[SPLIT LIP]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Locke

Your sarcasm is especially hilarious as you've backed up nothing in your post, firstly proving my point and secondly you come across as a total ass while doing it. Congratulations.

He comes across as a total ass?

He pointed out the flaw in your post. We know plenty about all of the characters. Kouta is a hero, but he's not the most intelligent person and believes what he's told too often, and doesn't consider consequences. Hell, he's accepted the Kiwami lock despite the warnings. Kaito is obsessed with strength and what it means, and has his own deffinition about what strength really is, for better or worse. Micchy is ultimately selfish, but his selfishness is not one-dimensional. His scheming was born from him just wanting to keep things the way they were. He's gone from cunning, to self-absorbed, and it's evolving into a full-on villain with nothing to lose and everything to gain. Sid was slimy, but he was also outright villainous. He, much like Micchy, was selfish in his goals, but unlike Micchy lacked any kind of subtlety, which led to his early demise. And so on, and so on. Maybe because historically Kamen Rider has relentlessly drilled every aspect of the show into the viewer's heads due to it's fixed length and often basic stories, but just becasue Gaim doesn't have every character reiterate their arc each episode to pad out the show as most do to make up for the lack of substance, doesn't make it underdevloped. You can overdo just as much as you can underdo.

Just because you whittle them down to one-word descriptors, doesn't make the characters that simple. I could say anything's as simple as I want, doesn't make it true. And biting back at people who call you out for it really paints you in an unfavourable light. If you're going to get snarky, make damn sure you're actually making sense or else people will call you out on being pretentious.

The only one I agree with you on is Gridon, but that really comes across as superficial love on the producton team's part. They like what the character represents, not especially what he is. People find likablity in stuff even if we haven't lived each day of it's life. There is no rule that says every single character needs to be as equally developed for people to like them. It's not hard-wired into the human brain that liking something means it can't be for superficial reasons.

[MaskedRiderAsakura]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SPLIT LIP

He pointed out the flaw in your post. We know plenty about all of the characters. Kouta is a hero, but he's not the most intelligent person and believes what he's told too often, and doesn't consider consequences. Hell, he's accepted the Kiwami lock despite the warnings. Kaito is obsessed with strength and what it means, and has his own deffinition about what strength really is, for better or worse. Micchy is ultimately selfish, but his selfishness is not one-dimensional. His scheming was born from him just wanting to keep things the way they were. He's gone from cunning, to self-absorbed, and it's evolving into a full-on villain with nothing to lose and everything to gain. Sid was slimy, but he was also outright villainous. He, much like Micchy, was selfish in his goals, but unlike Micchy lacked any kind of subtlety, which led to his early demise. And so on, and so on. Maybe because historically Kamen Rider has relentlessly drilled every aspect of the show into the viewer's heads due to it's fixed length and often basic stories, but just becasue Gaim doesn't have every character reiterate their arc each episode to pad out the show as most do to make up for the lack of substance, doesn't make it underdevloped. You can overdo just as much as you can underdo.

Couldn't have said it better myself. Saying we don't know anything about the characters is just factually wrong.

[Suzu]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SPLIT LIP

People find likablity in stuff even if we haven't lived each day of it's life. There is no rule that says every single character needs to be as equally developed for people to like them. It's not hard-wired into the human brain that liking something means it can't be for superficial reasons.

All of my yes.

[Locke]

Quote:

Originally Posted by SPLIT LIP

*snip*.

Kouta I agree with, some people are just good and therefore Kouta's actions always make perfect sense especially in the kind of reality that toku normally exists in. But I disagree with you a thousand percent on all the others. It especially helps that the down time scenes of Kouta just enjoying himself give him a genuine sense of humanity that convinces me only further of his actions.

Kaito is obsessed with strength, granted, but why is he obsessed with strength? That is my point here. We're very late in the game, and personal motivations, stakes and driving forces are completely missing from him despite him being our QUOTE Secondary Rider UNQUOTE. It isn't even like he gets to be human between the dramatic moments, as most of what he does is scowl, flap his coat and watch Mai swoon at his feet.

Micchy again, we understand his motivations much better than Kaito's granted but in terms of why he goes to such despicable lengths is not something we understand. And sure like Kouta - but the opposite - there exist people who are just bad but he's despicable to the point of insanity. Actually now I think about it the way he always dumps exposition to himself, maybe he is mad... He doesn't feel real to me, because no one is that pantomime villain in real life and nothing in the show convinces me his pantomime routine even fits in the context of this show.

The reasoning for Micchy's actions - namely the lengths he goes too - deserve to be explored, just like Kaito's motivations for why he is such a titanic asshole 90% of the time. I can't believe we're so late in the game, and they're so important to the plot, and I can barely bullet point a few things about them. Kouta is the only one I feel any kind of emotional attachment too, as he's the only character who is both semi realised and actually gets to feel lived in.

