaging stories.

I mean, I get all of that, but man, I really would've liked for baddies like Mister Titan and General Monster to stick around more, especially since their replacements do little to impress me.

I look forward to that, especially since General Shadow so far does nothing for me as a villain.

I believe you! Stronger is my second favorite Showa season after V3, so I hope you'll enjoy it more later!

Jo's actor originally auditioned for the role of Akaranger, so I think maybe he used that as inspiration for his long roll call as Stronger. But yeah, Jo has a pretty big ego by Showa standards. He's the only one I know about that has his own Stronger-branded S shirts. I love how he tricks Black Satan in to making him a remodified human, admires his new hands while using them to casually destroy one of their soldiers and then immediately laughs at their misfortune. This also makes him one of the few Showa Riders who became a Rider by choice, instead of being experimented on against his will or as means to save his life.

I liked the novelty of having Electro Wave Human Tackle as a sidekick for the main Rider, but sadly, she performs pretty much as badly as I'd expect from a female sidekick in the 70s. Her cool moments are sparse enough to be counted on one hand, but I assure you she definitely has some cool moments. Other than being a heroine, I like Misaki as a female lead, in a similar way that I like Junko from V3, or Mako and Chiko from X. She's generally likable, I guess. I think it's just nice to have Misaki as this character who's consistently involved in Jo's adventures, rather than mostly hanging around at Tachibana's place.

I've legit loved that call out ever since I first heard it in Skyrider. It's such a great boast!

Yeah, it's very much a "baby steps" sort of thing when it comes to this. I like Tackle as a character, and she is certainly a step up from alot of other female characters in the Showa era, but it's just a shame that the times really wouldn't allow for much else.

I just finished season 1 of Saban's Masked Rider.

And while there've certainly been some rough patches here and there, my overall view of the show hasn't really changed.

So rather than talk about the most current 13 episodes and end up repeating what I said before, I instead wanna turn attention to what is probably the most contentious aspect of the show: Ferbus

https://i.imgur.com/Xbx3khd.png

Even people who've never watched the show know who Ferbus is, as he's essentially the mascot of the show and the thing most people couldn't stand most in the whole affair. And to be honest, while I personally think he's just kinda there, I can easily see why he grew so hated.

Sure there's the common complaints, about Ferbus eating up screentime and being an obnoxious kid-appeal character, but I think the biggest detriment of it all is that Ferbus is a big reason why alot of things in the story either go wrong or are made worse off than what they were, and unfortunately he never learns even when scenarios blow up in his face, and is often easily forgiven.

Episodes 20 and 22 especially will test your patience when it comes to Ferbus, as those two episodes focus almost entirely on him and it's when he's at his absolute worst behavior. Heck, the 20s in general could be considered that, as even in episodes not with him at the forefront he often does something incredibly selfish or stupid that makes things worse for everyone else. It's very easy to hate this little fuzzball.

Do I hate him, and does he ruin the show for me? No, as I have experienced far, far worse, even if we're just strictly talking toku or even just Kamen Rider. But man, even I found myself either rolling my eyes or doing a deep exhale during certain moments or episodes. Luckily though, everyone else in the cast, even if they aren't exactly "deep" in terms of character writing, are likable enough to keep me invested. Especially Dex, who as I've noted before remains a very likable lead.

Similar to my stance on the second half of Super-1 where I said there was fun to be had if you could get passed the kids, there's some genuine heart to various aspects of Masked Rider if you can get passed Ferbus.

This is pretty much word-for-word why I hate Onari from Ghost.

It's a big reason as to why I can't stand JK from Fourze most of the time. Dude nearly gets the cast killed multiple times, and all he ever gets is the equivalent of an "Oh you~."

