American superhero television series
For the Valley City?Fargo, North Dakota television station that held the KXJB-TV call letters from 1954 to 2014, see
KRDK-TV
.
Kamen Rider: Dragon Knight
is a
science fiction
superhero
television series
that originally aired on
The CW
, from December 13, 2008 to December 26, 2009 in the United States. It is an adaptation of the Japanese
tokusatsu
series
Kamen Rider Ryuki
and is the second American adaptation of the
Kamen Rider
franchise after
Saban's
Masked Rider
(1995). The series was developed for television by
Power Rangers
alumni
Steve
and Michael Wang and produced by Jimmy Sprague via
Adness Entertainment
.
The series had a sneak premiere on December 13, before its official premiere the following year on January 3, 2009.
[4]
The series was dropped at the end of the year before its final two episodes aired. The final episodes were made available to watch on
The CW
website from December 18, 2009 until the series was removed in 2012.
[5]
In 2010,
Dragon Knight
was nominated for
[6]
and won
[7]
[8]
the
Daytime Emmy Award
for "Outstanding Stunt Coordination", a category introduced to the Daytime Emmys that year.
Plot
[
edit
]
While searching for his missing father, Kit Taylor finds an Advent Deck?a special card deck that allows the carrier to transform into a Kamen Rider and utilize unique weapons and powers?and uses it to become Kamen Rider Dragon Knight. He butts heads with Len, who serves as Kamen Rider Wing Knight, but the pair join forces after Kit learns that an alien warlord named Xaviax is responsible for his father's disappearance and intends on abducting him and the entire human race to gain power and rebuild Xaviax's homeworld. Xaviax tricks people on Earth into working for him by promising them whatever they want, or in some cases, by exploiting their fears and desperation. Kit wonders why Xaviax has to trick them and why he doesn't just find bad guys to do the work for him. Len tells Kit that the decks were only made for one person and that only a person with an exact DNA match to the original Ventaran rider could use it. This is why Kit can use the Dragon Knight Deck: he is the exact Mirror Twin of Adam, the original Dragon Knight, who betrayed the original team. One of the new Earth Riders, Chris Ramirez (serving as Kamen Rider Sting and tricked by Xaviax into believing he is working in a special ops government program to fight alien invaders), joins forces with Kit and Len when he discovers he has been deceived but is Vented?a process which traps defeated Riders in the "Advent Void" between dimensions forever and removes their Advent Decks?along the way. Kit vents Albert Cho, brother of Danny Cho, in retaliation. This leads to a personal hatred between Danny and Kit, as Danny seeks to avenge his brother against Xaviax's orders.
Later, Kase, a fellow survivor of Ventara like Len, joins forces with Len and Kit to fight Xaviax. In addition to training Kit as a Kamen Rider, Len and Kase tell Kit all about the twelve Riders who banded together as the protectors of Ventara?a world opposite to our own?to take Xaviax down. However, due to the unintentionally?traitorous actions of Kit's predecessor, Adam, Xaviax vented most of the Riders. Furthermore, Xaviax continues to send out Riders who fight to eliminate Kit, Len, and the other Riders who oppose him. After Kit is Vented, Xaviax recruits Adam to once again become Dragon Knight. Unlike when Xaviax convinced Adam to 'betray' the Riders by playing to his desire to remain with the girl he loved, Xaviax now uses a combination of blackmail and using Adam's girlfriend as a hostage to force Adam to work for him.
Meanwhile, Len uses his Advent Deck to awaken the Advent Master Eubulon?who brings back the Ventaran Kamen Riders from the Advent Void?and Kit, who becomes Kamen Rider Onyx. He also brings back Kase, though Eubulon is forced to briefly reassign the Advent Deck to Maya Young while Kase is trapped in the Advent Void. Once Kase is better, Maya gives back the deck, and the Riders head for Xaviax's base to destroy him. In the end, all the Ventaran Riders regain their decks, while all the Earth Riders (except Kit) have been released from the Advent Void & have their memories erased and returned to their normal lives, leaving Kit as the true owner of the Dragon deck after the previous owner Adam retires his deck thus officially becoming Kamen Rider Dragon Knight & the only active Earth Kamen Rider, leaving the Onyx deck inactive. But as the remnants of Xaviax's army and other dangers continue to threaten Ventara & Earth, Kit, along with Len, Kase and the other riders continue to protect both planets.
