The SO-DO Archives: SG Zero-One Riser (October 2019)

From the archives of Bandai’s candy toy blog, these are the SO-DO developments that took place during Kamen Rider Zero-One. In this post, the entirety of AI 02 is revealed, ANOTHER 2 is wrapped up, and SO-DO OOO receives a second wave. 

In its first month of September 2019, the Bandai candy toy blog covered SO-DO Kamen Rider Zero-One under the name SG Zero-One Riser, revealing the many changes that the SO-DO line would have going forward. Those posts can be seen here: 01, 02, 03, 04, 05.

Below are the posts from October 2019.

Link: SG Zero-One Riser 06

The reveal for this post is Zero-One’s Flaming Tiger form. Much like previous and future reveals, this features plenty of paint.

A unique feature to Flaming Tiger (and Freezing Bear) is the red hands with a palm detail not included on Zero-One’s other forms. The armor includes fists, open hands, and forward facing palm hands.

For those intending to keep all the hands together, this becomes tricky with 10 hands altogether. At the beginning of SO-DO Zero-One development, Mr. G wondered if there was going to be an increase of alternate hands, so he added a hole in the display stand strut for the sake of adding a new part called the… Wrist Sasser? Sassle? Your guess is as good as mine as to what サセール means. Using this bar, you can attach more hands, allowing for a total of 8 hands to be attached to the stand.

Flaming Tiger serves as the first reveal for AI 02, which will also include the Zero-One body.

Link: SG Zero-One Riser 07

Next up, Vulcan in Punching Kong! Making use of the previous Vulcan body, this includes the white arm and leg for the right side, giving the body a symmetrical look. Even the underside of the gauntlets are colored!

More on those gauntlets. They peg into the hole on the forearm, and allow for enough clearance on the hands to hold the Shotriser and replicate the form’s debut finisher. The Shotriser shown here is from the Shooting Wolf form, and is not included with this armor set.

Punching Kong is included with AI 02, along with a Vulcan body.

Not only that, AI 02 is revealed to be officially titled “SO-DO Kamen Rider Zero-One: AI 02 Feat. SO-DO Kamen Rider Build”! This means there will be an addendum figure for the SO-DO Build series.

And that figure is Kamen Rider Grease Perfect Kingdom, from the V-Cinext special for Kamen Rider Grease!

It was assumed by fans that this figure would be released on Premium Bandai, but it is a retail item. Since AI 02 came out in November, the same month as the DVD and Blu-ray, it made sense to include there.

The figure is black with gold and silver paint, as well as a decent amount of paint for the arms and shoulder armor. There are a fair amount of stickers, however, to get in all the little details.

Included with the form is the dog tags of Grease’s trio of friends. There are two versions, so that they can be held at two different angles. Mr. G provides a funny story about the creation of this accessory, recounting his exchange with Mr. S, the design maker from their manufactuer, Megahouse:

~A long time ago~

Mr. G: “I want to make the dog tags for Grease!”

Mr. S: “Let’s mold it into the fist – there are too many painted parts, and too many parts in general, so if you make them separate parts then the cost will be…”

Mr. G: “No, the customer would wanna change their angle, and I wanna have it for other Grease figures, so it’s a separate part!”

Mr. S: (Thinks about it > Feels resigned > Has an expression of determination)

~Later~

Mr. S: “I’ve made two kinds of dog tag prototypes.”

Mr. G: “Two types?! I can’t decide which one is better…”

Mr. S: “Let’s put both in.”

Mr. G: “Wha?”

Mr. S: “Because it’s SO-DO.” 

Mr. G felt that he could make the dog tags more expressive to make up for the fact that the hands are part of the forearm and thus not movable. He admits to overdoing it with such a small part.

The AI 02 lineup continues to grow as Grease Perfect Kingdom joins Flaming Tiger and Punching Kong.

Mr. D joins the blog to talk about SO-DO Chronicle: SO-DO Kamen Rider OOO. A second wave is announced, COMBO CHANGE 2.

This is another retail release, finishing off the remaining forms from the show. Mr. D explains that while it would be better for this to be a Premium Bandai set, they have listened to everyone’s comments online and have decided to release this wave on retail so that more people can pick it up.

He also clarifies the release format, which becomes more apparent as they proceed with the later reviews of COMBO CHANGE 1; The Combos are split into two boxes, meaning only two boxes are needed to complete one figure, as is the SO-DO standard.

COMBO CHANGE 2 consists of TaJaDor Combo, ShaUTa Combo, and PuToTyra Combo. Photos demonstrate that ShaUTa comes with the whip weapons, PuToTyra has both modes of its weapon, and all of the figures in these two waves are capable of doing the Combo Change gimmick.

