[MidoGreen]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Switchblade

Okay, first of all, why are we calling it "pulling a Kengo" when all Kengo did was pull a Phillip? And nowhere near as well, at that.

Second, I just realized that Yamamoto was the Green Wizard and he used the power of lightning. Hell yeah!

Third, this was a good ending. Wizard as a show has a lot of problems. It couldn't decide if it was a screwball comedy or a serious drama. It wasted damn near every character's potential. And it got so stuck on the two-episode arc format that it almost makes Fourze look well-paced (almost). That said, I do like how everything wrapped up. Fueki's plan really did tie together everything that had been going on - it was kind of like Ryuki, only it made sense. What's more, the show didn't cop out on anything at the end the way Fourze did. In fact, I'd say this is easily the strongest ending we've had since W. What can I say, the Showa fan in me is a sucker for a Rider show that ends with the hero riding off alone for further adventures.

Ultimately, Wizard is going down as a middle-tier series for me. It has some real strengths, but like Fourze before it, the weaknesses can't help but weigh it down. I'm glad that this looks to be the end of the Den-O format and Gaim is trying something new. We've gotten some good shows out of this style, but it's beginning to wear out and it's time for something new again.

Looking forward to the coda next week, even if it is probably going to be kind of silly and stupid.

I've been thinking that myself .

[NGW]

Average at best end to the series.

While it didn't do anything to piss me off in its resolution like..well any other season of the show I've watched has, it also didn't really have much of any major..anything.

Like the other seasons were able to piss me off with pretty much resetting all of the big dramatic losses and events, Ryuki was especially bad about this even if the reset made some form of sense. Wizard just didn't have any events or losses like that to undo, save for Koyomi's death, which I never really felt.

Admittedly I enjoyed the final fight between Haruto and Sora, that final kick strike is everything a final attack of the series needs to be.

I think in a way I have similar feelings to Locke.

Wizard is what got me into Kamen Rider. I remember seeing an ad for it on some sidebar somewhere, probably TFW or HLJ or some place like that, and it piqued my interest. I had always liked watching reviews on the Kamen Rider figuarts, and knew little bits about the franchise, but never actually got interested in watching it until now. I want to love this season more than I do, but in the time it has aired its run I've watched a few other seasons and I think that they all were just..better, Ryuki especially, which is honestly probably one of my favorite shows of all time. I just feel...mixed emotions and overall indifference to the season ending.

[Dormamu]

I don't know, I just don't feel the same about Koyomi bucking the kicket now like I did the last episode. I mean, it's not like he kicked Gremlin into the sun. Shoulda saved that for the finale. It's almost like Wizard lost steam about halfway through the series. Actually, let me rephrase that, it's like there were two story arcs, with episode 1-23 being the first arc with Phoenix, and the remaining belonging to Fueki's descent. I've got to say though, the last parting lines between Gremlin and Haruto were flawless. That's the gravitas that the series had needed all along. Here we have what could have been a fairly realistic scenario of a serial killer becoming your worst nightmare. Sora was a soulless thing even before he lost his mortal life the first time, and Haruto's finishing him off wasn't just a wish of Koyomi's. I'm sure his prior victims would have seen it as justice as well.

However, I did really enjoy the twists. I still think that all of the characters were poorly slotted into their respective roles, with Koyomi being the ultimate Mary Sue of (possibly) all of Kamen Rider lore. Maybe once we peel back the premiere of Gaim, we'll have something a little more hardcore, but it seems that the whole premise of Kamen Rider is to have some form of action, mixed with enough levity to make it a kids show.

[NGW]

I really hope Gaim ends up being more of what I am looking for in Kamen Rider and less the Kamen Rider spinoff of Kyoryuger it looks like on the surface.

[ZeoRangerV]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NGW

I really hope Gaim ends up being more of what I am looking for in Kamen Rider and less the Kamen Rider spinoff of Kyoryuger it looks like on the surface.

