[Sh Ranger]

Oh man, a lot of exciting Inoue and romance talk here. I definitely want to share my opinions on this!

Quote:

Originally Posted by EpsilonX

Anyways, I watched Gekiranger episode 7 last night. So far, this Five Venoms arc is playing out how I feared it would - I think they should have had a few more "generic" enemies before bringing out the elites. So I enjoyed how they struggled this episode. Long-term, I'm hoping that there's a reason for it - maybe bringing out these elites early means that the stakes will be even higher afterwards? I wouldn't mind it playing out that way.

Who among the remaining Five Venoms do you think has the coveted Madoku Ringi? I thought it was cool how they make it seem like one of them is about to use it, but then their Ringi turns out to be something else instead, making it a constant mystery to find out who actually has it. You're almost at the exciting climax for this arc so keep watching!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Lucha

The reasons why people hate Kiva are completely baffling to me. Like, how can you overlook how elegantly they weave the two timelines within each episode and dwell on shit like, "they never explained where the castle dragon came from, so this show sucks." Like -- what!? Why are you complaining about Emperor form when we just witnessed some devastating emotional and thematic parallel artfully drawn between Wataru and Otoya from decades apart?? Are you literally 12 years old???

I feel like I used to be a little unfair to Kiva, even as someone who never actually disliked it. On a rewatch, I picked up on a lot of cool details that I missed before and the stuff I remember disliking wasn't even that bad. So now I think it's an awesome show! Maybe it's like that for other people as well. Maybe people just need to rewatch it to see if they still feel the same way.

Quote:

Originally Posted by GoldenXtreme

I'm genuinely glad other people can enjoy stuff like Jetman and Kiva (my least favorite Sentai and Rider!), because I got nothing out of either of those shows besides a colossal headache. After all, imagine how depressing it would be if there was a show that genuinely nobody liked!

True. Even if the most terrible show ever makes at least one person happy, its existence is completely justified!

Quote:

Originally Posted by GoldenXtreme

I think people's Inoue Tolerance? mostly comes down to a few main factors. How much they enjoy dramatic romantic subplots, how much his emphasis on theme over internal consistency bothers them, and how much his writing quirks like his sense of humor and uh... women problems annoy the viewer. Probably some other stuff too that I can't think of off the top of my head! I personally find his writing misses the mark a lot of the time for me. I'm not a big fan of romance in stories and I tend to find his characters start to fall apart a lot of the time when you look at them outside of that scope. Like in Jetman, I feel like the romance element gets laid on so thick the show just starts to forget having the characters do much else, which is fine if you enjoy that, but I didn't! His general writing style is hit or miss, I find his treatment of women in his shows significantly worse than the majority of other toku writers and his attempts at drama sometimes fall so flat for me they wrap back around into unintentional comedy. That being said, I do like Faiz a lot, the only Inoue show I like as a matter of fact. Seems to me that everyone likes at least one Inoue show, when the elements are mixed just right.

I can respect that. I think Jetman is a great romance story, but if romance ain't your thing, then it makes sense that the show wouldn't appeal to you. You've totally spelled out what the deal with Inoue is and why fans are so divided about him. He's a man who cares about character interaction and the stories he writes are in service to that, instead of the other way around. He loves to write comedy, drama, romance and tragedy while the Tokusatsu genre is merely a cool backdrop for that. As a result, he usually writes a lot of stuff that people can deem controversial and yeah, I guess some people really do just want a more clear-cut conflict between good and evil, less interpersonal stuff. Morally complicated characters like Gai and Kusaka can be frustrating, but I have to praise Inoue for showing that people aren't always what they appear to be and that there's usually something deeper than that. Humans are great and all, but they're problematic and messed up in a lot of places and I think it's good to confront those problems and strive to become better.

Thanks for saying you enjoyed Faiz, BTW. We can agree on that!

Quote:

Originally Posted by AkibaSilver

I remember all the debat around Tokyuger when it started, how childish it looked, etc, and you know what? By the end of the show, I was in love. Godspeed, you rainbow train kids. Godspeed.

Personally, I still hate ToQGer. Not for the aesthetics or even ToQ-Oh's erotic attack, but for how terrible the story and most of the characters are. It's the only Sentai I gave up on completely and never gave another chance.

But like GoldenXtreme said above, it's good that someone can enjoy it, even if I can't.

Quote:

Originally Posted by AkibaSilver

So I can answer this one!
Romance is a tricky topic, and there are a lot of pitfalls in it. Sometimes it feels like it's only included because, well, there has to be a romance, otherwise people won't like it. This can include characters falling for each other for little reason, or in too fast a time, or just because execs believe 'Well, the man and woman have to end up together' - and I'm using that phrasing purely because Queer stories are often written more with the romance in mind, and thus it makes more sense for those to be romance heavy. From another angle, though, look at fanfiction, which has garnered a reputation (lessened in recent years, mind) of just being gay shipping and nothing else, even for characters who don't have that dynamic on screen/page/film. Add to that a common plot in any long-running thing of a "Will they or won't they" romance, which can often progress and regress at the whims of scheduling and renewal, and not for emotional reasons, and people can be burnt out on badly written romances.

But that's just bad romances, right? Well, sometimes it can feel like that's the only choice of relationship on offer. Friendships exist, yes, but they're subservient to the romance. And it erases a large chunk of the prospective relationships available in a person's life in favour of one that's raised above all others in media. Romance is an important factor in people's lives, true, but media often presents it as the only thing that matters. You can save the world, sure, but did you get the girl? Kamen Rider isn't immune to this - think about the Build V-Cins, where suddenly all the main cast outside of Sento are teased with potential women partners. None of this is to say romance is inherently bad, but it often comes across as incredibly prominent in everything, to the point where a series about romance, one with debatable realness (I've not seen beyond the first 10 eps of Kiva, I have no personal stake) can be offputting.

I think the abundance of slash fanfiction relative to hetero might be the result of stuff like your example with the Build V-Cinemas, where Ryuuga was forcefully written in to a relationship with Yui, who is almost universally hated by fans for how she comes out of nowhere and is overly rude. If the majority of ships in official media is hetero, I can see why most of the slash ships would be relegated to fanfiction. So probably if there was more of that in official media, then the demand for it in fanfiction would probably decrease. But hey, progress takes time and trying to force it would only slow it down. We just got to be patient.

Romance is definitely a tricky topic though and it has to be handled with care by someone who knows what they're doing. This is why I appreciate Inoue, cause he genuinely cares about the characters and wants to make their actions realistic. In his shows, the plot revolves around those characters, not the other way around. Everything usually happens pretty naturally. For how not to write romance, I refer everybody to the works of Sanjo Riku, who thinks romance can be set up in a single scene without any prior foreshadowing. I think he improved a little with Drive, but only a little.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kamen Rider Lucha

You two definitely don't fall into this category, but the group of anti-romance people that really tick me off are the ones (usually dudes) who balk at any hint of romance due to their indoctrination into a toxically masculine culture that forces them to shut off any vulnerability and automatically associate romance with "vile" femininity. I have lumped people unfairly into this category in the past, so it's nice to know that there are people with more nuanced and humane reasons for their aversion to romance.

Not sure if you've watched Ryusoulger, but there's this guy called Bamba, who has a really sensible approach to romance, where he's not averse to it, but he's also totally fine with being single until he meets a special someone. He's more chill about his relationship status and it's a healthier contrast to Canalo, who is always looking for the next rebound. I think that Bamba has the secret to a successful long-term relationship: Patience.