Web Animation / Kamen Rider Maizen

Kamen Rider Maizen is a fanmade Kamen Rider animated series by animator YASUEDA. Its characters are based on the Japanese Minecraft YouTube channels Maizen and water_sumanai, and as such is also a crossover set in the world of the aforementioned video game. The first episode aired on August 31st, 2022.

Zenichi and Mikey are an average human and his friendly anthropomorphic turtle who spend the day saving Villagers from the ever-constant Illager threat. One day, however, the Illagers unveil their newest creation: a belt that can use cards to channel the power of Minecraft's mobs to transform themselves into superhuman fighters called Bugmen. Zen and Mikey are no match, and the Illagers seize the opportunity to capture them both and imprison them in a base deep within the Badlands.

While Zen sits in a jail cell, Mikey is taken and converted into one of the cards to try and harness his turtle physiology, though the Illagers throw it out when it proves useless with their belts. After the police raid the base, however, Zen comes across a prototype for a new generation of the belts — the Maizen Driver, which can use a blank form without any cards. Taking it in order to survive and escape the base, Zen finds Mikey's card in the carnage, discovering that its power increases exponentially with the Maizen Driver's functions. Together, they form the new Kamen Rider of the world of Minecraft, Kamen Rider Maizen!

The series seemingly ended on July 30th, 2023 with its 12th episode, followed up with Ultraman Craft on YASUEDA's channel. However, a second season was later announced on December 3rd, 2023, premiering the same day.

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Tropes:

• Action Bomb: Anyone unfortunate enough to use the Creeper Card in a regular driver. It's to the point that the Illagers (sans Mikage) can't control it making it an unintentional kamikaze attack.
• Actor Allusion: Sumanai is chockful of references to his basis:
  • He is introduced as The Ace; the real Sumanai is a known Minecraft challenge content creator.
  • Custom swords are also Sumanai's specialty whenever they come up, so his Rider form in Kamen Rider Maizen is also a swordsman.
  • The Sumanai Driver is based on a camera, with Sumanai constantly photographing his findings. The real Sumanai films Minecraft machinimas in much the same way YASUEDA is the animator of Kamen Rider Maizen.
• Adaptive Armor: Maizen's Zombie form is able to change its functions by absorbing material related to the biome-specific Zombie variants. Absorbing water turns the zombie form into a Drowned, allowing its Blade Below the Shoulder to detach. Absorbing sand turns Maizen into a Husk, transforming its blade into a syringe that weakens whatever it strikes.
• All There in the Manual: The proper names of everything in the series sans the Maizen duo and Hinata are only available through YASUEDA's community posts.
• Ambiguous Situation: Zearu is the only member of Yorozoya who is represented by two avatars instead of one in real life, much like Maizen and Sumanai. Only the dog person appears in #8, making it unclear whether his human self doesn't exist or is a Decomposite Character doing something elsewhere.
• And I Must Scream: Converting a mob into a card requires them to be restrained and electrocuted, and using it on Mikey, a sapient creature, reveals they remain conscious during and after the process.
• And the Adventure Continues: Although the Bugmen have been defeated and all of Maizen's alternate forms lost, Zen and Sumanai still have a job to do — regular Illagers are still attacking villages, and the people trapped in Sumanai's cards were only seven out of a list of 26.
• Automatic Crossbows: Maizen's Guardian Form is equipped with one called the Guardian Sting, and coupled with the negative reaction time attainable through their True Sight abilities, it's very good at what it does.
• The Berserker: Maizen's Warden form, given that when activated the Warden in the space knocks both Mikey and Zen out, making this the second most dangerous form after Creeper. In this state Maizen will attack anyone regardless if they're friend or foe.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: The Enderdragon card is able to override the Evoker System's faceplate and become a berserker even stronger than the Warden, but the particular Enderdragon sealed within refuses to hurt Zenichi and Mikey as gratitude for liberating it from the Illagers.
