Angels, according to the Japanese

How would you describe an angel? You probably will think about a holy humanoid creature with wings, a messenger from God, sometimes bearing a halo on top, and wearing basic cloth/medieval style clothing. Angels are sometimes portrayed as having holy powers and weapons.

Well, forget about those. In 2010, angels need cards to henshin and use their powers. They wear helmets and spandex, and each are color coded. The use cards to summon weapons. Oh, did I mention they also have a robot? And who are they fighting? Aliens. Oh course, they appeared in Japan only. LOL. Yeah, that’s basically the description of 2010 Super Sentai, GoSeiger. Really, the story is that they’re angels (which is somewhat ironic considering GoSei Pink is a gravure idol… LOL).

Well, their henshin sequence is kinda neat, with wings and lights from heaven… LOL.
So what’s the story? Well, apparently angels have been protecting earth. But now we have aliens trying to conquer earth. Obviously to minimize any resistance, they damaged the angels’ headquarters. Fortunately, there are 5 angels in-training that are on earth for their training. Without access/help from HQ, these 5 young angels are earth’s only hope to fight the aliens.

As I suspected, the cards made everything corny. Again, ONORE DIKEIDO!!! Following Kamen Rider’s trend of using cards, GoSeiger is the first Sentai that focus on the cards. In fact, they focus too much on the cards. Everything the GoSeigers do require cards, from henshin, summoning weapons, summoning guns, anything. Even in the first episode, it’s already shown that this card business can backfire, where they were attacked while trying to put their cards into their changers. LOL. It’s unfortunate that this is the decision TOEI made to ensure toys sales. Super Sentai have been great lately, with Go-Onger and Shinkenger. I hope GoSeiger can continue the trend. I don’t know if I would get used to the cards though.

 

Kamen Rider W, My Impression So Far

Kamen Rider W started with a weird premise, where 2 guys henshin into 1 rider. In the beginning, I smell yaoi-ness aplenty. I even made this video:

Fast forward, Kamen Rider W is actually a pretty decent show. No yaoi-ness I could see. Even better, it feels really like a detective J-Dorama, with tokusatsu mixed in. I really love the show. Funny and entertaining.

But then guess who showed up. A new Kamen Rider, Kamen Rider Accel, Ryu Terui. Not only the design is a stark contrast from W (he looks like a cheap toy design, unlike W’s smooth design), he can transform. Yup, another transformrider, the bad trend started by Decade. ONORE DIKEIDO!!! Really, I just hate this Transformers Riders stuff. It’s just weird (Kuuga’s head being flipped, firing arrow from Kiva’s crotch, etc). Kamen Rider is supposed to be “human,” not Transformers. Well, Kamen Rider Accel can transform into a motorcycle. Well, okay, the transformation isn’t as weird as the other Riders in Decade, but I still think it’s fishy. Well, guess what, in episode 22, Accel gets a new weapon, the Gunner A. It’s a tank, and Accel in his motorcycle form can combine with it. That sounds fine, until you see how they combined. Watch this video I made:


Yeah, you be the judge.
What were the producers and director thinking? That’s just bad design. I mean come on, really? I hope they don’t do that often in future episodes.

Edit: Youtube suspended my account for unknown reason. If there was a TOS violation, usually they simply disabled/deleted the video and gave me a warning. Now, my account just went poof. I’m uploading the video to metacafe.

 

Decade vs Kuuga: A bunch of fools

LOL. I found these pics in forums. Apparently Masahiro Inoue (Kamen Rider Decade) and Ryouta Murai (Kamen Rider Kuuga: DCD ver) have been fooling around, parodying Decade’s transforming into another rider, …

…and Decade Complete Form’s finisher. Hilarious!

