Walking the path of Heaven, the man who will rule everything.
The 2006-2007 series of Kamen Rider and the seventh installment in the Heisei Era. Also notable for being the 35th anniversary series of the Kamen Rider franchise.In 1999, a meteor fell to Earth and obliterated the Shibuya district of Tokyo. Along with the destruction the meteor brought something far more dangerous: the Worm, an insectoid race of aliens with the ability to perfectly mimic the appearance and memories of a human. Seven years later, the Worm have infiltrated society and are slowly killing off the human race, replacing them with their own.Earth's only defence lies in the secret organization ZECT, who are losing ground against the evolved Worm and their Clock Up ability. To counter this, ZECT develops the Masked Rider System and Kabuto Zecter weapons, which new recruit Arata Kagami is eager to try out.Enter Souji Tendou: genius chef, philosopher, loving brother, martial arts expert and all-round Ace at everything he does (also, kind of a dick). During a Worm attack, Kagami calls out for the Kabuto Zecter but instead it goes to Tendou, who proclaims that he is The Chosen One and uses it to transform into Kamen Rider Kabuto.This series can also, at times, get really depressing, hence its own Tear Jerker page.Main characters include:
Note: This article uses Japanese name order (surname followed by given name) throughout.
This series includes examples of:
Actor Allusion - Shiro Kanzaki's actor, Kikuchi Kenzaburo, has a cameo as a Zectrooper and the Worm mimicking him - before promptly impaling him the same way Kamen Rider Odin was once.
And Kikuchi Mika (no relation) appears in an outfit similar to one she wore on Tokusou Sentai Dekaranger.
Boring Invincible Hero - The main problem with Tendo. Hell, it got so bad that the show had to introduce an Evil Twin because no-one else could come close to being a Worthy Opponent. Even then, the twin only lasted two episodes before Tendou overtook him and proceeded to curb-stomp him into the ground. And the show makes it clear that the only reason Tendou had trouble in the first place against the twin was because he was going through a Heroic BSOD.
But Not Too Foreign - While Hiro Mizushima merely grew up overseas, the show hangs a lampshade on this trope by casting a clearly mixed-parentage boy as young Souji Tendou in flashbacks. They do resemble each oher to a degree.
Cameo - Kikawada Masaya, who plays Hongo Takeshi/Rider-1 in Kamen Rider THE FIRST, briefly appears in-character to call Tendou a weird guy. Epileptic Trees, away!
Kagami sort of gets one in the Hyper Battle Video: "The man who washes his face in front of a mirror every day."
Although not a Meaningful Name, Hiyori tends to say any variation of "Why me?"
Charles Atlas Superpower - Tendo has actually been training his whole life to use the Kabuto Zecter, and is shown dealing with an armed mugger while not messing up the tofu in his hand in the first episode, well before obtaining said Zecter. The fact that all his training gets ignored in future episodes while his latent ability isn't led to a fair bit of Memetic Mutation.
Cheshire Cat Grin - You know the world's in trouble when Souji Kusakabe (aka Dark Kabuto) does this upon entering Earth in Episode 42. Who knew such an innocent-looking smile could be so terrifying?
The Chosen One - Each Zecter chooses their own host. At least until the Natives show up and Tendou proves that you can buy control of a Zecter.
Cross Over - After show segments sometimes feature the characters crossed over with settings or the characters from GoGo Sentai Boukenger.
Divergent Character Evolution - Tsurugi Kamishiro, who began as a one-dimensional rich jerk who was only there to act as yet anotherrival to Tendou and fill out the show's Rider quota. After Tendou was finished proving his superiority and moved on, Tsurugi developed the most delightfully quirky personality as he sought to regain his lost wealth and learn about the ways of the common people with his best friend Ka-GA-mi.
Elite Mooks - Shadow, the elite Zectrooper platoon.
Empathic Weapon - The Zecters, who choose their masters based on their own personality quirks.
Engrish - Lampshaded by Tsurugi Kamishiro, a native Japanese speaker who takes mundane Japanese words and, believing them to be exotic and foreign, mangles them something fierce. (e.g. Ramen becomes the exotic French dish "La Men".)
