I was personally drawn to Kamen Rider when live-action superhero movies were really taking off. I love superheroes, I love big action, and here was a tv show that had wacky adventures and two fisted fighting every week. I started with Kamen Rider Double and Fourze. In Kamen Rider Double the protagonists are two detectives who make one superhero. Fourze is a high school student who decides being a superhero is the best way to befriend the entire universe. I made my way from there.

Fourze was actually created in the wake of the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami specifically to make children smile. There was also a twitter set up and run by different actors in character with the objective of giving children hope. ( translations of twitter and the twitter itself)

That’s why I love Kamen Rider. It’s not ashamed to be a superhero show. You can watch people fight a giant enemy crab with the power of rock’n’roll, or race against time to save their loved ones as the world comes crashing down around them. Many superhero movies in the West are determined to be taken seriously as austere works for serious people, and suck all the joy out of flying around the planet at hypersonic speeds.

“Who pumps the Batmobile’s tires?” “I can’t answer that, I’m fighting an Incan blood god!”

I remember watching Man of Steel and being blown away by how boring they managed to make a fight between two godlike beings with super-strength, super-speed, super-senses, freeze breath, and heat and x-ray vision. Rather than showcase the different abilities of both combatants, it was instead “throw him into a building. Now throw him again.” Rider largely avoids that.

Rumours abound of another attempt to bring it to the West, apparently called Power Rider, but there has been no additional information besides a copyright notice. TOEI recently announced plans to bring the original Japanese series to the West, apparently it will be aired on cable with subtitles but details are thin on the ground. Kamen Rider V3 has already been released on DVD in the States, but expect to pay a very pretty penny for them. There are also numerous fansubs on youtube.