And that’s all of the reveals for this post. There is more info on the individual figures of COMBO CHANGE 2, but more recent posts talk about them in more detail, so look forward to that in a later SO-DO Archive posts.

Link: SG Zero-One Riser 08

This post reveals Kamen Rider Valkyrie in her default Rushing Cheetah, adding the show’s female Rider in AI 02. Like previous entries, much of the color is there through paint, though all of the spots are added with stickers.

In the past, Poppy was SO-DO’s first female Rider under SO-DO Ex-Aid, and was a delicate body. Comparatively, while Valkyrie’s body is shorter than Vulcan, she is given a thicker and less delicate body.

Unlike Zero-One and Vulcan, Valkyrie’s armor is not compatible at all with the other figures. The compatibility was seen as a moot point since they made her shorter, and it seemed to be a decision made to maintain the strength of the parts – at this smaller size, they might be more fragile… is what I’m guessing Mr. G is getting at. This crosses into safety rules for toys, which he suggests is a subject more severe than the subject of cost.

Like with Vulcan’s Shooting Wolf form, Rushing Cheetah comes with the Shotriser as a holdable weapon, along with a blank belt buckle.

Valkyrie joins AI 02 with the Rushing Cheetah armor, and of course, her body.

The blog also continues its coverage of SO-DO Gaiden Kamen Rider Zi-O: ANOTHER 2, with the review of Another Double.

Much like the previous Another Rider reveals, this features plentiful use of PVC for safety reasons, so a lot of paint is used with minimal stickers. The notable sticker, just like with the other entries in ANOTHER 2, is the date, in this case 2009 and 2019. This is to represent the Another Riders summoned by Another Zi-O.

Also featured is Another Fourze. Just like with the show, this uses parts of Another Faiz. The figure comes with alternate stickers for 2011 and 2019.

Link: SG Zero-One Riser 09

This post starts with the reveal of Zero-One’s Freezing Bear form.

Though it does feature paint on the head and parts where applicable, most of this armor is clear blue plastic. This replicates the look of the show’s design, where ice armor is formed over Rising Hopper.

In order to replicate the chest design, a sticker must be added to the chest of the Zero-One body, which has the Rising Hopper chest armor printed on it. The alternative would have been to paint it on the inside of the armor, which would not be the ideal. Since SO-DO Zero-One has put emphasis on giving you a body for every armor in the Complete Set, the idea of putting a sticker on the body seems fair.

Mr. G also explains a bit of the difficulty in working with this form:

While there was a precedent for using a lot of clear parts, like Grease and Cross-Z Charge, it is difficult to adopt clear material when it’s not for a power-up form or a rival character – the material cost is considerably high for just an alternate form.

And, more than that, it was difficult to know how clear it was going to be. After adjusting the degree of clearness, based on a design image, I saw the live action suit for the bear form and went “It’s that insanely clear, and transparent, and translucent?!”

Yeah, it was considerably clearer than expected, so I quickly corrected the mold to increase the transparency…

The bear who’s had such twists and turns, check out its beautiful transparent condition in hand!

A notable detail of the form is this sticker for the Rising Hopper face on the sides, which has already been applied for your convenience.

They determined that if you were to remove the front of the helmet to apply it yourself, it would mean that these are small round parts that don’t pass safety standards. It’s another little insight that the blog kindly gives us about toy production and the decisions within.

Much like the Flaming Tiger form, Freezing Bear has unique hands that share its design. The armor comes with the same three types of hands included with Flaming Tiger, as well as a return of the Wrist Sassle to put all of them onto the display stand.

With that, the entirety of AI 02 is revealed: Zero-One in Flaming Tiger and Freezing Bear, Vulcan in Punching Kong, Valkyrie in Rushing Cheetah, and Grease Perfect Kingdom. This wave was released in November 2019. The Complete Set box contains two bodies for Zero-One, allowing both forms to be displayed together.

The blog ends with the reveal of Another OOO, the last figure in ANOTHER 2.

This blog post came on October 27th 2019, making it a full year since the episode of Kamen Rider Zi-O that featured Kuroto Dan as Another OOO. Because of this, the blog declares this blog post is not merely SG Zero-One Riser; It’s King Kuroto Dan 1st Anniversary Article: SKuroto Dan Visor.

Apart from that, it is the same specification as previous reveals; PVC for a lot of parts, paint for the head, but this one features a ton of stickers for the torso. There are also 2010 and 2019 stickers for the date on the back.

Finally, we end on a most joyous Kuroto Dan celebration.

Thus concludes the coverage of SO-DO Gaiden Kamen Rider Zi-O: ANOTHER 2. As of writing this, it is the last time the Another Riders have been given SO-DO treatment, so it is unclear when or if another wave will be released.