Yeah, making the movie plot relevant like that is very... 2010s tokusatsu-coded of them now that I think about it. Doctor Miracle was also pretty great, I totally thought they were going to stick around for more than one episode, what with their onion powered transformation potions and striking appearance seeming like overaching villain material. Talking about Doctor Miracle also reminds me that the episode featured a youth detective squad, a concept the show liked so much that it used it THREE different times with completely unique characters. There is a pair of Toei Fushigi Comedy shows with the same concept too, it must have been a huge fad in Japan in the 70s and 80s!

Pretty much this. While I appreciated how the show had more major arcs compared to its predecessors mostly having standalone episodes, I can't really say what the show is about, beyond what the trilogy is about in general. I think it peaked with Solbrain. Honestly, I don't mind Exceedraft being a lesser version, but the way the plot goes to hell left me with a bad impression, instead of what would've been an okay one.

I actually fairly like the overall design of the Try Jackets, although I wonder how they're supposed to see out of those opaque-looking visors. Sync Redder was a big improvement in that sense. I also winced at that early suit-up scene where Ken slaps his face with the metal gloves. Surely that hurts.

I think the main characters were decent on their own, but yeah, I didn't really feel their dynamic as a team. Looked like there was a hint of rivalry between Hayato and Kosaku, but it didn't go anywhere. Katsuragi got nothing and Ai got screwed by the final arc. They've got nothing on Ryouma, Daiki and Masaki!

You forgot to mention the part where God and Devil use Santa Clauses to fight their proxy war.

Crazy how Miyashita Junichi followed this with Janperson, which we both loved. Blue SWAT could be either high quality or a car crash, I have no idea what to expect from this wildcard writer. I can't even attribute it to being his first time, as the sudden biblical warfare in a rescue police show isn't a sign of poor experience, only poor and deranged narrative.

Speaking of Exceedraft, a young Mamoru Miyano was a guest character in episodes 7 and 8 as a kid. For those not familiar, that's Mr. Ultraman Zero or Deathryuger for Ultra and Sentai fans.

They're really bizarre in the sense that they completely remove the illusion that the suit actor sees out of the visor or "eyes". Even knowing it was probably no worse than any other suits of the era, it still kind of freaked me out to explicitly notice that everything was being viewed through miniscule slits in the helmets!

Yeah, at first I thought the show was really going to lean into internal team conflict as a source of drama for the narrative, which could have made for an interesting alternate sort of appeal compared to Winspector and Solbrain. Totally petered out though. Also you weren't kidding about Katsuragi not being great. I'd barely be registering his presence most of the time.

I don't say this lightly, but I now consider those episodes the new winner of the "most unhinged tokusatsu Christmas story" prize. That is a HIGHLY competitive category!

Even the episodes he did for Winspector and Solbrain were a lot better than what he did for Exceedraft in my opinion. Blue SWAT is one of those shows that almost no one seems to have seen, so yeah, no idea what I'll be getting into when I tackle that one. Ah, the joy and terror of never knowing when a tokusatsu is going to jump you with the greatest or worst thing you've ever seen.

Well, this is not tokusatsu at all, but it’s still related, so I’ll share my impressions here. I watched "The War at Sea from Hawaii to Malaysia" from 1942. That is, the same propaganda film for which Eiji Tsuburaya made miniatures long before Godzilla and Ultraman.
If we talk about impressions, now this film is interesting precisely as a piece of the era. Thanks to him, you can find out what people thought at a critical historical moment, because neither before nor after they would have ever filmed something like this.
Viewers, along with young Tomoda, go from a cadet to a military pilot participating in the attack on Pearl Harbor and the battles near the Malay Archipelago. The scenes with the military are very massive and impressive in scale. It is clear that no expense was spared on the film. Propaganda for the most part manifests itself in the absence of any conflicts. Tomoda gets along well with his peers and with his elders, and his family also fully supports him. Although some of his mother’s phrases and actions can be interpreted in two ways, and it is quite possible that the director dared to put a secret meaning into the film, unnoticed by the censors. Also slightly surprising is the almost complete lack of justification for the war.
Typically, in propaganda films this is the main emphasis: to explain the need for bloodshed as eloquently and as accessiblely as possible. Here it is presented simply as a given. Apparently, by that time the Japanese were already in the mood to conquer the world and they had no need for additional explanations. The enemy in the film is faceless. Only technology and an English-speaking voice on the radio. Most likely this is explained by the lack of European actors, but in the end this only benefited.
If we talk about the technical side, the miniatures are excellent. I understand why they were mistaken for real filming at the time.
Planes fly and drop bombs on ships and buildings. Of course, in my situation, when there is no electricity for 15 hours a day due to the bombing, it doesn’t look very nice, but it’s still worth appreciating good work.
As a result, I can recommend watching this film to those who want to know the origins of Godzilla, as well as those interested in that period. But both as a work of art and as propaganda, the movie is frankly weak. I think that the director and screenwriter clearly did not believe what they were filming.
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/i...MQAv4ucPwnpw&s

As of last night, I have just finished Jiraiya and with it, all of the Metal Heroes of the Showa era in its entirety. It's been a long time coming and as such, here is my ranking list for them all and this is probably the easiest ranking list I've ever done thus far:

The Complete Metal Heroes Rankings (Showa Era Edition)
1. Metalder
2. Spielban
3. Jiraiya
4. Sharivan
5. Gavan
6. Shaider
7. Juspion