Dead Fish Fansubs, who has subs random episodes of various Japanese TV shows once, subbed the first episode of Kamen Rider Stronger, the fifth series in the entire franchise. Since I had time to download it, I decided to download it, and so, here is the review of first episode.
The series kicks off in Mikawa Gulf in which a girl is talking about the latest features of this new boat that they are riding. Nothing interesting is happening until, Black Satan; an organization that, like the previous one is bent to destroy the world just seajacked the boat. After doing some warnings to the passengers, one Black Satan foot soldier reposted that they are being followed.
The monster, Gangar ordered one of the foot soldiers to activate the Interloper, I device that its functions will be learned later. While he is going to activate the device, the girl who is lecturing about the boat attacked him. She is starting to get interesting.
The boat landed on shore and they saw the bike of the one chasing them. The foot soldiers are now looking for the man. They foot soldiers heard a whistle and they asked, “Who is he?” The man replied, “Last name Jo, first name, Shigeru.”
He was then ordered to get down because he knows Black Satan. Wrong move, Shigeru just single handedly defeats the three foot soldiers! Back at the boat, we are introduced to Electro Wave Human Tackle, a free warrior who is fighting against Black Satan. She then attacks the monster but the monster escapes. Tackle looks for the monster but there is no sign of him. Shigeru arrives talks to Tackle about what happened and lectured Tackle about getting hasty in transforming.
Shigeru wonders why Black Satan wanted the craft and Shigeru noticed might be their clue, a matchbox coming from a hotel. So, Shigeru goes first, causing Tackle to get pissed. Aw, so sweet!
Anyways, Shigeru arrives at the hotel and bumps on someone who will later have a major role in the series. After the man leaved, he bumps into one Black Satan foot soldier, which led us to discover that he is a member of Black Satan and his true form is a Cyclops. He’s name in the organization is Master Titan. He then carried a flowerpot and ordered his foot soldiers to keep an eye on Tackle.
That flowerpot will be seen again on Tackle’s room in which we saw her wearing gloves. After Tackle wore her leather jacket, the flower started to emit a mysterious fume that caused Tackle to get drowsy. Meanwhile, Shigeru is waiting in the lobby for Yuriko, Tackle’s true name. He is waiting for five minutes for her. Therefore, Shigeru decides to leave the girl (jerk) and saw a truck loading the same flowers from Yuriko’s hotel room. Shigeru noticed that he looked familiar but ignores it, checks his watch. Its over a minute after the last time he check his watch.
Back at Yuriko’s room, the flower continues to emit the said fume causing Yuriko’s head to get hurt and was later abducted by a Black Satan foot soldier. Before the foot soldier escapes, Shigeru arrives at the scene of the crime, confronting the two… and was partly pissed that the two never remembered his name, causing Shigeru to give a proper example on how to call him, its either Mr. Jo or Shigeru-san, either of the two would work for him… and starts kicking the foot soldiers’ ass!
Yuriko woke up and saw Shigeru fighting the two foot soldiers. The two escaped and met up with Gangar and the others. The two reported to their boss what happened. After the two finished talking, we saw a jacket flew towards them. They heard a whistling, its Shigeru… or so they thought. They saw a man who looks like a Japanese rhinoceros beetle, with an S on his chest and emits sparks in his body.
Gangar orders to introduce himself, he replied, “The heavens call, the Earth calls, and the people call… they call me to defeat evil! I am the warrior of justice!” Gangar doesn’t understand what he is trying to say.
Okaay. To begin with, that’s what you call a one-liner. A line you will first say before kicking someone’s ass. In short, he will beat you up. Since it is clear, to everyone to those who don’t understand what “Superman” is trying to say, let’s continue.
The mysterious warrior started fighting the foot soldiers and saw sparks coming out from his body as he chops his enemies. He now then reveals his name; his name is Kamen Rider Stronger. After some short exchanges, he fights the foot soldiers, later, Gangar. But before Stronger was able to finish him, he escapes… but he was followed by Stronger. The two continued fighting. Seeing that his champion will be defeated anytime soon, Master Titan calls for more backup to assist Gangar.
