[Den-O]

"Presented by ZAIA."

The cruelty of humanity. That is what Gai Amatsu instilled in Satellite Ark. In doing so he instigated not only the Daybreak Town Incident, but also the creation of Metsuboujinrai.net, and all the pain to come for both humans & humagears. For 12 years Gai has manipulated events from the comfortable shadows of ZAIA Enterprise. Now the mysterious man behind A.I.M.S. has his sights set on Hiden Intelligence as well, but can Zero-One keep his grandfather's company safe? Gai Amatsu is a master manipulator, and maybe one day, he could even be a hero. But for now? With strength that's 1000% greater than Zero-One's, the golden solider Kamen Rider Thouser is born!

Packaging
Keeping in line with the sort of packaging the Zero-One line has had, Thouser arrives in a mostly white box, but with appropriately ostentatious gold details and lettering. There are no fun black light gimmicks or anything like that with Thouser's box. Just some really standard stock photos and a nice portrait of the figure across the front. Nothing special to report this go around. Figure time!

Main Figure
Unfortunately I've yet to be able to handle all the riders from Zero-One so far. Having missed Horobi, Jin, & Valkyrie, I feel like I need to preface this review. Because I don't feel like I have a complete picture of the Zero-One Figuarts line yet without them. So if my impressions of Thouser are way off base, I apologize. That being said, while he's certainly the most ornately detailed of the Zero-One riders, he has a number of flaws as well that need to be addressed as this line continues.

Zero-One really set the standard for this line. An absolutely rock solid release to kick off a new line up of rider figuarts, which doesn't always happen. And while I thought he was fantastic, I did feel Vulcan was a less than perfect follow up. With Thouser much of what we see is new, but there's a lot of familiarity as well. The basic form of the Zero-One mold is there, but Thouser still manages to be very different. In the legs we can see the exact same textured black detailing between the two, but the armor that covers it is entirely different. So these two do share at least some parts. However what they don't share is the same range of articulation. Thouser has very restricted ankles, largely due to the design of the ankle cuff, where it drops down around the back of the foot. This nixes almost all of the outward movement of the foot, so good luck with wide stances. The knee bends are fortunately spared, having been directly carried over from Zero-One, no new armor to get in the way. The hip and thigh are largely identical, with only surface details having been changed for Thouser. However the thigh armor does extend further up toward the waist on him as well. And because the drop down hips on this mold already don't go down very far, rotating the hips up to pose the figure is a dangerous preposition. Be very very careful to angle them correctly or you will damage the silver paint on the thighs. Bot overall I really like the way the legs look, the design is great and paint work magnificent.

Around his waist, Thouser has the appropriately named Thousandriver. And much like the Zero-One Driver in this line, I feel like we've been a little cheated. The Zero-One Driver is essentially non-functional because it can't revert to it's closed pre-henshin state, and the Thousandriver is exactly the same. The two halves that cover the window of the driver are permanently molded open. So even if you remove the keys you can't really recreate the closed driver. As for the keys we get the Amazing Caucasus Progrisekey & Awaking Arsino Zetsumerisekey. Only the Caucasus key has any detail and that's just the emblem on the end of the key that winds up being in the driver window. Outside of this both keys are just black plastic. The Driver looks fantastic, but it feels half realized, much like the Forceriser. The belt also has Key holsters on each hip, but considering so far there are no closed Progrise or Zetsumerise Keys in this line that I'm aware of, these holsters are entirely pointless.

The ab section of the torso is very very similar to Zero-One, it's possibly the same part, though there are some details sculpted into the surface like fabric folds on Thouser. The upper body is the big difference with Thouser having completely newly sculpted armor and some really bright regal colors. But Thouser's armor is also quite thick? The chest armor sticks out a fair bit further than Zero-One, nearly as far out as the Thousandriver. Luckily the torso's articulation is nearly the same as Zero-One. We get a full rotating waist joint, and a ball jointed upper body that can lean about 45 degrees to either side, with a fair bit of room to arch the back. Thouser also features quite similar arms to Zero-One. They're essentially the same, again with new armor for Thouser. Thankfully this means we get the same basic elbow bend and wrist articulation. However the shoulders are a different story. Largely because of the large new shoulder pads which Thouser sports. Covering a greater portion of the joint, and having less range to move, the pad limits what the arms can do. Leaving us with about a 45 degree bend in straight out and upward movement. This is a bummer but it wasn't unexpected as well.

