[Diamondmatter]

Mine aren't very memorable (half of them I only got reminded of by reading this thread!), but here they are:

• Call me childish, but gimmicks are my favorite part of the franchise, bar none. No reason besides the cool factor. Only a select few series would intrigue me if they weren't Kamen Rider series. Makes me feel bad to say, since I love the franchise so much, but it's true.
• On that note, Ex-Aid might be my #1 favorite for gimmicks and toys (the gadgets, not the LVUR line, that's for sure). Everything just seems to be the best it can be, to me.
• On that note, Ex-Aid has my favorite design style. The hair is very geometrically pleasing, and the crazier design moves are executed well enough to turn out very good; namely Snipe LV50, Para-DX, Burger Action Gamer, Lazer LV3, and best for last, Maximum Gamer.
• Kabuto's probably one of my favorites. It's one of the few that really hooked me so that I'd binge it instead of watching an episode or two when I felt like it. Its second half and ending were pretty meh, though.
• Like others have said, Agito is boring. Shoichi is boring, his amnesia story is uninteresting and the only reveals we got out of it were boring. Ryo was too boring of a character for me to care about his woes. Hikawa was pretty great, but he didn't carry the show. It felt very static despite any movements the plot made (even when Shouichi got his memory back, especially since it only lasted a few episodes and he was extremely cagey during that time).
• Kuuga was much better than Agito, and I don't know or care if it's because it was the first Heisei Phase 1 series I watched. I'm also not sure if this one's controversial. People seem pretty 50/50 on Kuuga.
• Yeah, Wizard's fine. The plots of the week didn't bore me to tears, at least, and the characters are likable enough.
• Unless someone brings to my attention that show from it is really really good and has a steadily advancing and interesting plot, I'll probably never be able to sit through Showa beyond maybe one episode of something to test it, hypothetically.
• Den-O is also just fine. A li'l better than Wizard, but it's not spectacular. The hot mess of a plot that does time worse than Kabuto drags it down.
• I don't like Fourze as much as Double or OOO, or even Drive. Not sure why. Possibly the ensemble "quirky" cast with no one truly charming to attach to, like Shotaro or Ankh.
• A few design opinions: Kiwami is fine; Mugen is fine, better than Kiwami in fact; Infinity is subpar and kinda awkward looking; Shining is boring, Burning is better; Decade's fine, and so is Diend; cheap materials can utterly destroy a suit's look. This applies to many, many Ghost forms; Wizard's designs would be cooler if his form change gimmick was more than just Kuuga with a noisier belt.
• I agree with criticisms of Blade brought up in this thread but I like it anyway.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich

But Ghost does one thing better than any other series I've ever seen, and that's the messages. For all its faults, it's a show positively dripping with substance, and a depth that puts a lot of other shows to shame. I know a lot of people found the constant platitudes hollow, but I could not possibly disagree more. Ghost was a show that, even at its very worst, was always interested in teaching its viewer something. It was a show all about how simply being alive, in of itself, was a truly wonderful, profoundly meaningful thing. How no matter who you are, the fact that you exist is something to be cherished. How our differences as people can, instead of pushing us apart, make us stronger as individuals. How our experiences with one another pass on to create something far bigger than us. Something that lives on long after we're each gone.

I hope I'm not being redundant given what you said about people finding it hollow (and given the countless Ghost discussions that have occurred before ), but I just don't see it. I simply don't know what it did to make that statement besides having a guy come back to life and having some flowery lines. It did not inspire me to live or appreciate living. Actually... if I take it at face value from memory, I can't think of any message Ghost's trying to get across.
I can think of several ways of getting that message across better. Kill a character, have another character who's a (legitimate) ghost, have a villain who hates life (though that's a bit blunt), those last two ones put together, something like that. I can think of some plot points that are vaguely about life, but they don't really openly cap off that point.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich

See I can easily see the case for not liking Takeru (he's very vanilla "nice guy" and I get why that bores people), but saying he had literally no personality or flaws is a pretty massive exaggeration. He spent an awful lot of time in that show having fits of poor self-confidence, indecision, and general mopiness. I've seen people criticize stuff like the episode Grateful debuts as being "sudden" or "out of character" and I'm really not sure where it comes from? His writing, for better and worse, was totally consistent throughout.

Those flaws came off very ill-defined to me. He didn't struggle with them, they simply were a behavioral quirk that popped up occasionally. He never overcame them. When he moped, he just moped until an Eyecon popped up.

Sorry for contributing to another Ghost argument, and if I sound overly spiteful of it. Just, when I see your posts about Ghost I want to understand! When I think of Takeru, I want to see him smiling at the sun like I do with Godai or Shinnosuke. As opposed to kinda just standing there.