[DreadBringer]

I didn't know that the Decade talk here would involve various different people, I thought it's all Zatyme. I guess this is called "TokuNation watches for a reason".

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER DIE: Look at him! Look at our shiny new Kuuga (...Newga?) on his classic bike. We've got a lot of ground to cover in these two episodes, as Team Decade try to save the World of Kuuga from absolute destruction, and what better place to start than with Onodera, our definitely-as-good-as-Godai Kuuga. What did you think of our new/old Kamen Rider?

FISH SANDWICH: I think the way I'd answer that question has changed a bit over the years, but there's one constant in my opinion of Newsuke – he's very different, for someone so familiar.

Oh, so the Onodera debut, although it got better at the end (even it's due to him learning more of heroism), wasn't really well-received here (I refer for Die here, of course Fish wouldn't resonate with this for obvious reasons). Actually I was kinda afraid that, especially with Kuuga bashing here (yes it was probably joking due to it contrasting with the reply to Enchilada645, but sorry it did gave me a wrong impression at first because bashing people for liking different stuff commonly happens in fandom and they mean it - hence the "unpopular opinion" start), Onodera will be hailed here as "the right way to handle Godai, give him an actual humanizing trait in relatable motive like impressing a girl instead of turning them into typical goody-two-shoes", I've seen that happened to someone like Superman here for example, but instead, the response here seems to be similar to Kotaro from Den-O? But otherwise yes, iirc, not being able to get Odagiri back was the reason that this is a brand new Kuuga story, as well as any other seasons who gets revisited. The video games also separate Godai and Onodera (both of their first names are Yusuke! in this thread I gotta refer to original Kuuga as Godai then) at times like Battride War.

For Onodera's motive, well, I think this is a mistake people commonly do, to only judge character's morals by motive alone, like if they don't fight for altruistic reasons then that character "isn't even a hero", but an even worse case of this (not done here, but an example) is when someone claims to have noble motivation despite doing bad things, they're hailed as "doubtful hero". It should be obvious that the former is still much better than the latter despite the motivation. Actions define the hero/villain archetype, and characterization determines the traditional/anti label. So it doesn't matter if he's abrasive or only does it for approval, he's still a hero if he regularly saves peoples lives by fighting monsters. Doing it for un-heroic reasons just makes him an anti-hero (of course morally grey hero wouldn't suit original Kuuga other than being its own entity).

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER DIE: Like, the monster/mystery plot is nowhere in this story. People flagged up Tsukasa as being like Tendou, and I can vaguely see where they're coming from after this story, while still objecting to it. Tendou would normally figure out a mystery and keep the solution to himself for maximum showmanship. Here, it's like Tsukasa either read the entire script beforehand, or is playing a New Game+ version of Kamen Rider Decade. There are multiple scenes of Tsukasa explaining a ton of plot points, and none of it is a logical leap from the available information. He just knows everything that's going to happen, and he's happy to ruin the story for the other characters -slash- viewers. It's anti-tension for the first one and a half episodes of this story.
Am I crazy? Am I being unfair to this two-parter?

FISH SANDWICH: It's definitely a whole thing about how Tsukasa is often characterized. The script for these episodes doesn't really let you inside his head the way you'd generally expect from a protagonist, and I can see that making it difficult to find what it is you're meant to be caring about in the story. It can make Tsukasa very entertaining (love him crashing that police meeting!), while also making it hard to truly invest in him and his journey if you aren't willing to read between some lines. Like, is his ability to speak Grongi an interesting hint towards his potential true nature, or is it simply convenient that he can do that? It's all up to the viewer in the end.

Now I see what I'd expect more of Tsukasa here, he had several real dick moves, and he's appropriately called "Dickeido" by some of the fans, like him constantly pouring water at the coffee without stopping, and dismissing people he finds boring like Onodera's motive (I know Onodera deserves to be called out, but I think Tsukasa just offends there by condemning someone as being boring - he offends others just that it happens to be someone deserving). I'd wonder though what would Tsukasa react to someone more like Godai there, actually the likes of those are what people like audience going to bash as being boring more - they unwittingly making opposite comparison (to some audience) for Tsukasa here. And for Tsukasa's dick acts, I guess him being baffled for the Gamio's assault and wanting to save the world there shows his standards, that even a jerk like him would have limits, and that's required to assign him as the main hero (like many of secondary Riders being one of the main casts), albeit obviously anti-hero as what Androzani24 talked about him dirtying his hands to accomplish that. I'd think the mystery part, for Tsukasa knowing everything, it's down to the production team instead of Tsukasa "playing New Game+" to not actually make a scene of working out towards the mystery, just going instantly to the results of Tsukasa figuring everything out. Tsukasa learning Grongi language is probably an interesting method to implement, the reverse of monsters learning human language.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER DIE: One of my favorite parts about it was how it ends up grouping a whole bunch of characters, how it talks about a lot of different things. There's the origin story for Onodera's need to protect smiles. There's Tsukasa's internalizing of his mission as one that's more about helping heroes be better, instead of just fighting for no reason. And then there's how the series uses Yashiro's role as motivator/sacrifice to talk about how the supporting cast of a Kamen Rider show might see themselves, and I kind of can't stop thinking about that?
She's so self-aware about how she's the reason why Onodera is willing to fight, and her feeling conflicted about that is 1000% Kuuga. She's the ultimate theme of Kuuga in this story, not Onodera, and that makes me really happy. She's someone who views Kuuga as a necessary evil. She regrets the necessity of Kuuga, while doing everything she can to motivate Onodera. And even as she dies giving him the words he'll live by, she manages to feel like a jerk for inspiring him. The specificity of that, to have a supporting cast member wish that they weren't so good at motivating a hero... man, I'm gonna think about that for a while.