• Big Damn Heroes: When it seems all hope is lost after Sando is unable to help Sumanai disengage the rampaging Maizen Driver in #8, Homura rushes in to help him up, followed by the rest of Yorozuya shortly thereafter. With four extra helping hands, they finally have enough manpower to pin down Maizen long enough for Sumanai to rip off the Maizen Driver.
• Book Ends:
  • #3 starts with Hinata dreaming of buying Zen a stun baton to win him over as a romantic partner. It ends with her getting her wish, except she's not as emotionally prepared as she thought she was.
  • The first and last villains in the series are destroyed by Maizen's basic Craft & Break, the Mikey Strike.
• Catapult Nightmare: Zen has one at the beginning of #3 where an unknown enemy takes Mikey's card and rips it before his very eyes. He wakes up to Mikey and immediately hugs him.
• Celebrity Cameo:
  • Sumanai's alternate forms are themed around this trope, as his cards use the avatars of real Japanese YouTubers instead of mobs. The powers provided by each card are per creator, meaning that if they have more than one distinct avatar (e.g. Penko-chan, who has both a human baby and a brown bear), the card will grant abilities based on all of them. Ironically, Sumanai himself is a Decomposite Character of the real person, with his more reserved qualities split off into his secondary avatar, the masked man.
  • Sando, the head of the YouTuber group Yorozuya, is a Recurring Extra who helps out Zen every now and then. The rest of the group appears in #8 to help him save Maizen from the Warden form's berserk rage.
• Cool Bike: Maizen's unnamed Rider Machine, which in addition to the standard modifications most Rider Machines get is seemingly autonomous.
• Expy: The Rider Troops created by the Illagers in #8 are Riotroopers in all but name.
• Flash Step: Maizen's Enderman form does this similar to how the Enderman blink in and out, in addition to the actual teleportation they use.
• Foil: The Maizen duo and Kamen Rider Sumanai deliberately oppose each other despite being allies. Maizen is based on the nature of Minecraft and land, while Sumanai is based on water and technology. Zenichi's partner Mikey needs to be with him to properly use the driver, while Sumanai's partner is The Mole and thus operates away from the action. Maizen uses monsters for the basis of his powers, while Sumanai's are seemingly inspired by actual people.
• Grievous Harm with a Body: An interesting case of this, when Maizen's Limit Break for Zombie Form is to create an energy version of a Zombie and slams it into the enemy.
• Heroic Willpower: The only logical explanation for how Mikey's card is able to fly to Zenichi and block a blow from the Guardian Bugman.
• Lightning Bruiser: Maizen's Enderman Form is blindingly fast when it needs to be, and wields a pair of heavy power fists.
• Lightning Can Do Anything: An electric current can free Mikey from his card prison, but zapping him again will seal him back. Zen's friend initially takes advantage of this to troll Mikey, but relents and lets Zen use it as something akin to how Ikki Igarashi controls Vice. At the end, it's revealed humans (or at least characters that are physically human) cannot be freed in this manner, requiring the device on Mikage's bike to unseal them.
• Limit Break: Maizen's Enderman form gains a pair of gauntlets called the Ender Knuckle that can generate Hard Light blocks and act as pile drivers, but the ambience during its debut implies that it's a taxing process and so can't be used often.
• Magikarp Power: The Maizen Driver and Mikey's card form are extremely weak on their own, but will completely obliterate the transformed Illagers when their powers are combined together by Zenichi. This is further relevant in #3 where without Mikey's card inserted Zen can't use the Guardian or Enderman cards he got from previous fights.
• Manchild: Just like in his source material, Mikey is old enough to live with Zenichi and Hinata on his own, yet sometimes acts like the pet everyone but Zen is content to treat him as.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Maizen's blank form bears a passing resemblance to Kamen Rider W. As Mikey is still conscious inside his card, Maizen would also be a fellow two-in-one Rider. #3 confirms this when Mikey extends his fist while in card form only for Maizen to do the same and deck a monster he was aiming for, showing they can both control the suit.
