It has been a little over a year but I'm finally getting back on finishing the remaining episodes of Abaranger.

One more thing I will note: the Asuka theme, "Fight! For The Earth!" will be greatly missed. :(

Ogawa Maki. <3

Started watching Dekaranger today and I'm already almost done with Episode 8.

As of now, I just finished Dekaranger and about to start Magiranger.

Dynaman is AWESOME.

I'm only three episodes in, but so far it's managed to capture me more than any other Showa toku I've watched to this point -- its first two episodes have an absolutely insane pace where you literally cannot blink for fear of losing anything, and that certainly sets a tone, but it's one of those things where I can't help but love it. It's something that would easily put off anyone else but I just couldn't help but fall in love with Rei Dynapink jump-flipping onto Hokuto Dynared's motorbike and telling him to drive not even moments after he's seen a giant crab bubble some civilians into the back of a truck, and all in the space of a few seconds. Might need to come with a warning that your brain'll be fried!

After it calms down though in episode 3, the themes really become clear and it's a lovely one I actually didn't expect. I didn't know what 'Kagaku' meant in their Sentai name and all I truly knew going in is that the outfits were sexy, they've got a kooky scientist dude as a commander and there's explosions everywhere! So I figured the latter part was the theme; just dynamic action everywhere! And while that sure does happen... 'Kagaku' means science, and that's where a really cool, unique part of this season kicks in. While it doesn't look like it at first, every member of the Dynamen are scientists; and they will use that skill to solve the monster gimmick of the week -- so, Episode 3's Bat Evolution uses gas that turns people into Salamander people (it's sentai, roll with it)? Usually the heroes of the show would just make it explode and everything's gone back to normal and the villains for some reason don't think to use it again -- again, it's Sentai, roll with it; but I think it's really cool that this season instead takes the approach of 'exploding the monster' not solving everything, and the Dynamen instead have to dissect the gas and come up with a countermeasure by the end of the episode.

Beyond that, it's a really good addition to the themes of the season. As with like half of Toku in existence, Dynaman is about dreams, and something our mentor Dr. Yumeno states is that he chose these people not just for their combat skills; but because they're people with large dreams working towards them that will inspire kids and create a world where those dreams are possible. From episode 2 every Dynaman has a stated scientific dream; from reducing pollution in motorbikes to talking to animals, and it's all lovely stuff that while simple, is in that very Showa toku vibe that carries a certain feeling with it. It's about what that all communicates to the kids at home and what that might inspire in them. Just a very nice show so far.

also the villains are called the evilution empire i've been waiting so so long for someone to do that very obvious pun

https://i.imgur.com/7u8utR3.jpg

Watching some more Magiranger. 33 episodes down, 16 to go.

It was likely 2007,8 or 9 when I finished Magiranger so I might benefit from a rewatch, I thought it was OK and it was notable for being both the last 4:3 and SD Sentai but I actually found Urara boring(sorry if that's an unpopular opinion!) and it was kind of overshadowed by Deka and Bouken IMO, it still wasn't too bad though and some things like Hikaru are admittedly easy wins against Mystic Force!

Sorry for the double post, but I am currently trying to finish up GoGo5 out of the way so I can then get back to finishing Flashman which I'm sorry to say I was enjoying much more! I don't mean to be too harsh on GoGo5 but I was honestly not prepared for how boring it can be, for years in Japanese toku I'm not a big fan of the little choice presented in either 1999 or 2010, and this might be a controversial opinion, but for 1992 onwards I'm generally fine with 6 transforming human members as standard (although I did like Carranger) just for the simple thing that generally something like Goseiger is not going to be as good as one of those like Liveman anyway so they might as well just at least go for the six! I just never saw why they didn't put Jeek Hunter in the actual show, especially in favour of LINER BOY! But in my personal headcanon, I just like to imagine it's because Kyoko Hayase is too good for that team and should've been in a better show! Again sorry if you like GoGo5, I'm just finding that I probably prefer Lightspeed to it technically more than I preferred Lost Galaxy to Gingaman!

Well, a certain alien cobra man came pretty close!

Just finished Magiranger. Personally, I really loved this series. Love the magic and family themes for this series as well the mythological motifs used for both the heroes and the villains. The ranger suits are great and I find the rangers themselves to be pretty likable for the most part with Urara/MagiBlue being my favorite out of all of them to the point I considered her as one of my Top Favorite Blue Rangers of Super Sentai. The villains are great too with Wolzard in particular being my personal favorite. I also love the opening theme song as well as the ending theme at the end of each episode. Though all of this is just my personal opinion. All in all, Magiranger has pretty much become among my Top Favorite Super Sentai right alongside Megaranger, Timeranger, Dairanger, and Jetman.

