KAMEN RIDER KIVA - SERIES WRAP-UP

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I don't know what to do with this show.

I enjoyed watching it. I'm going to say that right up front, since I feel like a lot of what's going to come next will sound like I didn't have a good time. I found this show's mix of humor, drama, and earnest examinations of love to be a generally positive and unique experience. It was a show that tried a bunch of different things, approached A Kamen Rider Story in some idiosyncratic ways, and left me glad that I watched it. I had fun.

I don't know if the show was that good, though.

I remember making some comparisons to Ghost at the beginning of this thread, and I'm reminded of my final takeaway for that series here: Not as bad as you've heard, not as good as you'd hope. (I feel like Ghost has grown in my memory, though, so take that with a grain of salt.) There are intensely problematic elements that the show mostly skates away from, and bizarre side characters that become integral to the storytelling. There were episodes in this series that made me cry from their beauty, and ones that were the worst Kamen Rider episodes I've ever seen. Quality-wise, it's all over the place. Even within individual episodes, you could have clever scenes followed by stupid scenes followed by beautiful scenes followed by crass scenes. Every character had at least one multi-episode storyline that was embarrassing, and every single character had an arc that included moments of poignant clarity. Big tent, this show. Contained multitudes.

The plot of this series... I think it might be my favorite part? Maybe? It's not like it amounted to much, in the end. Bishop was an idea, not really a threat. King was a threat, but not really an idea. The Fangire culture never felt like a thing, despite all of the royal trappings and pressure on their leadership. But there was a fluidity to the storytelling that I really enjoyed. After Den-O, which would have these lurching Time To Care About Sakurai Again switch-ups in tension and stakes, to have a show that slowly and deliberately evolved its world and expanded its focus? I liked that. I never felt like the Fangire storytelling got in the way of the character storytelling. (God, sometimes it was the other way around, especially in the last few episodes.) The world-building for Kiva was solid and unobtrusive, creating just enough friction for these characters to sharpen up against it. Nothing ever felt like wheel-spinning, and there clearly wasn't a huge rush to resolve things at the finale. It was just a solid world in which to tell some stories about superheroes and love.

I don't know if I liked these characters, though.

I mean, I liked the stories that were told with and about these characters. Nago's quest to accept that he may have a flaw or two, Megumi's inability to compartmentalize her work and personal lives (she marries her co-worker!), Kengo's constant and abiding friendship and decency, Shima's constant and abiding terribleness as a boss, Yuri's steadfast warrior spirit, Otoya's steadfast horny spirit, that time Jiro ate a domino... they are memorably weird characters, and that's no small thing.

But, like, I'm okay saying goodbye to them? For most Kamen Rider shows, reaching the finale is bittersweet. We have to say goodbye to these characters, sometimes forever. The Hibiki finale was almost explicitly about that, and it hits like a punch in the gut. (Sorry to bring up the second half of Hibiki without a Content Warning.) It can suck to lose the characters, even as another show, another set of friends, is on the horizon.

I don't really feel that sad about saying goodbye to these weirdos. I'm okay with their story being done, even as I enjoyed it. This isn't Den-O, where you had such a good time going on an adventure with your monster friends that you will keep riding the rails until Ryotaro quits to go have a film career, and you'll still keep going anyway. This is like... this is like gorging yourself on a type of snack. You eat so much of it that you get nauseous thinking of having it ever again. It was good - you wouldn't've eaten so much if it wasn't - but you would never ask for more of it. These characters and their journeys... I am okay putting them away for good.

Thematically, I liked a lot of what it was saying, even if I don't think it was saying the same thing all the way through. I'm not sure if it's supposed to mirror Wataru's growth as a man, but I liked the show moving from Wataru's lack of self-definition into Wataru's need for connection into Wataru's self-determination into Wataru's need for love. There's a fuzziness to it, maybe, where certain early themes fell by the wayside. (Boy, Inoue pretty much got sick of talking about art and artists, didn't he?) And the larger theme of Love, using that to encompass both familial and romantic love was sort of tricky, and not entirely successful. (Basically, once Wataru gets horny for Mio, it's a little weird for him to keep thinking about his mom and dad.) But there's always a whole bunch to unpack from an Inoue show, and this one was no different. I liked seeing him talk about uncaring systems, and self-determination, and the power of art (when he felt like it), and all of the rest of it. Seeing all of that run through Wataru made for a frequently mystifying, occasionally frustrating, and perpetually fascinating show.

