Kamen Rider Fourze: The Final Score

[Terthna]

Fourze is the worst Kamen Rider I've ever managed to watch all the way to the finale. That's not to say it's the worst I've ever seen (so far that would be Kiva, which I abandoned about the time the Zanvat sword showed up), but the show only just barely managed to keep my attention enough to keep me from dropping it entirely.

What was most irritating to me was the fact that in the latter third of the show you never saw Fourze use any of his switches aside from the ones that form changed, which helped to make the battles more boring and repetitive. Even though, mind you, his final form had that thing where he could combine the effects of various switches, something he only managed to use about half a dozen times before forgetting about it.

I give the show a C-; not bad, but definitely below average.

 

[BLASTMATIC]

Fourze was a mixed bag at first rocking the silly/goof that they had i felt as episode 20 onward maxxed out the heat with good arcs, fun stories and such. The Yuki arc was strong and hard and fun and balanced all at the same time it had all what Fourze can do in the show by the time it came time to do so. My biggest gripe was the ending but i will get to that in a second, the villians were intriging because you didn't know what they really wanted until Gamrou showed his hand and bam, there was the reason and the reveal of Kengo being an alien and such which made sense why he was the way he was. the ending weakened the death of kengo because it was so impactful when it happened, but by the finale it was like meh wtf you brought him back after all that which i can see happening because it woulda made it hard to do in a movie that might not have been time wise and such. Either way the series is a Score of B-, it had fun, goofiness and great action.

 

[004Brave]

I give it a B. Fourze has a lot of heart, but the story was not all that well. Great opening episodes and impressive final episodes, but that middle part between Meteor' debut and end of ep40 were the series' slow point. The Aries 2 parter were the best out of that middle section.

Also, congrats to the writer of Gurren Lagann and Koichi Sakamoto. For their first Kamen Rider show, they did a good job. I hope to see more of their work!

 

[NeonZ]

As a show by itself, Fourze was just "good". It never bored me and left me annoyed, but it also isn't something that I'd chose as my favorite Rider series.

On the other hand, I really like the way they've been handling most of the extra material for it. It's probably the best expanded franchise Rider has done so far, IMO. The Rider universe and movie teases were nice, Megamax was excellent, of course, but even the Hyper Battle Video was amusing, and the Rider Club Quiz extras are pretty fun too.

 

[ClimaxHeroDen-O]

I give it a solid A+. I loved it from start to finish, and it's now tied with Den-O as my favorite series(and my toy collection can attest to that). to me, it so many high notes and had so much that I enjoyed that I barely ever saw things I thought were bad about it. I'm a big fan of the Shonen genre, and this series really captured the hot-blooded, high energy, action-packed nature of Shonen. even then, it had heart and did take itself seriously when it needed to. the heroes were likable, the villains were wicked, and the story worked. it also was great in it's more aesthetic elements as well(music, designs, etc.)

I could go on about more why I enjoyed it, but then it'd probably be on the long side of things.

 

[Smilodon]

As a show by itself, Fourze was just "good". It never bored me and left me annoyed, but it also isn't something that I'd chose as my favorite Rider series.

On the other hand, I really like the way they've been handling most of the extra material for it. It's probably the best expanded franchise Rider has done so far, IMO. The Rider universe and movie teases were nice, Megamax was excellent, of course, but even the Hyper Battle Video was amusing, and the Rider Club Quiz extras are pretty fun too.

I'm with Neon on this one. It was very middle of the road for a series that ostensibly looks like a radical departure from previous years.

There were highs and lows but for some reason, I can't really seem to see any production troubles that may have gone on backstage (Or maybe OOO's were just too blatant for anyone to ignore). I hope there is some Hyper hobby article with Tsukada and Nakashima or something that'll just talk about how Fourze developed from start to finish so we can get more insight on Fourze from Pre-Production to the finished product and possibly discover why they handled certain things they way they did.

 

[Demi-Fiend]

8/10

Which is a B.

 

[XenonVincent777]

This show was so much fun to watch. The characters were great, the action was over the top and it made me reflect on my high school days in some way.

The best moment for me in this show is when Gentarou made a great comeback by returning from the dead and giving us a great Cosmic Form fight.

I'd give it a B+. The story was kinda cheesy and Kengo returning from the dead felt rushed, and the Horoscopes could've been alot better, but it's a show I'd rewatch again and again.

 

[Dr Kain]

Fourze is the worst Kamen Rider I've ever managed to watch all the way to the finale. That's not to say it's the worst I've ever seen (so far that would be Kiva, which I abandoned about the time the Zanvat sword showed up), but the show only just barely managed to keep my attention enough to keep me from dropping it entirely.

You must not have seen Decade, Den-O, or Hibiki yet. Kiva is by far one of the best series out there and Fourze is a fantastic show. Not as good as W, but better than OOO (which was really good nonetheless). The best KR series are still Black, Blade, W, and Kiva though. If you want to read my full opinion on Fourze though, go to the other discussion. My final score for it (and do know, I watched this series over the last 8 days, so I was not watching it on a weekly basis) is an 8/10.

 

[Solo the Wingman]

I've been mulling on this one for a bit, trying to pin down what I liked about Fourze and what I didn't like about Fourze. It's a bit harder to do than I'd like, but not for the usual reasons.

Thinking over it some more, it almost seems like Fourze adhered too rigidly to its tropes and ideas. After episode 20-ish, the two-episode arcs were adhered to so rigidly that it destroyed pacing and consistency of the series. Each characters' stock tropes were played up so much that they became one dimensional caricatures of themselves and all development stopped. (I found Gentaro, himself, in horrible need of some backstory explanation and character development.) To borrow a phrase, it was like the writers strung a bunch of TvTropes pages together and said: "Let's do that."

The Stock Sound Effects are a bit of an indicator of this. Having one set sound effect for every action is well and all, but when those actions are happening simultaneously or in quick succession, and you insist on playing each and every one of those sound effects in turn, it just doesn't work. Had I submitted anything like some of these Fourze episodes I'd have been fired on the spot. I have to wonder what the sound design people were smoking sometimes.

Overall, I think I'm more of a fan of where Fourze started from instead of where it went. The first 13 episodes? Loved it. Everything after that ranges from decently good to just plain bad. I've seen people around here accuse Kobayashi of writing melodrama for the sake of angst... but I really feel that that accusation should be laid at Fourze's feet instead of any of Kobayashi's recent Rider work. So much of the last two episodes exists only for the characters to angst about without any build-up or justification. It kills it for me.

So... I pretty much have to give the show a solid C. It was decent, but only average. Good, but not great. That rating just feels right to me.


Now if only someone would give us a Tomoko Nozama: Goth Detective spin-off*, I'd be a really happy camper.


* Note that I don't want that spin-off because I ogle Tomoko. My wife would pretty much kill me if I did. I just really, really like the character and would like to see more of her.