As of now, its onward to GoGo Sentai Boukenger.

Travelion is one of my all-time favorite sentai mecha.

It's funny how when I'm not a fan of the primary mecha, the secondary one always manages to win me over. I felt that way about Magiking and Travelion.

Magi King is a design I didn't have a lot of love for until I actually watched Magiranger, funnily enough. I'm not sure it's a huge favorite of mine now, exactly, but I've really gained an appreciation for the individual components and, after seeing how the toys work, the notably intricate and clever transformation scheme. I like it most as a big dragon, though.

(Also, Wolkaiser is where it's at for Magiranger mecha, as far as I'm concerned. That one is definitely a huge favorite for me.)

Meanwhile, Magi King was always it's main draw for me :lol
God, I love it's look. Unique, creative, and fits the theme perfectly!

I must admit it does seem a bit much to say Magiranger is as good as shows like Liveman,Jetman,Dairanger etc lol but I think possibly my favourite things about the show were both the Wolzard Fire transformation episode(I wanted to see more of that particular version of him!) and also it was pretty good for music, Sister MAYO is pretty good for ending themes in my opinion!

^ Well, I did say that Magiranger is among my favorite Sentai among the four I mentioned earlier. I didn’t say anything about them being the best since whenever I do a Top Favorite list of some kind, it’s purely subjective and I feel I got quite a lot out of it and thus being able to enjoy the series as throughly as I did like I have with Jetman, Dairanger, Timeranger, and especially Megaranger. It’s not to say I disliked or didn’t enjoy other Sentai series I didn’t mention on some level, far from it. It’s just that those four (now five) really stood out for me and I’m not entirely sure whether or not some of those would be among my Top Favorite Sentai list since there are other Sentai seasons I really wanted to watch before finalizing it and even if they weren’t, they would at the very least be considered as honorable mentions.

Loved Wolzard Fire too. Easily one of my favorite Extra rangers despite only appearing in the final three episodes and Magi King is one of my favorite main mecha of the franchise. Oh, and speaking of Liveman, that Sentai series, along with Gokaiger, would have made the list of Top Favorite Super Sentai themselves had I been able to finish both shows in their entirety when I first watched them years ago. Planning to have those be remedied and I’m considering watching/re-watching Liveman while going through with Boukenger and then watch/re-watch Gokaiger after Goseiger. Will also be watching Gekiranger, Go-Onger, and Shinkinger beforehand too.

Apologies for double post in advance but I am now officially halfway through Boukenger.

EDIT: Finishing up on watching episode 26 of Boukenger and Sakura/BoukenPink has definitely become my favorite ranger character of this season as well as being one of my favorite Pink Rangers of the franchise.

So, if you'll all forgive the self-indulgent preamble, lately I've had a million ideas floating around in my head for like, all sorts of different shows I'd love to do some big (re)watch thread about, because writing about tokusatsu is clearly something I enjoy doing. But as fun as that process is for me, doing a whole thread like that the way I want to involves a level of commitment that still feels pretty intimidating to me right now. Fortunately, writing so glowingly about Kiramager over the past year or so in particular caused to me have the realization that basically most of what I do on this site amounts to cheerleading, and that led to a bit of breakthrough – a way to get back to my roots, as it were.

You see, with Zenkaiger on the air, I thought it'd be neat to do something to join in on the anniversary festivities, and if having my own thread is too scary, what better time to show one of my favorite threads on the forum some love, good old "What are you watching (Sentai edition)"? I mean, I'm not sure how weird it is to attach sentimental value to a forum thread, but when it comes to gushing about tokusatsu I'm watching, this place is like my training grounds, man. My home turf!

It's crazy to think, but it's quickly coming up on five years since I made the decision to start rewatching Ninninger on one of my usual fickle whims. I didn't even think I'd do the whole show, but I found so much passion talking about it, I ended up spending months and months aftewards working my way through a bunch of Sentai I'd always been meaning to get around to, and talking about them too. It cemented Ninninger as a legitimate favorite of mine, it grew my affection for the franchise as a whole, and it helped me gain confidence when it came to putting my thoughts together about things I enjoy. It's a period I look back on quite fondly, so with that spirit in mind, I've come up with an idea, that, in the tradition of Ninnin Rewatch!, comes with the embarrassing name...

