Which Rider Series Would Work Bestn in Amreican Comic Books?

[MattComix]

I'm willing to bet the "nothing bad can happen ever" part is directed towards my post because I was very blunt about my opinion and why I would not want Rider or any other toku heroes run through the ringer of modern comics penchant for grimdark excess and convoluted continuity.

 

[Seigi]

I just think comics are a wonderful storytelling format, and I wish Kamen Rider could be a part of it.

Then you should read Spirits. Awesome while still true to the spirit *no pun intended* of Kamen Rider.

 

[Sage Shinigami]

Re: Thread Topic

The original Showa Riders would do just fine as an American Comic Book. I confess to not being a scholar of comics, but I do know that there's no shortage of Western comic books that are created, published, and eventually finish with no problem. American Comic Books ≠ Superhero Comic Books. Superhero Comics Books ≠ DC and Marvel.

You can create Kamen Rider without the help of DC or Marvel, and I think they'd be just fine. That people almost instantly jumped to such easy shots at DC and Marvel for this though, suggest that I was indeed wrong when I championed the idea that "people can see comics without seeing superheroes".

In so far as the grimdark thing...C'mon Son. I watched Agito. I love it with a passion and I think ALL THREE Riders from that series are some of the greatest Heroes (deserving of a capital "H") ever to be created in any form of creative storytelling...but you CANNOT tell me that show isn't dark. Leaving Ryou's plotline alone...the deaths some of the people suffered at the hands of the Unknown? They were as gruesome as you could possibly get without using blood.

Re: Super-Hero Comics

In hindsight, I kind of wish I hadn't said anything. Not because I feel I was wrong, but because nothing I say will change the mindset of people. Which would be a very damning criticism of comics...if half the people complaining (in general, not merely in this thread) had picked up a comic in the past five or so years.

DC/Marvel superheroes aren't heroes? You're going to have to run that by me again, and you know what, I'm going to need you to be very thorough with the evidence, because I'm probably the one of the most hero-loving people you've met. I'm incapable of rooting for the villain (even when they're not wholly wrong--*cough*Thor movie*cough*), and I have dropped comics, anime, and Toku(!) alike if I don't think the hero's up to snuff. They make mistakes, yeah. They can be jerks too (though not all the time), but at the end of they day they try to do the right thing. I've seen characters in Rider do the same thing and not get as much flak. (Whassup, Tachibana.)

Are you complaining about these universes because bad things happen? Matt, I think you're one of the coolest guys on this forum and one of the few people here I respect (Iga too), but while I think heroes should be heroes, I also think that if the villains are worth anything, bad things HAVE to happen from time to time. (Within reason, and so long as at the end of the day the good guys give the villains a sound smackdown.)


Yes, bad stories are made. (In Toku too. Hey G3 Princess.) And you know what? I get pissed at them too. I'm still pissed at how Johnny Storm died. (Note: How. Not "that".) I'm pissed that the JSA got their butts handed to them by two Johnny-Come-Latelies who had no awesome origin stories to warrant what they were able to do. I get annoyed about a lot of things--it's a collaborative medium and sometimes creators don't get a certain character.

But I'd be lying if I said there weren't a crapload of comics to have come out in the past five years since I got back into comics that I didn't love to death, and for all the problems I have with bad comic stories, I have way more problems with the fact that I can't go anywhere anymore without seeing someone slam comics. Either the criticism comes from some guy who's been reading forever that's angry about some minute detail that was omitted from a recent comic that was in some other comic that came out in the 70's, or from people who get the lion's share of their information from comic book news sites because they don't read comics anymore because of one story that happened back in 2005* pissed them off, or worse just general negative here say from friends of friends who read comics. It's impossible to have a single discussion about even the good comics amidst all this. (Why I rarely post in comic-related threads in AniComix anymore.)

And yes, there's complicated continuity in superheroes comics. But apparently the alternative is Kamen Rider Decade. And while Infinite Crisis made sense to me, I'm STILL lost when I watch that show.

I think I've rambled enough. Apologies for anyone I offended, and possibly for having an opinion. Also, you're right Matt, the Ultimate Universe does suck and is totally full of asshole.

*Yes. Civil War was complete and utter rubbish. So was Identity Crisis. I'm pretending to ignore them and hoping everyone else will too.

 

[Igadevil]

Thanks for posting that.

