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It's an amazing series thus far. It's up near Kuuga/Akito, 555, and Kabuto.

Gaim has been pretty good. Think in regards to the motif it did have the usual "Ew what are they doing this year? It is horrible looking," but the good writing and seeing it in action enough has quelled that for the most part. Still can't say they are amazing, but they aren't as bad as I first thought they were.

Story wise it has been a great series. Doing away with the two-episode-arcs have done wonders and orange meguca certainly has had a good balance of the silly others like with the intense moments that made me get into toku stuff at a young age. There is serious consequences in the storyline, unlike the previous few where it was kind of implied, but never really delivered on. I'm crossing my fingers it ends well since a lot of Kamen Riders, no matter how good, tend to have iffy endings. Especially the cookie cutter ones that have plagued the past few years in terms of the big "emotional" loss that isn't really a loss.

It would be cool if Kaito/Baron got a proper final form. Still don't like that he is using the same energy lockseed as another rider but somehow it is different on him, but I'm glad he at least got that at least. I'm going to guess with what I know on things though that he won't get a true final form, which is a shame.

I actually liked the Gokaiger suits pretty quickly myself, but yeah that is the pattern in modern Toku stuff. They release the outfits, and either you adapt to stand them or to like them. Most the time. Still not enjoying the ToQGer outfits and I'm very worried about Kamen Rider Drive. Gaim's suits work though after I got use to them.

People like using Wizard as an example and it was probably one of the worst offenders of having too much "nothing is going on", but then a lot of them have been like that. Fourze, OOO, they all had stretches where it felt like I was waiting on stuff. Wizard just had a lot more of it (probably because the one actress was busy a lot, same problem that happened to Kabuto really).

I agree. Zangetsu really wasn't on screen enough. Just when you learned more about him and things were picking up he became the Shin version. I think his death was a good part of things but it would have been nice if he had more use after being out of commission for a few eps like you said.
Also the Zangetsu-shin bit reminds me of one thing I don't like. Baron uses the lemon energy lockseed but it becomes different for him. When Micchy used the melon energy one it should have become different too. I don't like the weirdness of that. Just seems off to me.

I don't see him getting one. It would have been nice, but with the direction the show went he didn't end up the primary rider threat so Micchy is going to have the crazy final form to fight him with

ToQGers have pretty boring suits and the helmets are just awful. I've grown to ignore their helmets and suits in general. A form of standing them I guess. But it is still a pretty ugly design to me overall. Drive I don't know how it looks yet but the car motif worries me, especially since it looks like it is using the car motif just like ToQGer is doing the train one.

From what I heard the girl who needed Wizard's magic to survive. Harumi? I am so bad with names. I've heard she had other things she had to do sometimes so that is why she was almost never around. I think the issue of filler eps goes back a long way with Kamen Rider. While it is good to have something to break up the flow now and again, a lot of them had issues with a lot not really going on for a bit or things advancing, just lingering and waiting for one ep to really push stuff for a moment then linger on something new. Gaim has been wonderful since it doesn't do that much. It keeps pressing forward.

It is a bit of a mess up since we didn't see him much, but given how good the fight leading up to it was and that weight stuff I am content with it. One thing that bothered me with Wizard since we are bringing it up as examples comparing it to Gaim was that no one ever became a Phantom. After a while it loses that believability. If everyone is saved, then by the middle and near-end you have no worries about people. The tension is gone because they will always somehow save them. Even isn't a big thing because you knew it would be fixed in some way by the next movie. Just like they have been doing since Double. bit got really played out, and it is predictable when the end result of that plotline always comes out the same. Having death return puts some weight on that though. Kyoryuger I won't watch

Hopefully they make something since he is pretty popular. If not for this then the final Gaim movie when he teams up with Drive they could give Kaito something. Perhaps.

Overall I'm personally enjoying the show as well, and given from the original premise, and coming off of the long drawn out series that was Wizard I was originally having very low expectations of this series. But honestly It's become one of if not my favorite Heisei Rider series in years.

However If I had a gripe about anything it's suits having a commonly reused element that often makes most of the designs eerily similar and takes away a fair amount of significance between each Rider design. The set that avoids this is usually the secondary class riders and energy riders who at least don't have the luxury of arm changing and pretty much stay to their base Lockseed. However most of them ended becoming pretty irrelevant to the Main 4...well 3 riders.

As for Micchy's new leaked final upgrade, it shares everything I like and hate about Kamen Rider Zeronos Zero Form. As a form it contributes greatly to both the character and somewhat to the overarching character element into the story, seeing that it's a rare lock seed and possess Redue's weapon I'm interested into how Micchy gains it and how it relates to Redue despite it's very last minute inclusion to the story. Aesthetically however, the long absence of Ryugen now makes sense and overall as upgrade it seems a little cheap since honestly NOTHING NEW has been added. Overall it's a amalgam of Grape, Kiwi arms with a minor recolor design (Similar to Zero form I believe). But regardless it's a still fairly better than Baron Lemon Energy arms in terms of sheer laziness with said upgrade. The suit actor without a doubt makes the form his own, but the fact that it's the third rehashed use of the Lemon ELS it has very little to no individuality on it;s own.

