I would disagree on that though. Like, very very heavily disagree.

And that's fine; I can see why someone would get the exact opposite impression. Personally though, I don't see any of it as Inoue actively trying to give some sort of free pass to stuff like that.

Oh, absolutely. The one in the casino! Where it's Otoya betting Red as Black wins about 7000 times in a row! And then he pays off a bet by telling the crowd he charges a billion yen for a violin lesson! And there will not be any change given!

So, I'll play Devil's Advocate on this one and maybe point out that Inoue having the other characters treat Otoya's more-or-less criminal activity as somewhere between Wacky Hijinks and There's No Fixing Him... I mean, that's pretty much Inoue giving Otoya a free pass. Letting a Otoya continue to be terrible while pointing out he's terrible... it's not a great move for the writer on a kid's show. This isn't Mad Men, you know? It's Kamen Rider, and there is maybe something to be said for these characters having a moral code that keeps Otoya from interacting with the plot.

(Counterpoint: I like that Yuri brought up how Otoya's massive character flaws to her boss and he was just like As Long As He Doesn't Get Killed I Don't Care What Else He Does. That is a writer who is aware that Otoya is awful, and lets Yuri by the one to protest his continued involvement. She's trying to fix things!)

My only true calling in life is complaining about Inoue, and I feel a bit hesitant about venturing my opinion here, because I don't want to be seen as trampling on anyone's feelings, or being in Inoue's corner, nor do I want to be seen as defending Otoya, who is an obnoxious caricature—and yet, unintentional as it may have been, his behaviour is pretty consistent with the show's 1980s setting. :p

I'm conflicted because I feel that zero consideration was afforded to the idea of how Otoya would appear to anyone not involved in trying to make a weekly TV show out of a toy-line in 2008, and part of why we are having this conversation is because things have changed so very much in the last 10 years or so in the way we are talking about the issues that Otoya is a lightning rod for, but also because... I think I prefer the idea of a main character who is demonstratively awful to the idea of a character who is a blank space, the kind of stock character that producers hope children will imprint on, and draw a connexion between their own fantasies and the power fantasy that the toys embody.

I guess I'm thinking about this too much, but also this is the week where I came dangerously close to being cancelled for suggesting that it was possible to read a villain from Sailor Moon as a tragic character in contrast to her archetype in Greek mythology, rather than as just The Source of All Evil, so this is a very 2021 sort of vibe for me. There seems to be an increased need/demand for purity of motive in fiction from audiences lately, and an increasing level of vitriol in regards to characters who don't meet those standards, and, even worse people who like these characters, and it's a very weird time we're having culturally in the west right now, I feel.

tl;dr Inoue is awful, Otoya is awful, but the work is very much the product of its context. It is impossible not to engage with that to some degree, but adjacent to all this, there is this theme of motherhood that I keep coming back to, and it stays my hand hand each time I consider going to Inoue's house and burning it down.

Why is this reply so long? Guys, I don't even really like this show.

I think it's (and this is a little hard to write because a- Inoue Forever, and b- I genuinely enjoy Otoya's whole thing) Otoya's proximity to the plot that makes his period-appropriate grossness so... unavoidable? Otoya seems to permeate this show, the core of what it's saying and how it's saying it, so making him someone that needs to be either ignored (good luck!) or redeemed (tough hill to sled) is maybe way more trouble than it's worth. You have to forgive a ton to look past him. (That, or, like, be on an Inoue Forever wavelength.) I don't begrudge anyone who'd hope that a writer would make enjoying a show designed to sell toys to Japanese children something that wasn't shackled to representations of masculinity that were tired and objectionable even back in 2008. There is a level of verisimilitude that I am okay with the Decorative Vampire Monster-Detenotation Show maybe omitting.

Or maybe I'm getting other people's objections all wrong! Either way, sincerely, I'm happy for folks to talk about their objections to Kiva. It enriches the experience for me, and I'd never want someone to feel uncomfortable pushing back on parts they find problematic.

I absolutely agree, we should always ask for more, we should always ask for better, especially considering how horrible the world we live in is. I have so many feelings about this, and I struggle to find the words to express this over and over again, and, well, then you sadly end up with me being all emotional in your thread (sorry!).

I just... I'm all about Death of the Author, about knowing as little about the person behind the work as possible, but it's impossible not to see the values and politics of the time in which a work was made reflected in its telling, I guess, and there is a lot of 2008 in Kiva. That's what I'm trying to say.

I don't know, I personally hated 2008. I'll put a pin in this, as I want to come back to talking about Otoya later on.

(every one of my paragraphs in this post began with "I". That's awful.)

You're sharing your experience with art! That's basically the whole point of this thread! "I" statements are perfectly acceptable!