At first I thought they were actual siblings (like Die here, and was confused of Tsukasa claiming he fights for his crush) and it'd be combination of several Kuuga characters like being one/several of the Kuuga's cops (not only Ichijou) as long as Minori (Godai's little sister). As the female Ichijou, there'd be an opposite here from what I get as well, as in Kuuga, it was Godai who had an influence to others and drawing them in; the others being the more reluctant one, albeit briefly (Ichijou was only reluctant at first 3 episodes), but in Decade as seen in the dying scene, Yashiro was the one to draw in and push Onodera, the one who is more reluctant, as he almost retired when Yashiro is dying. The term "onore Decade" exists for a reason like the messing with original series, but at least in this scene, aside from that inspiring words scene can be hated due to it being treated as cheesy or that some want the series to not showcase preaching, regarding the talk about Onodera and heroism here, it at least shows that, despite Onodera contributes likely far more compared to the police force, doesn't mean that he's necessarily the most heroic for being the one who saves the world, it can be the others that are more heroic instead, but has less power/scientific intelligence to contribute as much as Onodera like Yashiro here.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER DIE: The entire ending was such a blast. (Well, I probably could've done without the body-horror of Kuuga turning into the Gouram.) It's almost totally unearned, but I don't care even a little. Kuuga's heroic arrival, Tsukasa's superfan speech, the dual finishers where they meet in the middle... it's all so fun and joyous and reverent that I don't care that I literally couldn't tell you why Tsukasa suddenly waves the flag for Onodera. Don't care, can't care. Bypassed all of my critical faculties and had me cheering for this finale.

FISH SANDWICH: It's so much fun, isn't it? I've said that Decade's whole goal was basically to have every arc feel like you're watching the Decade movie, and the huge stakes of this crazy Grongi apocalypse going down, these two heroes banding together to face the danger, the special effects that go massively beyond anything Kuuga could've done in the year 2000... it's so memorable. That climax is something that truly set a gold standard for every following arc of this show to live up to, and I've always remembered it quite fondly.
Even the gross body-horror! ...Sort of!

True, Decade's high point would be the effects/action, I saw a footage before and it seems that Decade has stellar special effects, and like the discussion for episode 1 before. It's Decade's thing in general to have the previous Riders turn into their assists, not only Kuuga to Gouram here - as I've known in video games like Climax Heroes. But actually, the one that I hate the most for Onodera is actually not character but the Rider stuff, the fact that they watered down Kuuga power wise, like base Decade going toe to toe with Ultimate Kuuga before at the Hell Bros fight. I think as I said in Fish's Kuuga thread, Kuuga Ultimate form is my favorite implementation of the final form in the franchise, with the power upgrade being distinct from previous Kuuga's already devastating attack, only used against the final threat so it won't look like a fool like being jobbed, and knowing the escalating power, it's justified that Godai would only use basic attacks against Daguva in the final fight, but even then, basic attacks are still enough to put him down showing his power as well.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

FISH SANDWICH: Decade did this super cool thing where there were new monsters for the old shows, even going so far as to get the original designers to create them, and in the case of the big bad wolf in these episodes, N-Gamio-Zeda, he even comes with his own real-life backstory. The basic idea of using a wolf Grongi as the villain for the Kuuga movie that never ending up coming together was kicking around way back in 2000, with a parchment Ichijou finds in the 48th episode even having his logo sneakily hidden on it. Since that movie didn't end up getting made, they apparently decided to revive the concept for Decade, and even got Kuuga's narrator, Fumihiko Tachiki, to provide his (very cool) voice. It's one of those neat stories where it means literally nothing to anyone but diehard fans, but if you are a diehard fan, it's cool how much more history there is behind this guy.

