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Kamen Rider Die watches Kamen Rider Kiva
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05-07-2021, 11:13 AM
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DreadBringer
Veteran Member
Join Date: Jan 2020
Posts: 1,287
I don't know how it will be taxing for me here, as regarding the series writer here can feel like if a degenerate company gets free pass for their questionable choices due to clinging to something good the company has made...
Kiva's also one of a series I don't know much other than the Riders (as I've played Climax Heroes), so I may say less things here.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Kamen Rider Die
KAMEN RIDER KIVA EPISODE 01 - “FATE - WAKE UP!”
Kiva’s a show that is both densely packed with incident (it introduces a hundred named characters across two timelines and has about four hundred fight scenes), as well as one that I never felt overwhelmed by. There’s a rhythm to the progression, which is maybe appropriate for a show that feels informed by music and performance. They keep throwing new information at you (or, data, at least), but there’s a flow to the episode that makes it easy to not focus too much on the details that are clearly there for later exploration. (Like Kamen Rider Grease being Wataru’s dad! That feels like it’s going to be important! Wild guess! Also,
holy shit
, Zanki is in the credits!!!) It’s smoothly constructed, which is what I’m most looking for in a premiere.
So it's a meta-casting for Otoya and Kazumin being both Kouhei Takeda, and I said meta-casting because similar role isn't the only common thing about them. And true that, I think that phase 1 is more experimental of the era, though it can result in controversial stuff, and that it won't likely happen anymore for phase 2 as phase 2 has been swimming in success with mostly similar formula for each series, or probably the experimental era does lead to a conclusion, where Den-O style is the one get chosen. For Kiva,
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Kamen Rider Die
Like, there’s a lot of fun visual ways that information is conveyed, you know? The stained glass border when we head back to 1986. Those little diegetic nods that we’ve returned to 2008; the cracked walkway, the plates.
I don't know if this is offensive... but... the years shown is 1986 and 2008. Are you sure it's not 2020 instead?
Also fucking indirect disrespect to Inoue here, his father's a writer for Showa Kamen Rider, and his father is iirc the reason of his feud with Kobayashi.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Kamen Rider Die
And, like, thematically,
such
an Inoue show. Wataru’s inability to express himself is, like, an Inoue hallmark. It’s present in not just the literal sense, with his adorable notebook of apologies and cries for help, but in his need to use music as an emotional outlet. That’s a thing that comes up in a lot of Inoue’s writing, the value of self-expression through art, and it gets a little coverage in the first installment of Kiva despite tons of other ground to cover.
Wataru’s ambivalence about his own humanity marks him as another questing Inoue lead. He feels a separation from the world he’s protecting, and at this point it’s tough to see if he’s longing for a connection or wishing for isolation. (I mean, almost definitely the former, but I like that there’s some ambiguity here.) He’s a sweetly sad boy, and that little scene where Kivat offers some role-play toy psychoanalysis in the bathtub (
from a floating violin-shaped soap caddy!
) is a nice window into a character who spends the whole episode being weird around three-dimensional women.
Wataru is a someone who's really meek, closed-off, shy, doormat, and other asocial traits. He's likely the shining beacon of relatability among the main Riders. And like Ryotaro, he does get a flak too for that trait, considered a pussy, coward or such, and I only wonder if you'd have objective view (and afraid of potential offensive takes) if Wataru doesn't come from a series written by Inoue. Wataru's outright someone having a disorder, like aspergers or savant syndrome, and from what I see, kind of those is usually get bullied and used as punching bag by their peers. I've seen in other medias too that someone who is extremely nervous and closed off, interact like Wataru by giving their thoughts in written manner instead of speaking, such as commercials. But between the actor Koji Seto and suit actor Seiji Takaiwa, there would be such a contrast between the portrayal as Kiva, where as Wataru he's painfully asocial, but Seiji Takaiwa fighting as Kiva would seem to have Wataru's character issues completely thrown out of window due to different people.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Kamen Rider Die
And, shit, I don’t know where these women are going to go in the narrative, but I love how they all kicked-off. Opening the series with Yuri throwing down with the Spider Fangire, hitting the midpoint with Megumi laughing at the gullibility of the Horse Fangire, and having Shizuka around to gently nudge Wataru away from being descended upon by angry villagers… just great, great characters. I loved each of the performances for their unique energies. Yuri is closed off, tentative, but intensely focused. Megumi is flippant, energetic, and never one to hold her tongue. Shizuka is perplexed, indignant, and loyal. With Wataru being a cypher for most of this episode (but an effective and charismatic one, somehow!), it leaves way more space for the various women of Kiva to make an impact, and they totally did for me.
Unless you talk about the action and hunting part as Megumi and Yuri's appeal.... well their performance for fighting wise in this episode is misleading, despite the reputation and occupation as Fangire Hunter, they won't live up to that not long after. Shizuka is a motherly figure towards Wataru, and she even claims to be one, but for her being centered around Wataru, there's a consequence I'd expect from this (and what would you expect from the writer too).
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Kamen Rider Die
This whole episode did it for me. I loved the inexplicable debut aspects, the insanity of some of the world-building (Kiva’s Rider Kick causes a lunar eclipse that makes a
Dinosaur Cathedral
eat the soul of a decorative vampire monster???), all of that premiere shit that you take for granted on subsequent viewings. But I also loved the cleanliness of the delivery, the way plots and details rhyme across decades (Yuri and Megumi’s God Has Erred declaration, Megumi and Wataru’s fish obsessions, Yuri and Wataru’s weirdness around tiny animals), how this blenderized inaugural episode was fun and charming and... and
weird
, in all of the most engaging ways. I’m not quite at the point where I know what story Inoue’s telling yet (The Perils Of A Life Unlived would be an early guess), but I like the way he’s started to tell it.
Kiva has my favorite design for base Riders in phase 1. The bulky, heavy-duty type. Though unfortunately, it does cause a strain to the suit actor, which would lead into one of the hated trope in Kamen Rider.
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Last edited by DreadBringer; 05-07-2021 at
11:15 AM
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