[SPLIT LIP]

Note: Just so you know, this is just an opinion piece on why W is my favourite series. I'm not trying to convert or force anyone or make any finite claims, even though I may say something like "it's the best." Obviously I mean I personally believe it's best, but saying "in my opinion" over and over shouldn't be necessary. If you don't agree that's totally cool and you're a snappy dresser and all those nice things mom said about you are true.

So with Gaim on the horizon and lots of new goodies getting pumped out of Bandai and Tamashii every week, I'm getting excited for Kamen Rider again. The only problem is there's nothing to tide me over. I've tried every series that interests me and I'm just kind of tired of going backwards when it comes to "new" series. Then I remembered a lot of people seem conflicted on W, some saying it's good but over-rated, while some think it's bad, and of course there's those who also like it. But it got me wondering. W was my first real exposure to Kamen Rider. It was the standard which every series I watched afterwards was subconciously judged by. I've watched plenty of good shows sinc ethen like OOO, Den-O, Ryuki, etc. Maybe I was seeing the show through rose-tinted mini-nostalgia glasses? Playing favourites with my first love? So I sat down, went through it again, and judged it with the same scrutiny I judged every series I've watched since to see if maybe I was wrong about my gushing praise?

I wasn't. It's still awesome. Maybe even a bit more since I recognise more subtle forshadowing. W is my favourite series, and hits just about every right note with me. It's flaws are minimal and when it's good it's DAMN good. There's a lot I like about it. The characters, the story, the designs and gimmicks. There's very few things in W I wouldn't pick over their equivelant from another show. Stand-out aspects include:

Shotaro is an EXCELLENT main rider, perhaps even one of the best, objectively speaking, and certainly in my opinion. The character himself is really well-rounded, especially after the movie war crossover with DEECAYDO, but a lot of it has to do with the acting. There's something that always gets me when I watch a rider show, and that's the main character's actor. Up until about Den-O I want to say, I kind of felt like the riders themselves often looked and felt (early on) a bit generic. It's no secret all riders are pretty-boys, but they look fairly similar and have similar characters. They're silly and awkward/bumbling but also stoic and know when to get serious. You're typical action hero. Shotaro takes this formula and does something few of the riders I've watched have done: make it genuine. He's a pretty boy, yeah, but he has a very unique face. He doesn't look like he's acting (be it successfully or unsuccessfully), and doesn't shift from silly to serious. When he bungles or does something silly, it's pretty much always because he's so serious, like when he's trying to be all dramatic and noir at innapropriate times. He's not just randomly dropping shit one moment and then the single most focused human being the next. Plus, he's got a way about him that's fairly unique. He dresses in detective wear, obviously because of his job, but he's also just got a deffinative body language and method. Plus, unlike just about every Rider show I've watched, the rider himself is in charge. He has no employer, he has no mentor or supernatural guide to explain things. He knows all about his abilities, he knows his enemy's methods, he's not just taking direction or learning it as it comes. He's the authority on the Rider side of things. And that's just at the start.

Philip is almost the exact opposite. He needs direction, almost supervision, or else his obsessive nature distracts him. Wheras Shotaro is emotional and driven, Philip is calculating and almost apathetic. Of course he doesn't stay this way, in fact I never realised until rewatching it how accurate Philip's statement in Movie War was, about him never making a decision for himself, and Shotaro making (in that context, a wrong) decision on his own. The ammount of growing the two characters do in the first 16 episodes is great. They both aspire to be different than they are. Philip wants to be more human, and Shotaro wants to be more hard-boiled like his bos, which to Shotaro means not letting your emotions show. Even their powers reflect this. Philip's memories are all bright colours and contain very esoteric abilities, like elemental attacks, or in Luna's case mystical lifelike illusions. Very imaginative things. Wheras Shotaro gets the darker colours, and the physical powers like hand-to-hand fighting and weapons. More practical abilities. And thus W, being them combined together, represents the balance between the two and has different attacks combining the two methods for best results. Example: the metal shaft by itself is okay, but it's real power is when it's powered by and of Philip's memories. It gives the finishers more of a significance besides "end the battle already." Even Fang takes this further, being the brightest colour (white) and being nothing but instinctual rage.

