I really appreciate their uniformity, yeah. It helps reinforce that the Go-Busters are up against an army, not just a new wacky villain each week. Having a clear hierarchy and recognizable attributes sells that this is a larger-scale conflict than whether or not the team can detonate, like, a Forkzord. (So glad the Forkzord came back!!!)

TOKUMEI SENTAI GO-BUSTERS MISSION 39 - “THE UNSTOPPABLE FISTS OF MESSIAH!”

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Or, y’know, The One Where A Kid Beats Up Ryuji.

I mean, I’m basically just teasing. This was a cute episode about how fighting for your dreams is more important than fighting other people, and real strength comes from being honest with what you want out of life. Ryuji’s the one Go-Buster with a clear dream post-Vagras, so it works out great to have him try and get Kenta to come to terms with how beating up his own dad is not the solution to his problems, but to instead be willing to stand up for his dream of becoming an engineer. It’s a heartwarming episode, truly.

But it’s also the one where a kid beats the holy Enetron out of Ryuji, and I don’t think this episode would be anywhere near as effective as it was if Kenta’s actor couldn’t deliver the martial arts goods. This was an action-heavy episode, and it needed a guest star who could convincingly defeat not just a dozen possessed bystanders, but also the Blue Buster. And this kid did it! He’s as good as any member of the stunt team, and the slow-mo shots of him demolishing Ryuji were almost as joyful to watch as last episode’s showdown in the squared circle. There’s precious little in this episode that isn’t Kenta kicking people’s asses, come to think of it: a little bit with Enter saving Escape, the obligatory Megazord fight, and that’s really all. When you got a kid like Kenta coming in for an episode, I guess you just get out of his way?

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IT’S TIME FOR TATAKAE!

It’s a Kobayashi joint, so we gotta have someone screaming TATAKAE sooner or later. Was I expecting it to be a tiny boy with the voice of Messiah? No. Was I happy that it was a tiny boy with the voice of Messiah? Yes!

There are two things I remember about this episode.

1. The kid playing Kenta didn’t take long to get typecast as all hell, since Hurricaneger 10 Years After (#shamelessplug) featured him in pretty much the same role. The only difference is that he got to be one of the heroes for the final battle.

2. The voice of Karateloid, Hiroyuki Muraoka, is also a suit actor, meaning that he portrays the role physically as well as vocally.

When you can pull a frame like this out of it, it honestly surprises even myself that this is probably one of the episodes of this show that sticks in my head the least?

Maybe it's a consequence of how long it took me to really start liking Ryuuji; maybe it's just a little too by-the-book hero tokusatsu in its story of Helping Some Kid... I don't really know! But even having watched the entire show twice, several years apart, I can't for the life of me think of even a single particular memory associated with this one to reminisce about, which I don't think has happened much in this thread?

Kinda crazy, because as Die's description attests to, there's definitely at least one thing in this episode worth remembering!

Makes sense! This kid was great!

There's also the flashback where Kenta's dad angrily tells him to stop wanting to be an engineer and get back to karate, which eventually gets recontextualized away from horrifying emotional abuse into troubling tough love, which ends up being largely a lateral move story-wise, but I'd rather stay positive! Kenta beats up Ryuji and both actors sell the hell out of it!

TOKUMEI SENTAI GO-BUSTERS MISSION 40 - “J STANDS IN FRONT OF THE MESSIAHROID”

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He literally does!

It’s nice to get a somewhat serious episode about J and Jin’s partnership. They’ve been a comedic duo pretty much since the beginning, with really only Jin getting anything close to a serious storyline. (Even though one of Jin’s serious storylines was the fact that he doesn’t take anything seriously, so….) The partnership of Jin and Juice has been left to ridiculous physical comedy and elaborate background gags, with only subtext to speak to their bond.

Until now! This time out, we get not get the answer for why Jin isn’t leaving hyperspace, but also an example of how deeply J cares about Jin. Naturally, it’s exhibited in the most confusing and counter-intuitive way possible, because: J. Jin’s body never completely materialized in hyperspace 13 years ago, forcing him into a kind of stasis, only able to interact with the world as an avatar piggy-backing off of J’s Marker System. (I don’t… 100% know how this is possible? According to what we’ve been told previously, J wasn’t built until landing in hyperspace, right? So how was an incomplete Jin able to build anything, let alone a full Buddyroid?) So the idea of Jin being the Guess I’ll Die meme pushes J over the edge. Jin’s sent J out into the world in his stead, and J has grown to love it. He can’t believe that Jin wouldn’t fight for life with everything he has left, and if Jin isn’t willing to do it, then his Buddyroid will have to do it for him.

It’s a great message of support and encouragement, one that comes out of J’s thoughts as saving a Messiahroid, attacking the Busters, and threatening to kill Jin. It’s… not a great plan from the Stag Buster! It’s adorably misguided and briefly deadly, but it speaks to the largely silent bond of Jin and J. Just like Jin is pathologically incapable of discussing his feelings in a healthy way, the Buddyroid programmed off of his brain patterns attempts to will on his partner by assaulting their teammates and threatening to save Jin over Jin’s dead body. The two of them… they deserve each other, and I mean that in so many different ways.

Was not expecting to get a sweet episode of friendship for Jin and J! Glad to know the series had this one in the tank!

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IT’S TIME FOR LESS FOCUS ON MEGAZORDS!

