[Locke]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SPLIT LIP

Everything you said would be just fine... if this wasn't the MAIN CHARACTER OF THE SHOW.

"Little windows into the character" is not enough when this is the hero. It is not evidence of good writing, rather the opposite. We should not be told everything important about him. We need to see it, not get second-hand accounts that could be mistaken or lying. I can't believe I need to say this, but show, don't tell.

And that's even accepting that these "little windows" exist. Again, the problem with being a bad actor with bland, forgettable dialogue means eveyrthing you do is ingenuine. None of his struggles feel, not that I ever witnessed any, feel genuine because he's not conveying any emotion. I don't mean to play therapist, but how does any of this make him FEEL? We don't know, because he never shows it. We may sometimes have one of the stupid characters tell us, but their stupid so what could they know?

I sat through sixteen episodes of Wizard and Haruto never did a damn thing. Not once. Nothing I can remember. He never saved anyone in a memorable "man, that got me" way. He puts a ring on their finger, rubs their hand on his crotch, then fights a Half-Life enemy. No pretending to be a little girl's dead father to spare her the pain of learning the truth, no risking time to make sure a family isn't broken up by a misunderstanding, just "Plain sugar." Hell, it's like the writers realise how bland he is and made him pick the blandest, most unexciting doughnut there is as some sort of commentary on their own errible writing.

I mean really I read your post and think "where the hell did you pull that from?" Because nothing you said actually happened in the time I watched the show. Subtle humour? He laughed once, but that wasn't humour. He was laughing at Stinko dressed as santa or something. There's no humour about him, subtle or not. Windows into his character? Again, WHAT WINDOWS? What exactly ever happened that made him react in any way besides "I must fight?"

Oh, and Wizard's lore, what little there is, really doesn't since "because a wizard did it" is not an explanation, nor does it make sense. At least OOO showed us most of what happened all that time in the past. Wizard gave us one badly done flashback that they repeated for a bit for, like, five episodes before apparently what the villains are doing and why isn't important. Hell, Wiseman just showed up and he, aside from looking about as threatening as the Terror Dopant, has done, said, and generally been nothing.

You shouldn't use the shows pacing as a reflection on the character. Haruto is sound the show just gives him very little focus because it wastes all its time on the Gate of the week.

Really the criticism of the lack of insight into Haruto as a Rider is a flaw I'd have with all of Kamen Rider, cheesy and clichéd as it was, whenever the Power Rangers would morph for the first time in their respective season and they'd have that fight where they'd do a dramatic morph and test out their powers with gleeful exclamations of how awesome all of it was, it made a big difference between feeling like something has happened and that they've just put on a costume but Kamen Rider seems to rarely have that, it rarely seems to explore what the character is going through in their battles or how the powers effect them and all the fun things they could do with them.

It's like Date right, love the character, but I would have rather there was no bullet subplot and instead he was hurting simply because of the effect the suit has on its body. No matter how hard the show tries to make him feel like Ironman his general lack of interest in the suit and its powers reduces it to feeling as plasticy as it actually is.

Haruto's humour is usually in the form of wry comments, I guess if you don't have a dry sarcastic sense of humour you might not even pick up on what he is saying as jokes. I picked up on it and laughed every time. Also when you see his Underworld you get a much better feel of the character and his motivations and he gets stronger from there. Although I liked him before that.

Also there is more to Wizard than the White Wizard and you're just being facetious now, so I feel no reason to debate that at all.