~Fish's Zenkai Tour!~

To explain as succinctly as I can, the idea is that for each new episode of Zenkaiger, I want to pop in here to talk about the premiere episode of a Sentai series, working my way all the way back up to Zenkaiger itself by the time it reaches its conclusion. And I mean just talk about it. An active part of my goal here, and why I say I'm getting back to my roots, is to keep these fairly surface-level, and if I'm real lucky, short. (Already failing that one!) A little chat each week that could be about any number of things – from discovering classics for the first time all the way to reminiscing about shows I've already seen. It's the "Zenkai Tour" because I'm not planning to stay in any one of all these worlds for long, so to speak, which means this is less zenryoku zenkai, and more like... 小力紹介, I guess? Did I just get myself a tagline for this thing?

Episode 1 – Himitsu Sentai Goranger

https://i.imgur.com/hr1wQPa.png

Gosh, Shoutarou Ishinomori is so cool. That's kinda all I can even think about watching this. Like, this is the absolute roots of Super Sentai, and before it was its own franchise, Goranger was but one (well, five) in a long line of awesome heroes created by him, and there's kind of a magic to thinking of Goranger as part of that family, rather than the one it created for itself. Like, even the designs of the Gorangers themselves sit very comfortably alongside guys like Rider #1 and Kikaider, both because they have such similar aesthetics, and because those aesthetics are so freakin' good.

But then, there's the actual episode to talk about, which I enjoyed quite a lot. I could easily see myself sitting down for 80+ episodes of this, as ironic as that is to say when the whole reason I'm doing this is to avoid watching any more right now. But this is a pretty strong first episode that's positively dripping with 70's toku style. Things used to be way more hardcore back in the day, I tell ya'! These kids today get their powers as part of some fun adventure narrative where most human casualties are merely implied, but not the Gorangers! Their entire origin story is that their entire organization gets gunned down except for them, which makes up the entire first fourth or so of the episode. Like, it's literally just watching the Gorangers-to-be individually lose their comrades while barely escaping with their own lives. It's honestly a heck of a way to bring the group together, brutally establishing the threat posed by the Black Cross Army and laying down some nice pathos for the heroes with this shared tragedy they're trying to avenge.

Not that it dwells on that too much, mind you, as the show quickly skips to a fun sequence of Akaranger calling the already established members together for their first real taste of action. I love how apparent it is what the trends at the time were they wanted to chase? There's always that aspect to tokusatsu of trying to capture something kids admire as cool, and for the Secret Sentai, it's clear that spies were apparently the thing every kid wanted to be in 1975. It's stuff like the whole routine of Akaranger handing out cards telling the group where to meet, instead of just like, saying where they're going to meet. Or how they've each got a piece of their emblem they have to place into a wall to unlock the door to their awesome secret base. Like, I can just picture the target audience watching this at the time and genuinely thinking this is the kind of career they want, you know? If you've gotta work for an organization, why not make it a cool organization, right? It's not hard to see why this series was a big hit, is what I'm saying.

(Also, speaking of that emblem, I only just realized it's both "S" for Sentai and a 5. I'm probably not smart enough to join a cool organization!)

It's a simple but strong start that even did a solid job packing in some personality for the characters. It's nice to be able to say I've now seen Kiranger asking for curry rice, and seeing Hiroshi Miyauchi playing Hiroshi Miyauchi is always a treat. He's an awesome dude contributing to making this an awesome team, and that's really my main takeaway from this episode – these guys are awesome and I would not be opposed to seeing more of them. Hard to do better with a first episode than that!

I will have zero context for any of these posts, but I'll be sure to enjoy your enthusiasm and passion, Fish!

So the interesting thing about Gorenger? It wasn't always the first Super Sentai. For a long time, Battle Fever J was officially the first Super Sentai series. Gorenger and JAKQ weren't added to the list until the mid-90s.

I don't have a whole lot to contribute as it's been ages since I saw this show, but I remember when I first saw it, and the translation butterfly effect in the subs was something like Japanese > Cantonese > English, I found the bold definiteness of the statement "THE YELLOW RANGER LIKES CURRY" to be highly amusing.

If, in some imaginary scenario necessitating subterfuge, I ever had to give someone a sort of secret phrase to indicate that we are we all above board, I would definitely pick this statement.

That sounds like a really cool idea Fish, especially now I'm watching more! I would've watched Goranger earlier but put it off because I wasn't sure if it was all subbed and Battle Fever J is more typical in terms of series length but I will try and marathon it eventually, I mean it's shorter than MMPR and personally appears more enjoyable to me!

