It's a nice relief that after Kamen Rider Decade, there have been a series of Kamen Rider seasons that were miles better. Kamen Rider W, Kamen Rider OOO and Kamen Rider Fourze were really fun deviations from what Kamen Rider used to be. Kamen Rider Wizard was for me not so good. I can't stop praising Kamen Rider Gaim for succeeding where Kamen Rider Ryuki failed. Kamen Rider Drive helped me cope up with my personal distaste of Ninninger though their crossover was pretty good for me. Plus, I never realized that a lot of Kamen Rider series were doing better than the Super Sentai of that year like I never knew how good Kamen Rider Agito was compared to another of my favorites in Super Sentai namely Gaoranger. Though I'd still watch Boukenger over Kamen Rider Kabuto and Shinkenger over Decade.
Why am I bringing Decade up? I say the show had that potential to become a great anniversary season like Gokaiger but it ended up creating a disaster. I guess the whole reason why the show got cut short was like every other show with Toei... lack of popularity. I felt like the same happened to Metalder during its airing last 1987 as Kamen Rider Black was too hard to beat. Changerion was a cult hit for only 39 episodes. I think Decade was ambitious but it ended up as what I'd call that it ended up as "Saban's Masked Rider repackaged with good acting, action and so on but the writing is just as horrible except for the Shinkenger part! At least Mako wasn't sick like Kimberly but still it wasn't enough to save the series!" I was excited for this series but it ended up with me disliking the series due to how it failed my expectations.
After rewatching Gokaiger, I considered that it may have been close to impossible to call back a lot of old school actors during that time Decade was filmed. The show featured the world of Kamen Rider Amazon which was a very old school Kamen Rider but he was played by a new school actor. With that in mind, I had one amazingly crazy idea. Why don't they just hire new school actors to play as old school characters? Let's face it that some people may prefer the modern remakes of old school stories rather than the original old school. I don't think anything's wrong if you get a couple of new school actors to play as old school characters. Like I really think Ryoma Takeuchi playing as a younger Kotaro Minami for any crossover movie or a stage play isn't a bad idea. The old school casts aren't getting any younger!
Was making alternate versions of the Kamen Riders necessary because old school characters were played by new school actors? Not really. They could have kept the same personality with different actors. If you've watched some series, some characters don't die but they're immediately replaced by a new actor. I know it can be confusing to a child but let's face it, it's been nine series after Kuuga. So let's say that the seven year old who was watching Kuuga was now 13 years old. Seven year olds watching Kamen Rider Decade don't need to see the original cast members. Grown up fans can just tell them that because the original actor wasn't available so they decided to get another cast member.
Considering that what's done is done is this. Innovation means there's going to be failures along the way. Newer doesn't always mean it's better but it can be improved overtime. Remember that some inventions failed a lot of times before they came to fruition as successful inventions. Sometimes, what's new can end up in disaster and it's time to go back and fix it. I guess that's what Decade was. It was a season that tried to do a massive crossover series but failed. Fortunately, the people behind Gokaiger managed to succeed where Decade failed.
I really didn't mind the AR versions of the Riders, but yeah, the writing felt sloppy after the World of Hibiki. I feel even Movie Wars 2010 didn't do it that much justice either, especially Narutaki whose true identity was teased at the end of Decade and how it connected to the final episode.
ReplyDeleteWith that said, I feel like saying "ONORE SHIRAKURA!" and especially "ONORE YONEMURA!" Though in fairness to Shirakura, he managed to come up with good stuff recently such as KR Amazons; and I'm seeing a speck of hope with the KR #1 movie especially with Hiroshi Fujioka himself helping out with the writing. As for Yonemura, I have ZERO hopes for him that Toei needs to fire him already, much like Jonathan Tzachor.