[Rating: 7.5/10]

Genre: tokusatsu, action, drama

Tsukasa Kadoya is a wandering photographer who suffers from memory loss. He cannot remember his past or where he comes from, but he holds the power to transform into the masked rider known as Decade, who is apparently fated to be the destroyer of worlds. As he traverses through the many alternate worlds and eliminates the foes within each, each step seems to take him closer to what has been foretold…

If there were such a thing as a visual encyclopedia for the Kamen Rider series, this would be the movie version of it. Kamen Riders from present and yesterday ‘reuniting’ in this series will probably be either something you love or not. One thing I must say, it certainly opened my eyes to the whole rider universe and led me to seek out some older series I have missed, since I am relatively new to this franchise (my firsts being Kabuto and Den-O). One thing I liked was that each world and main rider(s) had a fair amount of screen time (at least 2-3 episodes each), and I was surprised to see fairly decent developed back stories to what has been happening in each world since the end of the various series. The only sad thing was that the original actors of the different are obviously either too busy or old to reprise their roles, which will disappoint the hardcore fans a little, but does not detract too much from show. I enjoyed watching Tsukasa grow as a character and find his ‘home’, and I think his friendship with Natsumi and Yusuke was pretty well developed. However the villain Narutaki was a bit of a disappointment, because in the end he didn’t really do much and he had so much omnimous build up compared to Apollo Geist and co. My favourite universes in the show were Blade, Hibiki, Kuuga, Ryuuki. While I liked the Samurai Shinkenger episode, I found it to be unnecessary (they probably just had it since the two shows were going on at the same time), and I saw not much point for the Amazon storyline – plus the guy who’s Amazon is rather annoying. There was quite a bit of Kiva crossover as Wataru was a bit of a messenger/advisor, but at that point I didn’t really understand as I had never watched Kiva before, so maybe I may have to rewatch decade now that I have. Daiki is another character I could’ve done without as he didn’t serve much purpose.

I have also watched the movie All Riders vs. Dai-Shocker. While it answered the questions left in the series’s cliffhanger ending, I felt it could have been much more developed character and plotwise, as it was basically just a battlefest of Decade vs. everyone else, and then vs. the main baddies. The movie was also a tad too short and felt rushed throughout. That said, I guess we should take into consideration that most of the target audience are children, but why is it that the opinion is that children can’t have an attention span longer than a certain amount of time? I would think if it’s something they really enjoy, they could sit there a bit longer.

Overall, Kamen Rider Decade is a solid tokusatsu series and is something I would recommend as a taster to someone who would like somewhere to start with, since there have been so many seasons out already. It’s really like an overview of everything that has happened so far, as it is the commerative 10th Kamen Rider series. It an example of the possibility of a successful crossovers. The soundtrack is also quite decent.

You’re also probably going to remember this quote after watching 31 episodes~ “I’m just a passing by Kamen Rider.”

[Rating: 7/10]

Genre: Tokusatsu, Action, Mystery?, Romance

Wataru is the teenage son of Kurenai Otoya, a brilliant violinist and playboy. Kiva is a hero who protects the human race from the soul sucking monsters known as the Fangire. And then you have Yuri, a member of a secret organisation who hunts said monsters. Just what is the connection between all of them? The story unfolds over a twenty year period…

This is my first Kamen Rider series review here although it’s not the first I have watched. Ever since I discovered them I’ve been pretty hooked, because to me it’s like Power Rangers meets Ultraman but for adults (that is, with darker, more mature themes). It took me two watchings of the first couple of episodes before I could proceed with Kiva, because of the each episode being half set in 2008/the present and the other half in 1986, and the flow wasn’t always smooth so it was a little confusing at first. Also there were quite a number of characters and incarnations (sort of) of characters. That said, once I got the used to the time switches and understood more of the story as it was revealed I grew to like it better as it went along.

I like that the characters were pretty well fleshed out, except for Otoya who I wanted to hit/strangle half the time, yet I couldn’t help but like him and his eccentric ways to a certain extent. I think for me the female cast were the standouts of the show, and while they may have seemed rather stereotypical at first, I enjoyed watching their stories unfold and their characters develop, my favourite being Megumi, the other girls were likeable but the became a bit of train wrecks at end which was disappointing, considering how strong they started off. I’m glad Yuri ended up happy later though. The only female I did not take to was Shizuka, who was rather annoying most of the time. I felt she was rather extra and served more for a plot device. Amongst the male characters I found Bishop most intriguing, I’d like to have known more about his past and the 3 Arms Monsters, Jiro, Ramon and Rikki were pretty awesome. Bishop’s actor, Murata Mitsu has pretty good stage presence, he costume and makeup were pretty creepy but somehow compelled you to want to look at him. I didn’t really care much for Nago but started warming up to him halfway through~ I thought his relationship with Megumi was quite cute. Wataru was a pretty likeable character as well, though I found his personality change near the end pretty sudden, even if the events were leading up to it. The Fangire being inspired by stain-glass designs were rather pretty, probably the most attractive monsters in the Kamen Rider franchise that I know of (the Worms in Kabuto were pretty ugly buggers). The effect where the Fangire patterns would show on the human form came out quite nice.

The method of storytelling for Kiva was quite unique, and while confusing added a lot of interesting things to the show – it’s rare for back stories to be in such depth, let alone take up half of each episode (and effectively the series). I like how everything and everyone was related to each other though I think the overall execution could have been a little smoother and more coherent. It seemed rather experimental at times. I’d recommend this show to Kamen Rider and Sentai fans who are already fans or familiar with this sort of show, but for someone watching this genre for the first time, I’d probably recommend another series as 48 episodes is quite a feat to sit through~