Yoohoo~!

Okay. I think I have a lot of err... backdated updating to do. Did that sound like an oxymoron to anyone...? "Backdated updating".. huh.

I haven't properly blogged since before I left for Japan in May!

But for now, just to let off some pent-up energy (I'm caffeinated and slightly twitchy :D), let me introduce you to my newest obsession: Kamen Rider W! (Also known/ read as "Kamen Rider Double")

Okay, technically, this was the 2009 Kamen Rider series; it was airing alongside the second half of Shinkenger, after Kamen Rider Decade finished its run. Except... I was only interested in Shinkenger then, and I wasn't particularly drawn to Decade. Inoue Masahiro might have done a far too good job portraying the standoffish protagonist. :p

So I kinda paid no attention to W (Double) as well.

So how the heck have I come around to it only now?

Well, sometime last month, I stumbled across some clips on YouTube; Peacemaker Kurogane actually had a stage play! And, playing Okita Souji - Hamao Kyousuke!

He does a really good job of it too; he generally does good interpretations of characters he plays, really rising to the occasion when he's acting, so it's really funny that in real life, he's just kind of... blur. LOL. But it's somewhat lovable. Haha.

And then, that reminded me of Goseiger (the Sentai series which replaced Shinkenger after it ended), which Hamao acted in, and which I never finished watching... So I thought maybe I'd go finish watching it.

I had the long weekend to burn, after all... Hari Raya holiday on Sunday meant PH-in-lieu on Monday, and then I took Tuesday off. Wahaha.

Now, the thing is, Sentai and Kamen Rider series always air back-to-back, in a one-hour slot, and there's usually a very brief teaser for both shows at the beginning of the hour, showing snippets of that week's episodes and what to expect. Sentai usually runs first in this hourly slot, so in all my Goseiger (and some Shinkenger downloads), there're teasers of the W episodes that aired alongside Goseiger.

And they sounded quite interesting, so I got... tempted. Into watching W. And now I'm just... hooked. Haha.

First thing that drew me in: I'm not a particularly big Kamen Rider fan (apart from watching Masked Rider when I was er... much younger), but I don't think there've been many (or any) Kamen Rider series where the Rider is made up of two people.

Which is why Kamen Rider W (Double) is named the way it is; this series' Rider requires two people to transform to "make" the Rider, and when transformed, there're basically two minds in one body - Hidari (which literally means "left" in Japanese) Shoutarou is the Rider's left side, and Philip - this younger boy who doesn't seem to have much in the way of a personal history - is the right.

Oh, the myriad ways in which this means that things can go wrong... after all, as Philip says, "The two of us are a single detective." I'm sure that means that if either of them were incapacitated somehow, neither would be able to transform. Interesting. XD

During the non-serious and "daily-life" moments of the series so far (I'm only up to episode 14 at the moment), I love the comic timing, and the way that Kiriyama Renn (Shoutarou) and Suda Masaki (Philip) portray their characters just makes the series so FUN. :D

And okay, one of the things I love best so far is really Philip's character.

He reminds me a little of Sheldon from Big Bang Theory; they both don't really care much for other people (apart from a very select few), and are quite absorbed in books and knowledge and research. But although Sheldon is still extremely entertaining in all his intellectual snobbery, Philip, by comparison...

.... is fucking awesome. :D

Sheldon is an eccentric know-it-all, but Philip *could* actually technically know *everything* as long as he wanted to and had the time to look it up.

Because Philip seems to have been born with an ability to access the Earth's memories; which looks a bit like him appearing in a bright white, non-space, filled with thousands upon thousands of bookshelves full of books. I suppose there's a reason why he calls it the "Planetary Bookshelf".
It's also a bit like how I imagine my dream library to be, except with actual walls, made of dark wood, with soft carpets and sofas and muted yellow lighting. XD

At his whim, and using keywords, he looks through all this to find information he needs, and the bookshelves and books basically shuffle around him and disappear if they are deemed redundant in any "search".





I think the above two gifs are from someone's Tumblr... Pretty much the visual representation of Philip's brain doing a Google search.

And the bulldog clips in his hair. Adorkable. Haha. :D

And the opening song! "W-B-X", which stands for "W-Boiled Extreme". Yeah, "Double-Boiled Extreme" sounds kinda silly, but it's a reference to the show. Shoutarou actually runs a private investigation agency, with Philip's help, and likes to think of himself as a real man's man, a "hard-boiled detective". Philip and Akiko (one of the side characters) just think he's "half-boiled" instead. Which gets his goat everytime. XD

Love how it starts with the muted trumpet, giving it a sound that's reminiscent of black-and-white detective films, and I love the way Kamiki Aya and Takuya voices overlay each other in the chorus.


In particular, I like these lines in the chorus:
"W-B-X
2人のBody＆Soul ひとつに (他に無いさOnlyつまり相乗り)
W-B-X
最高のパートナー 出逢う時 奇跡おこる (So we can make it)"

"W-B-X
The bodies and souls of two become one (I will ride with only you and no other)
W-B-X
When I meet the best partner, a miracle will happen (So we can make it)"