Therefore, a group of foot soldiers riding a motorcycle appears. Stronger rode in his bike and cool motorcycle stunts ensues. After all foot soldiers were defeated, its time for the boss to step up. He was ordered by Master Titan to decorate the hotel’s interior with flowers for their mission. Remember that flower earlier? Yep. They will use that flower. Master Titan then exclaims to himself that Stronger is familiar… very familiar.
We are now brought in a greenhouse. Yuriko was inside the greenhouse and confronted the man who is taking care of the flowers. We then learned that the flower that we saw earlier has poison and it emits toxic pollen in the air. Aside from that, Yuriko points out that Black Satan’s Machinemen can turn into humans.
Now that she reveals his secret, he transforms into Gangar and after evading an attack, Yuriko transforms into Tackle! The foot soldiers arrived, and Tackle started fighting them. After clearing all foot soldiers, she fights Gangar and was defeated. He ordered that she will be hanged in the Satan Dome.
Hanged, Gangar explains their plan. The flowers they cultivate will be send to flower shops around town (Hence, the boat and the truck), once they distribute the flowers, the customer might inhale the pollen and die. Simple, yes, foolproof, yes, that my friends, is chemical warfare back in the 70’s! After learning the whole plan, she reacts about the plan and calls for Shigeru.
Shigeru arrives, pissed and spots Yuriko hanging… and starts acting like a jerk… again. Gangar is about to attack Shigeru and Shigeru decided to call for timeout and explained that he will not win in this form. Pfft. Overconfident. He removes his gloves, revealing an electric coil-like design in his hands, does his henshin pose and becomes Kamen Rider Stronger!
He first saved Yuriko, then fight Gangar… after making his speech and beat the foot soldiers. As they fight, we learned that Gangar likes to spring his body to create a stronger attack. Because of the invisible yet strong attacks Stronger received, he used his Rider Video Signal, one of his abilities to counter him. It turned out that the lower half of his body has a quick release spring on it! Learning the secret, he attacks Gangar and finally, finishing it with his Rider Kick that ended the guy. At the end of the episode, Yuriko is chasing Shigeru with her own bike at the beach.
On to the review, unlike most Kamen Rider series back then, the first episode never explained their origins. That said approach was good, giving us viewers something to expect in the next episode.
Now to the first impressions on Yuriko and Shigeru, Yuriko is the prototype for the female Kamen Rider. She fights like a Rider and not those girls coming from Super Sentai. Even if she fights like a Rider, she still has this feminine charm in her, making her unique in the series.
For Shigeru, I knew about him in the Rider 1-RX TV Special and the Kamen Rider Spirits manga. In the manga, he was someone who is over confident, thinks he is a hotshot and a regular jerk… and it fits in the series! He is like the prototype for Kamen Rider Kabuto’s Souji Tendou except he doesn’t cook and doesn’t quote from his grandma. However, aside that both characters are jerks, and have the same bug motif, they also have a hobby of saying something before fighting. Shigeru is one person I expect to have the most character development considering that he thinks of himself highly. Heck, he even wears a shirt with Stronger’s logo on it!
One thing that I liked between the two of them is that they were rivals and at the same time, friends. That’s one of the things that I liked between the two. Its like they are over best friends but they are not lovers. They have mutual feelings to each other but that’s it. Hope they would develop the relationship between the two in the next episodes.
As for the Stronger suit, I find it awesome and weird at the same time. Seeing Stronger raise his hand made him look like he doesn’t have a neck. The armor looked like he is playing American football. Hope they will explain in his origins why he looks like an American football player. As for the Tackle suit, it looks simple yet at the same time, striking. The suit never made her look like a Sentai female warrior, but more of a female warrior. It is great that we would see her mouth, it gives this certain feminine touch in it.
About him being an electric Rider, it was cool. Seriously, him chopping his enemies with sparks coming out is cool! Also, it seems in the opening theme that Stronger can be an electromagnet, cool.
For the entire first episode, it was good. Like I said, it had a different way of introducing us to the characters. The only think that I hated about the episode is that I never felt certain uniqueness in Black Satan... aside that the name of the organization sounds like a name of a death metal band. I think I will just wait for the other episodes to be subbed to see if Black Satan has something more in store for us.
Overall, the first episode of Kamen Rider Stronger had a different way of kicking off the entire series. Aside that it left the traditional origin story then monster of the week thing, it had a different way of introducing to us the entire cast. Can’t wait for the other episodes to be subbed!