So, yeah, the second episode was fantastic! R/B's on a roll so far and is a much needed improvement over Geed's lacking quality.

I love the chemistry between not just the two brothers, but all three siblings. I was a little worried that, although they're a family, Asahi would be just another character. Her devotion to her brothers and the effort she put in to help Isami out in the face of danger was super refreshing to watch. Dad's also amusing to watch, kinda dopey and I can't help but feel that he's hiding something. Love that we're already seeing a bit of mystery beyond "who's summoning the monsters?" with the crystals being in the parents' journal.

I'm at the point where I don't want Aizen to be the villain. Kinda hoping he's a big ol' red herring. His positive energy is actually pretty infectious and the actor nails every scene he's in. (I'd also like the poor reporter interviewing him to become a running gag haha) His intro while he looked at the wrong camera had me laughing.

And we finally got a battle in the city this time! I was wondering how the action team would pull off using multiple Ultras in fight scenes regularly but they've done a good job thus far. There's a lot of personality in these fights and it's neat to see the brothers figure out which powers work best for them. Training scene at the start was cool too. Sometimes you sorta forget how easy it would be for them to destroy something if they're not careful, like we saw with Isami and that bridge.

One thing I'd like a little more is some definition on Isami's character. The first episode portrayed him as this sort of spacey guy in his own world while here he's more easily agitated. Katsumi's been great so far though. Looking forward to see the three siblings visit Eizentech next week!

R/B subs
https://twitter.com/ColorSubs/status...594387968?s=19

Nice. I was hoping they would do this.

Geed lacked quality? What?! Geed was great, Ultraman was a toku fan, that was so cool.

And Zero (and Salary Man Zero) were great.


Anyway, R/B has been fun so far. It's fun watching them learn their powers.

I know I'm in the minority, but yeah, I didn't enjoy Geed. I like the concepts for Riku and Raiha, and I loved Reito and Pega, but that was really about it. I felt the show underused the idea that Riku was Belial's son (it didn't matter unless it was about Belial making a move really), I hated Moa as a character and Zena was pretty boring. Basically, Geed was a lot of wasted potential to me.

But yeah, this is all a deeper discussion for another thread haha.

https://i.imgur.com/gf7B1zB.gif

oh my heart!

https://i.imgur.com/0o1kyjk.png

This show is growing on me about as quickly as I expected. The second episode was great. R/B so far is very fresh and very fun. Not only did they nail Katsumi and Isami's dynamic right away, which was the single most important thing to get right, but the upbeat tone is hitting a really nice balance of goofiness and drama so far. Kamen Rider might want to take some notes. :p

EDIT: Oh, one other thing. I find it hilarious that in the Crystal Navi bits at the end, they specifically call out Taro's fire-themed Ultra Dynamite attack, but when talking about Ginga they just leave it at him having "various techniques". Almost like they're trying to dance around none of Ginga's literal rainbow of special moves having anything to do with water...

I'm having some issues with the overall pacing of the show, but it is growing on me.

I knew the missing Mother/Wife was going to be a mystery related to Ultraman but I'm surprised it popped up in the second episode.

Episode 3 subs
https://twitter.com/ColorSubs/status...25958843777024

Episode 3 was super fun. Really like the Minato brothers dynamic both in and out of combat.

The interaction between the brothers is one of the high points of the show so far. I have two siblings myself and everything about how they act, the bickering, the way the back each other up, it all rings very true.

I am getting tired of all the power up and form beings based on past Ultraman characters. This is the fourth season in a row to do this.

I'm enjoying this show a lot so far! The brothers figuring out "how do i ultraman" is a fun dynamic.

Episode 3 was good, although it felt shockingly light on actual events. I honestly thought the end of the fight scene was only the middle of the episode right up until the credits starting rolling. :lol

We get a single info-dump, and a quick surprise villain reveal and that's basically it for substantial development . I'm not necessarily complaining, but it just struck me as odd. Still, Aizen's a lot of fun. It remains to be seen how his character will really pan out, but for now he manages to pull off being eccentric without coming off as annoying, which isn't easy.

I'm enjoying it in a very lighthearted way. It's not really grabbing me like Geed or some of the other Ultras have, (Mebius, 80, Max, Zero)…

It feels a bit by the numbers but it's amusing to watch.

I swear it feels like the, 'and now we'll show off the toys' part takes up like 1/4 of the episode, like the Ultraman Henshin scenes keep getting longer and longer with each new series.

But whatever,..giants fighting and smashing buildings is fun to watch. I really don't expect any gritty Kamen Rider'esque drama out of Ultraman shows. ...though it's great when it does actually happen every few seasons.

So in the last scene of episode 3, the hat guy is the most likely to become Ultraman Orb Dark. He even dressed like Gai!

I really hope there would be an explanation as to why there is an Ultraman Orb Dark though.

The hat guy is Ultraman Blu's suit actor. I think Aizen is maybe just kidnapping people.

I really liked episode 3. I was honestly a little disappointed when the monster showed up because I was really enjoying the backstory development. It was nice to see that my hunch about the goofy dude was on the money: I knew he was the bad guy.

So in the 4th episode we finally get to see the brothers actually transforming separately for the first time, meaning that they can fight alone after all (because IIRC I saw somewhere stated that Rosso and Blue can only be activated at once).

I kinda got a feeling that maybe there will be an arc where the two bros are separated and have to fight monsters in different location. That would be a cool story arc.

Argh I'm waiting for Genmcorp to upload an SD version of episode 4.

I grabbed it (reluctantly) off of kissasian.ch

..because I didn't see it anywhere else.

Color Timer Subs posts download links on their Twitter page.

cool, bookmarked. Thank you.