Finally, probably the most interesting thing about the Thouser design, is his helmet. It's a harsh, striking design that certainly looks like the bad guy. Even despite Gai's change of heart later in the series, the design still speaks to it's villainous origins. Early concept art for Thouser had the compound eyes in blue and I think that actually would have gone a long way to making the suit look more heroic overall. As is there's some great royal purple compound eyes set amongst a crown of beetle horns. Luckily all the added bulk of the head itself and the armor of the torso don't really impact how the head can maneuver. While the figure has plenty of areas that should have been designed better, I think Thouser is honestly a classy enough to design to get away with some of that. It just looks so good, that it's hard to be terribly upset you know?

Accessories
Thouser actually comes with quite a bit for a web exclusive:

1 - Thousand Jacker. Thouser's ornate lance, the Thousand Jacker can literally jack powers from other riders and use them against them. I'm very pleased with the detailing on this weapon and it's proportionality to the figure as well. Sometimes these things don't scale out well but this one most certainly does. Bandai has also opted to replicate the jacking Break attack by including an additional extended Jack Ring part to plug into the hilt. I'm not a huge fan of that needing to be a separate part, but at least the functionality is actually there as well.

1 - Raidriser. Now this is an interesting inclusion. I'm really appreciative that Bandai even bothered to include one of these. In show these are used by humans in conjunction with Progrise Keys to turn them into Raiders; Pseudo-rider/kaijin. It's pretty awesome that we get one like this, but there's a caveat. It's attached to a belt, but only the front half of one. So finding a figure that it will fit perfectly on by only clipping across the front of the waist will be difficult. As far as I can tell it only fits newer model Body-Kun blanks. My 1.0 Body-Kun wasn't really compatible. I really feel like this part should have included the back half of the belt to plug on for stability. Also, you kind of need a closed Progrise Key to be able to use this thing properly, and again as far as I'm aware, there aren't any in the line. So it's a great inclusion, but it's very incomplete.

4 - sets of additional hands. That's 2.5 types of open expressive palms, hands to hold the Thousand Jacker, and 1 hand specifically meant to hold the Raidriser. Though according to the instructions, it's meant to hold it in the least secure way possible. So your mileage may very.

Final Thoughts
S.H. Figuarts Kamen Rider Thouser may not be the absolute best recent release, but despite it's faults it actually is a really charming and imposing figure in your collection. There's something to be said for an excellent color scheme and a wealth of sculpted details and added accessories. The next time we revisit Zero-One for a reviewing it'll be with Kamen Rider Vulcan Assault Wolf!

[Den-O]

Part 2

[Kurona]

This figure will be 1000% better once Metal Cluster Hopper with its specific Thouser-strangling hands comes out

[MikeMonster15]

I’m enjoying the Kamen Rider Zero-One S.H. Figuarts. The detailing of the suits are incredible and I like how Thouser was very pointy with his armor.

[Tokumonkey]

I restrained myself on this one; the line already had a couple of terrific villains, and while it'd be a little satisfying to have Valkyrie forever kicking Gai's ass on my shelf, I've already got five Zero-One Figuarts in the... uh... hopper, and Saber Figuarts are breathing down my neck, demanding shelf space.

[Melon]

Love the design of this suit. His head just reminds of Sauron with all the horns.

[TheRaizin]

Out of all of Zero-One's base form suits, he takes the cake for being the absolute 1000% best! Now I'm impatient to get mine!

[MrWilliamGraham]

This color scheme is 1000% garishly appropriate. Might pick up later to go with my future MCH

[Fredbob392]

Man, Zero-One really had no bad suits. Figure looks beautiful

[MikeMonster15]

It’s a good thing I already got the Kamen Rider Thouser S.H. Figuarts before the review. The suits do look wonderful.