Kamen Rider Kuuga General Discussion Thread
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MattComix
Super Moderator
Godai's not the kind of hero who is a hot-blooded warrior of justice like my other favorite Rider Minami Kotaro. It's really just a different kind of hero and that's cool. I like Superman but I also dig Batman and Spidey. You need your Peter Parkers as well as your Clark Kents and Bruce Wayne's etc. My only problem with it is that I don't like that a hero like Kotaro has been basically left out of the rotation all these years.
I'm not saying I want a Rider like Kotaro to be the all the time standard but throw me a series at least every 2-3 years or so that has a lead like that and I'd be fine.
Godai Yuuske is an arcetype I tend to refer to as the gentle/strong hero who is ordinarily a peaceful person that is thrust into a situation where it falls upon them to fight. Because they are people who deep down cherish life, they choose to fight in order to protect life from the greater evils presented in the stories.
Heroes of this type don't necessarily become warriors in the way that your Hongo's or Kotaro's did but more they keep their gentle ways as much as they can until their power is needed in which case they bring it and fight like hell because lives are on the line. In Godai's case if he fought with anger or hate he would be lost to the power of Kuuga and become a creature more dangerous than the Gurongi.
Which also plays into the idea of keeping ones smile even in the darkest of times. If we lose our smiles, that darkness eats away at us until there is nothing left. If someone like Godai lost their smile while having the power of Kuuga, the world would be doomed.
Both Kotaro and Godai I think play into the Japanese idea of the crying hero. Someone who must overcome either their own sadness or that of the situation to do what must be done in order to protect the lives of others. They don't revel in it, but they'll be damned if they'll stand by while creatures or even other humans with powers use them for cruelty and take joy in the horror and pain they cause.
I'm not saying I want a Rider like Kotaro to be the all the time standard but throw me a series at least every 2-3 years or so that has a lead like that and I'd be fine.
Godai Yuuske is an arcetype I tend to refer to as the gentle/strong hero who is ordinarily a peaceful person that is thrust into a situation where it falls upon them to fight. Because they are people who deep down cherish life, they choose to fight in order to protect life from the greater evils presented in the stories.
Heroes of this type don't necessarily become warriors in the way that your Hongo's or Kotaro's did but more they keep their gentle ways as much as they can until their power is needed in which case they bring it and fight like hell because lives are on the line. In Godai's case if he fought with anger or hate he would be lost to the power of Kuuga and become a creature more dangerous than the Gurongi.
Which also plays into the idea of keeping ones smile even in the darkest of times. If we lose our smiles, that darkness eats away at us until there is nothing left. If someone like Godai lost their smile while having the power of Kuuga, the world would be doomed.
Both Kotaro and Godai I think play into the Japanese idea of the crying hero. Someone who must overcome either their own sadness or that of the situation to do what must be done in order to protect the lives of others. They don't revel in it, but they'll be damned if they'll stand by while creatures or even other humans with powers use them for cruelty and take joy in the horror and pain they cause.
musashi03
HEROW
The thing I liked about Godai is the way they played with his issues on violence. Like how much he is forced to fight even if he knows that throwing a punch (as much as it feels good in the beginning) will definitely be regretful. He is thrust into a situation in which he's the only one capable of saving people through his fists, and as much as some people take it for granted, it's actually hurtful for Godai since he doesn't believe in violence and he's only stuck with this option given that the race of enemies he's facing feeds on what he dislikes the most. This personality of his is his very own saving grace against losing everything just to fight Number 0.
Personally, I loved the parts wherein Godai loses control, not because I like violence, but because I can see the exclamation point driven by the show. Like when Godai battles the Porcupine Grongi, it pretty much shows the very focus of the series... What Godai is facing, what he must become, and what he truly feels about that.
Personally, I loved the parts wherein Godai loses control, not because I like violence, but because I can see the exclamation point driven by the show. Like when Godai battles the Porcupine Grongi, it pretty much shows the very focus of the series... What Godai is facing, what he must become, and what he truly feels about that.
Smilodon
Friendship and the Cosmos.
So I was watching Kuuga again, and the episodes on Tudou have the Grongi subbed in Japanese, and me being a Japanese person could understand them.
To my surprise, I uncovered some interesting facts about the Gegeru, and that it's more complex that we may have assumed up to this point.
The Rose Tattooed Woman discussed in episode 32 (The Famous Bike Arc) about the Hopper Grongi proceeding on in the Gegeru, but as it turns out the Gegeru is divided into several phases. The Black Phase of the Gegeru, and the White Phase of the Gegeru. The white itself referring to Daguba.