About the "no bad things" though: The thing about Agito is that while things can get dark, everything feels purposeful. There's a method to the madness, one that I think is critical to making a good hero story: the villains are scary and powerful. As a result, the heroes look strong and heroic, because they're up against a serious threat that nobody can stop but them. Because of this you can get away with going dark places like mass-slaughter or a character committing suicide because it's counterbalanced by everything else and it always fits into the story. It's not unrelentingly grim nor a cotton-candy world without conflict. Agito in the end has a very optimistic view of humanity, despite how much evidence to the contrary it throws at us on the way there.

You can have over-the-top gore, dark themes and ideas and all that, but if you have to make it count for something, unless you're just going for pure exploitation. Rider comics have always had all those, and the best ones are the ones that make it work and not just look gratuitous. Spirits is an incredibly violent story with some of the most messed-up imagery I've ever seen (though I don't know if the translations have gotten that far) but it's great. Because everything feels like it fits, generally.

As for all that and American comics? I dunno, I have nothing to say about that because I don't read a whole lot of them. My only thing is about ongoing vs. limited series. If they made an American Kamen Rider comic tomorrow, I'd pick it up. But I just think that, given how Rider series work and what I enjoy in them, I'd want it to be a finite series. a 12/26-issue retelling of the original that covers the big events? I'm okay with that. You can do another Rider series after that, in the same universe even, but the story of Kamen Rider ________ has to come to a close eventually.

 

[NeonZ]

And yes, there's complicated continuity in superheroes comics. But apparently the alternative is Kamen Rider Decade. And while Infinite Crisis made sense to me, I'm STILL lost when I watch that show.

Wouldn't a better comparison be Countdown & Final Crisis? Heroes hopping through alternate universes, lead in that doesn't match the event, meta resolution... There a lot of strange parallels...

I still enjoyed Final Crisis though. Countdown not so much (Yeah, introduce all these new alternate character, some of them quite cool... just to kill them all for no reason).

I'd say that the confusion regarding Decade's continuity is born due to the staff's conflict regarding if it was in continuity or not. Different staff members seemed to have different ideas about the show.

Most obvious example is Wataru's actor saying that his character was the same from Kiva, only older, while producer Shirakura said that it was just a narrator/meta character and that, internally, they didn't even call him "Wataru Kurenai" - which doesn't line up at all with the explanation given by Wataru's actor, not only regarding the nature of the character iself, but that supposed backstage tidbit. If he wasn't even called Wataru Kurenai internally, his actor wouldn't be told that it was the same character.

Because of this you can get away with going dark places like mass-slaughter or a character committing suicide because it's counterbalanced by everything else and it always fits into the story. It's not unrelentingly grim nor a cotton-candy world without conflict. Agito in the end has a very optimistic view of humanity, despite how much evidence to the contrary it throws at us on the way there.

See, that's a problem that seems to have happened a lot to DC in recent years.Often there are comic books meant to launch new series which just end in a disaster or death and... that's it. The heroes aren't shown to be any more heroic for rising above the occasion, they just kind of fall by the wayside.

Marvel (generally) uses that for a lead in for an event which will resolve the story, but DC tries to launch continues series from that sort of thing, and it just goes nowhere. The closest thing in toku was the cliff hanger ending from tv series Decade, I guess, but even that was not nearly to the same extent that comic books go with these stunts.

 

[Aoi Kurenai]

And yes, there's complicated continuity in superheroes comics. But apparently the alternative is Kamen Rider Decade. And while Infinite Crisis made sense to me, I'm STILL lost when I watch that show.

What about stuff like the Ultraman Shouwaverse? Or the Tomica Hero shows? (heck, those tie into Ryukendo) Or the Metal Hero Rescue Police? Decade is just one bad example of continuity.

 

[Sage Shinigami]

Thanks for posting that.

About the "no bad things" though: The thing about Agito is that while things can get dark, everything feels purposeful. There's a method to the madness, one that I think is critical to making a good hero story: the villains are scary and powerful. As a result, the heroes look strong and heroic, because they're up against a serious threat that nobody can stop but them. Because of this you can get away with going dark places like mass-slaughter or a character committing suicide because it's counterbalanced by everything else and it always fits into the story. It's not unrelentingly grim nor a cotton-candy world without conflict. Agito in the end has a very optimistic view of humanity, despite how much evidence to the contrary it throws at us on the way there.

