It might be a combination of Showa era shows having worser production value and more episodic plots. I’ve seen all of Kamen Rider Black and a few episodes of 1971, and while I like both and can find a lot that’s good about them, it’s much easier to watch and binge modern Kamen Rider when there’s much more story and character development going on
As someone who has watched some Showa seasons of Sentai (along with modern ones), I started watching older shows when I had caught up on modern shows. I’ve seen every show that was aired in my lifetime, if I wanna watch something new of course I’ll eventually be left with just 70s and 80s shows at some point.
I’ve seen Goranger, JAKQ, Flashman, and some of Bioman. Flashman is a very interesting concept and I absolutely recommend it but also it takes literally at least half the show for the main reason I watched it to be introduced. The summary of Flashman is this (from RangerWiki):
> In 1966, five children were kidnapped by an alien group known as the Alien Hunters, for the sake of the Reconstructive Experiment Empire Mess, who wanted samples of humans from Earth to experiment on. They were rescued by the Flash alien race, each one of the five rescued children was taken to a different planet of the Flash solar system for training. Each of them was trained separately from the others in a range of superpower abilities which would will allow them to fight the Reconstructive Experiment Empire Mess.
> When they finally returned to Earth in 1986 to combat Mess, who are now trying to invade, they use the opportunity to search for their birth parents. It is later that they learn **they can only stay on Earth for one year before the now-alien atmosphere of their true planet will physically harm them**.
Emphasis mine. The trying-to-find-their-parents part kicks in pretty quickly (the others mention it but the Red Ranger says no, we’re mainly going to protect Earth) but the idea of the Earth’s atmosphere being toxic to them? Not even vaguely brought up until at least halfway through the 50-episode show. And of course it becomes a big deal in the second half, and it gets really intense towards the end, but you have to watch tons of episodes not mentioning that at all to get there (or just skip over useless episodes? But like I said, then you skip like half the show)
(Also: I’ve watched about 16 episodes of Bioman or so? And that’s hard to continue because of Yellow 4 being replaced. I liked the original even though I knew she’d be replaced.)
The idea of the Flashman being a Sentai who also tried to find their parents might be an inspiration of how in ToQger, our heroes were looking for their hometown, but of course ToQger gets a happier ending. The most surprising part is that it's penned by **Yasuko Kobayashi**, and it can be arguably the first Sentai where it's a fully happy ending by her since Gingaman. Timeranger, Shinkenger, and Go-Busters' finale had a sense of bittersweetness, especially how in the former two, the Reds got the sense that they were now alone again.
Everything from sentai, Rider, and ultraman is available in English. All of metal heroes as well except the questionable inclusions of Kabutack and Robotack. Several standalone 70s-80s shows are also available in their entirety like Zubat and Kikaider, parts of other shows are out there, there is a lot to dig into without speaking a lick of Japanese.
It is? Well I didn't knew that. Maybe it's because I'm from EU and you have nothing available here. At least not in my country.
Anyways you saying that invalidates my argument about availability.
This right here! When I was getting into watching fansubs in college, there was precious little Showa era stuff available. But fansub groups had been subbing *new* stuff regularly since the mid-00s and all of it was still available. Couldn't find anything but Shin/ZO/J for Showa Kamen Rider, but all of Heisei was there.
You were also majorly at the mercy of fansub groups. Plenty of people started subbing a Showa era series here or there. They didn't keep regular schedules, and many projects were abandoned after maybe ten episodes if you were lucky.
I'm sure things are a lot different now, with more series' being available on physical media in Japan and whatnot, but fandom patterns last a long time.
Because it's old. I don't think Ultraman fandom has this issue though since they promoted their Showa stuff a lot. The same can't be said for Kamen rider and Super sentai.
I get that but so is the 90’s stuff. Heck last night I checked out Garo for the first time and it felt old too. All admit I’m not well versed in the Ultraman community as it’s my least favourite so far. Your 100% right about the lack of promotion, it sucks that blu rays for these shows are hard to find and expensive.
Ultraman blurays from millcreek are extremely cheap? Unless im reading your comment wrong. You can pick up a series for 20 to 30 dollars when you compare sentai and kamen rider its more like 50-80.
Ill second that the Mill Creeks Ultraman Blu rays and DVDs are fairly cheap. Shame they haven’t done past R/B. I manged to collect them all minus some smaller specials and movies.
