[Battlizer MK II]

So, I've been watching (and re-watching) Rider with friends earlier this year, starting with Build and we were gonna move onto Zi-O but decided to start Decade first for context since no one had seen it....and then for further context we decided to go back and watch a handful of shows lol. Haven't watched all.of 'em recently.but I have a few thoughts on each. Forgive any typos, I'm blasting this out on a phone haha.

Build

Watched Build for the first time early this year and I really ended up enjoying this one. I feel like, in recent memory there hasn't been a Goku show that literally thoroughly explained every question I had about it and left no plot hook untouched. Not that it's necessarily important to me that everything makes sense but Build seemed to go.above and beyond in connecting everything and wrapping it in a nice ribbon.

Sento and his band of morons is probably the funniest group of Riders since demo. Gentoku's uh...personality shift had me damn near in tears lol. Evolt's probably the most charismatic Rider villain I've seen in a while and probably my favorite...though to be fair I hadn't watches a series in full.for a while before watching Build.

That said... I was already kind of iffy about the ending being just...everyone's cool. Nothing really changed, but I like this crew so much and their interactions together, I ended up not minding but if even Evolt's showing up and being cool with everybody....as much as I like him, eh. I dunno. Though, I guess Build even gave an explanation of how it's villain can show up in a crossover movies lol.

Have not seen the Grease movie yet, but I'm looking forward to.it when I get to it.

Decade

First time I've ever watched the entire series and...well, I know I said ultimately logic and plot holes s don't necessarily have to be an issue but they kinda do if they hamper the entire plot. I'm not sure what Tsukasa's journey was about, but he certainly did take one. The whole Rider worlds thing was confusing as to what actually was.occurring between the alternate Rider worlds and the real ones....but Den-O didn't have an alternate? Maybe there's an explanation but I'm lost aha.

Tsukasa himself, I didn't mind. He was one of the two main Riders's to be an unrepentant douchebag, the other being Kabuto which they alluded to, but unlike Kabuto he seems.to have less positive qualities and people didn't put up with his bullshit. But it wasn't am issue, it just kind of amused me.

That said...did he actually learn anything in All Riders vs Dai Shocker? I guess he apologized to his sister for repeated fucking off to journey through the multiverse but to my recollection he never really uh apologized for all the shit he did as Great Leader, huh.

He regained all his memories, instantly betrayed his friends, I forget if he was implied.to be be the one who tortured alt universe Riderman or not but if so...weird that he was just forgiven like it was nothing. He only seemed.to feel bad and run back to Natsumi once he himself.got betrayed lol.

Died is the worst thief in the world.

The grandpa turning out to be Doctor Shinigami/Igadevil still haunts me to this day. Why.

But seriously, I think Diend stole one thing and if he did steal something else he immediately gave it back. Whatever was going on with him, was even vaguer than it was with Tsukasa and that's saying something. This coupled with his betrayal in Super Hero Taisen sorta gives me a bad impression of him overall.

Really though why was the grandpa Igadevil. I know they "explained" it in Decade but that just raised more questions. He was old friends with Terror...or...or something?!

I think at the end of the day, Tsukasa didn't really.learn anything about himself and instead of growing as a person by the end he decided, "I'm now how I've been acting this entire series? Imma just go amplify that by a hundred." And that's okay. Now I know when to brace myself whenever he shows up.

W

First time I've watched this one all.the way through! Before I attempted to, but honestly after watching Den-O, my first Rider show, which I dug a lot and Kiva which...I didn't dig so much I sort of fell.off the whole blatant two-parter formula early. ...Though, I did watch Fourze some years ago and got hooked lol.

Double though, as popular as it was, always eluded me. One of my friends had already watched it all and loved it so I was prepared for.it to be good. And it was! The characters were amazing and that was really Doubles focus. Shotaro, Phillip, Akiko, and Terui were a great maim cast. Kamen Rider Skull was dope and while I wish they'd shown more of him...I also.appreciate him being sparse. Though that time he just showed up as a ghost was outta nowhere lol.

All in all, it's good like I said. But I feel like it's weakness was it's plot? I feel.W was heavily character focused, which is cool but I like more of a balanced approach. I think the Donovan family was ultimately kind of disappointing as was the plot revolving around the memories of the Earth. It just wasn't the show's main focus by the end, the issues involving Phillip were but I'm not sure that was handled well. Could just be me being upset that Saeko died but I dunno lol.

But for the kind of show Double was p, the two larger format it kept until the end really worked for it. So while ultimately not one of my favorites, it's still one I really liked. Looking forward to seeing more of the cast when I get to OOOs and looking forward to seeing the anime!

