Posts tagged kamen rider

I think I finally figured out how to add an ask box to this thing!  (My siblings weep at my inability to use technology.)

In honor of that, and to try to get myself back into the writing habit following silly real life getting in the way, I’d like to offer to write ficlets for people.  Just throw me a character’s name or a pairing and a brief prompt, and I’ll attempt to write 500-1000 words for you.  Hopefully this will get me back in the mood to work on my plot-heavy, ridiculously long things.  For Kamen Rider I can write Heisei Riders and Black; for sentai I can write Shinkenger and Gokaiger.  I’d also happily attempt some Les Mis prompts, if anyone were interested.

(Jemmir, if you’re still in the mood for it, I do have an outline sketched for a Gokaiger fic with Marvelous/Joe/Ahim… it just got rather longer and more involved than I expected.  If you’d like something else now given how long it’s been, no problem!)

harriettereece:

I think I’ve figured out what my problem with Kamen Riders is (I have the same problem with Sentai too).

 I mean, Toei calls them superheroes and it doesn’t wash with me. They don’t fight crime, just the forces of evil. So can we really say they count?

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I suppose the big thing is it depends on how you define superhero—and I don’t think there’s one really good definition.  I tend to use a very broad definition for superhero, one that encompasses what I love about the genre without necessarily leaving out the things I don’t always agree with: super heroes are generally good people doing their best to bring light and justice to an unjust world.  Again, I realize this is very broad.  Under this definition you could (and I do) count the Doctor from Doctor Who as a superhero.

Now, about Kamen Rider and Super Sentai and superheroes.  Trying to cut my long rant ended up in it being eaten twice, so apologies to anyone for this but it’s being uncut for now.

I believe that your argument is that Kamen Riders and Super Sentai members don’t try to fight crime, and thus aren’t super heroes.  A lot of tokusatsu heroes do fight crime and rescue trapped cats, though.  They just don’t do it in their super hero forms.  For instance, in the cat-in-a-tree case, a lot of Riders would try to save the cat.  Godai from Kuuga, Shinji from Ryuki, Hibiki from Hibiki, Ryoutarou from Den-O, Yuusuke from Decade, Shoutarou from Double, Eiji from OOOs, and Gentarou from Fourze would be all over the cat.  (On a tangent note that a lot of these are titular characters—Toei usually names their show after the one who carries the moral, even if other characters get equal/more screen time and are more likely to be liked by fans.  Hense why Ryuki and Blade are, respectively, Ryuki and Blade.  The only possible exceptions are Kabuto and Decade, and for Decade you could make a fair argument that Tsukasa eventually does learn the moral from his companions.)  The Riders just wouldn’t armor up to do their good deeds, because they wouldn’t need to unless something very strange was happening.  We actually see most of these guys doing good things on their own when the plot isn’t demanding their full attention, such as Godai directing lost children and Gentarou caring for the friends he has at the school who aren’t in the Kamen Rider Club.  (Now, Godai I could see using Dragon Form to save a cat once he’s over the trauma from Daguva, but it’s not strictly necessary.)  Is Superman less of a superhero if Clark Kent saves cats and Superman beats alien monstrosities?

A lot of Riders also have jobs dedicated to improving lives and saving people.  Hikawa is a cop; Shinji is a reporter who’s shown to be honestly dedicated to showing truth; Kenzaki signed up for a job where he was told he could protect people; Hibiki saves hikers from being dinner; Shoutarou and Phillip are detectives, and you know Shou would accept pro bono cases all the time if Akiko didn’t have her slipper.  Those who are jobless are dedicated to making people happy—Godai travels the world to bring smiles; Eiji is shown to desperately want to save the world but not know how to go about it given his past.

There’s also the fact that many super heroes aren’t also vigilantes.  For example, the X-men, one of the most recognizable super-hero groups, don’t go around patrolling Westchester and the surroundings for muggings (though that would be an awesome school assignment).  The X-men fight big threats, and they strive to right the injustices done to their people without violence.  I’m sure most of the X-men would stop a mugging if they saw it, and save a cat in a tree, but they don’t spend their time going out of their way looking for it.

There’s also the fact that most Rider and Sentai series are dealing with major, massive threats.  In a lot of comic arcs, it’s in the down-time between major events that we see superheroes being vigilante justice.  The JLA members may all stop muggings in their cities, but we don’t see it when they’re having adventures in space (unless it’s going to cause issues or earn them allies) or when they’re trying to prevent the invasion and take-over of the Earth.

Trying to exclude the Riders or Sentai would also raise the question of whether any antiheroes would justify as superheroes then.  Or if characters like X-23 in her recent arc would be a superhero.  She wasn’t looking for crimes to stop—she was trying to find herself and figure out how to be human.  But when something bad happened in front of her, she stopped it.  Repeatedly.  She was a good person standing up for what she thought was right, but she wasn’t being Batman, and I really enjoyed the run of her book.

I could keep rambling about this topic for a long time (I have a very soft spot for anything that hits my “superhero” vibe), but I think I’ll reign myself in now.  I hope this doesn’t come across as antagonistic; I just think it’s an interesting topic to debate.  Thanks for bringing it up!

(Source: areeceylife)