Toku Review: Kamen Rider 555: Paradise Lost

Its always interesting going back to early Heisei in regards to its movie when compared to the modern era. In how they try to tie into the series either as a final chapter, or interim happening during the story. Instead they choose to be these sort of alternate endings that may give a sneak preview to what will happen. Paradise lost offers probably quite the unique alternate future, in which orphnoch's have become the dominant species and intend to wipe out what remains of humanity. Quite an interesting set up in that it doesn't offer an alternate ending, rather an entirely new path the story takes, and its appearently Kusaka's fault things got worse in the prequel novel, because he is the worst.

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Thanks to a flower developed by smart brain, 90% of humanity has become Orphnochs as a desperate humanity faces extinction. Hope seems lost as Takumi has seemingly been killed in action by the riottroopers, Mari creates a resistance amongst the last of humanity as they try to steal the more powerful emperor belts, but attempts have mostly ended in failure since one of her best fighters is kind of a hothead. Fortunately Takumi is still alive... suffering amnesia as Smart Brain prepares to finally wipe out the last tenth of humanity.

Paradise lost is very dark... its probably one of the most dour films Kamen Rider has ever created. It is lacking in any form of levity as every attempt to give a moment to breathe is met with misfortune. But I'll be honest... the grim dark tone works a lot more here. Maybe its the fact that either Keitaro or Kaidou trying to be funny is not as present. As a result, the drama and feelings of hopelessness. Though its not like their is moments of levity, amongst the new characters proffessor Nomura does offer some moments of levity, its brief, but it does inject some moments of life. Though he probably is the better of the new characters. Aside from that we Mina, the girl that Takumi is friends with during his amnesia trip Mizuhara, who could literally just been Kusaka since he's basically almost the same character, jerk to orphnochs, distaste for Takumi, he is basically Kusaka just not with a crush on Mari.

Characterization is also a lot better across the board for the cast, making Mari the leader of the resistance gives her purpose she often didn't have in the show, and by extension the rest of the cast realizing that Kusaka is the worse is a big positive. Some characters still don't do much, Yuka's and Kaido mostly feel like background characters to Yuji. Also lucky clover makes no appearence, Instead we get Leo, the first emperor who despite only speaking english does leave quite the impressive mark with his actions.

And both new suits look incredible. Psyga's white and purple color scheme has this surprisingly menacing appearance, its easily the best suit that Faiz has. And then their is Orga, the menace, the color combo, the regality of it, peak suit design and the action has plenty of high points, especially in the final climax in the arena with Faiz vs. Psyga and Orga. Especially that final finisher with Psyga.

The story does hit all of the later plot points of the tv show, Yuji turns evil due to a misunderstanding but becomes good by the end, Takumi turns out to be the wolf orphnoch, it is by all account similar plot points but the film does many of them a lot better. Yuji dark side turn is better set up with the distrust of humanity against Orphnochs even the good ones, and even the Faiz blaster, just this thing that shows up in the show, and yes it is just something that also exists already, but the build up to his actual transformation is extremely well done, Takumi and Yuji's conversation, accepting his role and the multiple camera changes as he changes from silver to red. Wish the suit looked better but its an incredible transformation that feels like a better intro than in the show. I guess also the other thing is the ending. Murakami gets killed after Yuji is defeated by these mysterious backers by being crushed. While Mari and Takumi just... walk out of the arena to find... a place they can live happily. What is with Inoue and just ending with no kind of send-off, granted I was not expecting all orphnochs to perish but meeting up with Keitaro since he gets left in the dust. Its not terrible but, probably a better ending then the main series.

God I could watch this on loop forever

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CONCLUSION

Paradise lost is Faiz at its best, cutting out the fat that made the series at times aggravating and improving on characterization and handling key moments. Its not perfect by any means, some characters are underutilized and like his last movie, it has no ending. But it is a tense, dark and incredible representation of the series.

FINAL GRADE: A+