Tokusatsu Review: Kamen Rider Heisei Generations Part 2: Five Player Co-op action!

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Wow guys, just look at those bad-ass Beetleborgs

 Now for those of you who came in late here's the link to the first part of this review.

http://ondavidsbrain.blogspot.com/2017/07/tokusatsu-review-kamen-rider-heisei.html

Caught up? Good moving on, after the Pac-Man fever was cured a very familiar man with a certain ring observes the city and starts to form a plan. As for our villains Zaizen learns firsthand that just like Jack from BioShock maybe rewriting your DNA on a whim isn't exactly the smartest idea in the world. Yet instead of turning into something out of a David Cronenberg movie he says he got exactly what he was looking for. Have to admit though, first time Plasmid's a real kick from a mule, but there's nothing like a fist full of lightning an't it? Back at CR both Alan and Makoto are in recovery while Kagami's barely holding on himself from the slugfest to the point where Taiga offers to take over while he gets some rest.

 Takeru's still suffering from Hatena's virus and Emu's gone straight into the self-doubt cycle. Poppy tries to shake him out of it but to no avail while Kiriya asks her why Emu can become Ex-Aid if he didn't undergo the compatibility surgery, but we'll answer that later. Back at Zaizen's base Shinnosuke and the Police have the place surrounded, but before Zoolander can unleash the full power of Magnum on them Haruto uses his magic to sweep the cops away into the Corn-fields. Zaizen tells the captive Tougo that he'll be their first test subject for their grand experiment, to become the Ultimate Life FOR FUCKS SAKE THIS AGAIN!? Yep our main bad guy for this movie is yet another Dr Moreau type asshole who wants to "perfect humanity through evolution" by screwing around with DNA.

So he wants to turn humanity into Edgelord versions of Iron Man? Somewhere Charles Darwin is trying to eat his own beard, maybe Takeru could check and see; he does still have his Eyecon as far as I know.

 But Iron Man needs War Machine so he gets to work on converting Tougo into another monster like him when Zoolander and Haruto come in and Haruto offers to join their little Science club from hell. But when Zoolander tries to object Haruto points out that he got rid of the cops with no problem and Mr "Can't turn left" over there wasn't up for the job, and Crimson Dynamo says, "sure the more the merrier" and accepts. Back in CR Takeru gets a call from Shinnosuke who tells him the location of Zaizen's hideout which sends him up and running after finding out he and Akari have only 8 hours left before the Virus kills them, and in Takeru's case again. After one of Takeru's speeches Emu manages to crawl out of his self-doubt cycle and tells him he's not doing this crazy shit on his own and suits up while the other prominent players make their own preparations.

 Emu and Takeru make it to the hideout and Haruto lets them right on in as part of his plan, after confirming that he's Kamen Rider Wizard of course since these two never met Haruto, nor did Shinnosuke so he couldn't tell them he was on the up and up. The three Riders crash the party and Hatena sends some Foot Solder Bugsters to back the Models up. While showing of more of Sakamoto's awesome fight choreography Shinnouske shows up to help out the Riders.

 Shinnouske recognizes Mongo as the one who pulled that Ice T and starts seeing red. Yet not even Shinnosuke's best "I am a Man" punch can even tickle him, also free tip, don't bother shooting him it'll just make him mad. The four Riders are cornered by Zaizen and his goons when all of a sudden we get a good old fashioned case of Deus Ex Fructus as Fruit Jesus himself Kamen Rider Gaim literally crashes the party. And he managed to bring Krim along because he's Fruit Jesus LOL, in any case Shinnosuke can transform now so great we have five Kamen Riders against five evil nut jobs. So both sides do their respective transformations and the fight is on. Wizard gets to humiliate Zoolander again, Drive settles the score with Mongo, Ghost and Ex-Aid take on Hatena and Dynamo respectively which just leaves Gaim to take care of Valentina.

 While Drive, Wizard and Gaim finish up their fights with little to no trouble once they used their final forms that doesn't work out well for Ghost as all of his forms are completely useless against Hatena. (But then again Mugen sucks out loud so no surprise there.) But before Hatena can put Takeru down again the movie pulls a Gosei and gives Takeru A BRAND NEW POWER UP RIGHT OUT OF FUCKING NOWHERE!!! Noubunaga drags Takeru inside of his Eyecon and tells him that he, Hideyoshi and Ieyasu have decided to fuse together, because of reasons.

