What with Kamen Rider DCD being such an unexpectedly good show, I’ve been undergoing something of an Ishinomori renaissance lately. To this end I decided to try out the most recent adaptation of The Skull-Man and 009-1. Sadly, despite all their tokusatsu credentials, both opening episodes fail to live up to their creator.
009-1 fairs the better of the two but, at it’s heart, is pretty much Charlie’s Angels (or even Totally Spies) with Ishinomori character designs and out of place fanservice. Of the two shows, it definitely appears to be the better, creating a fairly well rounded and loving homage not only to the source material but the era of the source material and the inspirations that helped fashion it but, for the most, part, there’s only so much standard 60s spy glitz you can take before losing interest.
Skull-Man is a bigger problem, lacking much of the charm of the original character and discarding even the flavour of Shimamoto Kazuhiko‘s 1998 manga reboot. This is perhaps a problem with me as I was expecting something a little more heroic from the flavour of the show, instead the story revolves around a reporter with a dark secret and his wannabe-photographer sidekick as they trudge through a dystopian Metropolis flavoured set up and get nowhere fast. I understand what the writers were trying to do and I realise that maybe even a decisive attempt was being made to emulate the way in which Rintaro and Otomo Katsuhiro’s Metropolis anime adapted the Tezuka manga original but…it just didn’t work for me.
Sadly, despite the obvious best intentions of the shows, I don’t think I’m going to follow either to its conclusion.