I've seen both seasons of Saban's Masked Rider. It was like watching an action packed version of "Full House." Anyway, the cut editing was so bad that could could see that Masked Rider was really Japanese...no pun intended. A couple of years later I would be introduced to Kamen Rider, even reading some of Ishinomori's manga works, specifically, the Kamen Rider Spirits manga.
All I have to say is that compared to this series, it was a full 180. Aside from the team up with the Power Rangers, there was nothing redeeming about the show. All the characters were annoying, the villains were stupid, the cut editing was so bad that you can actually see the face Dex's Japanese counterpart, Kotaro Minami, not to mention they were using other Kamen Rider variations, Kamen Rider ZO and Kamen Rider J; and the atmosphere itself is like a TGIF sitcom (Full House, Family Matters, Step by Step, etc). It's with this that I show a lot of animosity towards Saban. I would understand him adapting Super Sentai for Power Rangers because Sentai is usually comedy with a touch of melodrama. But for Kamen Rider, the tone of the story is dark...like in a Batman/Spiderman sort of way, pretty much turning a dark drama into slapstick comedy. If the crew from MST3K watched an episode of this, they would have a field day. It's stuff like this that tarnishes the reputation of tokusatsu; which isn't actually all Power Rangers, that's just one aspect of it. For you Tokusatsu Adapt/American Toku Fans, you're better off watching "Mystic Knights of Tir Ra Nog", "Los Luchadores," "Van-Pires", "Big Wolf on Campus", "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles-The Next Mutation", "Superhuman Samurai Syber Squad," "VR Troopers," or "Beetleborgs" because this show is right down there with "Tatooed Teenage Alien Fighter from Beverly Hills." This atrocity rivals the crimes 4Kids committed towards Ultraman Tiga.
If Disney finds it in their hearts to actually consider their interpretation of Kamen Rider (especially with the new generation riders), they should actually study in great detail of what Kamen Rider is all about instead of just editing Japanese footage onto American TV without any knowledge of its source. Maybe then, there will finally be a live action show that can rival Power Rangers since Beetleborgs, if not more.