[9]
Episodes
[
edit
]
Cast
[
edit
]
- Stephen Lunsford
as Kit Taylor, Adam / Dragon Knight
- Matt Mullins
as Len / Wing Knight
- Aria Alistar
as Maya Young
- William O'Leary
as Xaviax
- Marisa Lauren as Lacey Sheridan
- Taylor Emerson as Trent Moseley
- Kathy Christopherson as Michelle Walsh
- Carrie Reichenbach as Kase / Siren
- Tony Moras as Richie Preston, Ian / Incisor
- Christopher Foley as Drew Lansing, Chance / Torque
- Christopher Babers as Grant Staley, Van / Camo
- Scott Bailey
as James "JTC" Trademore, Price / Strike
- Keith Stone as Brad Barrett, Cameron / Thrust
- Michael Cardelle as Chris Ramirez, Quinn / Sting
- Mike Moh
as Danny Cho, Hunt / Axe
- Tony Sano
as Albert Cho, Chase / Spear
- Mark Cameron Wystrach
(of the country band
Midland
) as Vic Frasier, Nolan / Wrath
- Jeff Davis (aka Jf Davis) as Frank Taylor
- James Patterson as Detective Grimes
- Jamison Jones
as Agent Phillips
- Mark Dacascos
as Eubulon
- Camila Greenberg as Sarah
Guest stars
[
edit
]
Guest stars featured
Kathleen Gati
as Kit's foster mother,
Victoria Jackson
as Aunt Grace,
Camila Mendes
as Rachel, and
T. J. Storm
as Grant's master.
Production
[
edit
]
Development
[
edit
]
In July 2006, producer Aki Komine received special permission from
Toei
to produce a pre-show pilot for an American production of
Kamen Rider
. Komine approached filmmaker and long-time Kamen Rider fan
Steve Wang
and his brother Michael Wang to help develop, write, and direct a pre-show pilot. Komine subsequently obtained the rights after Toei was pleased with the pre-show pilot. The show then received independent financing from Komine and his partner Fumio Sebata.
[10]
According to early licensing information for the series, Adness Entertainment had intended to also film a feature-length movie for
Dragon Knight
.
[11]
In an interview, Steve Wang stated that they had written a story for a film, but that Adness was now raising money to bring over another Kamen Rider for broadcast in the US rather than a film or a second season of
Dragon Knight
.
[12]
Writing
[
edit
]
Komine chose to adapt
Kamen Rider Ryuki
for merchandising purposes due to the amount of reoccurring characters and monsters the show had, including a female Rider.
[13]
Steve employed his brother Michael and long-time friend
Nathan Long
to write the show. Long and the Wang brothers wrote the story and structure of the show to connect with the action/effects footage of
Kamen Rider Ryuki
, a technique done in previous Americanizations such as
Godzilla, King of the Monsters!
,
Power Rangers
and
Saban's
Masked Rider
. Some key elements and minor characteristic traits from
Kamen Rider Ryuki
were kept but other elements had to be remade to meet the standards and practices for American children's programming.
Bandai
initially pushed the filmmakers to aim the show for five-year-old children but Steve wished to aim the show towards a young adult audience.
[10]
Title
[
edit
]
Toei had officially marketed the Kamen Rider franchise as "
Masked Rider
" for foreign markets.
[14]
(It stopped using the
Masked Rider
brand for foreign exports since the release of
Kamen Rider W
.) However, Wang convinced Toei to keep the title of the show as
Kamen Rider
instead of
Masked Rider
, stating, "Growing up, I never watched 'Masked Rider'... it was always KAMEN RIDER and seeing it called 'Masked' always felt strange. I'm just not a fan of using descriptions to name a character such as 'Masked'. That's like calling Darth Vader 'Armored Sith Lord'. It's silly to me."
[10]
This decision was also made to distance the series with Saban's earlier
Masked Rider
TV series (an adaptation of
Kamen Rider Black RX
).
Filming
[
edit
]
Akihiro "Yuji" Noguchi choreographed the action sequences of the show. Due to the show using a majority of the action/effects footage of
Kamen Rider Ryuki
, pre-planning was established so that the new footage matched the backgrounds and stunts of the Japanese footage however, the crew shot a majority of new footage to use less of the Japanese footage on some episodes. The suits for the Kamen Riders and monsters were re-fabricated and sent by Toei. The costume department was always on-set to have the suits camera-ready due to taking "abuse" not only from the American production but the previous Japanese production. The suit for General Xaviax was the only original design from the American production, designed by Steve Wang.
[15]
International broadcasts
[
edit
]
Dragon Knight
was shown in Brazil on
Rede Globo
during its
TV Globinho
programming block before being replaced by a re-run of
Dragon Ball
in September 2009
[16]
(due to the early and daily exhibition); Brazil's
Cartoon Network
was then the only venue airing the show until it came back to TV Globinho as a part of its Saturday Morning timeblock in January, 2010. The show was aired in Mexico on
Televisa
[17]
and in
Peru
on
Global Television
. It also aired in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and
Liechtenstein
on
RTL II
.
