[AkibaSilver]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kurona

Let's not forget that Zero-One's getting a Dynamaiting Lion form!

I couldn't forget becase I didn't know that!
(Also, image broken, sad times).

Today was going to be just a photo dump (of photos I took days ago but didn't post because life got busy with problem work, whomps), but it got me thinking about a phenomena in Rider that no-one thinks about. It's not as notable as the final forms, as argument-inducing as the secondary Riders, nowhere near as frustrating as "Do movie forms count?" I am talking, of course, about the early-gimmick-promo form. I swear this is relevant I promise.

These are what Toei shows off in all the initial merchandising rush (and often pre-show cameo) to showcase the gimmick of the year to the children and us, with the hopes we'll think "Wow, cool!" and buy the stuff, before it's never used again after episode 5. However, this initial push means they usually maintain a little more permanence in the fandom memory than other forms in the inital rush, since they're all we have to go on at first, and may be revisited later. I thought this was a pretty recent thing, and then I thought about it and I can trace it back to OOO at a stretch, but definitely Fourze. In order, we have:
OOO - TaKiriBa is used in the first episode (or maybe second, I watched the initial 10 episodes to OOO years ago, Kurona will know) to showcase the Combo Change.
Fourze - Here we go! It's not a form, but the Magic Hand switch is used in the OOO Summer movie, and it got released as part of a Core Medal/Switch set to entice existing OOO collectors to buy it.
Wizard - The ring powers all blend together, I'm not gonna lie, none of them actually stick in the memory enough for me to assign it here.
Gaim - Here we see a counterbalance to the "Show off multiple forms" argument. You could make a case for Pine or Ichigo, but Gaim gets around the problem of needing to make multiple Gimmick items memorable by having 5 Riders at the start, thereby spreading the load.
Drive - Max Flare, for certain. You could maybe make a case for Midnight Shadow and Funky Spike, given they get to be in the OP too... except they didn't get a HBV exclusive upgrade. Type High Speed, you never disappoint.
Ghost - Musashi gets to show up in episode 1, gets to be Takeru's main advisor, and is obviously the big Japanese spirit of the first few gained, of course he's the most important.
Ex-Aid - Here's a weird one. Ex-Aid is another that mostly gets around this by having multiple riders again, but the form and Gashat that got shown off the most prior to the series, and thus the focus of this list... is Genm's Shakiriki Sports. Dan Kuroto, you've done it again.
Build - Gorilla and Diamond get to debut in Ex-Aid, used by Takumi, and even have to be specially written out of the plot for that to happen, so they count here.
Zero-One - Flying Falcon got the most pre-show push, and the Key itself obviously gets used by Jin for a while. A combo of having many secondaries, and the gimmick-push form.

That leaves Zi-O, and the focus of my latest build. Zi-O Build Armor, who even got a Figuart, the only basic Rider armor to get one! Except Genm, yet again. To be honest, the whole thought vomit above happened because I was posing him, and my brain went "I know he did nothing in show, but why do I remember him as being so important?" Because the merch bash made me *think* he was important!

Still, even remembering how little he actally does, he's pretty cool! The armor look makes him seem more metallic and bulky, and the Build colours really pop. Even the drill weapon and bottle shoulders, which is a little tacky in show, works nicely here in scaled down form.


Plus, if you buy the full RIDE1, you have the parts to make Geiz's Build form, something I forgot existed until I looked at the box. It's not an idea they repeated with many of the armors (this, Ghost and Ex-Aid), but it's nice little thing that's fun to mess around with. The original action body is a little dodgy, given it's molded in black and not red, with a couple of red stickers (so much so they did a redo in Wave 5), but hey, the form still looks good.


And here's a group shot of all of Wave 1! I think they all look pretty good... even if I now have a spare Geiz body I need armor for. Toei, you've done it again.