Kamen Rider Kiva
Posted on February 10th, 2010
Kamen Rider Kiva
[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~
Filed under: ** jdrama, action, tokusatsu