[Locke]

Finished my watch through of Kamen Rider Drive.

I thought Kamen Rider Drive started off VERY slowly, to the point where I would have probably dropped the show, but I saw so many posts online about how it is a modern darkhorse GOAT of a Rider show that was just misunderstood at the time coming straight after GAIM. And while I know opinions have shifted on GAIM over the years, I lived through that show airing in real time, and people were RABID for that show back then, talking about it not like it was just the best Rider show, but one of the best pieces of media of all time, period.

As such, I pushed on with Drive. I had to know.

The balance between humour and drama has always been central to modern Rider shows, many handle the balancing act differently, and some handle it more deftly than others. I think Drive is one that really struggles in that regard. I actually enjoyed Drive’s brand of weird humour, especially early on, but as it tries to transition into a more serious show in the back half, it struggles to reconcile the transition as it won’t quite fully let go of its comedy elements.

Even if the comedy often didn’t smother the dramatic moments as it so often does, it is a show with lacking permanence and often rushes dramatic moments to a resolution to maintain a status quo. These two things combined together just end up achieving nothing other than rendering some of the show’s biggest narrative developments into near meaningless only minutes after they happen.

And it is weird, cause like I dunno what to do with this. I usually hate shows that ruin great drama with dumb comedy, but the dumb comedy to me is when this show is at its absolute best and a lot of the drama to me is just sorta whatever. So a part of me is like “oh no a dramatic scene is ruined again” but another part of me is smiling ear to ear as we sharply jump from a battle of life and death to some of the goofiest, silliest, comedy you can possibly imagine.

Chase might be the ultimate encapsulation of this. When he is introduced, he is a villain, and aside from a truly rad Rider design (which gets way worse when he becomes a good guy), he is an incredibly boring villain. His character oscillates between feeling aimless and completely static, as he has his weekly three minute skirmish with Drive that achieves nothing and then bounces. Save for maybe a scene where he stares into the distance saying something like ‘who am I?’ or something.

Then he ends up a good guy, and is almost entirely used in comedy scenes outside of his battles, and he suddenly becomes the MVP. Nothing really changed about his character, but the same stuff they tried to play seriously as a villain now being played for laughs, sorta identifies how much it didn’t work as serious drama. I loved how they took the most mundane situation or concepts and just dropped him into it, and let the comedy write itself. Chase’s stiffness, childlike naivety and his ability to only process things in the most literal ways just creates gold every time.

And his death? God damn, maybe the most emotional moment in the whole series, and I only cared because of all of the incredible comedy that made me learn to love him. It is also one of the few things the show doesn't just immediately undo, in fact, it doesn't undo it at all.

Outside of Chase and Gou (whose introduction as Mach is one of the few early developments that salvage that first stretch of show, he really does bring the show to life as it struggles early and I think it is a shame he is absent from a big chunk of them middle of the show), I thought the rest of the characters were a bit of a mixed bag.

Arguably the villain Heart is the character who feels the most “complete”, as so many of the other characters just feel so one note. That isn’t to say the cast itself is bad, a genuinely warm chemistry grows between them over the course of the show I quite enjoyed, but I just didn’t really love any of the actual individual characters.

Talking about Heart and the Roidmude, I think they also suffer from Drive’s failed balancing act, but in a slightly different way. The way Medic, Brain and Heart are written for the last 10 or so episodes is excellent, they all develop into nuanced, complex, characters and I think that is great. But I can’t ignore that for about forty episodes, the Roidmude are one note cannon fodder goofballs or mindless killing machines (or some combo of the two).

Even Medic and Brain who are in the show throughout are flat, lifeless, one note characters themselves effectively for the first forty or so episodes, before suddenly being properly pencilled in right at the end like they hired a whole new writers room.

Imagine how much better this show would have been if they had this presentation throughout the show, imagine if we had a wider cast of Roidmude written like these three were in the final moments. Some of the later developments around the truth of the Roidmude could have been absolutely killer twists, completely flipping and reframing the narrative, but they all happen within the final few episodes so it doesn't achieve much of anything.

From a visual standpoint, I thought most of the Evolved Roidmude suits were really ugly in a bad way. But it is kinda funny to me that a lot of the powered up forms are just the Roidmude turning piss yellow, given one of the most meme’d aspects of AI Generated “art” is the heavy yellow tint they always have for some reason. Is Drive predicting the future? One thing that really stood out to me though beyond that, is most of the named Roidmude seemed to have suits that were hard for the actors to properly move around in. Like outside of really old shows, I can’t remember the last time I watched a toku show where the monsters look more like sports mascots, battling to not tip over in their costumes. It made some of the climatic battles hard to take seriously as a result.

In terms of the Riders, they are a bit of a mixed bag. I think the whole toy car gimmick thing is absolutely rubbish, and the Machine Chaser to Kamen Rider Chaser downgrade has to be one of the biggest downgrades in Rider history, but the actual quality of the suits is probably some of the best we’ve ever seen in Rider. You don’t often see modern Rider shows opt for more limited form changes, so the base suits can be of a much higher quality, but I’d love to see other Rider shows go back to this design ethos at some point as I think it pays off massively here.

Narratively, I liked the focus the show puts on the Rider powers as a tangible thing, these are manmade weapons that need to be piloted with skill. The physical and mental condition of the Riders matter. They can’t just be any old body who can slap the belt on, transform, and suddenly turn into Bruce Lee (even if it is sadly largely abandoned in the second half).

In terms of the action itself, it gets significantly better when we move out of those early episodes and there seems less requirement of just marketing toys as a primary focus (which ironically makes the introduction of new forms, usually a massive hype moment for a Rider show, some of the weakest moments for the action, as it devolves back into its worst toy commercial like practices for those moments). I also think the suit actors do some amazing work in really bringing the characters through in their transformed forms, too.

Ultimately then, the last 10 or so episodes are the ones which will linger in the most clarity as time grants you separation to a series, so maybe Drive did the right thing in making these it's best episodes. Not a guarantee in a Rider show, in fact, I'd argue more Rider shows end up falling off of a cliff at this point instead.

However, that doesn’t mean I forgive Drive for its less than stellar journey up to that point. The opening arcs are woeful, the first third is often frustratingly stagnant, and while show gets better with the introduction of Gou / Mach, leading to strength on strength in the back half, it is hard not to feel like the show often wastes its best moments, either by not doing enough with them, or having them kick in far too late.

More than that, it never quite seems to reconcile what its true identity is. A prestige, high-stakes, police procedural or a goofy, throwback, Rider comedy? Whenever it tries to be both, it fails, but it also fails to ever pick a lane and stick with it.

Yet, despite all of this, there is a tangible, human warmth to this show, that still makes the final credits hard to watch with a dry eye, even with all of my negative feelings to so many parts of this show.

So yeah, I don't think I will be telling anyone this show is some misunderstood, darkhorse, GOAT or whatever, but like Tomari, while Drive may spend so much of its time in a slump, once it tightens its tie and goes into Top Gear, it is hard not to admire what a beautifully constructed machine this can be, during its best moments.