[Kamen Rider Die]

MASKED RIDER AGITO HYPER BATTLE VIDEO - THREE GREAT RIDERS



Well, I’ve just spent some time watching WandaVision, a TV show about an all-powerful character who manipulates reality and kidnaps people to paper over their own sense of helplessness amid a world of constant dangers, so now let me take a nice long drink of water before starting to enjoy this 19-year old Agito short that is going to be a nice breath of uncomplicatedly fresh air…

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Okay, so, that didn’t work out so great.

Yep, some slight similarities between this goofy-ass clipshow and a harrowing exploration of a woman’s grief, and I found them to be equally enjoyable.

It’s an HBV, so there’s really not a ton to unpack. (The Build and Faiz ones are, like, the only ones I can recall getting at larger themes. Speaking of HBVs, did anyone watch that recent Gaim Gaiden, the Bravo/Guridon one? Same deal, where it’s just this thin as hell plot and a few new suits, but with the troubling addition of nostalgia as an alternative to character growth. Didn’t love it!) It’s mostly an excuse to have the three main Riders (sorry, recently-killed Another Agito) be weird around each other and desperately avoid being seen as functional heroes, something that could not be more Inoue if it tried.

It’s a fun conceit, all three heroes putting their friends over as the Strongest Rider so that they can bail on this story. (The correct answer to Tele-pi’s dilemma, of course, is Leangle. Failing that, G3 but only when Houjou is piloting it.) I liked the touch of Hikawa immediately being okay with admitting he’s not that great, which is Hikawa’s eternal opening gambit. The escalation of Shouicihi’s Aw Shucks humility at actually being incredibly cool, yes, and I missed it so much. He’s the Sweetest Rider, and that’s not worth nothing. Ryou’s tendency to appear and disappear from this story, ceding a ton of the narrative to the Shouichi/Hikawa partnership, reminds me of the way most of Agito’s stories broke down: specifically, Ryou’s mostly parallel storylines and his occasional appearances for a group fight. Him being Incredibly Tortured in his monologue and then having Tele-pi’s reaction be OH MY GOD THAT IS THE BEST probably mirrored how the younger audience was viewing Gills’ unending torment and one-foot-in-front-of-the-other pragmatism.

As always with these early-Heisei HBVs, it’s nice to finally get names for all of these parts of Agito? The forms and gear and moves? (“Gills Feeler”, though… could’ve lived a happy life never knowing that!) It’s all said so casually here, like DUH everyone knows it’s called the Gills Heel Claw, dummy. It would’ve been nice to know these things as I was watching Agito? Ah, well. Hard to get mad about it now, you know?

It’s a cute little story, this one. The action is minor, the canonicity is questionable, and the new content is brief, but I had a good time with it. Building a story around Riders recounting their awesome abilities while throwing their friends under the bus to avoid an embarrassing hat? Sure, why not. At least Tele-pi let them all leave in the end! Not every traumatized god-like character would!