[18]
but RTL II cancelled the show after 17 episodes due to low ratings.
[19]
The dubbed version of the series also aired on
Indonesian
's free-to-air TV channel
Indosiar
on Sunday mornings at 6:00 am (UTC+07:00). There were plans in 2009 to air the series in
Colombia
on
Caracol TV
,
[20]
in Italy on
Mediaset
,
[21]
[22]
in Latin America on
Cartoon Network
,
[23]
and on other Cartoon Network affiliates in
Southeast Asia
, the
Philippines
,
India
,
Pakistan
, and
Australia
.
[24]
[25]
On the Australian digital free-to-air channel
9Go!
the show airs on Tuesday mornings at 7:30 am.
[26]
It was also broadcast in Japan on Toei's satellite subscription channel Toei Channel in the fall of 2009 as part of the Heisei Kamen Rider series 10th Anniversary project.
[27]
Voice actors brought onto the project include
Tatsuhisa Suzuki
as Kit/Kamen Rider Dragon Knight,
Hiroki Takahashi
as Richie Preston/Kamen Rider Incisor,
Hiroshi Kamiya
as Chris Ramirez/Kamen Rider Sting,
Hideo Ishikawa
as Vic Frasier/Kamen Rider Wrath and
Takahiro Sakurai
as Danny Cho/Kamen Rider Axe. The dub was then aired again on
TV Asahi
in 2010.
Previous actors from the
Kamen Rider
franchise who lend their voices to the cast include:
On
TV Asahi
affiliate broadcasts of the Japanese-dubbed
Dragon Knight
, the song "
Dive into the Mirror
" by
defspiral
, is used as the opening theme. The group also performed as Wilma-Sidr for
Kamen Rider W
. The song "ANOTHER WORLD", sung by
Tatsuhisa Suzuki
and Satoshi Matsuda under the pseudonym "Kit×Len", was used as the ending theme.
International DVD releases
[
edit
]
In addition to airing outside the United States,
Kamen Rider: Dragon Knight
is available on DVD in certain countries. In Brazil, 13 DVD Volumes containing all 40 episodes were released by
PlayArte
Home Video even though their site only lists the first two.
[28]
[29]
In Germany, "Season 1 ? Vol. 1" and "Season 1 ? Vol. 2" were released on DVD by
EuroVideo
and m4e (Made For Entertainment) in February 2010,
[30]
[31]
[32]
but no other volumes were released due to the show's cancellation over there. On July 21, 2010, Toei released the first DVD box set of
Kamen Rider: Dragon Knight
containing the first 20 episodes along with a DVD release of a Special Event that took place in January 2010 in Japan. Throughout the summer of that year, Toei released 10 DVD Volumes of all 40 episodes as well as a second box set with the last 20.
[33]
In most parts of Asia, 10 DVD Volumes and 2 DVD box sets of all 40 episodes were released by
Medialink
.
[34]
There are no current plans to release
Dragon Knight
in the United States, despite the release of several of the Japanese Rider series, including
Kamen Rider Ryuki
, the series from which
Dragon Knight
draws its footage, on Blu-Ray in the US.
Novel
[
edit
]
A sequel novel titled
Kamen Rider Dragon Knight: 2WORLDS 1HEARTS
was released exclusively in Japan on September 16, 2010.
[35]
Taking place a year after the main series, it introduces Len's Earth counterpart, Brian Mace, and the novel's main antagonist, David Stuart.
Video games
[
edit
]
2009 video game
A
fighting game
based on the series was released for the
Nintendo DS
and
Wii
platforms by
D3 Publisher
on November 17, 2009.
Nintendo DS version
[
edit
]
The Nintendo DS version of the game was developed by
Natsume Co., Ltd.
The player uses Advent Cards to perform special attacks based on how much the Advent Gauge is filled up, with the Final Vent being used when all three bars are full. The Advent Gauge is charged by touching and holding the Rider until all three bars are full. The player must select two different cards before each battle, with Final Vent, the Rider's Contract Beast, and the Rider's primary weapon (sword vent or strike vent, etc.) automatically in each Rider's deck. Contrary to the show, the cards Copy Vent, Steal Vent, Freeze Vent, Confine Vent, and Strange Vent can all be used by any character.