  • Maizen's default Finishing Move resembles the Crimson Smash, as both involve trapping the opponent with a spinning field and using an externally-propelled Diving Kick to drill it into the target. When the Enderdragon supercharges Mikey's powers in #12, Maizen attaching their sword to their shin causes it to resemble the Faiz Pointer in this regard.
  • Similarly, Sumanai's finisher with his Banana form resembles Lucifer's Hammer, except he doesn't need to kick the pile driver-like projectile through once he fires it.
  • The Maizen Driver is functionally identical to the Ghost Driver in terms of operation, except it takes cards instead of Eyecons.
  • Maizen's Warden form possesses a fighting style and sound-based abilities that resemble the more villainous Oni Riders like Kabuki and Shokuki.
  • Maizen borrows one of Kamen Rider X's Finishing Moves for the Blaze Form's fighting style, tossing its W HeatMetal-inspired baton up into the air, leaping off of it, and grabbing it again to slam down into the target.
  • Maizen's Warden Form is stabilized by replacing the Maizen Driver's exterior with the Evoker System's own, mirroring how the Zero-One Driver is exploitable by doing the same with devices created by There or the Ark.
• Outside-Context Problem: The entire conflict is based on the idea of a pre-existing fictional universe having to deal with this for the length of a typical show. The Kamen Riders and the Illagers' lesser suits don't play by the rules of Minecraft and are orders of magnitude stronger than even vanilla endgame, which is a problem as there's potentially dozens of Illagers with the monster cards and only one of Zen and Mikey to stop them all.
• Plague Zombie: The Zombie-Card's user seems to do just that with both the Illager Grunts and Hinata. Or in Maizen's Case Plague Rider, as seen in #4, Maizen's Zombie form seems to be able to give a normal person the ability to use Zombie form. When this happens the person appears in the same space as Zenichi and Mikey.
• Playingwith Fire: Maizen's Blaze form gives him this power, along with a an extending blaze rod staff, making him on par with the second Enderman Bugman. It's finisher has a Blaze appear with Maizen smacking and holding the Bugman there, as the Blaze spins its body, causing the enemy to explode in blaze of glory.
• Power Fist: Maizen's main weapon in his Enderman Form, though it runs on a limited energy reserve and isn't very effective without it or a Craft & Break.
• Powers via Weapon: Sumanai's Gin-san form has hammer which allows him to rewind time in an area struck by it.
• Real-Person Fic: In a sense, as most non-Illager characters are actual Japanese YouTubers and their personae. Most notably, the series's treatment of Yorozoya takes significant liberties with them, as Pieko remains in the group throughout the entire series despite leaving in 2023, while Zearu's human form is written out entirely.
• The Reveal:
  • #6 reveals Hinata and Mikage were Childhood Friends that Escaped from the Lab during the early days of the Illager organization. Back then, the Iceologer that Mikage turned into the core of his driver was their leader, and even then he was still slighting Mikage. However, while Hinata returned to society, Mikage stayed behind and usurped the Illagers' leadership entirely, remaining a villain.
  • #10 reveals that Hinata is both actually an Allay in disguise and the final component of the Evoker System, awakening Mikage's Super Mode as an angelic Kamen Rider not unlike Holy Live.
• Shield Bash: Maizen's default attack when Mikey's card is used.
• Shout-Out:
  • The transformed Illagers are officially called "Bugmen;" as their suits and belts are the prototype technology to the Maizen and Sumanai Drivers, this is most likely a reference to the "Karate Bugmen" Insult of Endearment used for the official Kamen Rider franchise in the West.
  • The pans Hinata looks at in #6 are lifted from the Minecraft mods Tinkerer's Construct and Pam's Harvestcraft.
• Shock Stick: The Hyper Stun Rod from #3 is a classical example, as well as a replacement for Hinata's taser.
• Super-Strength: Maizen's Iron Golem form gives him an iron hammer along with super strength enough to block large pieces of building debris and trip up a giant-sized Warden.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Relative to the rules of Minecraft, at least. The story takes advantage of using the game as a medium, with its mechanics foiling the villains' plans Once an Episode:
  • The Illager base in #1 is completely decimated sans those with the belts, because they're actually rather fragile in-game to enough players armed with basic equipment.
