Anime Review: Tanzaburou Toujima Wants to Be a Kamen Rider
First, let’s talk about Kamen Rider. It’s a children’s superhero television show that started airing in 1971 in Japan. In it, the evil organization Shocker, founded by surviving Nazis and their collaborators, wants to take over the world. To do so, they used cybernetic and mutagenic enhancement to create Combatmen (gender neutral term for their cannon fodder) and Kaijin, animal/human hybrid monsters. They abducted college student and motorcycle racer Takeshi Hongo, intending to turn him into an improved cyborg henchman.
However, Shocker failed to complete their brainwashing before the cyberization process was finished, and Takeshi turned against Shocker, becoming the masked hero Kamen Rider. Due to casting issues, Takeshi was soon joined/replaced with a second Kamen Rider, and they finally defeated the initial version of Shocker. The show was extremely successful and influential in Japan, spawning many sequels and remakes, and becoming a merchandising juggernaut.
Tanzaburou Toujima became a fan of Kamen Rider as a young and impressionable age. Like many children, he wanted to be the hero he saw on screen. Unlike most fans, this desire never went away. Since Shocker didn’t exist in real life, so he wasn’t getting turned into a cyborg any time soon, Toujima started putting himself through intense physical training and devoting himself to the sort of moral code he believed a Kamen Rider should uphold.
Sadly, this got him a reputation as a weirdo at school, and he grew up basically a friendless loner. Despite his rugged good looks and studly body, he was never able to connect with a woman who understood his dreams. By age forty, Toujima is a skilled construction worker and able to take on a bear with his bare hands, but desperately lonely. He decides to sell his pristine Kamen Rider collection as he realizes that if he died, the landlord would just toss it all in a dumpster. He still very much wants to be Kamen Rider, but reality says otherwise.
Until the day Toujima is visiting a festival and to his surprise people dressed up as Shocker Combatmen try to shake down a takoyaki stand. Toujima buys a Kamen Rider mask from a nearby vendor, uses it to henshin (transform) into Kamen Rider, and kicks their butts, crying with joy for the opportunity.
This proves to be an irritation for high school teacher Yuriko Okada. It turns out that she has been preparing for years to debut as “Electro-Wave Human Tackle II”, successor to Tackle, the first effective female hero in the KR franchise, who debuted and alas died in Kamen Rider Stronger. And this guy in the laziest of costumes beat her to it!
By coincidence, she is present at the next “Shocker” robbery, and clashes with Toujima. And then when they meet again, it is revealed that somehow, Shocker is real, complete with actual Combatmen and Kaijin! And Shocker is not impressed with the fools who’ve been impersonating them.
Stunned by this revelation, Toujima and Okada regroup in a local diner–only to discover that the owner, Mitsuba Shimamura, is already aware that Shocker exists, and has his own tragic backstory involving them. He promises to get in touch with his brother Ichiro, who will certainly want to know about this.
But the Shocker threat is closer than they think, because waitress Yukarisu (no family name given) is actually a Shocker Combatman sent to spy on Mitsuba!
This 2025 anime is based on a 2018 manga of the same name by Yokusaru Shibata, who also created Air Master (this becomes important later.) It’s a love letter to the Showa Era seasons of Kamen Rider.
Good: There’re some great action sequences. The characters have different combat styles so there’s a variety of fight scenes. While Tojima is clearly the protagonist, he’s not necessarily the most skilled fighter on the hero side.
The story takes its time to flesh out supporting characters, such as the Yakuza thug behind the fake Shocker robberies (turns out he’s also a big Kamen Rider fan, but due to his tragic backstory became a villain supporter) and even the kaijin.
Despite some fanservice issues, female characters are generally depicted as equally competent to the male ones in their own fields of expertise. Okay, Yukarisu is a bit out of her depth because she apparently was not a skilled fighter before becoming a Shocker Combatman and the strength of Combatmen is directly proportionate to how tough they are as normal humans. But even she can handle weaker Combatmen.
Less good: There’s an awful lot of male-oriented fanservice, with all the plot-important female characters having big breasts that are shown off often, and underwear shots every so often. In fairness, we do get shirtless guys as well.
Shocker doesn’t seem to have an actual plan or organization beyond “take over the world.” Most of the Combatmen are sleeper agents holding down ordinary jobs until called upon, and they have a nasty habit of breaking their brainwashing if exposed to love. The kaijin don’t seem to have bosses as such, just wandering around doing their own thing to “take over the world.” Presumably there is something going on behind the scenes, but don’t expect any answers in this first season.
This series also turns out to be a stealth sequel to the author’s other manga stories, so some references and characters won’t be clear to viewers just tuning in for this one.
Content note: Lots of violence, sometimes gory or lethal. Fanservice, as mentioned. It’s strongly implied that Bat Man takes advantage of his brainwashed female followers in more than one way. A bit of fat-shaming in-universe, though the narrative is clearly on the character’s side. Bullying is depicted as part of some characters’ backstory. Older teens should be okay.
Much like Samurai Flamenco or Bravern, this is a story about fiction suddenly becoming “real” in a somewhat realistic world. The mystery elements are a bit irritating, but if you don’t mind a lack of explanation just yet, this is a fun first season. (The manga is ongoing.) Recommended to fans of Kamen Rider and/or wish fulfillment.