Faiz

Now this one, I'd actually seen before. Watching it a second time was...interesting. I think I picked up more on a couple things like how Kusaka was the most realized and competent character in the entire show. Faiz has POTENTIALLY the most interesting plot out of the four shows mentioned here but I feel like it mostly meanders and goes nowhere lol.

Takumi, I feel is a pretty good protagonist. You can really.see him growing as a character from where Faiz starts and how it ends. No wild character shifts, it's still the same guy but he's listened up and stopped brushing people off. No beef with him.other than the fact that this man needs to sometimes take a moment to sit down and EXPLAIN and THINK lol.

Mari and Keitaro were alright. I feel like they both kind of petered off by the end in terms of importance. I never knew what became of Mari's hair cutting exploits. I was however reminded of how Keitaro can take forty something episodes to put two two together...

Similarly, Osada also faded into the background by the end but I felt her character was occasionally interesting, obsession with Kaidou aside. Kaidou himself... I wanna like his character but just what the he'll were they going for with this guy. He was all over the place and that seemed like the point but ipthere was no real rhyme or reason behind it, it seemed. Every Face turn he pulled was either followed or preceded by him acting like a unlikeable shithead.

Kiba was alright...until the end. I'll be honest, I never bought the while Orphenoch vs Human concept. Largely because it was mostly non-existant in the show, save for near the end and even that was brief. The Orphenoch acted more like vampires, being powerful otherworldly beings who implanted themselves in what seemed to be the most technologically advanced corporation in the world and ruled from the shadows. Screaming, "Oh no...these humans ...they're really gonna get us!" before killing dozens of humans.

Like the one human who does.lead the charge against them...probably only started to do so after realizing how many people they've managed to stalk and kill. Anyway back to Kiba's heel turn. I mean yeah...Osada was captured and horrifically experimented on by one group of humans. But she also was shot by an Orphenoch hunting them. He saw this!

And even if he was always gonna join the Smart Brain anyway....I don't buy him going full Super villain and then changing his mind after getting punched a bit. Speaking of Smart Brain...

Lucky Clover was kind of lame. Mr J got killed off and was threatened with losing his spot...but big crybaby Takuma gets to stick around and cower in the corner the entire show?! He fails constantly and then there's Kageyama who also fails repeatedly but she just hides it better lol. And Kitazaki was competent but...just a weird character. I kinda found it weird that Kusaka and Mihara went out to get revenge and...they failed and it went nowhere. Making his rival Mihara or something may have actually given Delta something to do aside from being lame.

What was the deal with the Orphenoch King. What are the Orphenoch actually? The show gives them a sci-fi vibe but they have a mystical king who was prophecies to save their race and has a mind of it's own delete are from his host? If there's any spinoff material that covers this, please forward it to me aha.

Mihara sucks.

Kusaka was probably my favorite character on the show, probably. There were things about his level of manipulation that were....realistic I guess but that was also hampered by him constantly acting like a manic cartoon villain and the other characters' stupidity.

But overall, he was probably the smartest person on the show. Interesting in that while he was the second Rider, he in no way redeemed himself other than deciding not to actively fuck with the lives of his allies. Unless he was driven by a petty jealously, he was for the most part, smart enough to realize Takumi was still needed to fight the Orphenoch.

The whole mother thing with Mari was pretty creepy. Kinda wish they didn't drop it to.see where that goes but....might be for the best that they did lol. Also his death is something I'm surprised they got away with even back then.

Overall I have a lot to say about Faiz. I find the concept interesting enough and the characters have....SOMETHING going for them but it always seemed to lose focus and mostly missed the mark. Still, I feel like I've held it in high regard for a while. Mostly because of...

The movie. The Faiz movie is probably up there as my favorite Rider related media, if not number one. It's insane that this has the same writers. Bigger budget or not, why couldn't this be the world of the show? The set up was WAY more interesting and the human vs Orphenoch conflict actually exists in this take!

Every character that didn't work for me or fell.off to me, works here. I understand Kiba's heel turn. Kaidou's weird fake mood swings are more mellow here plus they call him out for it! Osada calls him out for it! She has a spine in this! I actually liked her and Kaidou's relationship in this! I felt sad for these versions when they barely got screentime!

Psyga is one of the suits I feel is too cool.looking to not have appeared in the show. Same with Orga. Also hey there was no Lucky Clover in this. I can only assume they were killed off due to complete incompetence. Or in Kitazaki's case, because he was a liability to their new society.

Mihara was also gone, which I learned was due to apparently Kusaka killing him because he believed he was trying to mack on Mari? Uh...well... Y'know what....I can buy it.