  • The Guardian Bugman in #2 loses his advantage once Zen dunks him in the water, which Endermen are weak to and is where Guardians natively operate. The Evoker is using the Enderman card, and Zen is using the Guardian card, making the latter's victory inevitable even without True Sight and a high-caliber bowgun.
  • The villain of the week in #3 has Zen and Hinata pinned down in a base... which is mostly made of stone blocks and hardened clay. So Mikey takes an iron pickaxe and digs underneath it with zero effort.
  • In #4, Maizen's Zombie form has reduced strength during the day, since Zombies burn in sunlight. However, it can go toe-to-toe with other Riders at night, when they usually operate.
  • In the same episode, Mikage tries to rip off the Maizen Driver, but is cut down by a mere iron sword since he isn't transformed. He then has no choice but to run away, as he's outnumbered, alone, and has no window of opportunity to transform again.
  • In #5, we see that Maizen's Creeper form is still a death sentence since it's a Creeper. This would look like a suicide attempt...had it not been for the fact Mikey used a potion to make them intangible to their own attack.
  • In #6, the Spider Bugman's webs are cut down by Kamen Rider Sumanai's sword, since that's the tool required to harvest cobwebs into string in Minecraft.
  • #7 provides an example that isn't explored in the game itself. Mikage as the Warden Bugman is nearly unstoppable and has Super-Hearing. However, because Wardens need their sense of hearing to navigate, wouldn't they be extra vulnerable to extremely loud noises and sonic pulses? As Mikage learns the hard way thanks to Sumanai's Penko-chan form, the answer is yes.
  • #8 has Sumanai use the same trick from #7 to hold Maizen's Warden form in place long enough for Yorozuya to put them in a chokehold.
  • #9 has the second Enderman Bugman knocked out of their Super-Speed when direct contact with Maizen's Blaze Form causes them to ignite. Endermen teleport uncontrollably when hit with one of their weaknesses, fire being one of them.
  • #10 implies that because Hinata and Mikage gave each other gifts as children, they now possess the minor psychic link characteristic between all tamed Allays and their owners. It's not very useful in everyday life, but it enables Hinata to fight in the Mikage suit on its original user's level with no experience whatsoever.
  • #11 and #12 both show that while the Enderdragon card allows its users to Heal Thyself with Ender Crystals, it does nothing to improve their durability. A single strike is still enough to break them and cut off the user's regeneration.
• Throwing Your Shield Always Works: Maizen uses this as his main attack in his default form and for the default Craft & Break.
• Transformation Trinket: The mob cards, which allow Zenichi and the Illagers to channel the power of the respective monsters (or people, in Mikey's case) with their respective gear.
• True Sight: The Elder Guardian's debuff in Minecraft is represented as it and anyone channeling the power of the Guardians being able to see the exact position of any target at all times. It's quite useful for predicting the trajectory of a fast-moving opponent or launching a surprise attack.
• Wham Shot:
  • #3 ends with Hinata seemingly succumbing to the Zombie Bugman infection, only for it to immediately clear up and eject from her body in the form of a second Zombie mob card. This heavily implies that there might be a way to make more of the cards without resorting to violence or fully incapacitating the target.
  • #4 reveals Hinata and Mikage knew each other when she was a child through an old picture, and one or the other is currently in possession of a Totem of Undying (assuming it wasn't lost by either in the years since.)
  • #5 reveals a person disguised as an Illager has been secretly using the Illager's base with a secret room. With plans of another new driver on the screen.
  • #6 Reveals the mole finding out about Hinata being alive as well as her connections to Mikage.
  • #7 ends with Hinata getting kidnapped by the freed Iceologer.
  • #8 has Maizen transform into its Warden form... Though, the moment we see the Warden shove down Zenichi and Mikey, we know just what sort of conventions it's gonna have.
  • #9 gives us an unknown person walking up to Hinata's jailcell. However, due to their unseen appearance, it leaves us with the question on whether this is good or bad.