The game's "Ventara Mode" is a series of missions where the player must fight Advent Beasts and other Riders, with a chance of unlocking them (as well as more Advent Cards) in a certain mission. Xaviax is the final boss for all players except Wrath, who fights Dragon Knight as the final boss due to Wrath being possessed by Xaviax as in the show, and defeating Xaviax yields a different game ending for each of the playable Riders. Xaviax himself becomes a playable character in "Duel Mode" and "Advent Master Mode" (an arcade-style mode) once all 13 Riders are unlocked and the player has defeated every mission (including defeating Xaviax himself) available in the "Ventara Mode" for each Rider. In addition to the 13 Riders and Xaviax, twelve of Xaviax's assorted monsters from the show can be used as playable characters in the "Duel Mode".
Despite being a fighting game, it only supports single player.
Wii version
[
edit
]
The Wii version was developed by
Eighting
and uses a modified engine based on
Kamen Rider: Climax Heroes
for the
PlayStation 2
, which was also developed by Eighting. The two games use the same stages and music. Similarly, Dragon Knight and Onyx's character models were recycled from
Ryuki
and
Ryuga
's character models. Play mechanics for
Dragon Knight
, however, were changed significantly. The Rider Gauge (now Advent Gauge) does not charge and can only be filled by attacking the opponent without special attacks. Depending on how much the Advent Gauge is filled up, the player can perform special attacks by using an Advent Card, with the Final Vent being used when the gauge is full. The player can select any Advent Card before each fight. Contrary to the show, each Rider has access to the Advent Cards "Confine Vent," and "Return Vent," which- respectively- disable an opponent's card and counteract the effects of Confine Vent. Each Rider is allowed to have Six Advent cards at once and while their advent beast is always available the others can only be used once per round. The regular advent and Final Vent are always in a player's arsenal and cannot be removed.
Unlike the DS version, the player can only unlock both Dragon Knight and Wing Knight's survive mode in "Mirror World" mode while the rest of the Riders have to be unlocked in Arcade Mode. Xaviax is only a non-playable boss in both Mirror World and Arcade Mode. If the game is played with Wrath, who is possessed by Xaviax, the player faces Dragon Knight in Mirror World and Onyx in Arcade mode.
The game's "Mirror World" mode is a feature not in
Climax Heroes
and is a series of missions where the player not only fights against other Riders in one-on-one battles, but also defeats foot soldiers in
beat 'em up
-like stages, which were not featured in the
Climax Heroes
series until
Climax Heroes OOO
for the
PSP
and Wii, with more stages and
kaijins
. As the player progress, not only is he able to use other Riders, but he gains Rider Points to buy more Advent Cards in Card Mode.
Unlike the single player-only DS version, the Wii release supports up to two players.
References
[
edit
]
- ^
"Cage9 ? Bio"
. Archived from
the original
on March 24, 2014
. Retrieved
March 6,
2012
.
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"FACTOID"
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on July 13, 2011
. Retrieved
February 14,
2009
.
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. Archived from
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on June 12, 2008
. Retrieved
June 11,
2008
.
- ^
"
'Kamen Rider Dragon Knight comes to CW at the beginning of the New Year"
. Retrieved
November 17,
2008
.
- ^
"
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. December 12, 2009. Archived from
the original
on December 15, 2009
. Retrieved
December 12,
2009
.
- ^
"NOMINATIONS: 37th Annual Daytime Emmy Awards"
. May 12, 2010
. Retrieved
May 12,
2010
.
- ^
"WINNERS: Daytime Entertainment Creative Arts Emmy Awards (won for Outstanding Stunt Coordination)"
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. Retrieved
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2010
.
- ^
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2010
.
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.
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. Archived from
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on November 27, 2009
. Retrieved
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2009
.
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a
b
c
Johnson, Bob.
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.
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. Retrieved
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.
- ^
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. Archived from
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on September 28, 2007
. Retrieved
June 19,
2007
.
- ^
"Steve Wang interview of Way Above Top Secret"
. January 4, 2010. Archived from
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on March 4, 2012
. Retrieved
April 2,
2010
.
- ^
"?面ライダ?が米?で製作中 新たな"ク?ル·ジャパン"? ? 日?トレンディネット"
. Retrieved
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2008
.
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.
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. Archived from
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on December 28, 2015
. Retrieved
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2014
.
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.
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. Retrieved
November 17,
2014
.
- ^
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.
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. Retrieved
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2009
.
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.
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. Retrieved
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2009
.
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.
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.
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"
.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
External links
[
edit
]
- Official
- Interviews
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Media
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Universe
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Related media
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Sh?wa era
series
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Heisei era
series
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Reiwa era
series
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TVSP
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Original films
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Video games
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Manga and light novels
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Other media
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American series
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See also
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