Koichi Sakamoto Responds to Episode 19 of the Site's Tokusatsu Podcast

Koichi Sakamoto, lead action director on Power Rangers and director of Mega Monster Battle: Ultra Galaxy Legend the Movie and Kamen Rider W: Forever A to Z the Gaia Memories of Fate, responded after listening to a tokusatsu podcast episode that discussed Kamen Rider W: Forever.

Sakamoto confirmed that a moment in the film, where a helicopter pilot says “Kamen Rider,” was a deliberate inside joke for fans of Kamen Rider Dragon Knight, on which he had also worked. He also addressed a stunt spotted by listeners, Accel performing a move drawn from Power Rangers RPM: since most viewers in Japan had never seen Power Rangers, he said he had worked several of the American series’ stunts into Kamen Rider productions to introduce them to Japanese audiences. He specified that the Accel RPM move appeared once, during Kamen Rider W episode 28, “Invisible,” in a fight involving Accel, Fang, and Weather, and noted separately that Shotaro’s motorcycle-jump move originated in Power Rangers Mystic Force.

At the time, Sakamoto said he was finishing post-production on Kamen Rider W Returns: Accel and Eternal.