Hi fellas, welcome to my first IH proposal, as well as my first ever proposal in any moral scaling wikis (thanks to RubyDoesStuff for adding me to the whitelist). For my first ever proposal, I will propose whom I believe to be the most beloved character from Kamen Rider Ex-Aid, and one of the most beloved KR characters in general. Let me present to you Kuroto Dan/Kamen Rider Genm.
What's The Work?
Kuroto Dan is a major character in Toei's 18th Heisei Kamen Rider season Kamen Rider Ex-Aid, he served as the main antagonist of the first half of the season; in the later half, he served as a major supporting character. In the Another Ending V-Cinext trilogy, he served as the main antagonist again.
Who is He?
He is a delusional talent game designer with a god complex, who was responsible for the protagonist Emu Hojo's bugster virus infection. He later became the CEO of GenmCorp after his father was imprisoned.
What Makes Him Heinous?
When he was young, he was one of the first people to learn about the Bugster Virus. He then later used them to infect on Emu, his rival, because the latter had a better video game idea than his own, eventually turned him into Patient Zero, the first person to be infected with Bugster Virus.
In the events of the series, he started to be an ally to CR, a secret base in a hospital for Doctor Riders to save people from Bugster Virus, but actually, he only used them to gather the data of Bugster Virus, in order to create Kamen Rider Chronicle, a game where people and virus fight till death just to prove his talent. After revealing his true color, he started to be more hostile towards the heroes. The most notable example was the infamous Christmas death of Kiriya Kujo.
After the infamous Christmas incident, he started to fight against multiple Kamen Riders, especially Emu. His jealousy of Emu managing to create his own Gashats started to arise, he conspired with Parado to try to defeat Emu. After his failure, he then exposed the truth to Emu that he was the Patient Zero, making Emu having severe mental breakdown, forcing Parado to turn on him. He was later defeated by Emu when he reached Level 99, causing his death.
Even after being revived by Poppy in the later half of the season to help the heroes, he still kept his madness persona and was known to be uncontrollable. Despite being a useful ally, he was still constantly locked into the game machine due to nobody fully trusting him.
After the series ended, he then returned as the main antagonist in the V-Cinext, escaping from CR headquarters to create his another "ultimate game". One of his act of his plan was creating Black Parado, an evil version of Parado, the deuteragonist of the series in order to take Poppy hostage. He then betrayed his ally Saiko after knowing she was no useful to him anymore. He then created a level 1 billion gashat God Maximum Mighty X in order to execute his ultimate plan.
His final step of the plan was to create Zombie Chronicle, where people have to defeat his clones in order to revive all deceased Bugster patients from dying, but was ultimately defeated by Kiriya. Although it was a good intention from Kuroto to revive deceased patients, he still had his god complex intervening in his mind and the Zombie Chronicle plan of his was way too risky.
Heinous Standard
This season of Kamen Rider mainly involves villains who are either evolved sentient viruses who tried to harm their patients and/or innocent people; as well as the people who were behind it who attempted to spread the disease to various innocent people and cause chaos between humans and viruses. Let's take a look at the major antagonists/villains of the season:
- Parado: while doing many villainous acts in the first few arcs, he was just a kill-the-hero villain at best, especially when he later ultimately redeemed himself and aligned himself with Emu's cause, never betrayed him as well as being Emu's most trusted ally.
- Ren Amagasaki/Lovelica Bugster: While keeping Rider Chronicle in charge, it was still Kuroto's initial idea and he would not do that if the game was not created. He also contributed to Poppy's rogue phase but she was eventually recovered.
- Graphite: He was not really a big bad aside from being Taiga's arch-enemy as well as ruining Taiga's career of being a doctor, and at the end was ultimately defeated by him. He did not leave a big impact to the story aside from being a tough opponent.
Among these major villains, Kuroto definitely stands out for infecting Emu out of spite, infamously killing Kiriya (making them rivals even after becoming an ally in the later half); letting his virus to cause chaos to the people as well as hindering citizens' safety just to satisfy his god wannabe manner and for his own ego. Even after allying with the heroes, he still retained his god complex and kept doing more heinous acts even with noble intentions.
The only character who was arguably more heinous than Kuroto was his own father Masamune Dan, who is the main antagonist of the season, as he has done the similar thing as him but even worse, contributing to the later half's heinous acts. His worst act was arguably forcing Hiiro to work with him while keeping his girlfriend's data hostage; as well as killing her after Hiiro had a change of heart, however, Kuroto's acts were still unique enough and affected large scale so he cannot fail the standard. Another reason why he managed to stand out from his father was that his heinous acts were all done independently on his own, as he has never worked with his father while doing them.
What Makes Him Inconsistent?
Had not for his character arc in the later half and subsequent spin-offs to happen, he would likely be NPE. As the later half and the V-Cinext made him have a change of heart, turning him from a pure egotistical maniac into a well-intentioned anti-villain to stop possible game diseases as well as reviving the deaths he has caused by Bugster Virus. He was also On & Off as he spent half of the series helping the heroes as well as stopping his father from his game disease plans. This make him likely to pass the admirable standard. Some of his most admirable acts were reviving the two allied virus Poppy and Parado from dying as well as spending unrested days (and even his lives, yes, this guy had 99 lives to live after being revived) to develop the invincible gashat Hyper Muteki for Emu to defeat his father.
He was genuinely tragic as when he was young, he was abused by his father Masamune into creating Kamen Rider Chronicle and was also guilt tripped by his father into believing he was the cause of his mother's death. Therefore, his egotistical manner and villainous desire are likely caused by his father's abuse. In addition, his defeat in the V-Cinext was played for sympathy. At the end of the V-Cinext, after getting defeated by Kiriya, he finally found his inner peace and accepted his fate.
While his character arc in the first half was taken entire seriously, the later half made him a comic relief (for good reason) with genuine humorous moments. His humorous godlike complex in the later half was the reason why the Kamen Rider fandom love him so much and was frequently memed.
Verdict
Yes