[Locke]

Hibiki 03. Are these oni's ripping throats out to get to peoples voices? Shit son.

Hibiki has a very original set up, at least for a Rider show. Featuring a hero who is well trained, and already experienced. From this episode we gleam he's been hunting demons for six years, but with the casual way he shrugs it off I assume it may be longer. Hibiki travels from place to place, researching the area, building intel and then dealing with the demons in those places.

I dunno, I've just never really liked how nearly toku show is about an average joe growing into a hero. I get that it's marketed at kids and giving them role models and all that is important, and for a long running series they need to have a human side but with a lot of shows I really do wish they'd just fucking get on with it.

A protagonist should drive the narrative, not be driven by it, for superheroes Rider's are usually near hilariously reactive and for no real genuine in story reason. I know I'm probably gonna be mocked for this but I just normally find that American comics find better reasons to have people become heroes.

Most Riders are literally just Average Joe's with above average left wing ethics and dead parents, some get around this by having them thrown into the middle of it all by chance or whatever but the rest of the time I'm wondering why they chose a skinny Japanese model and not someone y'know...trained and experienced. I can count on one hand the amount of Riders who had me believe they were the character in the suit on strength of character alone.

That is probably a big reason why I love shows like Goseiger and Wizard so much, with Haruto being one of the most proactive Riders in years and the reasoning for him becoming a Rider made sense within his universe and made me believe him as Wizard and with Goseiger entirely skipping the origin story near enough, letting the characters learn about themselves through action and not trial and error.

The only real disappointment is of course with rips, I promise I won't go on about this every episode write up but it is really disappointing that the episode has been building and building to an action sequence and then when we get there the picture is so pixelated and distorted we can barely see a thing that is happening. But holy shit Wolverine!