What's up with Sokichi Narumi/Ryusei's fighting styles?

TheLPFan1997

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I watched the Nobody's Perfect MV and IMO, Oyassan has one weird fighting style. I've heard opinions (if not Word of God), that it's based off of Michael Jackson (particularly Smooth Criminal) or something like that. But I don't really get the whole thing, which leads to my question. And speaking of unique Rider fighting styles, is their any particular reason why Ryusei does Jeet Kune Do?
 
I watched the Nobody's Perfect MV and IMO, Oyassan has one weird fighting style. I've heard opinions (if not Word of God), that it's based off of Michael Jackson (particularly Smooth Criminal) or something like that. But I don't really get the whole thing, which leads to my question. And speaking of unique Rider fighting styles, is their any particular reason why Ryusei does Jeet Kune Do?

The writers thought that fighting style is in synchro with Soukichi's character of a hard-boiled detective.

About Ryusei, I guess because his school has a tendency towards its students learning Jeet Kune Do. Perhaps if someone who is a fan of Fourze could check back on the episode of Ryusei's flashback when he was still with his best friend. Around ep 20 -32 I guess.

Easy explanation is Toei just want a Rider with his own unique style.
 
I wish we actually had MORE of that.
The Heisei era of KR has been notorious for using street fighting instead of more unique fighting styles. I can see why it would be difficult in some of those suits, but I still find it lazy at times.
The street brawl thing only worked in Kuuga and Ryuki because the fights back then were much more brutal.

It can be debated whether or not it is a good idea. While I enjoy the martial arts that we see in Sentai, it is often very hard to imagine the actual characters fighting like that.
So you end up seeing the Sentai teams as a group of masked stuntmen, rather than a group of masked characters.
 
It can be debated whether or not it is a good idea. While I enjoy the martial arts that we see in Sentai, it is often very hard to imagine the actual characters fighting like that.
So you end up seeing the Sentai teams as a group of masked stuntmen, rather than a group of masked characters.
That's all part of the suspension of disbelief. And even then, recent Sentai have tried their best to incorporate out-of-suit fight scenes in the vain of the suited action (Sakamoto does this often). I think it works better in Sentai than in Rider, because that vibe of ridiculousness and non-realism is more grounded.

Hesei Rider opts for a more realistic take, which is probably why a lot of the battles were very street-fight-like. Still we have had some distinct styles in the past - Imperer with his Muay Thai, Kabuto with his kick-boxing, Meteor with his Jeet Kune Do and Wizard with his Extreme Martial Arts. However, at the same time, because these fighting styles are so defined and less "gritty" than street-fighting, it creates a huge separation between the human character and the armoured form.

Meteor wasn't bad, but there was a huge size-difference between actor and suit actor which was noticeable. For the rest of the characters I mentioned, it is hard to imagine the human character performing these moves (Honestly, I think Kiva is the worst offender but I believe that was intentional). But if I watched say Ryuki fight, I could believe Shinji would actually be fighting like that.

But that isn't to say I don't like this - I prefer distinct martial arts styles. I like seeing Sokichi Narumi pull off some Michael Jackson moves because it's appealing to watch and it is memorable. It's the reason why Ryusei/Meteor is one of my all-time favourite Riders. And to be honest, it's what makes Sentai such a fun show to watch to begin with. The street-fighting starts to get stale (which is why the armed-combat is a lot more flashy and they skip almost right to it).

As for Meteor using Jeet Kune Do, it's probably because he was written as a Martial Arts student, and Bruce Lee is basically a synonym for martial arts.
 
They've definitely gotten better at better matching the actor's movement's with the suit actors and vice versa. I'd say since Kamen Rider W with Terui/Kamen Rider Accel and with Shinkenger on the Sentai side (though one could argue that Gekiranger did a good job at matching the two as well), they've made good efforts to have the transition from out-of-suit action to in-suit action be as smooth as possible. Before this, a lot of the Rider action in the Heisei era consisted of the actor throwing one kick, trying to tackle the monster and failing, then transforming and kicking ass. With Sentai, it was a bit better because since you have to focus on 5-6 actors instead of 1 or 2, its a lot easier to have them pull off a few moves convincingly and not seem like they're skimping on the action.

But with, for example, Gentaro from Fourze, his still out of suit was very scrappy and street-like so it matched with Seiji Takaiwa's work in the Fourze suit (lots of headbutts). Whether its in the movies (like Eiji/Kamen Rider OOOs in Megamax and Ultimatum) or in the show, it depends on the abilities of the actors themselves. And its the job of the suit actor to portray that character as best as possible based on the onscreen image given by the main actors. And I feel like they're doing a better job at matching the two (not to say that the suit actors did a bad job in the past. Far from it, actually. Look at Den-O.) Looking at Gaim, Gaku is very athletic and they are slowly showcasing a bit of that as his fights progress. And the smart thing that they've done in the show is that both in and out of the suit, Kouta as a character is learning the ropes as each situation presents itself. So I predict that by the end of the show, he'll pull off some great fights on both fronts due to progression.

As for Ryusei and his Jeet Kune Do style, when I first saw Meteor fight using the style, while I thought it was awesome, I was very afraid as to how the actor would pull this off. At first, it was just a bunch of shots of the actor posing and screaming while doing a few kicks. But later on in the show, he managed to pull it off convincingly. He especially did the character and style more justice in the movies he appeared in. A lot of it has to do with Koichi Sakamoto's direction. Being an action director at the core, he knew exactly how to portray the style to the abilities of the actor, and maybe even a bit beyond that. Jeet Kune Do is a very tough style seeing as everyone compares it to how Bruce Lee implemented it. And it is very, VERY hard to pull it off like him. So anyone who tries to copy the style just looks unconvincing, especially if they are not trained in the art. So, props to Sakamoto and Ryo Yoshizawa for pulling it off splendidly in the Fourze and team up movies.
 
I'm guessing when Bandai dropped the Meteor Driver in their lap with that funky stanby music and henshin secquence, someone on the writing team had a flashback to the Disco era and was reminded of Bruce Lee movies or something.

I don't think there's any particular thematic reasons for the style, I think they just wanted a style to contrast with Gentaro's delinquent brawler schtick.
 

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