But don't worry, the fanboyism is blind for this series right now, and I know we wont agree now. And maybe not in a years time, or two, but eventually every series has a moment where people look back in it - and I mean REALLY look - and realise they were too quick to praise and too slow to criticise. I'll look forward to talking about Gaim then when we can have a real discussion.

[IXRollOutIX]

I mean, there are plenty of people still blinded by their fanboyism for W. While I'm absolutely loving Gaim, I can sorta see where you're coming from because I never got behind the hype for W, myself.

As for Kaito. I thought they explained that his father's business was erased by Yggdrasill causing his family to become super poor. He was sort of taken aback by the amount of power they had which made him feel weak - something he never wanted to feel again. In favor of "helping others," they destroyed his life, leading to trust issues and lack of teamwork. Ever since, he's had this goal of becoming strong enough to overcome Yggdrasill by himself.

[MaskedRiderAsakura]

In the case of Micchy, Micchy has lived his entire life without control nor the means to gain control. He has to live a double life because while he wants to go out and dance with his friends, his brother has been forcing him to pursue higher education and imposes his elitism on him.

Micchy outright states that he likes being a Rider because it's given him a degree of control that he's never experienced before. As the plot goes on, that control has been gradually slipping away from him and he's made desperate attempts to gain it back. It becomes increasingly clear that he only cares about his friends in the most selfish way possible; for him they represent a status quo that must be protected at whatever cost possible, which means eliminating those who ruin his vision.

The point is not to agree with what he's done or even sympathize with it, but just because the plot doesn't reiterate how Micchy has got to this point every 3 episodes does not mean he doesn't have his reasons.

Really, writing everybody off who disagrees with you as a blind fanboy does not make your point correct.

[Locke]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MaskedRiderAsakura

Micchy outright states that he likes being a Rider because it's given him a degree of control that he's never experienced before. As the plot goes on, that control has been gradually slipping away from him and he's made desperate attempts to gain it back. It becomes increasingly clear that he only cares about his friends in the most selfish way possible; for him they represent a status quo that must be protected at whatever cost possible, which means eliminating those who ruin his vision.

The point is not to agree with what he's done or even sympathize with it, but just because the plot doesn't reiterate how Micchy has got to this point every 3 episodes does not mean he doesn't have his reasons.

Only cares about his friends selfishly? He has one friend, Kouta, who he's been trying to kill for a while now because... reasons. So I dunno what show you're watching where it becomes "increasingly clear" that he's doing anything. My whole point is his motivations are increasingly unclear and the only reason he isn't difficult to follow is because he's so one dimensional.

Also why are we talking about plot reiteration every three episodes? We haven't had a single episode exploring this. Yeah we had the scenes of him being a bratty shit at the start, because boo-hiss his brother is successful but "to the man" but then we've had a giant gap of nothing and now he regularly talks to himself and tries to kill his friends. Pretty huge leap.

Quote:

Originally Posted by IXRollOutIX

As for Kaito. I thought they explained that his father's business was erased by Yggdrasill causing his family to become super poor. He was sort of taken aback by the amount of power they had which made him feel weak - something he never wanted to feel again. In favor of "helping others," they destroyed his life, leading to trust issues and lack of teamwork. Ever since, he's had this goal of becoming strong enough to overcome Yggdrasill by himself.

In a flashback so brief and so long ago, it was at a time when Bravo was still a threat. Considering his place in the story he deserves a bit more than that.

[MaskedRiderAsakura]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Locke

Only cares about his friends selfishly? He has one friend, Kouta, who he's been trying to kill for a while now because... reasons. So I dunno what show you're watching where it becomes "increasingly clear" that he's doing anything. My whole point is his motivations are increasingly unclear and the only reason he isn't difficult to follow is because he's so one dimensional.

He's trying to kill Kouta because he sees him as a factor, the main factor, that's stripping control away from his life. As irrational as it may be and as much as you may dislike the character, he has reasons, even if they're not sound to people like us, they exist.

The reason I say he cares about his friends selfishly (and yes, he has more than one. There's still all of Team Gaim) is because he only cares about what they do for him, and not their own personal happiness. It's why he doesn't let Mai learn about Yuuya's death, it's why he wouldn't let Kouta transform and it's why he actively tries to cover things up or hide everybody from reality. To 'protect' their happiness, even when in the end, all he's doing is maintaining the status quo for himself.

Again, you can hate him all you want, and I certainly don't blame people for doing so, but his motivation is anything but unclear. His goals do change quite a bit, and his actions are extreme to the point of being completely irrational, I'll give you that, but his motive for pursuing these goals has been fairly consistent.

[Locke]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MaskedRiderAsakura

*snip*

So you basically agree with everything I said then?

[IXRollOutIX]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Locke

In a flashback so brief and so long ago, it was at a time when Bravo was still a threat. Considering his place in the story he deserves a bit more than that.

The thing is, his character doesn't NEED to be elaborate. His origins were similarly short and simple because it doesn't NEED to be complex. There's also no point in reiterating his origins more than once. He serves his role in the story all the same.