Glad to see the actors are having fun! LOL

 

God Hand Teru, 1st Episode Impression

First episode of God Hand Teru has been subbed by TimeLesSub (Fansub FTW!). Apparently, this dorama is based form a manga of the same name. Teru is a young new doctor/surgeon in a top hospital. His dad is a brilliant surgeon, that people call him of having the God Hand. The first episode started just like any dorama. I thought this is going to be a J-dorama version of ER. Well, the realism is completely shattered on Teru’s first surgery. Here, take a look: (make sure you watch in HQ)

First of all, there are a lot of pauses of silence and self thoughts during the surgery. In real life, the patient would’ve been dead from the get go. You don’t see doctors pausing and having deep thoughts during surgery in ER. But okay, this is a dorama after all.
And then, bam, Teru’s superpower is shown. I swear I saw him saying “Henshin!” Now, that is just too much. I mean come on. In the J-dorama Voice, Daiki, the main character, has an anime-like deductive power, but the CG effect is very minimal and within the context of the situation. God Hand Teru’s surgery scene is just way too overblown, contrasting the rest of the dorama. Reminded me of the Nintendo DS game Trauma Center. Oh well, hopefully they don’t recycle that lengthy fanservice “Henshin” scene too often.

 

Kamen Rider Kiva ended, and Kamen Rider Decade starts

Kamen Rider Kiva has ended. The previous 2 episodes before the finale were pretty grim. The final episode definitely tried to turn things around to a happier end, obviously since Kamen Rider is a kids show. Taiga actually didn’t kill Maya, he (the scene) faked it. Wataru and Taiga are friends again, and teamed up to defeat the reincarnation of the previous Fangire King. Nago-kun miraculously got his eyesight back, and married Megumi. The last episode brought more closure than previous Kamen Rider series, although there are still a lot of things unexplained (what happened to Sagarc? What’s the history of Kivat?). The final episode should’ve just ended with Nago’s wedding. Instead, they have Wataru’s son + Kivat 4th(?) and future Fangire attacking, creating an endless ending.

The series started pretty weak. Usually, I find the actors of previous Kamen Rider series to be quite believable that they were the ones under the Kamen Rider costume too (In reality, the person under the Kamen Rider suits are not the actors themselves). Wataru is the first Kamen Rider that is quite obvious that a stunt man is under the Kiva costume. I mean Kouji Seto (the actor playing Wataru), is super skinny, while Kiva is obviously quite muscular. Also, Wataru’s shy personality is a complete contrast of Fangire fighting Kiva. The only draw of the show for me in the beginning was the 80s storyline. Otoya is simply hilarious, overshadowing Wataru himself. Nago + IXA seems to be more interesting than Wataru, but of course Nago is only a supporting character, thus the character was dumbed down in the middle, becoming the slapstick humor. Kengo is an unnecessary distraction. He’s not even relevant in the last couple episodes. I definitely hated his character when he became emo and stole IXA from Nago. The show got better and more interesting when Taiga was introduced, then Mio becoming a selfish Queen. Bishop is another awesome character, and freaky too! The best and strongest episodes were definitely the 2 episodes before the finale. Overall, it’s an okay Kamen Rider series, but definitely underwhelming compared to the likes of Kuuga and Den-O. It’s less confusing then 555/Ryuuki/Kabuto, and has a few powerful and funny scenes. Kiva’s henshin belt is not as cool as Kabuto’s. I think Den-O was definitely more enjoyable since they’re simply hilarious, and didn’t pretend not to.

The next Kamen Rider Series is Decade. The first episode is already on Youtube, unsubbed. Just on the first episode, Decade already henshin into 3 major Kamen Rider, Kabuto, Faiz, and Hibiki, complete with Kabuto’s clock up. They definitely didn’t hold back as Decade is the 10th anniversary of the Heisei Kamen Rider series. Below is the henshin scenes in the first episode, and I already want the belt!

I hope they can bring previous Kamen Rider actors as it will excite the fans, especially Hiro Mizushima as Kabuto, Kento Handa as Faiz, the supporting riders like Knight from Ryuuki, Zeronos from Den-O, Blade, and maybe even Shouwa riders or Kamen Rider The First! Alas, we already know that Joe Odagiri won’t be Kuuga. Hopefully it will be an exciting show. KAMEN RIDE…. DECADE!!

 

Go-Onger Ep30 and 31 Funnies