Though I wouldn't like Kuuga (as a Rider)'s handling here, I'd give more free pass to the threats as it wouldn't be exactly the same unlike Riders who are pseudo-return from the past series, it'd just mean that Decade's A.R Worlds have far less threat than the original series ones, with the final threat on the Kuuga A.R World being a "mere" Gamio, someone who doesn't seem to be nearly as threatening as Daguva (at least on his own), as he's put down only by 2 base Riders fighting him, Decade and Onodera Kuuga, even if Decade is an anniversary Rider. Though obviously Gamio would have the same goal of prolonging conflict among humans, and he even excuses his as human wanting conflicts - I̶'̶m̶ ̶k̶n̶i̶d̶a̶ ̶s̶c̶a̶r̶e̶d̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶c̶o̶m̶m̶u̶n̶i̶t̶i̶e̶s̶ ̶l̶i̶k̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶t̶r̶y̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶"̶f̶o̶l̶l̶o̶w̶ ̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶e̶x̶a̶m̶p̶l̶e̶"̶ ̶t̶o̶o̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶i̶n̶c̶i̶t̶e̶ ̶c̶o̶n̶f̶l̶i̶c̶t̶s̶ ̶s̶o̶ ̶i̶t̶'̶l̶l̶ ̶b̶e̶ ̶"̶f̶u̶n̶"̶,̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶a̶r̶e̶ ̶j̶u̶s̶t̶ ̶n̶o̶ ̶s̶u̶p̶e̶r̶p̶o̶w̶e̶r̶s̶ ̶i̶r̶l̶ ̶(̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶G̶a̶m̶i̶o̶ ̶w̶o̶r̶k̶e̶d̶ ̶o̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶b̶y̶ ̶t̶u̶r̶n̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶m̶ ̶i̶n̶t̶o̶ ̶G̶r̶o̶n̶g̶i̶s̶)̶. Other than Yashiro's final moment being favorite scene talk here, I also like that they didn't hold back of making Yashiro die here, I'm not usually talking or praising something like this - but for the stakes of the threat that can happen, though for others, it'd be still too easy solution that, Gamio died, all of what he left disappears too, erasing all of the impacts at once.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

FISH SANDWICH: Well, first of all, I'd just like to thank these Kuuga-centric episodes of Decade for also giving me the opportunity to talk about Kabuto with you some more. Really getting the best of both worlds here! But yeah, this is another one of those moments that's all about effectively establishing the way this show is going to work. Granted, the first time I watched Decade, I only vaguely knew who the Hoppers were ("popular guys from Kabuto", basically), so they weren't much more than a fun sudden obstacle, but it doesn't detract from the story or anything, and it succeeds as fanservice without a doubt. The thought that Decade can just throw ANY Rider at you out of nowhere is inherently exciting for long-time fans, and they picked a great pair of characters to lead off with. ...Plus, it's great that their appearance ends with them failing in their mission after their horribly flawed personalities cause them to become single-mindedly focused on something completely irrelevant. This is no shallow appearance; they totally nailed the characters!

KAMEN RIDER DIE: Hoppers Can't Close is maybe the most important aspect of Kabuto, no argument there. The only confusing thing to me is that their exit seemed to imply that our new Mystery Fisherman was able to pull villainous Riders to do his bidding (flashes of Delta and Tiger in the curtain), when we all know that Kageyama and Yaguruma were the real heroes of Kabuto. I guess this is just another one of those A.R. changes, though!
But that's a bit headcanon-y, much like either the most headcanon-y thing I'll ever think, or the thing that's going to make me love Decade more than any other Kamen Rider series:

For the Tendou-Tsukasa common comparison (at least to audience, and later since ep. 26 Decade's main writer is Yonemura - I don't know if this'd count as spoiler though), I'd find it a probably missing opportunity to make the Hopper brothers like, probably bring up Tendou regarding Decade, like the resemblance to him or irrational jealousy or such. Their other use and their flaw being a downfall is neat though.

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Originally Posted by TheRaizin

No. Never! It's what makes Tsukasa and Tendou special in that they're not very usual for protagonists. But I do would like to see another rider that acts like them, and not the typical protagonist. Although, that's ironic considering Touma is winning me over.

I like seeing riders with a lot more confidence and style. Haruto should probably be up there with them.

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Originally Posted by TheRaizin

Most people would prefer Godai, and/or Godai is the first they've seen of Kuuga and thus he is the most popular.

For me, Onodera was my Kuuga. I got to watch Kuuga proper later after this, but for the most part, everytime I saw Kuuga, I always associate him with Onodera.

