[Kamen Rider Lucha]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich

I think I've mentioned this before but I actually had a very similar experience to yours but with the key difference that I felt the last chunk of the show was actually quite good and it brought my opinion back up quite a bit.

I remember you saying that you lost interest toward the middle. I find that interesting, as I thought the middle portion of the show was by far its best stretch. I loved how Sugimura-esque it felt. Eager to see how you respond to the middle stretch in your rewatch.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich

One big revelation I've already had is to think of Ninninger as being ~character-driven~ above all else. It doesn't have the most engaging plot to be sure, but that's not where its focus lies. Also it's really funny and the action is great, which helps.

There are certainly some great characters. Kasumi is particularly excellent -- she's easily my all-time favorite Pink and one of my top-10 favorite Sentai heroes generally. I also think it's interesting to make their leader a dummy fueled purely by optimistic bravado (yes, I'm a Bakaharu fan).

That said, we differ in our assessment of the action. While I agree that there are some well executed individual sequences, especially in the show's early giant-scale fights (also of note, the human-scale action in the Chozetsu upgrade episodes), in general Ninninger is where I started to see Hirofumi Fukuzawa's limitations as an action director.

Fukuzawa is fantastic at choreographing stunts, but his cinematic chops are not up to snuff. If you compare his camera setups to those of any primary action director who has preceded him, they're lacking in movement, creativity, compelling shot composition, drama, and tension. His action scenes have a distinct, repetitive lack of personality -- they're like visual oatmeal. This is a huge bummer, as interesting action is one of the main things that draws me to tokusatsu.

I'm happy to report that Zyuohger has brought with it an improvement in Nakazawa's style. That could be chalked up to new technologies, like camera drones, being used. It could also be due to an increased budget (this is an anniversary show, after all) that allows him to shoot in more varied locations. Whatever the reason, it's an improvement I welcome.