We've talked about the afterlife of toei tokusatsu's, for the longest time between the mid 90's through the early 2010's, Sentai's got a versus movie and Kamen rider... got nothing at all. Today it is much different we see show's having a bit more of a life thanks to online mini series and 10 year later (Now 20, if you are 2000's kid you can start crying.) Of course their was one big outlier in the idea of the end of something. Kamen Rider Den-o was biiiiiiiig, it was very popular, still to this day and Toei wasn't going to let them go. Yeah we got the summer movie but their was so, so much more. Their is the 'crossover' with Kiva, a 'farewell' movie that was meant to be the end of everything. But it wouldn't be the end as the got 4 more movies between Decade and W. They were effectively the star's of let's go kamen rider. And made cameo's years after.
Thanks to the fact that technically the den-o forms could be relegated to the taros, who were voice actors and much easier to get back, meant that it did have a longer lifespan. So we will be dividing the den-o film series in two parts. Here we will be talking about the den-o movies that featured Takeru Satoh.
I'm Born
On a mission to the year 2000, the Denliner is hijacked by the thief-king Gaoh, who intends to find... the Gaohliner (Weird coincidence but whatever.) in order to destroy all of time. Ryotaro, Hana and Momotaros are left in the past where Ryotaro loses his memories of his time as Den-o and Momo can't enter him anymore, and they run into a younger Ryotaro that they name Kotaro to avoid confusion. Yuto shows up and the group sets out to stop the mad thief.
I'm Born is... painfully underwhelming. I think this needs to be stated that this was built up it got an entire arc dedicated to showing how we got to the beginning of it and not like a two-parter, but essentially 5 episodes, a two-parter to introduce Sieg and then a three part story leading in to this. And it introduces one of the two super forms for the season. In a way, I'm born is its own mini saga. And it just... doesn't feel as impactful as it should be, in fact I've used the phrase, just an episode of the tv show for stuff like, the sentai movies, because those are what they are, but this, this feels like a two-parter for Den-O with barely raised stakes, with the only raised anything being that the main enemy is a Kamen Rider.
And yeah he is... there, nihilist pirate who we never learn how he learned about the gaoh train, even the arc really doesn't feel like going into him more the plan they came up with to steal the den-liner. Which would have been a lot more serious an issue ha Zeronos not existed in the story at this point, so its more like a band-aid then anything else. And honestly, I am not fond of the Gaoh suit, I don't mind the bronze gold color, its the protusion on the shoulders and the eyes that make the suit feel a lot worse than it is despite coming from the okay base of den-o sword form. He isn't god awful as an antagonist but he is just there.
And as stated the biggest sin about this film is how underwhelming it is. Yeah they visit Toei's favorite set for movies of edo japan and the den-liner crew fights ninjas. But when compared to so many of its other films, their is just this feeling of anti-climax going on around here. The final battle just takes place in some destroyed factory location, the taro's take over the numerous Ryotaro's taken out of time to fight alongside Ryotaro, but I don't know, as a suppose end to the first half of Den-o. I'm born is okay, its not terrible but for a film, I am struggling to find a reason as to why it is a movie.
CLIMAX DEKA
In the aftermath of the defeat of Kai, Ryotaro, Hana and the Taros set up a detective agency in order to keep the remaining Imagin in check. Their focus is turned to an evil organization called... evil organization, led by Negataros who has stolen a pass from the owner, in order to restore the old future. Aided by a new detective, the den liner crew sets out to stop negataros... oh what's that, your wondering where Kiva is in all of this, well he shows up early on for a single scene, vanishes to nowheresville for the majority of the film and with very little fanfare shows up at the end to assist the heroes... what, you thought this was a crossover movie since both Den-o and Kiva are in the title.