Other than that they both include dancing in some shape or form, I don't really understand how you reached that conclusion.

[NGW]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ZeoRangerV

Other than that they both include dancing in some shape or form, I don't really understand how you reached that conclusion.

The dancing, and the whole fruit ninja gimmick makes it seem much more...well, aimed at kids ala Kyoryuger, than I personally like.

[Locke]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dormamu

I don't know, I just don't feel the same about Koyomi bucking the kicket now like I did the last episode. I mean, it's not like he kicked Gremlin into the sun. Shoulda saved that for the finale. It's almost like Wizard lost steam about halfway through the series. Actually, let me rephrase that, it's like there were two story arcs, with episode 1-23 being the first arc with Phoenix, and the remaining belonging to Fueki's descent.

It did suffer a bit of Fourze syndrome in this regard, huh? I loved those first 25 or so episodes. The final fight with Phoenix was epic, the show seemed to have a good grasp on what it was, the information it fed was slow but steady, the Gate's of the week had yet to fall into the agonising repetition of 'the asshole of the week'.

Then suddenly half way through the show kinda remembered that they wanted to have a wider plot for this show, while ticking as many Rider boxes as physically possible while still retaining its own personal sense of identity.

So what we got was a secondary Rider who was totally useless until like the last five episodes, we continued the Gate of the week format despite by this point the focus being taken entirely away from the Gate's, Phoenix was replaced in such a fashion that it felt insanely awkward and clunky and then the 'oh shit we have like ten episodes, wrap this shit up wrap this shit up!'

Bleh.

[Dr Kain]

Well we watched episodes 49-51 tonight, and from an action point of view, they were pretty awesome. From a story point, they were the most predictable sack of **** ever!!! My god, what the hell happened? We went from the build up of something great to the final 6 episodes of crap. The series as a whole was good, but it has been knocked down in rank from being better than OOO to being behind it. This series just did not know what it wanted to be and played everything safe.

I have no complaints about Haruto, as he felt the closest to a Showa rider compared to all of the Heisei riders, but it is the rest of the characters where things fell flat. Koyomi was pretty much useless for a block of 30 episodes. Shunpei is one of the worst characters ever. Rinko is one of the worst detectives ever. And Medusa, my god, I won't even get into how much of a waste she was. At least Phoenix and Gremlin made up for her, but she had about as much purpose in the show as Shunpei.

The story of the show could have been told in 20 episodes. Hell, they should have built up the additional wizards back in the early twenties, given them legitimate looking costumes, and built up the Philosopher's Stone Sabbat as an opposing force against the Phantoms so much earlier in the series. As it turned out, that whole portion felt rushed. They could have easily spent less time doing Gate of the Week plots and more on the actual Gates Turned to Wizard plots.

I was absolutely loving this show for a while, but there is so much potential with it that it is easily the weakest series in the Post-Decade era. I did love how Chimera set Beast free, but of course he is going to find him in the next cross over movie just so he can return, and that is something I am sick of. As much as I love cross overs, I don't want the evolution of the characters to be restricted to future movies. Not every rider needs to always be there just to please the fans of the shows.

Anyway, overall, I give Wizard a 6/10. The last several episodes did not completely ruin the show as series in the past have (555 and Kabuto), but they could have done A LOT more with them had they actually spent time to build this whole thing up months ago.

[Sentai Tamashii]

I just want to chime in that I LOVED LOVE LOVED how everything wrapped up, ever since Episode#40 I've been on this ride that ended so perfectly, sure overall as a show Wizard felt a bit like GoBusters, where they do much of nothing, but all the storyline converged to reveal the greater purpose, I truly feel that the last 11 episodes redeemed the series as a whole for me.

[Dr Kain]

lol Since I felt the last 6 episodes kind of pushed the series back. I also would not even say it was like Go-Busters, because unlike Go-Busters, Shunpei was still not as annoying as the Buddyroids and the characters were not half dimensional.