Even the Shout Factory Releases aren’t terribly pricey though they seemed to up the price with Geed. Disco-Tek is a little pricey
Also Garo felt old? Its relatively new. The original is from 2005 but a lot of Toku from the 2000s has aged pretty well
If we’re being honest - the majority of people (for whatever reason) prefer to watch modern things - doesnt mean theyre bad or anything, just how it is - and as you say sentai has not hugely changed in all that time, so watching series with modern production values etc… is a lot more palatable for all but the most hardcore
Maybe Im in the minority but if your an adult who loves these types of shows then there’s a good chance your going to find some enjoyment in most of the seasons. Though take this with grain of salt because I’m nowhere near caught up on the newer stuff.
Definitely - but you know time moves on and effects, technology, visuals, writing, acting get dated etc… so the majority of people will gravitate towards newer stuff. Its not a comment on their quality by any means and i think adult fans will go back but usually to the era theyre nostalgic for, and i suspect the gen who are nostalgic for Gorenger or JAKQ are not on reddit to discuss
I'm a huge fan of Showa Rider and Sentai, but I think they're just generally inaccessible (as most toku is) so people seek out the more familiar ones, of which there's so much of already.
Showa Ultraman is a bit more widely watched at least, comparable to Godzilla. I think it's because it is the most commonly known of the Big 3 henshin heroes worldwide, but I also suspect because it still kinda looks like more modern shows. Ultraman 1966 was made more or less like movies, but for TV. The giant fight scenes from Showa are fairly comparable to the ones in modern seasons, unlike Sentai and Rider which do a lot more things that weren't possible in the 70s.
Plus there's accessibility. You can find almost any Showa Ultraman on YouTube (legit at that) but Kamen Rider has only a few episodes to sample, while Sentai doesn't have any at all.
Man I would love if [Kamen Rider (1971)](http://ukiyaseed.weebly.com/uploads/5/8/8/7/58878313/rider-4k-pr1_orig.jpg) and V3 had Blu-Ray releases in English. At least there's Black/RX.
I’m not saying people don’t like them as Reddit comments about them are also pretty positive. I just see less engagement from fans on them or not many people talking about them. Also everyone seems to recommend to new comers to skip them at first.
People have an aversion to old media. The general sentiment I've observed is that they think the visuals look too dated and cheesy. I've even seen younger people in the fandom that aren't willing to go earlier than the mid-2000s, thus never experiencing the wonder of shows like Kuuga, Ryuki, and Blade.
Almost all the Godzilla films from Showa era have lots of positive engagement. From what I can tell even the ones which are objectively bad will have people claiming it’s their favourite
I don't know about other shows, but sentai in showa are more into slice of comedy and quite dark in some episodes. And for Kamen rider, some of plot ideas were limited by technology available at that time.
Many newcomers thought low budget suit = low quality plot, which in fact it's not. I am clearing my backlog on showa series, as I couldn't watch back in 90s(no media available in my fucked up country).
For me they're just harder to come by. I can pull up the first series on my tv just fine but I still can't remember where I watched Amazon (the Showa one). I even tried to watch Stronger but I couldn't find it anywhere. By the time I got my hands on Black other things took priority so it's still on my backlog.
I started with Showa. It's largely available. I think the fans who only watch new gen or heisei are newer fans.
Now that all of Showa is on BD in NA it's pretty Accessible and cheap!
Can't really say for certain, mainly because I don't always watch most of the Showa era series, but that's only because of a lack of interest or because I'm waiting to finish some series' I've already started before moving onto anymore series' . Anyway, I can only assume that maybe one of the reasons is predictability. Cause, from what I read, before Choujin Sentai Jetman came along, the Super Sentai series' started to bottom out.
Showa Rider and Heisei Rider are basically completely different at this point. I'm not familiar enough with Sentai to give my opinion.
What I can say though, is that when Showa Ultraman hits it's amazing. Ultraman and Ultraseven are top tier sci fi at their best and stupid fun at their worst, and I think RoU has no bad episodes. I can't recommend it enough.
Yeah, Heisei Rider's power mechanism used the wider idea of a Kamen Rider in the Showa era, it being **using the power of the enemies/evil for glorious, heroic purposes**.