HyperKabuto: Hyper Kick, several with the Perfect Zecter but most noteworthy are Maximum
Hyper Typhoon and Maximum Hyper Cyclone
TheBee: Rider Sting
Drake: Rider Shooting
Sasword: Rider Slash
Gatack: Rider Kick, Rider Cutting
HyperGatack: Hyper Kick
KickHopper: Rider Kick
PunchHopper: Rider Punch
Caucasus: Rider Kick
Hercus: Rider Beat (Avalanche Break)
Ketaros: Rider Beat (Avalanche Slash)
Forgotten Phlebotinum: Clock Up during the last ten-ish episodes. It was much worse than simply letting it go unused - you had a major baddie clobbering Riders via Flash Step and lesser ones speeding away as the Riders watched helplessly on a regular basis, as if all the Rider suits weren't designed to combat just that.
Gambit Pileup - ZECT, the Worms, the Natives and Tendou are all spinning their own series-long Xanatos Roulettes at once.
A God Am I: Tendo has one of the biggest God Complexes in all of media history. He never loses a fight, is perfect at everything he does, and the entire story seems intent on fueling that complex (For example, the Kabuto Zecter goes to him instead of Kagami as was planned, he gets the Hyper Zecter from a future version of himself, and the Perfect Zecter lets him steal Zecters from other people even while they're transformed). Heck, just look at his catchphrase! What he is essentially saying is "I will become God!"
Good Is Dumb - As a rule, the nicer you are the less privvy you are to secret information and the greater you get manipulated by the various Xanatos Roulette spinners.
Good Job Breaking It Hero: Towards the end of episode 7, Tendou tells Yagumura about the escaped Worm he was fighting. Yagumura believes he's trying to trick him and fights him in the opening of episode 8. When he later receives a call from his superior, he finds out Tendou wasn't trying to trick him, and it ended up resulted in a death of a smoking man in white clothes eariler.
Gratuitous English - The "Masked Rider System" (which is called that, even in Japanese, rather than "Kamen Rider System"), Kamen Rider "TheBee", ALL ZECTER COMBINE.
Cast Off henshin is usually accompanied by a voice speaking an English phrase to the effect of "Change (insect)."
To say nothing of Tsurugi, along with the occasional Gratuitous French, Italian, and Chinese.
The movie, God Speed Love, contains a good bit in the second half. Two characters speak a few complete sentences in English, and just about everything the computer says is in English.
Informed Ability - Remember when Gatack was introduced, they called him "the strongest Rider"? HA!
Although, in the final battle of the show, that title is justified at least partially... Gattack's Double Caliburs cut the worm that Hyper Kabuto's Perfect Zecter failed to damage, allowing them to win with a Double Rider Kick.
Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Around halfway, or even earlier if you look hard enough, Tendou begins to show more signs that he actually cares about those around him despite his attitude. Most notible throughout the entire series with Juuka and eventually with Hiyori, more obvious when you find out she's Tendou's "sister." Kagami might be one, too. To some degree.
Kaitou - the Sasword debut arc involves Tadokoro's team creating their own Phantom Thief, 'Shadow', to lure out a Worm that targeted criminals.
Kudzu Plot - Kabuto has more loose ends than a kitten-infested yarn ball factory.
It's heavily implied that Gon's memory problems are due to PTSD rather than amnesia. (Which, actually, is relatively accurate - memories blocked due to stress work a lot more like TV-brand amnesia than the actual amnesia condition.)
Mamiya Rena aka Uca Worm. After she takes a hard hit in one battle, she loses her memories of being a worm and resumes her human persona's former life.
Last Name Basis - It's very rare for any of the Riders, and several other characters, to be called by their first name. The Kamen Rider Decade Kabuto arc reverses this, using first names all around.
Leitmotif - the destruction of Worms (particularly by Tendou) will end with a booming Hollywood-worthy theme, accompanied by Tendo's path-of-heaven finger gesture. Without fail.
Love Redeems - Renge Takatori. Or rather, food redeems.
Meaningful Name - Souji Tendo and Tsurugi Kamishiro make highly pretentious catchphrases out of the literal meanings of their names. Lampshaded in the Hyper Battle Video when Kagami wants one too and gets, "The man who washes his face in the mirror every day."