Speaking of Wataru! I like him. I like that kid. I don't really care about him, maybe, but I like him.

It's a weird thing to realize, as a show is ending, that you don't really care about the title character. I liked his journey, but that was almost always for other characters that intersected with it, or the themes it was dealing with. Wataru himself... eh. He was almost always overshadowed on this show by other characters, and, like, the final episode only works because of the Megumi/Nago plot. That's not great! That is pretty much a failure from a storytelling perspective, a viewer not caring about the end of the title character's story. The performance was cute, and there isn't really a lot to kick about for his series-arc (outside of the last two episodes), but I find myself real lukewarm on Wataru as a hero. Sweet boy, but not a hero I'm finding myself that attached to.

So, yeah. That's about where I'm at right now. Usually, these Series Wrap-Up posts are about how great the characters were, and how much the plot let them down, and how sad it is to see them go. Not so much this time, I guess. Kiva's a fun show that had a bunch of memorable characters I am fine never seeing again, in a decent story that the characters sometimes screwed up.

Of all the ways I thought I'd feel about Kiva, not sure I foresaw Ambivalent as the way I'd describe my feelings. It was a fun show, though, and I'm glad I watched it. Just... probably not one I'm itching to rewatch.

https://kamenriderdie.com/images/kr/...ieswrapupb.png

my main takeaway from all of this is that darkness moonbreak is cool

You know when I first watched Kiva I always assumed Megumi was older than Wataru. But Otoya died before Yuri found a new man so Wataru has already been conceived. Unless Fangires carry their babies longer than 9 months then Wataru is older than Megumi right?

My main takeaway from this thread is that Fish's OST drops in his posts, more specifically his one from Episode 10 helped me find out the one song that stuck with me after my first time watching Kiva many moons ago, that I only ever knew as "Sad Violin Kiva Song", so that was great to find and listen to constantly again.

Valid takeaway!

Ha ha ha, you're right! Since Otoya dies in 1986 (or early 1987, depending on if the '86 plotline moves at the same rate the '08 one does), that means Wataru's at least 20 when the show starts... and they did a movie where he has to go back to high school?! He was way too old for that! On a lot of levels!

Also, yeah, there's basically no way Megumi can be older than Wataru, unless there's a deleted scene where we find out that Yuri had a kid at home the whole time and just never talked about it with anyone for an entire year. Megumi refers to herself as Wataru's older sister a bunch of times, so you weren't just imagining it.

Also valid takeaway!

I am seriously laughing about there being an edit made to Yuri's goodbye scene with Otoya, that she originally responded to his request for her omelette rice recipe with, "I knew you liked it! I always make it for my 4-year old daughter, and she loves it! Well, I guess I should say loved it, since I haven't seen her since I abandoned her to move in with you", and the other producers being like Wait What and making Inoue cut it.

I've read that Shima is still alive somewhere, but finding it out how Shima comes back... yes it was underwhelming, for the lack of plausible reason. The explanation in story is to make Shima see the kind side of Taiga, making him realize that his fanatic views of Fangire is wrong, thus tolerating Wataru. I'd think that being "spared" from death is not plausible reason to see good traits in someone, this goes for audience who also treat someone as innocent due to sparing someone from death... ignoring how they savagely attacked them at first. Probably yeah, without explanation can make the scene better to show... toughness Fangires have in Shima, though somehow Shima explodes like a monster being detonated without the monster dying, I think something like Ryuki did the fake explosion better to fake Goro's death, when Ryuki shoots Strike Vent, of which Magnugiga secretly escalates the explosion. Besides, Shima is partly at fault to turn Taiga like the way he is now, as without Otoya or King, Shima was the one who raised Taiga for a while, and Taiga points out that Shima's discrimination to Fangires was already long present before this incident where Taiga attacks Shima in a fit of rage, with Shima's cold and outright xenophobic attitude being what caused Taiga to angrily lash out in the first place.