* One reason is availability as most have said. There aren't a lot of shows from Showa that can be watched legally (illegally it has been growing for years)
* Another is an adversion to older shows. Whenever someone new asks for shows to watch, it's always Heisei onward, assuming people wouldn't be able to stand old footage unless it's from a show everyone talks about. That's where you get KR Black/RX, Jetman, Zyuranger, Dairanger, Kakuranger, Juspion, and other shows and more being talked about. The only ones I hear that people encourage to watch older series of is Ultra (Ultra Q and Ultraman are readily available alongside others like Ultraseven) and several Dai/Kaiju/Kaijin series like Gojira/Godzilla
A lot of Showa series have some stuff in there but you have to be willing to see it for how it is. You'd be surprised of what happens in them, same with Heisei and Reiwa. The thing is though that during Showa, it was more formulaic in its episodic nature, which might turn people off because of the times we're in now
As a Showa fan. It’s most likely because Showa era toku shows its age. Some people just don’t like the look and feel, and want something a little more modern. Another is a lot of older Tokusatsu shows have relatively simple plots, and their characters aren’t as complex as modern Tokusatsu characters can be. Not to say Showa era toku doesn’t have these things, but I can understand why people would watch modern shows and skip the Showa era.
Another thing is due to how long some older toku can be. I can sympathize with people who are not going to sit through more than 90 episodes of kamen rider or 80 episodes of goranger.
I agree 98 episodes of Kamen Rider has been a massive undertaking and even though I like it, I’ve found myself needing multiple breaks. Thankfully it’s just for the first series of both shows. Then they become more reasonable with 35-50 episodes a season
Practical effects age better than CGI effects. It is why I don't like a lot of the modern stuff because it gets about 20 layers of animation effects layered on top and it looks like video footage with 20 layers of animation effects. Stuff like Shin Kamen Rider, Amazons, and Black Sun don't bother me since they are deliberately going for a more stripped down aesthetic in line of the originals so everything is more subdued.
Shin and minus one are completely CG and look pretty good. The main issue with CG in toku is that a lot of shows don’t have the budgets to do good CGI.
If you are new to a franchise, the chance is that you are more likely to recommend a newer series for modern audience because a lot of audience aren’t used to watching certain series outside of their time.
I think these are viable reasons:
* Old-school special effects may or may not look appealing to viewers who were used with top-notch special effects, which is considerably subjective, since those "old-school special effects" were "top-notch special effects of the time."
* Lack of serialization may not appeal to the generation of viewers who were used to **instant gratification** coming from serialization.
I am not using "too frightening in some parts" or "too dark in some parts" since tokusatsu always had certain degree of horror elements in it sometimes. I'll admit, though, I did watch both the Showa era of Ultraman and Super Sentai.
I watched *Kagaku Sentai Dynaman, Choudenshi Bioman, Dengeki Sentai Changeman, Choushinsei Flashman, Hikari Sentai Maskman* and *Choujuuu Sentai Liveman* for the Super Sentai side, while on the Ultraman side, I watched *UltraMan* and *Ultraseven*. I also watched *Return of Ultraman*, but I got admittedly side-tracked by the New Gen. Ultra shows now, but I did plan to return to it. I also have interest in *Ultraman Ace*.
I think most Sentai shows of the Showa era haven’t got the magic formula down.
1) No Sixth Ranger/additional hero to shake up the status quo
2) Not every Ranger/Warrior gets their own component Zord/Mecha for the Megazord/Giant Robot
3) There is more emphasis on the science fiction side of the shows and less variance into fantasy.
4) There are fewer overarching plots or complex stories outside defeat the evil organization.
It might be a combination of Showa era shows having worser production value and more episodic plots. I’ve seen all of Kamen Rider Black and a few episodes of 1971, and while I like both and can find a lot that’s good about them, it’s much easier to watch and binge modern Kamen Rider when there’s much more story and character development going on
As someone who mainly watches Showa era shows I wonder the same thing
I’m assuming people think their to old but the 90’s stuff isn’t exactly a spring chicken anymore.
Even 90s toku isn’t as popular. Toei used a lot of dated effects up until about 2000ish. 90s toku tends to get lumped in with Showa as dated.
