Needle Smash

**Needle Smash**(ニードルスマッシュ*Nīdorusumasshu*) is a hedgehog-based Smash from Episode 1 of Kamen Rider Build.

## Personality

The Needle Smash seems to be a silent assassin who will kill anyone whenever they’re alone, but will stop doing his objective when approached by an opponent.

## Appearance

Needle Smash has a slim metal-plated body with a black and gray color-scheme. His legs are entire black with only the lower half of his legs colored white on the front. His upper body is covered with white armor with some areas colored blue. His upper body includes thin fins on the arms, shoulders, and head, sharp claws on the hands, and a head that holds six triangle-shaped holes that act like the face and with a long beak sticking out.

## Biography

10 years after a tragic incident caused by a Martian artifact, called Pandora’s Box, where the nation gets split into three regions by a giant wall, called the Sky Wall, there have been reports in one of the regions, Touto, of citizens being attacked by unidentified lifeforms called Smash. The recent reporting is on a Smash that’s associated with needles, called the Needle Smash. A reporter, named Sawa Takigawa, was interviewing with Gentoku Himuro, the son of the Prime Minister of Touto, about the reports, while showing a poor resolution photo of the Needle Smash, as well as a mysterious hero, named Kamen Rider, saving people from the Smash. Afterwards, during night time, Sawa was making her way back home until she suddenly bumps into someone and then realizes she ran into the Needle Smash. Despite the danger, Sawa tries to take a picture only to get knocked down by the Smash. With Sawa unconscious, the Needle Smash approaches her and prepares to stab her with the blade on his finger tip until he’s suddenly stop by the Kamen Rider, Build. Kamen Rider Build starts fighting Needle Smash with his Drill Crush until he places his Fullbottle into his weapon and performs Vortex Break. Needle Smash charges toward him, but Kamen Rider Build uses his Drill Crusher to strike the Smash’s abdomen, causing him to burst into green flames and falls down, weakened. With the Needle Smash too weak to fight, Kamen Rider Build takes out an empty Fullbottle and uses it to extract the Smash’s essence, reverting him back into a human being.

## Powers/Abilities

**Body Spikes**: Needle Smash is able to summon needle-like spikes from his body. Presumably, he is able to manipulate them as they were seen flying into his body when Sawa runs into him.

**Finger Tip Blade**: Needle Smash is equipped with a long blade on each tip of his index fingers that can inject neurotoxin.

## Trivia

* While Needle Smash bares no real resemblance to his motif, hedgehog, his design was made to hide the motif without directly inserting it in. This was done in order to bring out the unexpectedness of the Harinezumi Fullbottle that was created from his purified essence.
* At first, Shinohara drew the Needle Smash’s design as something that’s like a cyborg with a rather sharp feeling, but, Director Tasaki said, “This is the usual Shinohara Kaijin, so it feels more crazy!”.
* Shinohara struggled with the Needle Smash’s design because he had to stray from the hedgehog motif in order to keep it hidden.
* Shinohara stated that he drew 100 facial patterns for the design and submitted the one with as few lines as possible, saying, “I can’t do it anymore”.
	+ Because of this, Shinohara was disappointed when the Needle Smash was given little screen time.