Sorry to bring down the mood, but I finally finished GoGo5 last night. Wow, what a chore. I gathered I wouldn't absolutely love it and bad sentai is still watchable for me but IMO I found Matoi actually quite obnoxious whereas Carter's worst crime seemed to be more just being a bit boring and the ''70s Rainbow presenter'' look not doing him many favours and GoYellow, perhaps unsurprisingly, wasn't as sufficiently ''crazy'' as Gao vs SS painted him to be but on the positive I have at least now technically finished a quarter of a century of Sentai (1996-2020) and that is still an achievement, plus it can be easy to miss the good points, at least the ending theme was pretty cool and I did entertain myself by imagining how the dub voices could be! The phrase I will possibly remember most from the show though: You accursed GoGo5!

Will people doing their own watch threads be allowed to comment on the reviews when you get to the season that are their subjects.

Man... I remember watching Goranger's first few episodes a couple years back and being absolutely enamoured with them in that special way only Showa can manage. That watch unfortunately fell through and I intended to rewatch them this year alongside Zenkaiger before I got this huge impulse to watch Dynaman... and y'know what? Maybe I still will! Everything you've said here is on point for how much I loved watching this show and it's just so lovely and fun.

I gotta admit too that seeing you go on about the designs was so... great? good? cathartic for me? Because I still consider them the best Sentai designs to this day, despite the many many winners the franchise has pushed out since! You just really can't go wrong with their aesthetic, and that's why the Goriders are some of the best ever

Thank you! I'm also still quietly enjoying you talking about Blassreiter, even though that unfortunately seems to be less "enthusiasm and passion" and more "disinterest and contempt" at the moment. :lol

I'm basically trying to do a little sampler of the whole franchise, so having no context at all might actually be a really good position to be in. Hopefully, anyway! I'd be extremely flattered if I managed to get someone legitimately interested in a show doing this.

Oh yeah, I always forget about that because it's so insane to me. Like, I get the lineage is a little complex at the start, to the point Spider-Man comes up in it, but it's like, come on. Granted, back when every show was "___man" instead of "____ranger", it probably seemed easier to believe.

Honestly, I can easily imagine a bunch of kids in 1975 roleplaying as cool secret agents after watching Goranger legitimately using that as some kind of password. Anyone who doesn't know Kiranger's favorite food might be a Black Cross spy! :lol

You are almost certainly going to be done with Hurricaneger long before I get there, but of course everyone is more than welcome to jump in on the discussion. I mean, this isn't even my thread; I don't make the rules! :p

The thing that strikes me most about the Gorangers is that I honestly believe there's legitimately no room for improvement whatsoever? Like, you say they're the best Sentai designs to this day, and I don't think I could argue even if I wanted to? Literally everything that makes for a good Sentai team was already there from day one. The perfect set of five colors. The perfect balance between each of those colors with accents in the perfect places, like the gloves and boots. The perfect amount of unique details, like the highly distinct visors, keeping each member looking different without sacrificing their perfect unity.

You can do an infinite number of arrangements of that – lots of variations in new aesthetics or with additional motifs that make for great character designs in their own right, but I don't think, in nearly half a century of this franchise existing, there has a been a single team to come along and contribute something that was adopted as a new fundamental part of the "language", as it were. Because why would they need to, right?

And the trope carried on throughout the franchise with a select few rangers, most popular ones I can remember are:

Denzi Blue loves anpan(red bean buns)
Bouken Silver loves raw vegetables
Geki Chopper loves mench katsu/meat cutlets
Stag Buster loves Enetron and guzzles it like booze to the point of getting drunk

There was a single other yellow ranger who liked curry, I know that much...

Hahaha, absolutely! This is a sentiment to live by!

Yeah, it's a very loveable trait, though it's never portrayed with such earnestness as it is here, I feel.

Just finished Boukenger. Now, it's onward to Juken Sentai Gekiranger.

Have fun. :rock:

Thanks. I'm already halfway through episode 12. :)

~Fish's Zenkai Tour!~

Episode 2 – JAKQ Dengekitai

https://i.imgur.com/ub8HUJi.png

I've always had a huge fondness for these dorks from a distance. There's like a whole underdog vibe to JAKQ that I find a little fascinating. Even the designs alone straddle this perfect line between genuinely cool and endearingly lame that I've only barely ever been able to put my finger on. There's just something about this team that's got a super unique appeal, and yet they're clearly not the instant-classics that the Gorangers were.