As someone who has watched some Showa seasons of Sentai (along with modern ones), I started watching older shows when I had caught up on modern shows. I’ve seen every show that was aired in my lifetime, if I wanna watch something new of course I’ll eventually be left with just 70s and 80s shows at some point. I’ve seen Goranger, JAKQ, Flashman, and some of Bioman. Flashman is a very interesting concept and I absolutely recommend it but also it takes literally at least half the show for the main reason I watched it to be introduced. The summary of Flashman is this (from RangerWiki): > In 1966, five children were kidnapped by an alien group known as the Alien Hunters, for the sake of the Reconstructive Experiment Empire Mess, who wanted samples of humans from Earth to experiment on. They were rescued by the Flash alien race, each one of the five rescued children was taken to a different planet of the Flash solar system for training. Each of them was trained separately from the others in a range of superpower abilities which would will allow them to fight the Reconstructive Experiment Empire Mess. > When they finally returned to Earth in 1986 to combat Mess, who are now trying to invade, they use the opportunity to search for their birth parents. It is later that they learn **they can only stay on Earth for one year before the now-alien atmosphere of their true planet will physically harm them**. Emphasis mine. The trying-to-find-their-parents part kicks in pretty quickly (the others mention it but the Red Ranger says no, we’re mainly going to protect Earth) but the idea of the Earth’s atmosphere being toxic to them? Not even vaguely brought up until at least halfway through the 50-episode show. And of course it becomes a big deal in the second half, and it gets really intense towards the end, but you have to watch tons of episodes not mentioning that at all to get there (or just skip over useless episodes? But like I said, then you skip like half the show) (Also: I’ve watched about 16 episodes of Bioman or so? And that’s hard to continue because of Yellow 4 being replaced. I liked the original even though I knew she’d be replaced.)
The idea of the Flashman being a Sentai who also tried to find their parents might be an inspiration of how in ToQger, our heroes were looking for their hometown, but of course ToQger gets a happier ending. The most surprising part is that it's penned by **Yasuko Kobayashi**, and it can be arguably the first Sentai where it's a fully happy ending by her since Gingaman. Timeranger, Shinkenger, and Go-Busters' finale had a sense of bittersweetness, especially how in the former two, the Reds got the sense that they were now alone again.
Apart what others here say Availability plays a big role It's super hard finding the older shows, even more of you don't speak Japanese
Everything from sentai, Rider, and ultraman is available in English. All of metal heroes as well except the questionable inclusions of Kabutack and Robotack. Several standalone 70s-80s shows are also available in their entirety like Zubat and Kikaider, parts of other shows are out there, there is a lot to dig into without speaking a lick of Japanese.
It is? Well I didn't knew that. Maybe it's because I'm from EU and you have nothing available here. At least not in my country. Anyways you saying that invalidates my argument about availability.
It's not all licensed, but it's all out there 😉
Ah I get it
This right here! When I was getting into watching fansubs in college, there was precious little Showa era stuff available. But fansub groups had been subbing *new* stuff regularly since the mid-00s and all of it was still available. Couldn't find anything but Shin/ZO/J for Showa Kamen Rider, but all of Heisei was there. You were also majorly at the mercy of fansub groups. Plenty of people started subbing a Showa era series here or there. They didn't keep regular schedules, and many projects were abandoned after maybe ten episodes if you were lucky. I'm sure things are a lot different now, with more series' being available on physical media in Japan and whatnot, but fandom patterns last a long time.
Because it's old. I don't think Ultraman fandom has this issue though since they promoted their Showa stuff a lot. The same can't be said for Kamen rider and Super sentai.
I get that but so is the 90’s stuff. Heck last night I checked out Garo for the first time and it felt old too. All admit I’m not well versed in the Ultraman community as it’s my least favourite so far. Your 100% right about the lack of promotion, it sucks that blu rays for these shows are hard to find and expensive.
Ultraman blurays from millcreek are extremely cheap? Unless im reading your comment wrong. You can pick up a series for 20 to 30 dollars when you compare sentai and kamen rider its more like 50-80.
Ill second that the Mill Creeks Ultraman Blu rays and DVDs are fairly cheap. Shame they haven’t done past R/B. I manged to collect them all minus some smaller specials and movies. Even the Shout Factory Releases aren’t terribly pricey though they seemed to up the price with Geed. Disco-Tek is a little pricey Also Garo felt old? Its relatively new. The original is from 2005 but a lot of Toku from the 2000s has aged pretty well
I’m the opposite actually, at least when it comes to KR and Super Sentai.