Finished rewatching Fourze today, which is something I've been taking my sweet time with for a while now (a hair over a year and a half, making this the exact opposite of a binge-watch!), and even with so long to think about it, I mean, there's absolutely no way I can describe how much this show means to me, or how much I've enjoyed finally going back to it in full after a decade. Fourze isn't the show I call my favorite Rider series, but part of that is simply that it transcends such petty labels. This isn't just a show I like a lot; it's something etched into my very soul, and without it, I don't think I'd have stuck around to meet those shows I do call my favorites, let alone make the effort to find a place like this where I can share that love with people who are generous enough to care. Fourze was a hero created to bring cheer to people, and I'll probably never have the words to express the sincere gratitude I feel for all the cheer he's brought me over the years. But even if I can't manage to get across how special Fourze is to me, I can at least leave this post here simply to mark that I have in fact finished watching Fourze through again, and had a great time with it, because it's still as fun as ever, and always will be.

https://i.imgur.com/BfX4K2E.jpg

I rewatched Black with the Discotek subs. If I am infamous for anything on this forum, I hope I am infamous as "that member who thinks Black RX is better than Black". But I do like Black too! I think its reputation is hugely overblown, but the final stretch of episodes is fantastic and it's often very cool looking. I do think that the majority of the show is pretty... standard for the era though. When people think of Black, I think they are usually actually thinking of the really good final stretch and not the silly Showa nonsense that encompasses most of the show. Solid C in my book, so my opinion hasn't changed much. Can't wait to rewatch Black RX soon and find out if my love for it is as strong as ever or entirely misplaced...

I actually think that Black and Black RX are on pretty equal footing, they just execute themselves rather differently. The highlights for Black are definitely its first six episodes and then the final stretch, while everything inbetween is very standard Showa. My current watch of Stronger has only strengthened my viewpoint on that, given all the similarities I've been spotting.

While talking about early riders, I'll write this: Shin deserves more.

You know, I do have Fourze downloaded right now, and have been meaning to start for a couple of weeks now. Maybe this is the impetus I need...

I actually gave Shin Kamen Rider Prologue a watch today. I like the idea here a lot, but the movie itself wasn't very cohesive. The way the movie progresses tends to be equal parts confusing and unintentionally hilarious. Characters and events are thrown at the viewer so fast I spent a lot of time just going "who?!" and trying not to laugh at Shin's telepathic unborn grasshopper-man baby deus ex machina-ing. I... kinda liked it though? It was really unique and definitely one of those things you could only get out of the 90s.

This reminds me. I needed to get back to watching Kamen Rider Fourze at some point especially since I have 20 episodes left to the series.

^ Aaaaaaannnnnnndddddddddd speaking of Fourze, I am now officially back to watching said series and I almost forgot how much I really enjoyed the show's main cast and how much fun this show really is.

Revice Forward Live & Evil & Demons got subbed, so I just watched it.

I wouldn't call it a bad movie, but it does feel kind of pointless. The plot of the villains, Alicorn, is quite ridiculous, like they're able to create genetic clones of people in a few hours. Revealing Muramasa to be one of these, instead of Hiromi's devil, left me thinking, "hey, what exactly does this have to do with the story of Revice?" Honestly, it feels more like a Ghost V-Cinema, with all these superpowered artificial lifeforms and a character from a religious background becoming an amateur detective (Aguilera's really bad at this, the evil-dressed Masamura tells her that the good-dressed Hiromi is the devil and she doesn't even question it).

The movie is carried mostly by the charisma of its three protagonists, but I don't feel like it does anything new with these characters. Daiji has to learn to trust Kagerou. Hiromi has to gamble [x] to save someone. It's all safe and meh, in a way that I can appreciate for not being bluntly offensive like a lot of Revice, but I would've liked a different scenario that challenged the protagonists on a deeper personal level, instead of just showing us stuff we already know about them. It was nice to see BLUEBIRD in action, at least, as the true fulfillment of Daiji's righteous desire to protect humanity's freedom and peace.

To be honest, after a year, I have such an impression of everything related to Revice left.

It's about Daiji, of course it feels pointless. Dude is literally the middle child of Revice in every sense of the term.

Still need to watch it but given the movie is about Daiji and Hiromi, two people who aren't exactly the most interesting? Yeah it makes sense that it's got this middle of the road vibe I've been hearing from everyone.