"Saber + Zenkaiger: Super Hero Senki": The "Never-Ending Story" Of Super Sentai And Kamen Rider

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Well, it's sometimes better late than never though I believe it's better never late, right? I'm now reviewing Saber + Zenkaiger Super Hero Senki which was very much last year. Now, I want to give my thoughts on several stuff I'm catching up ever since real life caught up. The movie was due to the fact that Kamen Rider turned 50 years old and Super Sentai had its 45th season. Though, Kiramager was aired on the 45th adversary of Goranger with the monsters-of-the-week serving as tribute to the Masked Monsters. Now, it's time to look at another non-canon movie which seems to throw in elements from The Never Ending Story (which may be an inspiration to Kamen Rider Saber). 

The movie has the tandem writing of Nobuhiro Mouri and Junko Komura. I personally think Komura is hit or miss - she did well in Lupinranger vs. Patranger but I'm not fond of her anniversaries including the most recent one. Zyuohger was more eye candy and was only watchable IMHO because Power Rangers Megaforce really sank worse as eye candy with zero substance. Mouri was in charge of the Saber part. For all the initial flak Saber had - I actually ENJOYED it though it's nowhere near as organized as Kamen Rider Zero-One. Fortunately, Shinichiro Shirakura didn't mess this up since he can also be notorious for messing things up too. 

The plot of the movie seems to loosely follow The Never Ending Story and The Pagemaster. The heroes in Saber open the books and find some books. We also have the villain Asmodeus who is trying to make sure nobody stops his reign of chaos. The heroes find out that they are all characters in the book. This just reminds me of how Akibaranger had the rangers finding out that they were all characters in a TV show. Trying to write such a story takes a lot of effort. I tried to so in one of my deleted slapsticks and failed. Here, the cast of Saber read through various books which were "forbidden". Various heroes make cameos along the way in this movie.

It would be interesting how fiction creates fictionalized versions of DEAD real people. The late Shotaro Ishinomori left us so soon at the age of 60. Too bad that he ended up dead before the Kamen Rider series could be rebooted with Kamen Rider Kuuga. Before that, I heard that he was too disgusted with what could be considered Haim Saban's old shame Masked Rider ahem MASHED RIDER. The 1990s was a time when Kamen Rider didn't have a TV series but only three movies - Kamen Rider ZO, Shin Kamen Rider, and Kamen Rider J. I watched the movies and Shin was just too bizarre. Here, Ishinomori gets fictionalized and meets his own creations. It's almost like the claim that Robert E. Howard imagined Conan coming to life in the behind-the-scenes of the R-18 film Conan the Barbarian from 1992. 

In this movie, Ishinomori's childhood got fictionalized with fantasy elements. It just feels weird for a real person to get fictionalized. Though, I think I should've gotten used to hit such as how the real life Jubei Yagyu was given a fictional version in Samurai Shodown (Samurai Spirits in Japanese) and in Yaiba the Legendary Swordsman. Ishinomori gets a fictionalized treatment presumably as a tribute due to one fact - he was the founder of both series. Though, Goranger and JAKQ weren't included in the list of Super Sentai until 1995 came with Ohranger. I guess Ohranger using shaped visors was an intentional tribute to Goranger aside from the military theme and massacre scene in the introductory episodes.

The final scene is kind of messy but nowhere near as messy as what Super Hero Taisein's first movie gave us. Fortunately, the movie wasn't written by Shoji "Patrick Star" Yonemura. The final scene is one tribute where both Kamen Rider Ichigo and Akaranger appear. The later teams show up and we've got the guest involvement of Kamen Rider Revice. What's weird is also we've got Haim Saban Cake Boss I felt the movie was somewhat rushed and maybe a 2 hour feature would've been better. Though, it seems Toei Ltd. was probably on budget constraints resulting ot the cut.

I felt the film had quite a message. Ishinomori has been long gone yet his name keeps getting plastered. After all, Ishinomori Pro is part of Toei Ltd. I confess that I disliked most of the Showa era Kamen Riders (with the exception of Kamen Rider Black while I enjoy the excessive humor of its failed sequel Black RX). However, Ishinomori's idea was the one that allowed the birth of the Heisei era to the Reiwa era Kamen Riders. I feel like some people are just too stuck up to enjoy anything beyond the Showa era. In my case, I find myself enjoying new school Kamen Rider better than new school Super Sentai. My enthusiasm for this blog has dropped to more levels of low. In fact, I dunno how many more entries before I really drop Super Sentai. Yet, the spirit of Super Sentai seems to go on for a new generation of fans while older fans may step behind eventually.