Kamen Rider Ex-Aid Cast and Story Revealed at Press Conference

The press conference for the latest Kamen Rider series, Kamen Rider Ex-Aid, took place on August 30th in Japan.

Beginning in October, the latest Kamen Rider series, Kamen Rider Ex-Aid, will air on TV. The series will star Junon Super Boy Contest winner, Hiroki Ijima, as the titular Kamen Rider Ex-Aid, a med student known as Hoso Emu.

This will be the first time a doctor has been a Kamen Rider.

The series celebrates the 45th anniversary of the Kamen Rider series. The story focuses on Kamen Rider Ex-Aid, a young pediatric med student at Seito University Hospital who fights the “Bugstar” game viruses. The Bugstars are able to manifest themselves in the physical world by infecting human on a cellular level.

Under the code name “M”, Emu, a genius gamer, is given the ability to transform into Kamen Rider Ex-Aid by another member of the hospital’s staff. Ishima mentions his favorite Kamen Rider series growing up was Kamen Rider Ryuki.

Ex-Aid’s name is a joining of the words “extreme” and “aid”.

Battles will be showcased in two different scales. Fighting against the Bugstars on the cellular level, Ex-Aid and the other Riders will transform into their super deformed “Level 1” forms before going into their proper Kamen Rider forms to battle the Bugstars at human size.

Additional Kamen Rider characters include Kamen Rider Brave, based on RPG games, and Kamen Rider Snipe, based on shooting games.

Brave’s human identity is Kagami Hiiro, a surgeon at Seito, played by Toshiki Seto. Hiiro sometimes fights with his friends and is considered the tsundere type.

Snipe’s human identity is Hanaya Taiga, a former doctor stripped of his medical license who attacks Emu and Hiiro. played by Matsumoto Ukyo, who played Kishima Hayata in 2015’s Ultraman X.

The heroine character of Kano Asuma, a nurse who becomes the mysterious Poppipipo Papo, is played by Ruka Matsuda.

Other cast members include Tetsuya Iwanaga as Dan Kuroto, president of the Genmu corporation that created the Rider gear in the show; Palad, a Bugstar executive, played by Kai Shoma; Kaami Kaiba, director of the hospital; Kamen Rider Brave’s father, played by Hakata Hanamaru; Hinata Kyutaro, Asuna’s boss and member of the ministry of health, played by Nomura Hironobu; and Kujo Kiriya, an eccentric man who works with Emu and Hiiro. He works at the coroner’s office and enjoys playing tricks on Emu. Kujo is played by Onozuka Hayata.

Series star, Ijima, comments that the idea for this Kamen Rider is novel and rather cute, with this Rider being distinctly non Kamen Rider-like. Feeling it was a challenge to portray such a character at first, Ijima is now fairly confident in his ability to bring this concept to life.

Ijima also hopes Ex-Aid will become the best series in all of Kamen Rider’s history.

Shojiro Nakazawa (Shinkenger, Kamen Rider Wizard, Zyuohger) will direct the series while Tahashi Yuya, chief writer on last year’s Lupin III Part 4, will make his Kamen Rider debut as head writer.

Daichi Miura, who performed the ending song for the anime Parasyte – the maxim-, will perform the opening song, “EXCITE”. Miura commented that he is honored to take part in the 45th anniversary of such a legendary series.

Kamen Rider Ex-Aid begins airing on October 2nd.

Sources: Yahoo! Japan, MyNavi News, ModelPress, Animatetimes