Kamen Rider Kabuto
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Glamador
Member
I find Gattack insufferable. He's hotheaded but without the skills to back up. He perpetually gets himself and others into trouble seemingly without any ability to fix his mistakes or improve himself in any way. He whines constantly, butts heads with not only the other riders but his superiors and father and...well...he's just really annoying.
I see a lot of people say he was the real star of the show...but I just don't see it. Is it because he's an underdog? That people wanted to see him succeed over Tendou's incredible arrogance? Is it JUST because he was so different from the less-liked titular character? Because I don't think that's enough.
NeonZ
Active Member
It's not a matter of liking him or not. Gattack was often the point of view character for developments in Kabuto's storyline. Revelations regarding the main story, from Hiyori's identity to even the origin of Kabuto's belt, were often given to the viewer according to what Kagami learned and saw, rather than Tendo. Pretty much the only running plot that actually followed Tendo was "Dark Kabuto kidnaps Hiyori".
Now, in the end, that's kind of murky, especially due to Inoue's writing, who did treat Tendo as a more standard protagonist, unlike Yonemura, resulting in things like Tsurugi's inconsistent character arc (I'm Tendo's rival! No, I'm Kagamin's best friend! No, Tendo, you're the only one who can kill me!). Yonemura's epilogue chapter for Kabuto is Kagami focused too though.
Anyway, I don't see how Kagami didn't improve. He was beaten up a lot, but, unlike other secondary Riders, that was just building up to his evolution. He eventually comes to be relied upon by Kabuto, holds on and later defeats Nagi, after initially getting beaten up without even transforming, and he's the one who disarms the final enemy and carries Tendo for the Double Rider Kick. He wasn't just beaten up to be kept away from the main story, it was part of his character arc. Now, it's true that he was kind of an idiot, but yet again that was part of his character arc - learning to stand up by himself rather than following others, something he only completely gets in the final episode.
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Glamador
Member
I get that he's the window into Kabuto's world, and that makes him main-character-ish. But he isn't really a *protagonist* for much of the series. He's just the audience surrogate until he gets Gattack...and I still don't believe he really deserves it.
If you think about it, he got Gattack by just doing the exact same thing he'd done the entire series. Which is to say, refusing to give up and butting heads with the Zecter until it decided he had enough spunk to forgive his nonsense and bad attitude. And without Gattack he STILL wouldn't really be anything special.
His growth felt kind of manufactured. I suspect some of that is due to the incorherent writing that plagues Kabuto, but taken at face value he just doesn't do much to move the plot forward. He's a bystander, even after getting his suit that magically makes him competent in combat. And it feels like he never changed his approach.
Of course, neither did Tendou. But Tendou *was* the catalyst of the plot for much of the series. In my mind, that makes him the main character no matter how much the camera follows Kagami.
Compare with Hibiki, in which Asumu is most *definitely* the main character, while being in much the same situation as Kagami. Except that the story of Hibiki is all about Asumu, as a coming of age tale. Kabuto is a more narrative-heavy kind of story with mysteries and factions and a bad guy in the shadows. If Kabuto were a character piece like Hibiki, then I'd be more inclined to agree that Kagami is the one in the spotlight.
If you think about it, he got Gattack by just doing the exact same thing he'd done the entire series. Which is to say, refusing to give up and butting heads with the Zecter until it decided he had enough spunk to forgive his nonsense and bad attitude. And without Gattack he STILL wouldn't really be anything special.
His growth felt kind of manufactured. I suspect some of that is due to the incorherent writing that plagues Kabuto, but taken at face value he just doesn't do much to move the plot forward. He's a bystander, even after getting his suit that magically makes him competent in combat. And it feels like he never changed his approach.
Of course, neither did Tendou. But Tendou *was* the catalyst of the plot for much of the series. In my mind, that makes him the main character no matter how much the camera follows Kagami.
Compare with Hibiki, in which Asumu is most *definitely* the main character, while being in much the same situation as Kagami. Except that the story of Hibiki is all about Asumu, as a coming of age tale. Kabuto is a more narrative-heavy kind of story with mysteries and factions and a bad guy in the shadows. If Kabuto were a character piece like Hibiki, then I'd be more inclined to agree that Kagami is the one in the spotlight.
Lynxara
Nice post!!
I wish they could've come up with a less irritating window. You nail exactly why Kagami drives me nuts. He's a character who basically always acts the same, and gets rewarded for it in a way that feels very artificial.
You can do the "outside looking in" sort of writing set-up well, but to do that, your main character has to be really broad and identifiable in a way Kagami's not. Nexus got this sort of POV character pretty much perfectly with Komon, who never felt grating or frustrating as a lead despite being totally mundane for 99% of the series.
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