You can have over-the-top gore, dark themes and ideas and all that, but if you have to make it count for something, unless you're just going for pure exploitation. Rider comics have always had all those, and the best ones are the ones that make it work and not just look gratuitous. Spirits is an incredibly violent story with some of the most messed-up imagery I've ever seen (though I don't know if the translations have gotten that far) but it's great. Because everything feels like it fits, generally.

As for all that and American comics? I dunno, I have nothing to say about that because I don't read a whole lot of them. My only thing is about ongoing vs. limited series. If they made an American Kamen Rider comic tomorrow, I'd pick it up. But I just think that, given how Rider series work and what I enjoy in them, I'd want it to be a finite series. a 12/26-issue retelling of the original that covers the big events? I'm okay with that. You can do another Rider series after that, in the same universe even, but the story of Kamen Rider ________ has to come to a close eventually.

It would be a finite series anyway. Doctor Who has an American comic book but it never runs longer than 4-6 months. Plus Kamen Rider as a comic would end up like Spirits anyway. (In concept, though probably not execution.)

Wouldn't a better comparison be Countdown & Final Crisis? Heroes hopping through alternate universes, lead in that doesn't match the event, meta resolution... There a lot of strange parallels...

For the record, I didn't hate the lion's share of Countdown. There was a lot of fun bits mixed in, with most of the garbage coming near the last 12 issues. But even that "became" Final Crisis, which was a good story. If Decade had lead into some other Kamen Rider series that was on that level, I wouldn't have nearly the complaints about it I do, though.

See, that's a problem that seems to have happened a lot to DC in recent years.Often there are comic books meant to launch new series which just end in a disaster or death and... that's it. The heroes aren't shown to be any more heroic for rising above the occasion, they just kind of fall by the wayside.

Marvel (generally) uses that for a lead in for an event which will resolve the story, but DC tries to launch continues series from that sort of thing, and it just goes nowhere. The closest thing in toku was the cliff hanger ending from tv series Decade, I guess, but even that was not nearly to the same extent that comic books go with these stunts.

There's some truth to this, though more in the second paragraph than the first. I happened to think the DC heroes looked pretty impressive after sending death packing in Blackest Night.

What about stuff like the Ultraman Shouwaverse? Or the Tomica Hero shows? (heck, those tie into Ryukendo) Or the Metal Hero Rescue Police? Decade is just one bad example of continuity.

Yes, but we're talking about Kamen Rider. And Decade is a lot like COIE really (before that continuity wasn't as huge of a deal as it is now), except...y'know...COIE was pretty good.

 

[NeonZ]

There's some truth to this, though more in the second paragraph than the first. I happened to think the DC heroes looked pretty impressive after sending death packing in Blackest Night.

I'm not talking about events lead up. Those have gotten cliche by this point, but the stories have a clear resolution that justifies the build up. I was talking about stunts like the failed launch of the current Justice League (line up, not the current numeration) and the current "Titans" series. Both launched with some disaster the heroes were unable to avert and... that's it. There was no pay off at all. The heroes just came out of them looking bad and never recovered.

 

[MattComix]

@Sage Shinigami. Let me clarify something if I may.

Part of why it can at times be really difficult to discuss haivng an objection to excessive grimdark in American comics with other fans is because of reactions like "oh so nothing bad can ever happen" or "you just want the Silver Age back" and so on, yaddaydda. That's not really what I and I think most anybody else that expresses being just so totally fed up with grimdark is really talking about. This idea that we're somehow objecting to drama is basically dismissive. That may not have been your intention with your post, I'm just saying in general.

Some of my favorite toku hero stories have some greater or lesser degree of dark element to them. If I objected to any kind of darkness at all how the hell could I love Kuuga or Black? In a superhero story you can have darkness to create a mood or heighten the sense of danger but it doesn't need to be turned into a horror movie with capes or require the supporting cast getting slaughtered. Darkness can work and is something I enjoy though it doesn't need to be a pre-requsite for the genre or for every hero.

When I say grimdark, something like Agito is not what I'm talking about. That is not grimdark. The very term is meant to indicate a high and utterly stupid level of excess, not to denounce there ever being a dark element in a superhero story at all.

 

[FieryRed]

I think Kamen Rider Accel would be great in American comic books. He's not only cool, but he has special abilities (such as transforming into a motorcycle) that American comic readers would appreciate. Americans love fast cars, and I think Accel is the hero that they can identify with right away.