How 'niche' is tokusatsu, really?

What's a Power Ranger?

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Written by Cydrixar
Edited by GleamingGarmore
Thumbnail by Ghially
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► History of Kamen Rider

► Retrospectives

[PowerPackers]

It's weird most of my friends that are into the anime fandom that know of Tokusatsu. They see Kamen Rider and Ultraman as "live action anime". But Sentai is seen as just "Japanese Power Rangers".

[Awsomeisimo]

Tokusatsu is one of the rare genres that gatekeeps itself

[kamenrider]

James Gunn actually said he's a Kamen Rider fan and says he believes that there's an audience for the franchise here in America maybe he could help bring it over in some way

[tazzreviews]

With Godzilla, I went to see the theatrical rerelease of Against Mechagodzilla and the theater was PACKED with an audience young and old. And by the end the audience was applauding. It’s safe to say the King of the Monsters has stating power even while still using traditional Toku techniques. And if he can make it, I believe Ultraman and Kamen Rider can too.

[shinrodanreviews]

I love tokusatsu so much that for my college speech class, I did my informative speech on toku. Going from Godzilla to Kamen Rider. And I was genuinely surprised to see how many people like Power Rangers, even now

[IamSimplyYOSH]

Growing up watching Power Rangers as a kid and finding out what anime was I started to get into more Japanese based shows, when I found out that Power Rangers had a counterpart and that it originated in Japan I just knew I should check it out. The rest is history now lol. I have been a Rider/Sentai fan for a lot of years now and haven't looked back. It may be super niche but I am still gonna nerd out about it to my friends who have no clue what I am talking about sometimes xD

[HordikaNate]

It's extremely niche from my perspective but growing, for a lot of people it's difficult to get into it because of the effects "are just men in tights". I had a friend in highschool who knew about Kamen Rider, because of Dragon Knight and my teacher for Precalculus knew about (because he grew up with it) Ultraman, but mostly it's just "yo is that Power Rangers?" but even then it's not always in a negative context

[sir_coma]

I learnt this more recently, but Tsuburaya has ambitions to rival disney some time in the future. Not sure how they will achieve such a feat, but im sure every toku fan is eager to see that ambition realised.

[Vrahno]

Most countries/markets/cultures are so unique that they should be observed individually. I sometimes see fans making generalized statements about large territories like the entirety of Europe but they rarely take into account the massive cultural differences.
Speaking from Hungary, toku never had a chance to become popular because we're such a small, sheltered and stuck-in-the-past country where access to American and Asian media was limited for most of the past century. Official releases of Asian shows or movies are still rare. I think we got two or three Japanese special effect movies in the 80s and about four Power Rangers series between 1995 and 2012. And that's about it, barely anyone remembers them and there is zero mainstream interest for more. Even anime has always struggled to stay afloat here, despite anime having huge fan communities, unlike toku. I know there are few toku fans here, but overall I've seen far more rejection and bitter hate against tokusatsu and toku-inspired media than love. That probably won't change because the more recent media aren't being distributed here either.

[nicoleseraphita]

I'm a recent Ultraman fan, and i absolutely wouldn't have gotten into it without Tsuburayas's youtube channel. It helps that Ultraman Z is a great entry point too.

[Marcosatsu]

Three actual videos in two weeks?? Yes! Having a team of writers and editors has helped so much with ideas I've had for a long long time. I appreciate them so much ❤️

[jingisukhan]

It is niche, but niche that I like. I prefer it to be niche and good, rather then mainstream and boring like MCU

[RobotGooseStudios]

(Long rambling) 10:47 Fun fact about these three shows, they were also aired over here in Australia! My dad recalls my favourite Spectreman airing on ABC in the early 80s and Giant Robo (known as Johnny Sokko and His Flying Robot here) aired on Channel 0 (now Channel 10) from the early-mid 70s possibly all the way up until the 90s. Ambassador Magma (called Space Avenger here which was actually the working name for the US airings) possibly aired from the mid-late 70s, I haven't found out what station yet as my dad doesn't remember it and nor can I find it online, so I plan on contacting some of the stations (ABC, 10, 9) for any information, mainly when it aired and if they have any tapes since the english dub is partially lost. Spectreman was also incredibly popular in both France and Brazil, so popular there was a parody called Léguman, a segment on the French-Belgian puppet show Téléchat in the 80s.

[Animatior-zxct]

New Kamen Rider Fan here! I don't think I would know how or where to even watch Kamen Rider with out the fanbase for it being so informative. It took me some research and time to find it, but I have to thank the community for helping me get into Tokusatsu in the first place.

[kartiksadat]

To give a perspective from India.

India has dubbed every Power Rangers shows from MMPR to Cosmic Fury however the most popular show having the most nostalgia for people is SPD.

We never imported Kamen Rider here.

We had dubs of two other tokushows with them being popular as close to Power Rangers them being Tomica Hero Rescue Force and Madan Senki Ryukendo, both however are hard to find in Hindi dubbing due to it not archived properly.

We also dubbed Big Bad Beetle borgs hers so yeah.

And i believe a show called Justriser was dubbed although i dont remember it.

We are getting dubs of Ultra Man on Youtube officially so thats cool.

[allangarddegriss]

Somewhere between 2006-2008 Madan Senki Ryukendo aired in Puerto Rico in Spanish, on the weekends I think it was. Probably Saturdays.
From what mom says Ultraman also aired in Puerto Rico when she was young.
And I can swear I think they even aired some of Supaidaman at one point during the early 2000's too.

[TheKKVB]

Tokusatsu movies that are not superhero or kaiju related are underrated. The Last War is one of the most grim movies from the Golden Age of Showa Tokusatsu on par with the first 1954 Godzilla movie and has awesome special effects directed by Eiji Tsuburaya.

[garyang]

the kamen rider kabuto dub has lived rent free in my head since childhood

[benjaminmuratore]

One tokusatsu anime I'm surprised you didn't mention was SSSS Gridman, especially when you were talking about the Ultraman franchise.

[animedude]

Not sure if you heard, but Discotek announced that they'll be releasing Kamen Rider Black sometime next year. Not sure if that means anything, but it's cool that other companies are interested in Kamen Rider. Just thought I pass that info along.