Kamen Rider Ghost Rumour Roundup
And so that time of the year rolls around when the new Kamen Rider’s information is starting to trickle out and we get bits and bobs of what the show will be. Thus as every respectable toku writer/news source must do so, I will also round all these tidbits of information up. Most of this information, as of the date in the title, has all been revealed through various scans of toy catalogues and such, however there are still some bits of information which are pure rumours, so please take this all with a grain of salt. So let’s go Ghost and check it all out!
Now let’s start with what the show is all going to be about with its plot synopsis (with a translation curtesy of the Kamen Rider Ghost Tumblr) :
Our hero, Takeru Tenkuuji, aims to become a Ghost Hunter. One day, a mysterious eyeball called the Ghost Eyecon (Self Soul) is sent to him by his deceased father.
However, Takeru ends up being killed by a Ganma (a monster from another world) that was after the Ghost Eyecon! In order to save his childhood friend Akari from the Ganma, Takeru is granted a temporary life by using the Ghost Eyecon with the Ghost Driver to become a Kamen Rider!
Now, as Kamen Rider Ghost, Takeru must travel the world to collect the 15 Ghost Eyecons of “Great Men” in 99 days so that he can be granted one wish. Takeru is thrown into a war that may change the fate of the world itself!
Eyecon, open your eye! (眼魂で、変身! Aikon de, kaigan!)
Now having our hero being already dead/doomed does seem very Wizard, however the travelling aspect of this plot sounds very interesting. Hopefully it will mean more varied sets than our usual fair of urban Japan; it is also probably why we have not seen that many leaked set photos. Additionally I like the idea of finding the ghosts of great men in 99 days as it gives a nice end point to work towards, thus giving the show a good drive to move forward. I think it is a very interesting plot that is unique and having a quest storyline will be very good for pacing and just nice to see.
And now let’s move onto obviously the most important part of the show: the toys. What you see above there is Ghost’s bike, the Mashin Ghost Striker, combining with Ghost’s ship, the Captain Ghost, to I shit you not combine and become the Iguana Ghost Striker. We have not seen this kind of ridiculousness since the Dragon Phantom became a giant foot for Wizard to use as a final attack. I am very excited.
Okay now for more fun stuff! In the image above I’ve compiled all of the most important scans that have come out so far. In the middle top row we see a better view of the helmet of Kamen Rider Ghost’s base form, Self Soul. So far, I really like this base form: the orange and black work really well, the simplistic helmet pops extremely well and I adore the use of a loose cloak as a top. To the left is what is potentially Edison Soul, who I can naturally assume uses electricity as its main thing. I like the use of a lightbulb as the eyes along with the combination of a metallic blue/grey with the bright yellow. To the far right of the top row is our secondary rider Kamen Rider Spectre who is going to be debuting around November. Considering the fact that there is no scan, so far, of another driver it could be assume that they will also use the Ghost Driver. On the bottom right is another of Ghost’s forms, Robin Soul who naturally is using the soul of Robin Hood which will quite likely be a long ranged form. Finally of the bottom left is Benkei Soul who is based on the Japanese folklore hero of the same name who collected 999 swords after every fight he had; so potentially a very sword based form?
We also have some more leaks from the Japanese shopping site Rakuten. Apart from the forms mentioned before we also have Billy The Kid Soul, Tutankhamun Soul, Beethoven Soul and Nobunaga Soul (based on Oda Nobunaga a famous Japanese warlord). We also have the names of the weapons Ghost and Spectre use:the GanGan Hand and the GanGan Sabre which combine with the Ghost Gadgets Condor Phone, Cobra Mobile, Bat Clock and Spider Lantern to become different variations of the base weapons for each Soul. So far I’m really enjoying the historic characters they are using as it’s a nice mix of Japanese and western. I am also so happy that we are getting a return of the collectible animal/companions with the Ghost Gadgets that we haven’t had since Wizard. It looks like we are getting a lot of toys this year from the get go and I am very excited.
So above is the official logo of the show, which I really like the look of with the Ghost Icon being part of the ゴ in Ghost’s name. Apart from what I have covered, we also have more rumours that cannot be confirmed at this very moment. To begin with there is a semi-confirmed rumour flying about right now that much like Gaim and Wizard, we will have a crossover 2-parter with Drive and Ghost. The only evidence so far of this is leaked set photos of Kamen Rider Lupin appearing up again, thus vaguely fitting the rumour since Ghost is about the dead returning to life. This also suggests that Drive will have a shorter episode span possibly ending around 44/45. Now this could be good and bad: good since it means Drive will have a more planned out ending since there are less episodes, but it could also mean that Drive’s end will be more rushed. However it will be nice to have the crossover episodes wince they were a lot of fun.
Another rumour is that the band SEKAI NO OWARI will be performing the opening. This rumour comes from an alleged official Kamen Rider Ghost twitter account following all of the band members. Furthermore the band is signed to the same label as Shonan no Kaze who performed Gaim’s opening. Now for me the band will be a perfect fit since they do have a dark-ish tone thus fitting Ghost’s premise, but do have songs that are very upbeat and fun thus fitting with the fact that Ghost is a kid’s show and with the general tone of the past few Rider series. Furthermore they are heavily electronic, which fits even more so with the general tone of the more recent Heisei series. So if this rumour proves to be true, the band will be a perfect fit for the show.
(Credit of the image above goes to http://nitohkousuke.tumblr.com/ ) So overall I am very, very excited for Ghost. It has a very strong premise and unique theme in regards to its gimmicks and such. Additionally its designs are very, very strong. The only concern I have at this moment in time is the Ghost EyeCons themselves as they are weak in regards to collectability. They have no larger function apart from working inside the belt and have a very simple design. The use of QR codes is very interesting however and could help its sales, but again it’s too simple and has very little function. But apart from that Ghost should be very interesting and I am very much looking forward to it.
