Rider Warriors ('90s Outsiders)

Shin Kazamatsuri/Kamen Rider Shin

I'm a huge fan of Shin Kamen Rider: Prologue. I was one of its only supporters for years. It's not a perfect movie, but I loved what it tried to do. It was the first tokusatsu work aimed completely at the adult fans. It wanted to be a more realistic take on the classic Ishinomori Rider; it was darker, meaner, more serious, more violent, it brought the horror back to the character.

Being a "prologue" and a mystery, we don't get to spend much time with Shin as a character. He's already a guinea-pig, he's already investigating the news clippings he's connecting to his dreams. We're not given a chance to really know him, he's already on the go, he's already all-business. It's a very tense character and locked down performance by Shin Ishikawa. (Years after the movie, the dude changed his stage name to Shin! That's dedication.) So, critics of the movie find Shin bland or too stiff. But he's really in line with the style the movie's going for. There's literally only ONE lighthearted moment in the movie, and even then Shin's just kind of distant, because he heard the news playing in the background.

But Shin, as a character, has it REALLY bad, even by Kamen Rider standards. He's lied to by pretty much everyone. He volunteers to be a lab guinea pig, trusting his dad, but his dad doesn't try too hard to protect him from the sinister organization backing his research. (Not until it's too late.) Not only is Shin turned into a monster by the renegade nutball scientist Onizuka, but he might be a HOMICIDAL monster. How different is that? Unsure what to do, unsure what he's capable of doing, he's caught between the sinister organization, the CIA agents after him, and the loved ones who let him down. His pregnant girlfriend is murdered, their baby another possible monster. It would have been pretty neat to get a follow up story to see what a new adventure brought Shin, but his tale alienated too many people.

Did the movie push it too far? Maybe. But, damn, don't you miss when Toei was willing to take a risk and gamble on a project like this? All of their shows are the same now.

I got major shit at HJU one time when I said the Heisei Riders wouldn't exist without this movie. "OMG, Shin was a bomb, how could that be true?!?!?!?" I still stand by that. It went for the dramatic approach, it dispensed with fanciful villains and toys and went for a mainstream-sounding song rather than the traditional theme. (No "Fight, Shin Kamen Rider! Warrior of green, fighting for justice! Fight, Shin! Protect the world with your greenness!")

Masaru Asou/Kamen Rider ZO

Kou Domon's great casting for a Rider. The dude looks like he stepped out of a '70s show. And ZO's a slick looking movie, but action is its top priority, so he didn't have much to work with and Asou wasn't much of a character. He's a student who was in the wrong place at the wrong time trusting the wrong, nutty sonuvabitch. Spends the movie looking for Akomaru, who the movie mistakenly places most focus on.

My brother loves ZO and has the manga, and I remember there being a subplot about Masaru having a relationship with Naomi Morinaga's character. I don't know if that was ever planned, scripted or even shot, but it would have gone a long way towards giving Masaru SOMETHING else to stand out...and it would make the title tune "Love Can't Be Stopped" actually make sense.

Prince Dex of Edenoi/Kamen Rider Saban

Just fuckin' with ya.

Kouji Segawa/Kamen Rider J

Yuuta Mochizuki is cool. Many have noted how he resembles Hiroshi Fujioka. It's a no-brainer for him to play a Rider, he's a great choice. But despite having more screen-time devoted to only him, Segawa's even more forgettable than Asou! We know literally nothing about him and the movie is so strangely silent -- there's about four lines in the whole 45 minute run time, and three of them are "Kana-chan!"

He's a cameraman. That's it. (Funny -- that's about all we know about Hayato Ichimonji, but Takeshi Sasaki imbues him with such life that he makes Hayato memorable.) Segawa apparently is a nature photographer, and he gets immediately killed by Fog and is revived by underground hippies just because he's the only cast member of the movie. Because he's a nature watcher, that means he must love nature, so these underground dwellers decide he's the best pick for the J Power, and it all turns into some snoozy green message. Pretty much EVERY toku hero is a greeny -- even Gai Yuuki! -- so...that doesn't help Segawa stand out, either.

We're introduced to him as he's camping and that's where the whole dang movie takes place. It really looks like Koji and the little girl he's with (and spends the movie trying to rescue) are the only two people in this strange, mountainous planet where the Fog have landed, mistaking it for Earth. (ZO had such style to it, but J doesn't have any of that. I remember, back in the day, people joking that it was like the movie was quickly filmed without permits out in public places. And you know what? It does seem that way. It's probably Amemiya's least visually impressive movie.)

The most interesting thing is that Koji is actually killed, a deader-than-dead corpse when he gets changed and resurrected as a Rider. (I guess we know what the J really stands for, huh?) The movie could have done more with that, because that was a Rider first.

Toshihide Wakamatsu really dodged a jumbo-sized bullet when he didn't get the part. Poor Mochizuki. But, in a way, it makes sense for it to be him -- if the Fog landed on Earth in the time of dinosaurs and feasted on them, who better than the leader of the Dinosaur Sentai to get revenge?