So you'd appreciate Haruto too. I mean he's not one of the more well-liked protagonist AFAIK, being frequently seen as boring, having "no personality", etc. where while those 2 are divisive but gains biggest praise I've seen (plz don't gloat over that while putting down others... ~). I do want Haruto to remind that being confident and stylish (or being 'competent') doesn't mean you have to possess unpleasant traits like being arrogant, or such; Haruto has similar moral compass as most of other main Riders while oozing confidence. And yes, I've read too that there are those who don't like Haruto and thinks to "fix" him you gotta make him smug and cocky like those 2, and though you'd prefer Onodera here, I'm afraid of Onodera being considered as a way to "fix Godai", which is similar to the "fix talk" for Haruto there.

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Originally Posted by Switchblade

I used to think of Tsukasa as basically Diet Tendou. He has some similar tendencies in regards to helping out in the most dickish way possible (e.g. punching Yashiro in the face to stop the gegeru), but it finally clicked on me what the major difference is between them. Tendou is all about arrogance; he believes that the world revolves around him and he expects that everyone else should recognize that. Tsukasa isn't as self-assured. For Tsukasa, I feel that the most important thing to him is that everyone else should think he's cool. He acts aloof and brusque because he thinks that it makes him seem cooler. One of the things that's really neat about the character is that because he keeps coming back, we get to see older versions of him that are less image conscious.

Well, I'd think both Tsukasa and Tendou are the type who mostly focuses in only the saving people/the world part, so I'd not think "helping out" 100% fit to describe here. Like saving the world is just one out of a wide range of good morals out there, someone can do that yet fail in other moral deeds. I'd think the term helping out would cover many morally good trait and deeds in addition to “saving people”, like Die said the franchise is about "helping others psychologically", and KR has showcased many of that typically in most other main Riders, but CMIIW in this response I want to talk.

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Originally Posted by Androzani84

Yashiro’s actress was previously in Faiz as one of the bullies who tormented Yuka. In between the two shows, she had a regular stint on Madan Senki Ryukendo (the Takara-produced Tokusatsu show that outsold both Rider and Sentai, but had way worse ratings) as a flower girl.

One thing I remember about these episodes that isn’t actually in the episodes themselves is that Tsukasa’s actor actually spoke with a legal expert about Tsukasa’s action in the first episode and how much jail time they would earn him if he were a real person (22 years for impersonating an officer, tampering with evidence, withholding evidence, barging into a police meeting and assaulting an officer)

That'd be very surprising of someone so minor being appeared before as a character not even named iirc, both died too but in opposite way. And for Tsukasa's action, I guess breaking the law isn't necessarily questionable, but what Tsukasa did was a case of something questionable enough. For other things, it's something similar to Tendou as well before in Kabuto ep. 3, he too barged into a police station and assaulted several of them to do the job by taking the Worm of the weak (impersonating Yuki) which was held there.

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Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich

- Tsukasa and Natsumi maybe have one of my favorite hero/heroine dynamics in Rider history, by the way? They're constantly giving each other crap in a way that's about as dysfunctional as you'd expect from Heisei Rider, but at the same time you can tell they care about each other quite a bit, complete with him having a pet name for her and her always calling him Tsukasa-kun all affectionately.

I'd think that, the part of "you can tell they care about each other quite a bit", it's something that is expected from KR as well in any of the protagonist side casts, not just the dysfunctional part. The only few times that this is not a case is (cmiiw, iirc) when a villain is dragged into the protagonist side casts for common goal, not them being redeemed, like Kuroto in Ex-Aid.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

ISo, the thing that I think makes the Tsukasa/Natsumi relationship land so well is that it's of a slightly different duration than we've seen in other Heisei shows. Most of the dynamics in the other shows are either long-term relationships where the main character has a warm relationship with the other character (Wataru/Shizuka, Ryotaro/Airi, Asumu/Hitomi), or relationships that only start in the first episode and are all prickly and weird (Wataru/Megumi, Ryotaro/Hana, Asumu/Akira). The Tsukasa/Natsumi relationship is right in the middle, since he's only been hanging around for a little while. It's new enough that she can lose her temper at his quirks, but established enough that they can have little nicknames and friendly banter.

The two of them... it's right in this sweet spot of Antagonism and Affection, you know? Good energy.

I've talked about this before, but I'd think that Ryotaro/Hana doesn't fit into it being "all prickly" (they are an example of those starting at first episode though); Hana is all hostile and aggressive to the Taros Imagins, but for Ryotaro never showed any meanness towards him (to humans in general mostly too) even when guiding him, she sits with him, talks to him, and tries to help, without something like putting him down or such. For the other 2 example, it fits, with Megumi making condescending remarks that put down Wataru, though very briefly for Asumu/Akira (it's like Godai/Ichijou, Ichijou being hostile only at first 3 episode).