I think this needs to be put in perspective, at the time, Heisei riders never really crossed over with one another for anything big. Their was Ryuki and Agito but that was just a vhs special. This was to be the first meeting between riders and Toei cucks the audience and just gives you a den-o movie that cameo's Kiva, which the interactions are actually kind of good, if only the film made it look like they are in the same place and not just an actor looking at a mode. For some this may not be a downside if they had come from Kiva and were not fond of it. But it is dissapointing that the film doesn't do anything to really capitalize on it since the villain mixes both Imagin and Fangire.
Honestly the best way to describe this film is that it exists, why? Because Den-o was still quite popular and we need to squeeze just a bit more money out of the cast and crew so we have this film that feels like it is on auto pilot with little care. If the fact that the evil organization has no nam is any kind of idea of what Kobayashi was doing here, you can tell she is sort of phoning it in on this because.
Their are some moments that I think it does well. some of taro's possession works well, like Ryutaros arrest spree or Urataros possessing Yuto for something interseting. Owner and Noami get a good chuckle here and there. But it is a film that leaves just like with the previous film not much of an impact, and this was the first major crossover between riders, and it barely counts as one. Its just more den-o that feels so... underwhelming for what it is.
That is kind of a problem these movies end up having is that, it doesn't feel like we have built up to something, Despite the show that has such big personalities it never is able to match the climax's that they are wanting. They may be movie length but they feel like a tv movie rather than something you could go to the theatre for a truly unique experience.
FINAL COUNTDOWN
After the events of the series, Hana and the Taro's are visiting the present to see Ryotaro and Hana. But not too long into the era, they are attacked by a bunch of shadow based Imagin lead by a Kamen rider who turns out to be Ryotaro possesed by the Ghost imagin. The group gets their butt handed to them, even with the appearence of Yuto, until a blue den-liner shows up with a new rider who is able to beat them back. Owner reveals this to be Ryotaro's grandson Kotaro and his Imagin partner Teddy, they then reveal that the ghost train is being controlled by Shiro who intends to reverse the worlds of the living and dead as the crews head off to save Ryotaro and prevent the swapping of living and dead.
What follows is a film that, for all intensive purposes feels like a retread of I'm born, but despite that, Final countdown is probably the better film. The big thing is that unlike I'm born which really felt rather tensionless and lacking any stakes. Here the situation set out is quite dire as the heroes are nearly beaten before the arrival of the new Den-o. It sets these villains as a bit more of a threat than the bandits from the previous film, and that just goes through the film, it feels like the ending of an era for Den-o, even if Ryotaro initally takes a backseat as a distressed dude, it does show the crew doing fine without him.
But yeah Kotaro is a weird character, I don't ever bring this up because it never feels an issue but... it feels like their is a difference between the suit actor and the main actor, main actor has this cocky, confident attitude to his walk, the snap of his fingers and his imagin teddy immediately listening to him shows a different kind of hero. He does this thing of claiming he will beat you in a certain amount of moves. And then we see him out of suit and... I really can't see it, he may still have it but the body language between suit and in person just feel lacking. He doesn't give a bad performance and the arc of humble pie he gets is fine. But its hard to get a pin point on his character since the movie is not full about him.
Yeah, the film reuses the feudal japan location that Toei just loves to bust out from time to time. But we spend all our time here rather than the jumping around like its trying to be an epic journey. And the main villain in Shiro is much more interesting than Gaoh. Having an actual backstory that is sympathetic, it doesn't forgive what he does but still it is an interesting thing rather than nothing. It may not be much but it is something all things considering.
And suit wise things are much better, New Den-o I do think works with the blue, shoulder stuff is an issues and the rail stuff could be aggravating, but it is a good suit. Meanwhile Yuuki... repurposes the Gaoh suit, but both forms look better, it looks a lot more decrepit compared to gaoh for something to do with time as the rails rust. I like teh color difference between the two and the pauldrons don't bother me, maybe it is because the helmet is not as bulky but this just works so much better compared to the first go around. Final countdown isn't going to blow away people, but as what was supposed to be a final hurrah for this cast, it does a lot more at raising stakes and building to a climax compared to the first time. Of course this was not the end and instead of ending on a high... good note, we have four more films.
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