Which is maybe the story of the whole show, really. There's the whole elephant in the room that, despite making changes later on in a effort to better capture viewers' attention, One of which was particularly Big, this is the Sentai that called it quits after a relatively short run, especially when compared to its immediate predecessor. Honestly, based on the first impression I got here, I don't have a hard time seeing why the show failed to grab as big an audience as Goranger did.

There's an overall idea here that I think was very well intentioned, but also very likely the thing that backfired on JAKQ immediately, which is the clear shift in tone from Goranger. See, another huge part of that fascinating underdog factor is that JAKQ is the only Sentai about that most classic of Ishinomori staples – tragic cyborgs who fight crime. A much greater focus is placed in this premiere on fleshing out ts main heroes, Everyone gets formative backstories and motivations for becoming heroes considerably deeper than "everyone but them got shot to death", which contributes to an atmosphere that is also clearly aiming to be more grounded in reality, to the extent one of these shows can be. When I say that JAKQ fights crime, I actually mean they fight Crime, which is seriously the name of the criminal organization they're up against. Appropriate for the name, they're played up more as particularly nasty crooks than as the more typical grand fascist armies of the era.

Now, I realize as I'm writing this that a Sentai show featuring a more grounded tone and a smaller, more focused cast of developed characters, that underperformed and was met with some retooling, arguably also perfectly describes my absolute most beloved Sentai, Go-Busters, as well, which would go a long way towards explaining my attraction to JAKQ. This also makes it deeply ironic that I'm about to criticize this show for sacrificing the vibrancy that defined the series before it.

Mind you, I'm also going to stick up for it, as I think the conscious effort to differentiate JAKQ was smart, and I can easily imagine it paying off in episodes beyond the premiere, but talking strictly about first episodes (as is the goal here!), the difference between these two shows is night and day, and I'd be lying if I said I had more fun with JAKQ. It's not something I can really objectively quantify, though. It's not so much a matter of JAKQ doing anything wrong as it is a general feeling I have that Goranger was this lightning-in-a-bottle success that instantly pulled me in. And you know, if I feel that way, as someone who actively appreciates the goals JAKQ had more, I can only imagine what a lot of kids at the time must've felt like. Still some pretty fun toku in its own right, with some very cool concepts, and I can't speak for how it develops from here on, but I do have to admit I wasn't particularly impressed by this one out of the gate.

(As a footnote, the Kamen Rider Blade fan in me desperately wants to make some joke about Clover King being the Strongest JAKQ, but failed to work one in anywhere. Everyone else is welcome to try in my stead.)

The Card Suite motif is something I've always felt should return in Sentai. It's a cool motif! It worked great for Blade and G-Gundam!

The one thing I’ll always remember is that the playing cards in the show have “Nintendo” printed on them.

Also, yeah this show definitely veers more towards Rider territory than most Sentai shows. It’s literally the only series where the antagonists are humans, as opposed to Aliens, demons, robots or something that can be lumped in with the other three.

I'm now up to episode 39 of Gekiranger and I'm seriously loving this series.

Another satisfied customer. :rock:

:D

Speaking of Gekiranger, I finished the series just last night. Indeed, it is very easy to say that Gekiranger has now earned its place among my top favorite Super Sentai series right alongside Megaranger, Timeranger, Dairanger, Jetman, and Magiranger. And now, it's onward to Engine Sentai Go-Onger.

Went to catch up on Zenkaiger tonight with EP2. Literally my first Sentai since... Gokaiger or Akibaranger? Whichever came later. Neat, so far.

The henshin gears are quite noisy, aren't they? :lol

Well I’m on episode 19 of Turboranger, which is one of the more well known events in the show. I had an idea of what would happen, but it should be obvious what I was in for when this was in the screenwriter’s credit. 井上 敏樹

Sure enough, it’s a fairly depressing episode, featuring among other things, the onscreen death of a child (there’s very little left to the imagination. He’s on his bike, a car is seen coming, he’s screaming, we see him being loaded into the ambulance and we cut to a grave in the present). About the only bright side to this episode is that those who get affected by the spell of the week go back to normal when the monster dies. And even the latter isn’t any cause to celebrate this week, since both were pretty sympathetic.

In spite of this, I still think it’s a good episode and I’m going to use it in my fanfiction (albeit with some changes).

Shipped in

Magi - Geki from Brazil as well as Shinken Ranger , Gokai Range and Go Busters from Brazil.

Finishing up Magi (Stage 40) and have started the 10 Terrors mini series.

Also Gold and Silver Rangers due to show up in Go Busters 15.

Currently up to episode 23 of Go-Onger.