Mood Whiplash - Entire stretches of episodes strung together could be made of this. You'd switch scenes without a clutch between Kabuto and Gatack fighting for their lives against impossible odds, and Tsurugi running around saying silly words and dressing funny. Even if the actual show didn't already contain copious amounts of this, the after-show joke segments which often followed an incredibly tense cliffhanger ending would probably count.
Mythology Gag - The double gold stripes on the Shadow Zectrooper uniforms are a reference to the first Kamen Rider, who was redesigned with double silver stripes towards the end of his series (as opposed to No. 2, who had single silver stripes to differentiate them.) All Zectroopers also carry Arm Cannons reminiscent of Riderman's Cannon Arm, lampshading their status as 'normal' soldiers.
Tendo's Koans always refer to himself as the sun. Kamen Rider Black carries the title of 'Black Sun'. And Dark Kabuto's debut is also marked by an actual black sun ie. an eclipse.
Non-Serial Movie: ** Subverted. 99% of the movie is set in an After the End alternate universe, but at the end Tendou goes back in time and alters history, creating the T.V series timeline.
And in an odd subversion of the Timey Wimey Ball, this actually makes the plot slightly less confusing by explaining some of the plot points of the series itself (i.e. how Tendou got the Rider Belt and Hiyori's obsession with drawing bug-winged people).
Promoted Fanboys - Tokuyama Hidenori and Uchiyama Masato, who played Yaguruma and Kageyama respectively, are unabashed Kamen Rider fans, and gladly returned to reprise their roles when the Hoppers appeared briefly and early in Kamen Rider Decade.
Real Life Writes the Plot - Daisuke Kazama/Kamen Rider Drake had his storyline hastily concluded and took an extended leave of absence when his actor - an up-and-coming male idol - had to record (and promote) his new album. Later, Hiyori Kusakabe was Put on a Bus for several episodes (and was almost entirely divorced from the events of the final arc) after her actress developed health problems.
Shoot the Dog - Literally with Kageyama (at least the first time), leading into a Heroic BSOD for Kagami (also the first of several).
Shout Out - The Hopper Zecters to the Double Riders, Kabuto himself to Stronger, "Maximum Hyper Typhoon/Cyclone" (named after, respectively, Rider 1's belt and motorcycle).
And in a non-Kamen Rider example, Hyper Kabuto's design bears similarities to Super Blue Beet. Not to mention that both of them have Evil Twins wearing black armor.
The Hopper Hell Brothers are also a reference to the original Kamen Rider—originally, Kamen Rider's name was going to be "Kamen Rider Hopper King".
Hell, Tendou's finisher is a shout out, as it's the first Heisei finisher to be explicitly named "Rider Kick" (even though past kick finishers resembled the original much more than the ones in Kabuto.)
After Daisuke gets dragged into a womens' restroom by Gon, a random girl catches him in there and calls the police with a red-colored cell phone that sounds exactly like the Faiz Gear Phone.
And then there's Kick Hopper's Finishing Move combo: Rider Jump! Rider Kick! Just like the theme song to the original Kamen Rider series.
The seventh Heisei Rider and the seventh Showa Rider are both rhinoceros beetle themed.
Surprisingly Good English - The Zecters, voiced by an Indian actor. Also, Hiro Mizushima (Tendou) can speak fluent English. He only ever speaks with an English accent in non-canon bonus material though; in-character, he uses a Japanese accent like anyone else (e.g. still pronouncing Rider as Raidaa.)
Well, you don't switch to an American accent every time you use a borrowed word. First, it's borrowed and therefore legitimate (like any other word you might care to borrow) to use the Japanese pronunciation. Secondly, if you switched like that, you'd sound horrible.
He actually does in the after-show-segment concerning Kamen Rider Stronger - and it's incredibly jarring to hear.
Swiss Army Weapon - Kabuto Kunai can be use as handgun, axe or combat knife.
The Worf Effect - Kabuto and Gatack against the Hoppers in episode 36. Though Tendo had conveniently fallen victim to the 'Red Shoes' system at the time, but still.
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