Kamen Rider Zeztz: Following Ultraman To America

Yes, that is a Kamen Rider series trailer in English, except maybe that last word. It is on Toei’s official YouTube channel. Kamen Rider Zeztz is coming in September, but what’s interesting is how Toei is releasing this. The new series is the first attempt by Toei to simulcast one of their shows to the English audience, presumably through that YouTube channel.

Tsuburaya Productions has already been doing this with their Ultraman franchise. (For those of you unfamiliar with Japanese superheroes and just came out of James Gunn’s Superman By James Gunn, it’s not the same guy at all. I’m not even sure he’s accurate to DC’s Ultraman from the comics and the Crime Syndicate of Earth-3.) You can watch it subtitled on their official channel (the newest one is Ultraman Omega as of this writing) and I just found out they created an English channel to watch it dubbed, along with other languages for those of you who don’t speak English…though I’m not sure how you’re reading this if you don’t. Translator, maybe? Anyway, the only way to see it otherwise was wait for Shout Factory to release it as part of their TokuSHOUTsu network, and the same for Kamen Rider. Mills Creek also has Ultraman on home video while Kamen Rider has Shout Factory doing the same. And I am so far behind on both franchises.

Now you’ll be able to watch the show while or just after it airs in Japan. Are they finally waking up…during a Kamen Rider series set in the sleeping world? YouTuber TJ Omega took time off from talking about Transformers to discussing one of his other favorite franchises in this video about Kamen Rider Zeztz, which is tough for me to get my fingers to type correctly, and I have a few thoughts of my own.

I’m guessing it’s Zeztz with the long “e”, because that sounds right for a show about Inception with superheroes. (I find it slightly amusing that Chrome’s spell check is recommending “Zest”, which kind of the opposite and the name of a bar soap that sold itself on waking you up. Also it doesn’t like “spellcheck” as one word.) It is an interesting idea. This allows them to reduce location shooting and film battles in studios where they can better control lighting and layout. Of course this depends on how the dream world is depicted. Previous Riders have gone into memories of the past, mirror worlds without people but a few monsters running around, and other alternate realities, plus almost as many quarries as Doctor Who. The dream world could end up looking a lot like the regular world. We’ll have to see.

It’s the distribution that’s interesting. Go to the Toei YouTube channel now and you’ll see a few old Kamen Rider series, but they only have the first two episodes, the rest marked “hidden”. Shout Factory TV distributes the show on their own streaming service and channels, but also on others like Tubi and Sling, free with ads and subtitles. Now we’re about to get the show for free at the same time as Japan, again presumably, on their YouTube channel as Tsuburaya is doing with Ultraman. Does that mean we’ll get an English dub like Tsuburaya is doing, since the trailer is almost completely in English, or is it just subtitles. And how long will those episodes be up for. TMS Entertainment’s YouTube channel is showing the first two episodes (the first case) of Case Closes/Detective Conan in English, but claiming it’s for a limited time to promote a new movie or that would be this week’s Saturday Night Showcase. Otherwise they actually offer a bunch of shows on that channel. Japan is starting to see the benefit of official YouTube releases instead of only fighting the unofficial (illegal) uploads.

I do wonder how this works with the Shout Factory deal. Will it appear on the TokuSHOUTsu channel, 24/7 streaming channel, and Shout Factory streaming service? Will it go live the same time or will you have to wait for the full series. Will Toei do the same thing with their sentai shows or other “tokusatsu” shows? That’s what I wonder. Will the show remain up after it airs, are they still working with Shout Factory, and will we get an  English dub or just subtitles? I’m okay with subtitles. When I’m ready to catch up with Ultraman I’m going for the dubs as an English speaking person (and their dubs have been pretty good thus far), but if subs are my only option with this series, I can handle that. Channels have you use the closed captions as subtitles on YouTube, and they’ve been on Saturday Night Showcase with that warning. They will be translating into multiple languages, so as long as the quality is good…and to be honest I question their past subtitle work…this should be great. It will give the fantranslators a break, unless they follow TJ’s advice and actually hire them. Shout Factory should.

Meanwhile, Crunchyroll is breaking out a sort of Kamen Rider anime.

It’s just a dude putting on a Kamen Rider mask to fight street punks from the look of it. The Fandom run Kamen Rider Wiki says it’s based on a manga. There have been actual Kamen Rider anime, but if there’s an official English release in any form I’m not currently aware of it.

We’ll learn all our answers (like will it be any good?) when the show drops on Japanese and English speaking territories in September.