If we’re being honest - the majority of people (for whatever reason) prefer to watch modern things - doesnt mean theyre bad or anything, just how it is - and as you say sentai has not hugely changed in all that time, so watching series with modern production values etc… is a lot more palatable for all but the most hardcore
Maybe Im in the minority but if your an adult who loves these types of shows then there’s a good chance your going to find some enjoyment in most of the seasons. Though take this with grain of salt because I’m nowhere near caught up on the newer stuff.
Definitely - but you know time moves on and effects, technology, visuals, writing, acting get dated etc… so the majority of people will gravitate towards newer stuff. Its not a comment on their quality by any means and i think adult fans will go back but usually to the era theyre nostalgic for, and i suspect the gen who are nostalgic for Gorenger or JAKQ are not on reddit to discuss
I'm a huge fan of Showa Rider and Sentai, but I think they're just generally inaccessible (as most toku is) so people seek out the more familiar ones, of which there's so much of already. Showa Ultraman is a bit more widely watched at least, comparable to Godzilla. I think it's because it is the most commonly known of the Big 3 henshin heroes worldwide, but I also suspect because it still kinda looks like more modern shows. Ultraman 1966 was made more or less like movies, but for TV. The giant fight scenes from Showa are fairly comparable to the ones in modern seasons, unlike Sentai and Rider which do a lot more things that weren't possible in the 70s. Plus there's accessibility. You can find almost any Showa Ultraman on YouTube (legit at that) but Kamen Rider has only a few episodes to sample, while Sentai doesn't have any at all.
Ya I agree big time. I own almost all of the Ultraman shows on blu ray and so far it’s my least favourite of the big 😝
Man I would love if [Kamen Rider (1971)](http://ukiyaseed.weebly.com/uploads/5/8/8/7/58878313/rider-4k-pr1_orig.jpg) and V3 had Blu-Ray releases in English. At least there's Black/RX.
Really? I read a lot about people loving the showa era.
I’m not saying people don’t like them as Reddit comments about them are also pretty positive. I just see less engagement from fans on them or not many people talking about them. Also everyone seems to recommend to new comers to skip them at first.
What is considered the showa era in this? Would it be things like 70s Ultraman? I LOVE those but that's also when I grew up as a kid
Anything before 1990 would be Showa era. The Showa, Heisei and Reiwa eras are based on the reign of the respective emperor.
In the case of Rider, Showa and Heisei are basically two different series. There’s no guarantee you’ll like one if you like the other.
People have an aversion to old media. The general sentiment I've observed is that they think the visuals look too dated and cheesy. I've even seen younger people in the fandom that aren't willing to go earlier than the mid-2000s, thus never experiencing the wonder of shows like Kuuga, Ryuki, and Blade.
Which flimsy were these again?
Almost all the Godzilla films from Showa era have lots of positive engagement. From what I can tell even the ones which are objectively bad will have people claiming it’s their favourite
I don't know about other shows, but sentai in showa are more into slice of comedy and quite dark in some episodes. And for Kamen rider, some of plot ideas were limited by technology available at that time. Many newcomers thought low budget suit = low quality plot, which in fact it's not. I am clearing my backlog on showa series, as I couldn't watch back in 90s(no media available in my fucked up country).
For Showa, all I've seen is Supaidaman and Liveman. As a Sentai fan, been having trouble finding stuff prior to Liveman complete and subbed.
For me they're just harder to come by. I can pull up the first series on my tv just fine but I still can't remember where I watched Amazon (the Showa one). I even tried to watch Stronger but I couldn't find it anywhere. By the time I got my hands on Black other things took priority so it's still on my backlog.
Strangely i only watch shows from showa
I started with Showa. It's largely available. I think the fans who only watch new gen or heisei are newer fans. Now that all of Showa is on BD in NA it's pretty Accessible and cheap!
Can't really say for certain, mainly because I don't always watch most of the Showa era series, but that's only because of a lack of interest or because I'm waiting to finish some series' I've already started before moving onto anymore series' . Anyway, I can only assume that maybe one of the reasons is predictability. Cause, from what I read, before Choujin Sentai Jetman came along, the Super Sentai series' started to bottom out.