To your point about Death of the Author... that's nearly always my take. I don't care what Inoue meant, I care what he made. In general, that actually lets me get more out of his work than he probably intended. Like, I've called his work on Faiz "accidentally progressive", because I find it hard to believe he was making a show in 2004 that could be read (and read thoroughly) as being analogous to the struggles a marginalized community has inside of a larger culture. It's there, but I'm not sure he knows it's there. You know?

Anyway, hi, yes, Otoya. Definitely going to be a lightning rod for discussion for the next couple months, and I am very much looking forward to folks sharing their thoughts (respectfully!) on Wataru's dad and the specific era/culture he represents. No such thing as a wrong opinion, as long as you can respect opposing views.

I am actually excited to see so much debate! Y'all are my favorite type of fans!

You're far too kind, thank you. I absolutely agree with you on Faiz as well, there must have been something in the water during the time in which Inoue was working on that show. I remember when I read about the idea of disidentification, about the notion of children who felt like outsiders reading their experiences as comparative with some unlikely candidates in pop culture, and I feel there's a lot in Faiz and Kiva that could lend itself to such readings, and may indeed be the root of why I keep going on about themes of maternal relationships here.

I'm looking forward to this too! These are the kind of threads that keep me refreshing the forum every day.

The Peter Venkman of Kamen Rider. Thank you folks y'all far too kind. *mic drop and walks away*

Though you frighten me with your proud declaration of bad person for this stuff, I'll still say; people can like any kind of characters, no matter what their alignments are, because interesting, deep, or enjoyable isn't related to alignments (although I wish for toleration for any kind of characters, not declaring certain character as bad because "it's not my type I like"). What people can't is 'whitewash' them and excuse their morally bad aspects. People can like them and find them interesting while acknowledging the negative traits. And in the inverse talking about the character's flaws and show objections to them ≠ hating the character. DreamSword says that it's not a problem when the show itself acknowledges that what a character is saying or doing isn't 100% okay, well, the media, the show tend to give those characters the comeuppance or at least (if they're competent enough to escape), the well-deserved scorn, it's the fans who tend to defy that.

And for Otoya as parent, well, for Wataru to be born, you have to be faithful to 1 woman, and keep that until you're married, as both father and mother are required to make the child born. That'd be the opposite of what's Otoya doing here, which is taking someone's woman away in a violent way (picking fight with him), and later seeing another woman, ditches that woman (for the relief of his victim) for that another woman immediately. Like I said before I know little about Kiva, but Otoya may've redeemed after that to actually stay faithful to 1 woman and start a family.

And again I want to ask for the contrasting reaction between this and a previous series. Here, you think Wataru facing the reality of his dad's past is relatable and this part has him apologizing to others for Otoya and likely blaming himself for their misfortunes, but before in a series like Blade, you think the idea that something someone's father did without knowledge and prevention gives enormous weight equals to them being unable to function as a person and that you can't relate for "I Must Atone For My Family’s Misdeeds"? That parents aren't extension or reflection of the child and thus is their own people and responsible of their own actions?

[QUOTE=Kamen Rider Die;799693]Most of the rest of this one is given over to Megumi’s lack of satisfaction with her job, and that was a blast to watch. Her getting surly at Mal d’Amour (thank you, subtitles, because I could not figure out why Maid’Amour didn’t have a single maid) (also, naming the cafe in the gothic tokusatsu show “Heartbreak”... INOUE FOREVER!) at Wataru and Shizuka was nicely unnecessary, her just taking her frustration out on these two awkward children.

Here lies another one of Wataru's problems. He's a doormat, he doesn't like to refuse people, and therefore has needlessly subscribing into several newspapers. And as you said Megumi dunks on a child, it's clear here as Wataru didn't cause anymore problems, and she just mocks his poor social skills. And Shizuka defending Wataru as trying hard to change should mean that not every of those bad words can be dismissed as purely banter, especially, especially that people like Wataru is commonly ostracized irl, with all the badmouthings like that, though I feel that Megumi's words to him are more like brutally honest parent.

Well yeah, in this episode, Nago seems completely heroic and charming, although calm and collected. But from what I read, he's not all it seems. I haven't gone through it fully obviously yet of course, but he'd remind me of Yaguruma from Kabuto. At first glance too, Yaguruma seems to be the knight in shining armor type to fight off monsters and save people, while also being a good leader to his men, but he has plethora of dark traits later.

IMO, that'd mean it's not the problem of split timeline premise, but the Fangire handling though. The split timeline premise is of course, in line with phase 1 series being experimental, and thus making those seasons more controversial, but split timeline premise can be done without giving same Fangire for 1986 and 2008 timelines to fight.

I think Otoya is the closest to the Kuroto of Kiva. What do you think for the Kuroto fanbase by that?