Kamen Rider Black Sun (2022)

Kamen Rider Black Sun (2022)

Dir: Kazuya Shiraishi | Script: Izumi Takahashi | 10 episodes, approx 44 mins each.

Until viewing Black Sun, the most recent Kamen Rider series that I'd watched in its entirety was the fruit-themed Gaim (2013-14), so if there's been a natural progression in how the franchise does things in the intervening years, from a production standpoint, specifically, I'm not aware of it.

Timed to coincide with Rider's 50th anniversary, Black Sun feels different because it's aimed toward an adult audience. The bright 'toy line' colours that usually adorn a Rider's suit are absent, replaced with nondescript shades of black.

Besides the longer running time per episode, there's also scenes of drug use and an elevated level of violence, including immolation, decapitation, severed limbs, etc, some of which is even perpetrated by and against children.

Thankfully, its 'mature' angle does include concerns that are more than just onscreen violence. A human and 'non-human' divide explores discrimination, prejudice and racial hatred, among other things.

A reboot of the Showa Era's KR Black series (1987-88), it's set primarily in the year of its release, 2022, but jumps back often to 1972 (in reference to the 50 years). The earlier time period is crucial in making sense of the more contemporary one, a world in which humans and Kaijin (anthropomorphic animals and plants) experience a strained co-existence, with the aforementioned violence fuelled by bigotry and intolerance present on both sides.

A seemingly small portion of the Japanese public occupy a middle ground: either happy to co-exist or campaigning for equality. The public face of the men in power, the politicians and social elite, hides a sinister objective that aims to exploit the less fortunate for financial gain. It's the typical machinery of dicks that keep the unseen way the world operates in perpetual imbalance.

An air of menace and oppression is established in Ep 01, from which all else flows. The accompanying emotional weight that's supposed to help drive the narrative is centred on bonds of commonalty, either pre-existing or newly formed. The most successful is that which develops between Black Sun (Hidetoshi Nishijima) and a girl (Kokoro Hirasawa) on the side of equality.

It was great to see that the FX were mostly practical, with CGI used sparingly, mostly for transformations and creature appendages. The 'Creation King' was especially pleasing, in that regard. It has less 'fight scenes' than the regular kids show, to allow more time for social drama. It's not until halfway through the series that we see the first proper henshin.

I wasn't exaggerating when I referred to an exaggerated level of violence before. Black Sun is thematically a LOT darker than any of the KR series that I've watched in the past. As such, it's definitely not suitable for young children; it's rated 18. The only real light that breaks through is in the relationships, which are mostly passable, but rarely inspiring.

The second half of the series is certainly better than the first, but at no time did I ever feel compelled to make it to the end of the ten episodes. I wasn't invested in the relationships, so could've quit it at any time. I went the distance solely to satisfy an interest in finding out if the presence of the traditional Rider belt would be explained. SPOILER: [it wasn't]