Outside of those two, you have Akiko. And Goddammit, I like Akiko. I don't love her, I won't start a fanclub, but she's one of my favourite female leads along with Hana from Den-O because she's not just a pigeon-toed damsel. Sure, she get's into trouble, but more often than not that trouble is a deliberate, and successful, attempt at defeating the enemy. Especially early on when she's more at odds with Shotaro and is trying to establish herself as part of the detective agency. She found the money Dopant's racket, and she pretty much took out Sweets herself. Even when the Dopants got less ridiculous and Akiko herself fell more and more to the sidelines she was an asset. In fact, her shining moment of awesome and ridiculous was when they fought the Nightmare Dopant. Figure this: The Nightmare Dopant is an enemy with purely mental attacks. It asserts it's own will onto someone else through mental strength, to the point where even W had a hard time keeping up. Yet when Akiko sleeps in an attempt to expose it (since she talks in her sleep, which is pretty fucking funny) not only is it a nuthouse of weird, twisted versions of her friends, but she actually manages to give the Dopant a run for it's money with her twisted mental stature.

Terui Ryu was not my favourite character when he showed up, because I knew from first glance his archtype. He was the serious guy, the edgy, tormented "badass" with something to prove, his inhibitions clouded by a revenge arc that I knew was going to pull the whole "revenge solves nothing." And you know what? That wasn't far off, but it was really well done. Mostly because it didn't last too long. It only took a few episodes for him to find the true murderer of his family, and after that he pretty much did when he set out to do: hunt him down and kill him. And he did. And it saved him. Why? because he didn't kill the Weather Dopant out of revenge, his revenge was filled when the memory was destroyed, though Isaka still died from excessive memory use, Accel didn't have and trite "oh God what have I done" story. The dude was hard, and knew that evil people eventually get what's coming to them. He deffinitely lightened up around Shotaro, but he stayed focused and intense and instead shifted that where it belonged, onto his enemies. And he had a sense of humour about it too, like teh episode where they're all roped into helping an aspiring film director, and he can't bring himself to kiss on command, when they get back to the agency he makes up some bull about honour and tries to kiss everyone. That was funny. Also, his rider form was pretty cool. Yeah turning into a bike is silly, but it gave his suit a sweet motif. Like a knight. And Trial is the best Secondary Rider upgrade ever. It's not a pallete swap with minor additions, it's not just the old suit with shit thrown on top. It's an all new outfit that takes the bike motif even further and the whole "it may not be as strong, but it's faster" makes for a really cool finisher where he kicks like seven hunderd times until a giant "T" is stamped on the bad guy, because if one kick won't do it, try ten, or a hundred.

But if I could use one word to describe what makes W, to me, stand out, it's "Skull." And I don't just mean Skull himself, as awesome as he is with his sweet design both as rider and human, his cool voice and demeanor and his man among men attitude. He's not some idol to be worshipped as so many series fall into the trap of doing with cool mentor characters, he's a man and all that that entails. But more than just him, it's the backstory behind W. The Sonozaki family, Shroud and all that. Everything that happened before the show itself. Again, few rider shows have that level of explored, intertwined backstory. Usually it's just one singular event that starts it off, but in W there's many factors that build until we see Shotaro and Philip use the W driver for the first time. I won't go into detail because I'd just be reiterating the show, but anyone who's seen it knows why it's good. Which brings me to the Sonozakis themselves. They're some of the best villains I've seen in Kamen Rider because they're not just monsters. In fact, they're not monsters at all. They're people. Real human beings, not pointless disguises. They have lives outside of their villainous doings. They run corporations, have jobs, have real human lives. It's much more down to Earth and much more preferable to "bunch of rubber monsters/badly dressed people stand around poorly lit rooms pontificating about nothing at all meaningful." When we see them they're usually doing something with purpose, be it as important as distributing Gaia Memories or mundane as familiy dinners or runnign their legitimate business fronts. Between that and the Narumi Detective Agency, W gives believable and fundaemental reasoning behind why the two sides don't just go after eacother and take the other down while they're hanging out at home: the Rider stuff is not the only part of there lives. The Sonozakis have appearencs to keep up, and W has a job he needs to do. Neither side, at first, knows the extent of the other's involvement or significance, so it makes sense why they don't just kill eachother in broad daylight. And because they're both human, you can understand why they wouldn't want to have an all out war if they can continue handling things descreetly. Afterall, what happens to the Sonozaki's plan to reshape humanity if they're found out by the police and government and have all their assets frozen and authorities kicking down their door?

And finally there's the story. The very emotional story about two guys who are basically brothers with a bond forged in battle while a looming menace stretches it's way into every dark corner of the city they love. The entire lore of Fuuto, it's windy fame and the characters, not just the heroes, love for it is great. I don't think a single other rider show has ever given backstory, or even the name of where it takes place. Add to that the story of Shroud trying to subvert her old family and save her son who already died, to Shotaro becomming the stalwart protector of the city. It's just great. The setting and music just compliment it. Again, so much effort went into creating a world, not just a series of events. I love the jazz music that goes along the rock. W has a real identity that just oozes personality and uniqueness that I've yet to see matched. It's not super dramatic, it's not a straight up comedy. It's fun. Fun without anything to prove.