Episode 4 was great. I'm loving R/B more and more each week, and the down-to-earth baseball plot here caused me to have the revelation that R/B's light tone, comedy, and general heartfelt flavor make it something of a successor to Ginga's first season. Just, you know, with an actual budget this time. I adore Ginga, so this only further endears me to R/B.

Hey, Fishy Sandwich, would you say Ginga's worth a shot? I've never heard anyone praise it, so this piques my interest.

___

Also, to everybody, would you all say R/B's worth trying out? I'm curious. Is the story good so far? Are the transformations 5 minutes long? And what of the action/CGI?

They are upping the ante for the action fights in R/B. The up close fighting from Isami's POV was great this episode 5.

Also Aizen whistling Gai's theme at the end and the appearance of the Dark Orb crystal.... :D :D :D

Ginga's honestly not a show I can wholeheartedly recommend. It has boatloads of heart, which is why I love it, but even beyond the special effects it's got quite a few problems. It was made at a weird time for the franchise and you can tell they needed some time to get back into the swing of things. It's not a truly awful show or anything, but you have to be willing to meet it halfway for it to be a worthwhile watch.

I also have serious reservations about telling anyone to watch Ginga when the official subs on Crunchyroll are so awful.

R/B, though, is something I'd recommend without hesitation. The overarching "story" so far is just a couple mysteries building up in the background, so there's not much to say on that front, but the stock footage is no worse than your average Super Sentai series, and just like every Ultraman since X, the production values for the action are top notch, so there's nothing to worry about there.

At least at the moment, it's a very fun show.

Yeah, X feels like the show where Tsuburaya fully got its groove back completely.

Okay! I'll try giving R/B a shot! :D

Thanks!!

Just watched it and baseball plot was surprising full of heart and very real and down to earth while still not feeling like it didn't belong or anything. I realized while watching that this is something that Ultraman, during it's better seasons anyway, does better than the other major toku franchises. It's show about giant alien superheros but still manages to nail some very down to earth moments. The fact that this episode does this so well is enough to mark this as a good Ultraman show, I think.

Very true. The best Ultraman series are about the people, and not always so much about the Giants and Kaijus.

...If you've seen Ultraman 80, and then watch episode 41 of Ultraman Mebius,....a Ninja will sneak into your house and cut onions. **Fact!!**

...not a lot of Toku shows have a sneaky Ninja. :)

I had not seen Ultraman 80 and the ninjas still got me. It helped that I had been an elementary school teacher at some point, but it's really a near universal thing it addresses. Which again, is what Ultraman is good at addressing.

I also think of that Orb episode with the retired villain. Age and things changing and eras ending whether you want them to or not and things not being as you remember are universal, down to earth things, even if most of us are world conquering supervillains.

yeah I was a music teacher. Ninja got me too. Made my chest tight and made me think about my past students.

"Toku has Heart!"

Just finished the Baseball episode. Yep, right in the feels.

Just watched episode 5. Why am I already shipping Isami and Ninomiya.

Even Katsumi and Asahi think so too.... :D :D :D

Still not clear on what motive Makoto Aizen has for summoning the crystal kaijin though.

Aizen is obviously an Orb fanboy who wants to become like Gai. Maybe Aizen and mama Minato once met Gai before Aizen and wanted Gai to work for him but got turned down so now he did something that cause Gai and mama Minato go missing. Now he's using the brothers to collect the Ultra Crystals for him, then he will later reclaim those crystals and make himself the new Orb

I must say, I low-key hated the very light-hearted and generic tone of this show at first, especially after such strong iterations in the franchise as Geed and Orb, but 5 episodes in... I kinda love it.

Like, the characters are so much flatter and boring than what we had before, but it’s still fun. And the action scenes - dear god, Tsuburaya Productions cannot be stopped. This stuff looks so gorgeous. Miniature-work, effects, suits - every single episode has amazing visuals and techniques.

And Makoto Aizen – he’s just too much, in a good way. I’m really glad that they play this character consistent, if he’s only be a fool like that in public but some kind of evil maniac in secret like many other villains in the past I’d be tired of his shtick pretty quickly, but since the character is always on crack I can laugh about it. Makes me wonder though, why do I like this guy even though I hate smear characters in other shows… I don’t know really.

Anyways, I like R/B, even though some things could be tweaked a bit. I think they really need to get rid of the "past-Ultraman as transformation items"-thing. Especially since it serves no purpose other than "This dude gives you fire powers, this one water etc". If they used it better, like if Rosso uses Taro’s power he actually connects to his consciousness and gains advice and thus character development from a past Ultraman, that’d be cool.

But I’m afraid the potential is wasted as Tsuburaya just continues to pump out Legend Ultraman-merch every year. But hey, if the show is as entertaining as R/B, I can forgive them.

Also, I wonder how Orb fits into all of this. We know the name of the show with the giant circle in the back basically spells "ORB", we have seen Ultraman Orb Dark as figures and stuff, and now Aizen discovers Gai’s jacket and hums his signature tune. I gotta say, if this show takes place in the same universe as Orb and if Gai himself shows up and becomes a support character, that would be fantastic.

This show doesn't need to take place in Orb's universe since Gai himself can travel across the multiverse anyway

This post really hits the nail on the head and I think episode 5 was great about this too. R/B has really stepped its game up these past two weeks.

Shockingly Kiwami and I are in agreement about something again. I thought the premiere was fine but it did leave me fearing R/B would be kind of "watered down" compared to the last couple shows. Thankfully that fear turned out to be completely unwarranted.

So what you're saying is the show would be better if it were more like Kamen Rider Ghost? :D