Thus creating another Movie Exclusive form for Ghost, Tenkatoitsu Damashii.

 But you must be thinking, "wait this Bugster was able to overpower Ghost's Final form there's no way this brand new form could do the job that his most powerful form failed to do right?" Well if you are asking that then you must be new to Tokusatsu so in case you are, whenever they introduce a new form, it's an automatic win condition for that fight logic be damned. So with this brand new, untested and undoubtedly weaker new form, Ghost kills Hatena in no time flat, thanks Yogurt! Ghost then goes after Crimson Dynamo and accidentally reads his memories revealing that he was the one who extracted the original Bugster virus from Emu 6 years before. During Dynamo's unholy beat down of Emu he gets an idea, to give him a taste of the same hell he and his minions experienced, so he inserts the Proto Mighty Action X Gashat into Emu's Gamer Driver along with his normal Mighty Action X Gashat to make him OD on the Bugster Virus and send him to the Game World.

 But that's where Dynamo made his mistake, since Emu is Patient Zero and his Bugster (Parado) is still around he's still infected with the original strain. So all that did was give Emu a home-brew, bootleg esq version of the Mighty Brothers XX Gashat (in other words a temporary preview of his then upcoming form) so he transforms into Ex-Aid Double Action Gamer Level XX and he and Ghost finish of Hatena and Dynamo for good. So we begin to warp things up with Takeru and Akari's Game Syndrome being cured, Tougo being saved, the Riders congratulate each other on a job well done, Takeru dies for what was it the 6th time now?

 But as expected he pulls through, (yet doesn't lose any braincells despite his body dying so once again science can go suck on a railroad spike) and everyone's happy. So the movie truly ends with Kuroto and Parado gloating how their plans are coming closer to fruition thanks to the information they got from observing Zaizen's activities, not the least of which being that Kuroto finished two new Gashats. The first is Pac-Adventures, the second is a new game for Parado, Perfect Puzzle one half of the Gashat that makes up Kamen Rider Paradox.

 So that was Kamen Rider Heisei Generations and despite some bumps in the road this was a pretty good movie. Like a lot of the really good tie-in movies the events of this story actually are followed up on in the main show but that's not what makes a movie good (though it is a nice touch) nope the characters are on point, don't contradict their portrayals from the main show and some even show their lives have developed once they've hung up their belts. We see Takeru going to High School and move on with his life, Shinnosuke working for his wife and new baby and Haruto, continue to be one of the most boring Kamen Riders in recent history by having yet another plain sugar donut. You notice that I didn't mention Gaim but that's because we didn't see Kouta (mostly due to his actor Gaku Sano not being able to make it to filming so they had to use stock voice clips of him, wait they really couldn't just get him into a booth to churn out some new lines?)

 Though there were some flaws, Zaizen's plan was stock and generic in this genre though the execution of it was competent, unorthodox but competent. The three goons he had were physically strong but had rather stock personalities, hell we never heard their names spoken out loud though out the movie. Also yes we saw their names on Shinnosuke's files on them but they still didn't hear them so I don't care. Oh and also Takeru still sucks like a vacuum cleaner, his supposed final form wasn't enough to defeat the Hatena Bugster but an Eyecon composed of three spirits was enough to do the job even though Grateful couldn't scratch him?

 Also if Chiaotzu gets a free Sundae when he died 3 times what does Takeru get when he dies 6 times? But aside from that the writing was competent and even the Pac-Man CGI was pretty damn good, like I said far better then that blight of an Adam Sandler movie since he actually looks like Pac-Man in this movie. So overall even if you aren't watching Kamen Rider Ex-Aid I'd still give this movie a watch just to see some shenanigans and really good fight choreography. Now what to do next time? Oh wait, next Monday is the 21st? My friends we will begin an expedition to the world of one of my all time favorite video games with a Lets Play in honor of its 10th anniversary.

Would you kindly watch my full Lets Play?

Special thanks to my Patreon backer Jesse for his support.

Kamen Rider is owned by Ishinomori Productions, Toei Productions, and Bandai.
Blazing Saddles is owned by Mel Brooks and Warner Bros.
Family Guy is owned by Seth Mcfarline, 20th century fox television, Fuzzy door Productions and Fox Television animation. 
Bioshock is owned by 2K Boston, 2K Australia, Take-Two Interactive, Ken Levine, Alyssa Finley and 2K Games.