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Thread
:
Kamen Rider Die watches Kamen Rider Kiva
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06-10-2021, 09:52 PM
#
537
Kamen Rider Die
Kamen Ride Or Die
Join Date: Aug 2019
Location: Chicago, IL
Posts: 6,159
KAMEN RIDER KIVA: QUEEN OF THE CASTLE IN THE DEMON WORLD
Thanks to DreamSword for providing me with a way to
legally and respectfully
watch these Net Movies with English subtitles! Toei makes it so easy to keep up with their franchises!
EPISODE 1 - "KURENAI WATARU'S HIDDEN SIDE?!"
I had to
triple-check
to make sure these movies were released before the movie, and that the movie was released after Episode 27. There's even an ad at the end of the episode promoting the movie as Coming Soon, but I still don't think I'm watching this right, because Takoto? He's a guy in this? And everyone knows him? Except I've watched 28 episodes of Kiva and I completely don't know him?
I assume he's a movie guy, since he's talking about monsters that'll probably also be in the movie. It's weird that he's just hanging around with absolutely no explanation outside of the aforementioned monsters and Kengo calling him New Guy, but what the hell. It's a Net Movie. None of this is intended to do anything other than goof around.
Like, Yuri and Otoya are in the present! Otoya is acting chummy and calling Wataru his son! By any definition, that is the
culmination
of the entire Kiva series, and it's tossed in here as a gag. They have taken something that almost entirely resolves the core dilemma of the title hero, and flung it into a mess-around movie tie-in. That is like discovering a gold nugget and using it to prop a window open. It's too valuable to be wasted!
But this was a funny episode, and it's all probably AU stuff anyway, so I'm not going to complain more about it. It's all good for a laugh, with Wataru slowly becoming more confident as a performer (he's performing stand-up comedy for a high school festival for some reason?!?!) while the rest of the cast mugs in overblown reactions. It's relaxing, for its very very low stakes. None of it makes any sense, but it's all in good fun.
EPISODE 2 - "HIDDEN BATTLE IN CASTLE DORAN?!"
I can't imagine watching this show and then watching Hibiki for the first time. I know some people did. There've been a few people who talked about coming into the franchise through Kiva, and then watching other series. But, like, after experiencing Jiro in this series,
in this special
, I can't ever take Zanki seriously again. This is like when actors play their famous characters in parodies on Saturday Night Live or whatever. Jiro in this is like Zanki As A Joke. Jiro's all cool and calm, while also being
completely
unhinged. He's able to be detached and mysterious during the few seconds where he's not bouncing in his seat, sniffing playing cards, or trying to distract an opponent by shouting that there is someone behind them. He's beyond ridiculous in this episode.
It is one of my favorite Kiva things to date, and he's a big reason why.
Like, it is the Arms Monsters challenging Wataru to Hell's Old Maid, where the loser is sent to Hell. (Truth in advertising, at least.) It is utterly bonkers, and perfectly calibrated. It's joyous and hilarious, letting the weird rivalry from the 2008 Arms Monsters Perpetual Game Night rope in Wataru, and keeps a sustained level of tension that dwarfs anything in the series to date. I was probably more invested in Hell's Old Maid than any single fight this show has put on, and I'm not even joking a little. This was, maybe, everything I want in a Kamen Rider special. It was delightful.
EPISODE 3 - "NAGO KEISUKE'S HIDDEN SIDE?!"
I mean,
of course
Nago is a train fanatic. It's a mode of transportation that takes careful planning, runs in a predictable pattern, ferries people in a largely impersonal way, and does not conform to individual requests or pleas.
Of course
Nago is a train fanatic.
Otherwise, like, Takato is just off-brand Kabuto, isn't he? The look and demeanor scream TENDOU at such an impossibly high volume that I had to check and make sure it wasn't the same actor somehow. (It's not, in case I wasn't the only person to suffer from this delusion.) He's fun, though, with his merciless use of Nago's embarrassing past to squeeze our resident button aficionado (AficioNago?) in an emotional vise. It's all very funny, even if it's just Takoto Remembers Something Even More Pathetic About Nago for the entire runtime. Seeing Nago
lose his shit
over teenage love letters and bouts of blubbering is incredibly funny, for almost all of the same reasons the Jiro stuff worked in the previous episode. It's these stoic men of mystery that become lunatics for childish reasons, and it's never not a comedy jackpot.
EPISODE 4 - "CAFE OTOYA D'AMOUR"
I didn't love this one!
A lot of it is the weird optics of having a mother and daughter shoot through a series of fetish costumes suggested by the mom's boyfriend. That is... even for Kiva, that is
intensely problematic
. (There's also a bit where Yuri and Megumi bicker over which of them is the better/cuter maid in Otoya's maid cafe, and they try and settle it by feeding him.) It's a super duper weird and uncomfortable short.
It's also not particularly funny? It's just the gag of the two women dressed up in a goofy costume, Takoto points out that it wouldn't work as a business, and then we move on. The costumes themselves aren't really funny or clever (maid, butler, "singing", cheerleader, ninja), and then the end is just Otoya screwing up an order and getting freeze blasted by Takoto (who has a white Kivat?!), the end. There're really no jokes outside of Otoya being a creep and the two women alternately feuding and acquiescing, so it's like... that happened! Okay! I kind of wish it hadn't!
EPISODE 5 - "THE QUEEN ARRIVES"
Yay! Shizuka!
I don't have any complaints about this perfect conclusion. Having an all-powerful Shizuka obliterate the terrible men in Wataru's life is probably going to make the actual series finale seem weak and unconvincing by comparison. I could not wipe the smile off my face during this episode, from Nago's decision to frame Wataru not being at his home 24/7 in case Nago needed him as
a failure of character
that necessitated a full accounting of Wataru's shortcomings; to the conclusion, where a colossal Shizuka squares off against Kiva... before it's all revealed to be a bad dream of Wataru's.
OR IS IT?!
(It probably is.)
__________________
Currently working on: Go-Busters is next! Archive of previous shows on
KamenRiderDie.com
!
Last edited by Kamen Rider Die; 10-02-2023 at
08:57 PM
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