This stems back for my argument regarding system before, system would lead into bad nonsense thing if it's ruled by someone as rotten as King, a sociopath who has cruel ruling of Fangire laws, and his "love" for Maya: he initially claims that he doesn't love her, but seeing her have feelings for Otoya made him very entitled to her being his, even trying to threaten her with Taiga's life, taking her Fangire powers; sparing her from death to make her feel worse than that, and so on. But it's not entirely system fault, the other Fangires need to wise up if they're not entirely malicious and overthrow King and instill a reasonable one as King, especially if there's Fangires who love humans and wants to stay that way (and probably the ones who love humans propose to work together with humans), albeit of course the problem is King's sheer strength. But system can be made to prevent chaos going on (but for King and Taiga, it's to gain advantage over humans), how systems can corner or benefit is based on who's in charge.

Don't dismantle system, improve it, which is what Wataru is doing, overthrowing evil monsters who assume roles as King to put himself as the King, so that he can likely establish a rule to make it fair for both humans and Fangires, albeit Taiga isn't 100% evil unlike King and he's on process to redemption. It's what I think makes sense for Wataru's goal as peacemaker between Fangires and humans (remember besides of trying to eliminate himself, he vows to do this too! the rules established by King is also what takes Mio's life!), despite that it seems to not follow what you want for Inoue being against system (King himself is an evil counterpart to Wataru, that's why he dons the outfit and King can look like Wataru), which is Wataru altering the system to his noble needs but I explained above regarding system.

I don't understand that Kiva's sexism here is implemented at this late of the show to keep the status quo of Nago being the IXA user instead of Megumi, as well as Nago forgetting Megumi to ask Wataru to run Aozora, probably Wataru's now strong without even henshin to Kiva Emperor that he can scare off Fangires with just a glare (built-in King quality), that Wataru is the one that fits to influence others by that, 180 degree change from him at the past. For Shima being welcomed back with open arms, you forget about how what matters is "Wataru is Wataru"? Same can go for "Shima is Shima, no matter if he's a rampaging monster or human like them".

So, two things.

First, even though Shima sees Taiga's actions - turning him into a Fangire, faking his death, and then resurrecting him as a normal human - as proof that Taiga cares about people and can be redeemed, let's also recall that this entire stupid scheme was built to either make Wataru feel like enough of a hypocrite to join Taiga in subjugating humanity, or to goad Wataru into a duel to the death with Taiga, depending on which phase of the scheme we are in. Shima may look at the end result as proof that Taiga is worth saving, but that's only because Shima is a hectoring, goal-oriented asshole. I'm not sure Taiga had good intentions for about 95% of his plan!

Second, while I did just called Shima a hectoring, goal-oriented asshole, the details of Shima's time as Taiga's surrogate dad are pretty vague. We can assume he's as awful a father as he is a boss, but there's way too little evidence to say if Shima's that bad, or if Taiga - someone who is maybe sometimes slightly overstating his hardships - is making himself a victim. It's one of the big problems with this plot: we don't ever see anything Taiga and Shima are referring to? It's all Tell, no Show. Definitely makes finding an emotional core in this part of the series damn near impossible.

That would be a great story! I'd be real into that! It's... not the story the show is telling at this point? Like, this is a story where Wataru ignores his friends, dresses like the tyrant who nearly killed everyone in his family, and forces his Three Weird Uncles to kneel in submission. We are not at all in a story about Wataru's kindness and nobility.

I don't think anybody behind the scenes can stop Inoue from doing anything, considering some of the stuff we've seen!

But that's the funniest part to me: this is all the fixed version.