[Sh Ranger]

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER DEN-O & KAMEN RIDER KIVA: CLIMAX DEKA

I didn’t like how even the tenuous rules of Den-O seemed to be suspended for the sake of breezy comedy.

Shouldn't you be happy to put all that Time Nonsense behind you though? The best parts of Den-O is when it's not focusing on that.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

(it’s nice to see Airi give that lunch to Ryuta, for sure)

She finally sees the real Ryutaros! I was very happy for him in that moment!

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

A cute adventure, nothing more.

I mean, that's the least I expect from any Den-O content. Sure, it's nice to have a deep and meaningful story with development for the main characters, but a movie where the Denliner crew are cops, Momotaros has a cool bike chase scene, Ryutaros goes nuts arresting anybody who looks suspicious, Urataros uses his deception to help Yuto, Kintaros has a cool fight scene and Kohana beats a bunch of people up on her own? Virtually every character is doing something cool here. So I'll take it!

The movie is indulgent comedy that gives the Denliner crew the excuse to experience all those espionage and detective tropes for the first time, which they have an awesome time doing, with even Ryoutarou getting in to it at the end.

I think the reason why people may not like this movie is due to taking it too seriously and not appreciating it for what it is, just a cute adventure. I understand that not being invested in Suzuki's story is going to get in the way of that. It's mostly a simplified version of Wataru's story, but I thought it was good enough.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

But it is not a third the runtime, it’s over an hour, and there’s a shocking amount of nothing to the plot. All of the setup for the cop stuff happens offscreen, as does everything related to Negataros. It’s no backstory and no character. Negataros’s scheme is vague to the point of self-parody (he recruits people by saying Hey Do You Want To Join An Evil Organization), but he’s missing the very specific flavor Kai gave the same schtick. Which, Negataros’s shtick is one hundred percent Kai’s schtick. The next villain the Den-O crew faces after defeating Kai is just palette-swapped Momo doing Kai’s dialogue! It’s uninspired.

I don't think Negataros and Kai are that similar, other than getting bored easily. Where Kai is apathetic and sick of everything, Negataros is motivated in the pursuit of his clear goal. It's like he took inspiration from the Showa style bad guys and decided, "I want to do that but better." Negataros' whole generic evil organization is totally to be a parody but that's pretty appropriate for a movie that parodies the cop comedy genre. It's just another part of the fun of the movie. He's also the first Dark Rider to debut after his heroic counterpart's show is over.

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Originally Posted by Sunred

Random tangent, I wonder what a crossover of Otoya and Yuri with the Toei tokusatsu heroes of 1986 would be like. Exhibit A we got Flashman, a group of spandex-clad former human abductees-turned-heroes from outer space and exhibit B we got Spielvan and Diana, an extradimensional armored warrior couple. I was hoping there would be a scene where they would play one of these shows off on the background randomly as a nod to the year but sadly they missed that mark. Heck, Inoue worked on select episodes of Flashman so double shame.

Fun Fact: Flashman Episode 14 was Inoue's writing debut!

But yeah, a crossover between Team 86, my favorite 80s Sentai and my favorite Metal Hero? I've been wanting that before you even mentioned it! Maybe I'll make a fanfic of that one day.