Lynxara
Nice post!!
I still think the writers didn't really plan out the king orph thing enough, so they turned Kiba evil to have some one to not only kill off Kaixa, but to have a generic villain in the final few eps.
Hmm, not sure I can agree. Given Inoue's absolute love of moral relativism, I would think that depicting a "good" monster killing off a "bad" Rider was probably one of the things the series was built around. That the storyline leads to Kiba no longer being "good" would be further exploration of Inoue's beloved moral relativism, and let him do another type of plot he loves, the "sympathetic monster" story.
Basically, I think it's fine to dislike this stuff or think it didn't work, but it probably wasn't made up off the top of the writer's head. This is probably stuff that was in the original series pitch, because it really does go back to what the show is supposed to be about. I just think that the idea of a superhero show that's all about embracing moral relativism isn't a concept that aged well.
Say what you want about the way the series ends, but that will be your opinion. Fact is, the ending we got is open ended, probably one of the first (and possibly will be the only) like it we'll ever get.
I don't agree. Open endings are really, really common in Japanese writing, and quite a few tokusatsu that predate Faiz have open endings. It wasn't unheard of in Rider, either. Off the top of my head, Amazon's ending is rather open and ambivalent, as is Black's. Also, Agito ends on an open ending that's really similar to Faiz's in many ways, but arguably better-executed. A few plotlines do get close off, but a lot of big issues are left up in the air.