Toku heroes who almost were

[Kivat]

We'd never have experienced the glory of his gravity-defying hairstyle, anyway :laugh:

I'm willing to bet that Kinomoto Minehiro (Kamen Rider Accel) tried out for Sentai at least once, since his name was coming up in casting rumours for a couple of years before he got the W gig. I definitely remember seeing him named as a potential Go-on Blue :sweat:

Oh my. If He ended up being blue instead of terui ryuu/accel, it would've been horrible. That show, much less the character does not fit him at all.

Though, if he did audition for sentai as many times as you say or at all, I'm definitely looking forward to seeing him in 1 or 2 years as a Red or Blue senshi.

 

[Kamen Rider Cherry]

Anyway, Furuhara Yasuhisa (Sousuke/Go-On Red) auditioned for both the roles of Eiji/Bouken Silver, and Tsurugi/Kamen Rider Sasword. He didn't have much acting experience at that point(Had only appeared as a background character in Nobuta wo Produce) and was still kind of scrawny/gawky looking at that time. Which was after he went from being 88kg down to what his weight was at the time he first started acting. He really whipped himself into shape by the time Go-Onger rolled around. I really admire him a lot more now that I know more of his background, how hard he worked, and how determined he was to follow his acting dream.

He really whipped himself into shape by the time Go-Onger rolled around.

Oh yes he did. :drool:

Probably not, he was rocking that hair before Go-Onger.

Excuse me, but that is just adorable.

 

[Axel]

I remember back when Boukenger Rumors were surfacing, Go-On Black's actor auditioned for the role of Bouken Black.

 

[Kamen Rider Cherry]

I remember back when Boukenger Rumors were surfacing, Go-On Black's actor auditioned for the role of Bouken Black.

BoukenBlue, you mean.

 

[ryuuseipro]

As some may know, there was also a bit of musical chairs casting with four classic shows:

Spectreman (P Productions; 1971) - Former model Jirou Dan played Jouji Gamou in the pilot (he wore a blue business suit and ivory cowboy hat, and was supposed to be the owner of a sports store). P-Productions decided to cast the late Tetsuo Narikawa in the role after the pilot. Jirou then went on to play Hideko Gou in Return of Ultraman (Tsuburaya; 1971)!

Mirrorman (Tsuburaya; 1971) - Toshio Shiba (Godzilla Vs. Hedorah) played Mirrorman's alter-ego, Kyoutarou Kagami, in the pilot. When Nobuyuki Ishida was cast in the role instead, Shiba went on to play Kouji Kasuga, the alter-ego of Silver Mask (Nippon Gendai/Senkosha; 1971)!

 

[Shougo B'Stard]

I was talking about this in another thread, it's something I just found out recently, and another one for the list.

Hiroshi Kawai (aka Kazuoki Takahashi) was supposedly going to play Kenta/Black Mask in Maskman, based off his popularity as Hayate/Change Griffin in Changeman.

This really interests me, not only as a fan of Kazuoki's, but because I always thought that, while the actor who did play Kenta (Kouichi Kusakari) was likable and gave his best, there was something about him and the way they wrote for him that made Kenta not seem like the typically reliable, kick-ass second in command. Kazuoki proved that he could do that, and I think he would have made Kenta as cool as he was supposed to be.

The same year as Maskman, Kazuoki ended up playing a supporting role in Metalder. I don't know why he wasn't chosen for Maskman -- maybe because he would have been the oldest cast member, or maybe it's because it was around that time that Toei was getting away from reusing past hero actors in new roles...:shrug:

 

[Aoi Kurenai]

Well that definitely would have been interesting. I've always thought it kind of sucked that Toei stopped reusing actors after a while, especially since they were so keen to use guys like Ohba for nearly three years in a row.