[Fish Sandwich]

I got way way behind on this thread for a bit, so allow me to do some catching up real quick.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER 1

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The arc of his story starts at Takeshi Is Awesome, and ends at Takeshi Is Awesome.

I'm pretty fond of this movie. It's not really a favorite of mine or anything, but I deeply appreciate its whole existence, I guess. Just the fact that they used the usual spring movie slot to do a film with this much of an intimate and personal narrative. It was, of course, especially personal for Hiroshi Fujioka himself, who on top of playing Hongou again in such a starring role, was actually directly involved in crafting the movie's story from early on. Everything I've ever seen from Fujioka in interviews suggests he has an immense respect for the character of Kamen Rider and the way a hero like that serves as an inspirational figure, and you can definitely see that coming across in this movie. Even the very Ghost message of how precious life is was apparently more something Fujioka wanted to emphasize, which blew my mind a little when I first found that out. Like, it might be a happy coincidence that the story is so thematically matched to Ghost?

Regardless of the details of the production though, I was pleasantly surprised by this movie when I first watched it. There are lots of little bits of the execution that aren't that great, but I still found it enjoyable overall, and I applaud it for having the soul it does.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER GHOST SUMMER MOVIE: 99 EYECONS AND A DARWIN AIN'T ONE

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who was this angry lunatic and why were they posting using my account

(and yet that was still more level-headed than most critical opinions of Ghost I was used to seeing at the time!)

Anyways, yeah, not a great ending, but a pretty good summer movie, I'd say. Dark Ghost is ~maybe~ my favorite movie villain Rider? I'm not committed to that opinion, but I think about it every now and then and realize that I actually really like this guy. The thing is, just the previous year, the movie villain Rider was Dark Drive, who I thought was like the coolest dude ever... until I saw Surprise Future, and the twist of that character's identity ended up diminishing a lot of my affection for that (amazing!) suit in the long run.

Argos, though? Way more my speed, with his reasonably fleshed out motivations and goals. He's exactly the kind of character I imagine as a literal Dark counterpart to a hero, because he has aspects that both compare and contrast with Takeru, and I find all that super cool. He's at the very least my favorite part of the movie he was in. And his suit is sweet too! ...Which is why I don't at all like that he ditches it for that much lamer Kamen Rider Extremer getup! But at the same time, it's like, if my only gripe with Argos is his choice of outfit for the final battle, I think that goes to show how much of a satisfying antagonist I found him.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

KAMEN RIDER GHOST MISCELLANY PART 3 - RIDER SPIRITS

These things are rushed as all heck, and I have always legitimately adored that about them. We've had how many big dumb crossover movies that barely acknowledge the actual character behind their returning characters, and here come these shorts where Nobuhiro Mouri just decides, for these low-budget free YouTube things, that he's not gonna stoop to that level with his scripts. The new heroes get new forms based on the old guys? Have them reference some central theme from those shows to prove they've earned it! Old villain suits coming back for them to fight? Have them bring up their whole deals from those shows in dialogue! Make the whole format for the fight scenes like 50% moral debate and *cram* those speeches in there if you have to!

In a world of so much Kamen Rider spin-off material where legacy characters are reduced to Just A Suit, these things strive to be more than that, and it made them yet another one of the pleasant surprises of Ghost for me.

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Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Die

~SINCE I CAN'T TIME TRAVEL BACK TO PREVENT THE TRAGEDY OF THAT REVIEW~

Also a pleasant surprise from Ghost: how good this extra finale was! Just an absolutely perfect thematic capstone for Ghost as a series. Like you caught on to (this time around), there's a really obvious meta layer to Takeru reassuring a child that you don't have to be sad Kamen Rider Ghost won't always be around, and that's cool by itself, but along with the Ex-Aid guest spot, the episode manages to work all that super smoothly into the overall messages of Ghost as a series. That conversation at the end between Takeru and Ayumu is probably one of the biggest things that cemented for me that Ghost was legitimately one of my favorite Rider shows ever. It's so true to everything Ghost was about, and you can really feel the year of growth Takeru has had as a character, learning everything he has from all the people he's made a connection with in his adventures.