[KaijuUltraFan]

I think with W/Double the two parters I liked because it fit the them of 'two as one' all through the show. Plus I really liked the whole 'hard-boiled detective' angle, and I really like Phillip and Shotaro and Akiko (and Accel/Rider 2) as characters so I was invested in their stories.

And I thought the Sonozaki family as antagonists were great. Claydoll was cool and Taboo (without doubt my favorite villain) was fantastic and really bizarre looking.

It's different enough to really be different, but familiar enough to still be Kamen Rider. Then there's that battle truck that the motorcycle can jump into and switch out the back half of the bike to something else, (again, the two into one theme)...there was just a lot of little details and stuff I really liked about the show.

Then the characters really did grow up and develop. Phillip and Akiko grow up a lot through the show (I love the episode where Akiko goes undercover as a maid). Shotaro tries to grow up and harden up but he can't, he just has too big a heart. He's 'not' hard-boiled, he's a softie who tries to be a badass. Ryu as Accel grows up and develops quite a bit.

Idk,...maybe it's like anything else you either like it or you don't, it grabs you or it doesn't.

For me I'd seen The First and The Next movies and really liked them. I'd seen maybe 20 episodes of the original 71 Kamen Rider and I liked it. And I'd seen bits and clips on Youtube of Kuuga and Agito, Decade and OOO's,...all fighting clips for the most part, but I liked them. Then for some reason I just picked 'W' one night and sat down to watch a more 'modern' Rider than the 1971 one that I'd been watching, and I just got really pulled into the story and the characters and ended up binge watching the whole show in less than a week. So it was my first Rider series that I watched start to finish so maybe I'm just partial to it.


Split Lip I agree that Ryuki clicked with me towards the end, finally. But I really felt like I had to power through like 25 episodes in the middle where it just seemed like nothing was really happening. It started off really strong, and it ended strong,...but the middle just ...bought time? Spun its wheels? I thought them introducing the Psychotic Snake Rider in the middle was probably the best part of the middle section. To me he was what made it interesting.

To date I haven't disliked any of the Rider shows really, I've liked them all. Some I just liked quite a bit more than others.

I started Ex-Aid last night and am on (I think) episode 5-6 now. I'm liking it. Some of the fight scenes are pretty over the top with the screen just full of smoke and explosions then slow-motion hits and kicks then all kinds of colorful text all happening at once,...it's a lot going on at once sometimes. But so far the story and characters are interesting,..and I'm not sure why but I'm completely fascinated with Poppy Pipopapo. I sort of wish they'd made a figuarts of her but I couldn't really find anything interesting related to her character to add to the collection.

..I did drop the SHF Ex-Aid level 2 figure into my 'buy it now' bookmarks though. (these shows just kill my wallet. I always end up wanting at least one SHF Rider from a series. And some shows like 'W' I've got maybe close to 10 'W' SHF's? Ouch. hahaha)