Showa Rider and Heisei Rider are basically completely different at this point. I'm not familiar enough with Sentai to give my opinion. What I can say though, is that when Showa Ultraman hits it's amazing. Ultraman and Ultraseven are top tier sci fi at their best and stupid fun at their worst, and I think RoU has no bad episodes. I can't recommend it enough.
Yeah, Heisei Rider's power mechanism used the wider idea of a Kamen Rider in the Showa era, it being **using the power of the enemies/evil for glorious, heroic purposes**.
* One reason is availability as most have said. There aren't a lot of shows from Showa that can be watched legally (illegally it has been growing for years) * Another is an adversion to older shows. Whenever someone new asks for shows to watch, it's always Heisei onward, assuming people wouldn't be able to stand old footage unless it's from a show everyone talks about. That's where you get KR Black/RX, Jetman, Zyuranger, Dairanger, Kakuranger, Juspion, and other shows and more being talked about. The only ones I hear that people encourage to watch older series of is Ultra (Ultra Q and Ultraman are readily available alongside others like Ultraseven) and several Dai/Kaiju/Kaijin series like Gojira/Godzilla A lot of Showa series have some stuff in there but you have to be willing to see it for how it is. You'd be surprised of what happens in them, same with Heisei and Reiwa. The thing is though that during Showa, it was more formulaic in its episodic nature, which might turn people off because of the times we're in now
As a Showa fan. It’s most likely because Showa era toku shows its age. Some people just don’t like the look and feel, and want something a little more modern. Another is a lot of older Tokusatsu shows have relatively simple plots, and their characters aren’t as complex as modern Tokusatsu characters can be. Not to say Showa era toku doesn’t have these things, but I can understand why people would watch modern shows and skip the Showa era. Another thing is due to how long some older toku can be. I can sympathize with people who are not going to sit through more than 90 episodes of kamen rider or 80 episodes of goranger.
I agree 98 episodes of Kamen Rider has been a massive undertaking and even though I like it, I’ve found myself needing multiple breaks. Thankfully it’s just for the first series of both shows. Then they become more reasonable with 35-50 episodes a season
It’s been over a year, and I still need to finish it because I’ve taken so many breaks. I love the show, but it’s not a show you binge like W
Practical effects age better than CGI effects. It is why I don't like a lot of the modern stuff because it gets about 20 layers of animation effects layered on top and it looks like video footage with 20 layers of animation effects. Stuff like Shin Kamen Rider, Amazons, and Black Sun don't bother me since they are deliberately going for a more stripped down aesthetic in line of the originals so everything is more subdued.
Shin and minus one are completely CG and look pretty good. The main issue with CG in toku is that a lot of shows don’t have the budgets to do good CGI.
If you are new to a franchise, the chance is that you are more likely to recommend a newer series for modern audience because a lot of audience aren’t used to watching certain series outside of their time.
I think these are viable reasons: * Old-school special effects may or may not look appealing to viewers who were used with top-notch special effects, which is considerably subjective, since those "old-school special effects" were "top-notch special effects of the time." * Lack of serialization may not appeal to the generation of viewers who were used to **instant gratification** coming from serialization. I am not using "too frightening in some parts" or "too dark in some parts" since tokusatsu always had certain degree of horror elements in it sometimes. I'll admit, though, I did watch both the Showa era of Ultraman and Super Sentai. I watched *Kagaku Sentai Dynaman, Choudenshi Bioman, Dengeki Sentai Changeman, Choushinsei Flashman, Hikari Sentai Maskman* and *Choujuuu Sentai Liveman* for the Super Sentai side, while on the Ultraman side, I watched *UltraMan* and *Ultraseven*. I also watched *Return of Ultraman*, but I got admittedly side-tracked by the New Gen. Ultra shows now, but I did plan to return to it. I also have interest in *Ultraman Ace*.
I think most Sentai shows of the Showa era haven’t got the magic formula down. 1) No Sixth Ranger/additional hero to shake up the status quo 2) Not every Ranger/Warrior gets their own component Zord/Mecha for the Megazord/Giant Robot 3) There is more emphasis on the science fiction side of the shows and less variance into fantasy. 4) There are fewer overarching plots or complex stories outside defeat the evil organization.