Man, I thought that was cool. I'm gonna search some more.
To my surprise, I uncovered some interesting facts about the Gegeru, and that it's more complex that we may have assumed up to this point.
The Rose Tattooed Woman discussed in episode 32 (The Famous Bike Arc) about the Hopper Grongi proceeding on in the Gegeru, but as it turns out the Gegeru is divided into several phases. The Black Phase of the Gegeru, and the White Phase of the Gegeru. The white itself referring to Daguba.
Man, I thought that was cool. I'm gonna search some more.
Ryuutaros
"Training."
I thought Godai was a very interesting character, even more so than some of the Heisei Riders. I loved watching his motivations, his morals and his ability to make people smile. It was particularly interesting when these things come into conflict in the story (Almost constantly in some ways.) and how he has to keep a pure heart even against the Grongi or becomes something no different to them.
Lynxara
Nice post!!
I think Godai is a little more interesting than some of the later Heisei Riders because he was a character conceived primarily to be part of his particular story. Kuuga's conflict required a character like that to make sense. Odagiri Jo's charisma and the writing help make Godai really likable, but the character clearly wasn't conceived just to be likable.
Since Godai was a very popular character, a lot of the later Godai-like Riders in Heisei struck me as pretty conscious attempts to mimic what people liked about Godai first and attempts to give the show's story a logical protagonist second. This kind of writing tends to result in characters that aren't as memorable, because they don't quite make sense in the story's context.
Since Godai was a very popular character, a lot of the later Godai-like Riders in Heisei struck me as pretty conscious attempts to mimic what people liked about Godai first and attempts to give the show's story a logical protagonist second. This kind of writing tends to result in characters that aren't as memorable, because they don't quite make sense in the story's context.
Lynxara
Nice post!!
I feel like they went back to the Godai well a few times after Faiz... like, Kenzaki and Eiji both feel pretty Godai to me. I'm a bit on the fence regarding whether Shotaro is a Godai or not.
Shotaro's got the right character traits, but W depicts his purity of heart as a genuine character flaw sometimes. That's not something I see Kuuga or its imitators ever doing.
Shotaro's got the right character traits, but W depicts his purity of heart as a genuine character flaw sometimes. That's not something I see Kuuga or its imitators ever doing.
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musashi03
HEROW
Shotaro was different from Godai in some ways like Shotaro's unending quest to be a romantic, but mostly they do have the same purity. I guess it's hard to see that since we have the people in Tokyo easily liking Godai while we have the people of Fuuto treating Shotaro like a joke most times. Even if Godai does his 2000 skill introduction, people are always open-arms about this while in Shotaro's case, he either gets ignored or gets a slipper slap. In a sense, the people around them is what makes each character different in the viewer's eyes, but this still doesn't change how common their intentions are.
Lynxara
Nice post!!
I think how the fictional world reacts to a character is a pretty important part of his depiction. So while Godai is questioned by a few cynical characters, their cynicism is usually put in a negative light. People who are admirable, like Ichijo, can take Godai at face value.
Most shows that used Godais chose to lionize the hero's purity in a similar way. Like, I can't think of when Eiji has ever been completely, inarguably wrong about anything in a way that was purely his own fault. Eiji's pure-hearted and his purity keeps him on the right path.
A lot of the characters who question or belittle Shotaro are often treated as being perfectly justified for doing so... or at the very least, Shotaro is made to look a bit hopeless for seriously expecting anything else. He usually ends up being saved by Philip in situations like this.
So it's in that regard that I think Shotaro may stand up as a character conceived to tell a particular story first and simply to be likable second... even if there's quite a bit of Godai in what makes him likable. Shotaro's fallibility leads to a lot of Philip's most heroic moments.
Most shows that used Godais chose to lionize the hero's purity in a similar way. Like, I can't think of when Eiji has ever been completely, inarguably wrong about anything in a way that was purely his own fault. Eiji's pure-hearted and his purity keeps him on the right path.
A lot of the characters who question or belittle Shotaro are often treated as being perfectly justified for doing so... or at the very least, Shotaro is made to look a bit hopeless for seriously expecting anything else. He usually ends up being saved by Philip in situations like this.
So it's in that regard that I think Shotaro may stand up as a character conceived to tell a particular story first and simply to be likable second... even if there's quite a bit of Godai in what makes him likable. Shotaro's fallibility leads to a lot of Philip's most heroic moments.