Hopefully however the scan with Kaitou might mean that his infection could allow him to create his own special fruit and with the Sengoku Driver he can generate a final upgrade for him to fight on par with Kiwami and Yomotsugheri Arms.


On the topic of Sentai on the other hand, ToQger is honestly the exact opposite of how I feel for Kyoryuger. Designs are completely horrid, but for a sentai it works with the Norikae Change. Overall I don't cast as much; however the story and villain dynamics are so far fairly better written than Kyoryugers. In all honesty while Kobayashi's slow burn plots often drag the stories further than usual (Thinking of OOO's) they often come with a good pay off in its fairly concrete writing.

Content wise, ToQger surprisingly keeps me entertained, while Aesthetically I generally don't care for it at all. But it works well in conjunction with Kamen Rider Gaim on it's Super Hero time set up.

Well that's definitely a different way to look at it with Gridon and Zangetsu. But while the latter is definitely a slight pallet swap of the same design I thought his character and experience made up for it. I also thought it was a complete waste of a suit if they were only going to debut Zangestsu-Shin only a few episodes after the original.

I can agree with you that Micchy is arguably more important than Takatora, whose role as you said; was a wall that both Micchy and Kouta had to overcome. However one must remember that they brought back Takatora after he was portrayed and supposedly killed the first time by the other New Generation Riders. Why would you spend all that time nursing him back to health only to "kill" him off again is my question. But like I agreed with Itami, I do think it's a nice touch to loss of Micchy's sanity though.





Guess it just goes to show you that you should never judge a series by its cover. Even if a series like Gaim followed after Wizard's mediocre run. xd

I can where you're going with the constant rehash of designs. I think it in part has to do with that most of the lockseed armor and their corresponding real life suits are designed mix and match (save with the Energy riders) with each other to follow the gimmick of the show. I do tend to agree that most of the cast has become pretty useless as of late, even if I have a soft spot for both Marika and Gridon and wish they'd have a bit more screen time.

I actually kind of of liked Zeronos's Zero Form and didn't even bat an eye when I saw Ryugen's leaked upgrade. I kind of actually like the redesign for some reason since it seems to fit the character more, however cheap it may seem to be.
I will also agree that Baron's Lemon Energy arms was also a complete waste. While the color motif and theme of the power theme of the lockseed might suite him well, it was a completely missed opportunity to give him something new. What's more, they gave him a by now completely whored out form that nearly everyone worth mentioning has used. Can anyone think of, say, Kamen Rider Ixa, perhaps?

Let's hope he does something cool with the fruit and his infection, but I doubt we'll see anything cool sense we're so late in the series without any new scan to say anything to the contrary.

I actually thought that the Norikae gimmick was a complete ripoff as it really didn't do anything new aside from swapping out the colors and weapons. It really felt half-assed. While I can't compare ToQGer to Kyoryuger since I have not seen the former in its entirety yet, I will say what made me dislike Kyoryuger was mostly the common complaint about it being centered around one character, with no real contributing character arcs to the other major players.

I have however heard that ToQGer is pretty quirky and definitely has its moments.

Yomosutgehri Arms was actually a real surprise to me, almost makes me think it was late addition like Baron's Lemon Energy arms was. But if we were to get a scan of Baron's supposed Final Form, we would have to see it pretty soon, wouldn't we? Like in the next few weeks? I doubt we'll get anything since we can clearly see Baron fighting the Rosyuo in his Lemon Energy armor in scans though. But like you said, I guess it's not completely out of the question to get something at this point, however low the odds may be. Again I'm not particularly found of how they IXA'd him with the armor either. I actually like the characters surrounding IXA and the amor too, which is a shame.

I liked Kyouryuger for what it was. It had good designs, wonderfully developed, colorful characters and honestly the little kid in me really enjoyed the "Earth's melody" that the show was trying to explore. Great potential up until the end, but it was ultimately fairly wasteful and forgetful.

Exactly. The kids might like Daigo alright as a the typical fiery Red Senshi, but to me there was way to much emphasis on his character and took away from the the more well-developed, memorable characters the show surprisingly had. I don't even get why they forced that pairing on us. It came from completely left field and if anything I thought that their might be hint of a possible pairing between Daigo and KyouruViolet (forget her name atm). Aside from the final fight with Deboth, I thought the battle between KyoryuGold and Degold quiet enjoyable in the end.

Hmm, maybe I should give ToQGer a chance then?