How Skyrider Saved Christmas!

With the holiday season nearly upon us, it's as good a time as any to bring up the proud few Christmas-themed Kamen Rider episodes. Just so we're clear on this upfront, I believe in an equal-opportunity most-wonderful-time-of-the-year, but from personal experience I have always celebrated a fairly secular version of Christmas that involves gift-giving and eating a lot, not too far from the version of the holiday celebrated in Japan, where it's basically an excuse for stores to have sales and for people to eat KFC & "Christmas Cake". Also, there's kinda a short supply of Hanukkah/Kwanzaa/etc.-themed Kamen Rider episodes, so we're going to have to make due with what we've got.

So, that said, I'm a sucker for Christmas episodes. There aren't too many among the various Rider series, and of the few that do exist, the actual connection to Christmas is pretty superficial at best. I'd say the original series' Christmas-themed episode (#39, which I'll review at a later date) is probably at the top of the pile, but I also have a strong fondness for, as you probably guessed, Skyrider's holiday outing. I'll get to that in a moment. Aside from these, there's also a two-parter in Kamen Rider V3 (which comes right in the middle of the Riderman Saga, so it's a bit on the gloomier side before the holiday cheer starts up) and a really odd Super-1 episode that pulls double duty by being a "bad dream" episode. Not that the show itself is all a dream, but it involves a Tapir monster that causes people to experience nightmares and- well, it's a long story that I'll get to some other day. Apart from this, pickings are slim, although I recall one of the episodes near the end of Ryuki at least acknowledged that is was Christmas time.

But back to Skyrider. This one qualifies as a Christmas episode pretty much because it takes place on Christmas Eve/Day and involves a monster who inexplicably turns into Santa Claus in the beginning. So start decking the halls for New Kamen Rider episode #12, "The Dark Santa Claus: Aah! Transformation Impossible"

Our story opens on Christmas Eve in Tokyo, where people are out walking, shopping, stumbling home from parties drunk outta their minds, and all that good stuff. Neoshocker gets into the holiday spirit by, what else- kidnapping random people!

And the ringleader this time around is the slimy slug Kaijin, Namekujin. He briefly appears as the creepiest looking Santa ever at the beginning of the show, mostly just to make a "Here is your present!" crack before transforming and blasting two hapless extras with killer ooze. Ho Ho Ho!

Of course, it doesn't take long for our man Tsukuba Hiroshi/Skyrider to get involved. An ongoing trend in New Kamen Rider is that our hero usually makes his first appearance in any given episode by 1) suddenly appearing to stumble on the weekly Neoshocker plot by sheer coincidence or 2) coming into frame already in the process of kicking someone in the head. This time around, it's the former, but Tsukuba still manages to get mixed up in things fairly quickly. A boy named Kimio witnesses his father's abduction, encounters Tsukuba & friends, and you can figure out the rest. Before long, our hero is sneaking into a massive Neoshocker base somewhere under Tokyo, where the majority of this episode will be taking place. He silently takes out a random Aricommando (the Neoshocker henchmen) and plays a little dress-up.

If you get a kick out of seeing the inner workings and daily routines of early Kamen Rider villains (and really, if you don't, you should probably get that checked out), this is a great episode. As Tsukuba sneaks around, he scopes out the base's communications room, training facilities, power center, and command center. We even get to see some nifty little moments like the one above, where the henchmen must swipe in their access cards to enter the base. We also see what kinda grub they give the prisoners (bread and water, natch.) I like little details like this, because it adds to the overall believability of Neoshocker. Well, as believable as they can be, I guess. In any event, it doesn't take long before Tsukuba locates the prisoners (being used by Neoshocker for experimental fodder) including Kimio's dad, and is witness to a gruesome display of Namekujin's power: killer slug thingies that melt people!

Sooner or later, the bad guys figure out something's amiss when guards start turning up unconcious, so they sound the alarms and a manhunt ensues. Tsukuba is eventually cornered and he transforms into Skyrider to kick some butt. General Monster, Skyrider's early episode archnemesis, observes all of this via Evilvision™. Note that Monster has gotten his unexplained power-up by this stage of the series, and makes a point of showing off his robotic claw (complete with creepy sound effects) as seen below.

Skyrider continues to raise hell. Check out the Neoshocker targets painted to look like Skyrider!

Tsukuba, having since reverted back to human form, eventually makes his way to an operation room, where he falls into Namekujin's trap. Well okay, it's more like Namekujin catches him off-guard, blasting his Henshin Belt with sticky slug goo before he can finish transforming, which renders him unable to become Skyrider. I should point out that this is a neat trick that could probably work to disable most of the other Riders; preventing the fan/power source in their belt from spinning or keeping them from inserting the card/cell phone/Zecter/etc.

BLACK (with his King Stone Flash) or any of the none-belt using Riders could probably get around this, but it's a pretty interesting weakness that gets exploited a few other times (Gelshocker once froze Kamen Rider 1's belt fan before he could finish transforming, and V3's got blasted by ink from Ika-Fire, among others.)

There's an amusing bit where Tsukuba attempts to Henshin several times in a row to no avail. Regardless, he still proves he's the man by saving all the prisoners even without being able to transform. Eventually, everybody who's good escapes, but Tsukuba gets attacked by Neoshocker and suffers a serious beat-down. I mean check this out, he gets hit so hard a giant black blob appears on the screen (okay, okay, it's really the Neoshocker henchmen holding him while Namekujin beats him up.)

Actor Murakami Hiroaki is really getting thrown around in these scenes, it's quite impressive. Eventually Neoshocker's goons chuck Tsukuba off of a building, but the intense wind force from the fall, coupled with Namekujin's gunk finally starting to wear off, manages to burn off the ooze and Tsukuba becomes Skyrider!

And it's go time!

So Skyrider kicks a couple heads, defeats Namekujin in a brutal fight, and the Neoshocker base is blown to bits in an explosive montage. I know, in spite of the fact that it was supposedly somewhere under Tokyo, but hey- it's a Christmas miracle! Kimio and his father are reuninted, gets a present from Skyrider (merchandising, ba-by) and everybody's happy.

And to all a good night!