This is probably a weird thing to say after the recent episode of Ace having a gauntlet match against every Megazord model, and the big new addition to the cast being a Buddyzord, but the biggest change to me in the post-Messiah storytelling is that the show has sort of flipped the importance of the Metaroids and Megazords? Back in the Messiah days, the Megazords were the ones executing the actual plan of siphoning Enetron to power up the Vagras plans in hyperspace, and the Metaroid was just a Marker System to facilitate that. Defeating the Metaroid was helpful, but defeating the Megazord was crucial. Now, the Megazords are, like, a random byproduct from the creation of the Messiahroid. They just sort of pop out of hyperspace some amount of time after a Messiahroid spawns, but they aren’t really trying to accomplish anything? They’re just there, and they get defeated, and that’s sort of it. The Messiahroid has a clear objective (or doesn’t in this episode, but then that becomes the point) while the Megazord sometimes steals Enetron, but mostly just wanders around until it’s defeated. In this episode, the Megazord is defeated before the mid-episode commercial break!

I don’t know that I find the new emphasis on Messiahroids to be better or worse than the emphasis on Megazords, but it’s certainly noticeable.

So I assume Paraboloid 2.0’s experiment was to see if older models could be upgraded? I don’t think the episode says anything about what the Messiah Card was trying to achieve this time.

But it does lead to what’s probably the best suit in the show, in the form of Enter Unite. Given that unlike Escape, he was plenty powerful without a suit actor form to let someone else do the fighting, one wonders how unstoppable he is now.

(And for a bit of clever design work, the suit look is based on a prince, and he called Messiah “Majeste” (French for “king”). And what happens to the prince when the king dies?

The show wouldn't be complete without the last human-Buddyroid pair getting a focus episode. I think this highlights even further why J is such a cool guy, he just loves being alive and has a simple dream of seeing the winter snow with his friends. Beetles have such short lifespans after all, so J lives like he's a beetle, drinking as much as he wants.

While the core 3 now have the luxury of looking towards their futures, Jin is afraid deep down that he might not have one, as he might have to sacrifice himself for the sake of everybody else. It's the opposite of selfish, so of course the self-proclaimed egoist J would scold him for that. Jin hasn't been fair to J, expecting him to deal with it since Jin is the one with his life at stake, not acknowledging that J would suffer from losing him. The problem with J's argument though is that Jin's life isn't in danger right now, so J has to learn to focus on saving the lives that need him the most. It's a depressing moral, but not a wrong one. When J stands in front of Jin, he's also being a shield, so this trait basically shows you J's sense of heroism. His ego won't accept the idea of people weaker than him getting hurt.

Maybe? Enter immediately writes it off as a worthless accident, and the Messiahroid's mission is... just collecting stuff into itself? Like Enter says, it isn't helping them collect data on humanity, so it's not worth pursuing.

This is a nice way of looking at it!

TOKUMEI SENTAI GO-BUSTERS MISSION 41 - “PINK BUSTER, THIEF FATALE!”

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Why not spend an episode on giving Hiromu a principled thief partner who falls in love with him? It doesn’t further the series story in any visible way – Enter and Escape are absent, we’re not doing anything with Jin’s revelation from last time, the Megazords continue to exist with no clear purpose – but it’s a cute story that gives Hiromu some new notes to play.

It’s neat to see Hiromu spar with a potential love interest, because this show generally shies away from human antagonists. We might get an episode where a tiny boy wallops the crap out of Ryuji, but even he’s just possessed by Messiah. There aren’t a ton of stories that put the Busters in opposition with another person, and that makes those episodes a little more interesting to talk about for their deviation from the template. (Like… the one where Ryuji has to get the scientist’s teen daughter out of the maze? And she’s not even really an antagonist, just sort of a brat.) Pink Buster is a different kind of puzzle to solve, and it forces Hiromu out of his comfort zone of Attacking and Being A Surly Jerk.

Well… maybe not the second one? Reika’s a smooth criminal, and her combination of subterfuge and Sunday Morning Japanese Television-level feminine wiles (basically encroaching on Hiromu’s personal space until he falls apart from bashfulness) is a fun counter to Hiromu’s mission-oriented focus. Hiromu tries to talk her into doing the right thing, but what he eventually figures out – all on his own! – is that Reika was already doing the right thing, just in her own way. It’s an episode that’s thankfully less about Hiromu dictating morality to another person, and more about Hiromu learning to respect someone who has a different view on morality than him.

Besides that, we’re 100% in Lupin territory, as mandated by the 1979 “Every Toku Show Must Do A Gentleman Or Gentlewoman Thief Story” Accords. The Lupinroid (Over-Time has it as Louperoid, and that’s ridiculous to me) is doing a very fun nonviolent scheme of stealing people’s greed, while the Pink Buster leaves a calling card and only steals from people who deserve it. Nothing that really happens is a surprise if you’ve ever seen a single Lupin-indebted toku story, but it’s a standard nowadays for a reason – they’re just fun to watch? The Pink Buster’s acrobatics are cool to see in conflict with the Go-Busters combat maneuvers, crescendoing with the elegant dance of Pink and Red demolishing a squad of Bugglars. It’s what every toku Lupin story is leading up to, and this one doesn’t disappoint.

I wasn’t disappointed by this one at all, regardless of several obvious drawbacks. (Besides the stated ones in the first paragraph, you can toss in Yellow and Blue spending the episode on the sidelines.) It’s a charming little action/romance for the least charismatic Buster, and that’s enough for me tonight.

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IT’S TIME FOR Pink Buster!

She’s great, Reika. Gorgeous, obviously, but I like how she both plays Hiromu and then can’t help trying to impress him. She’s a Robin Hood-style thief, and she doesn’t mind getting Hiromu flustered just for fun. The two of them had great chemistry, and I sincerely hope the Pink Buster makes a return appearance.

There's a lot about J that makes him an extremely charming character, obviously. Literally just the way his arms are always in that power stance is more iconic than some entire characters, and as this episode shows, he's as good a Buddy as anyone in spite of his (hilarious) ego and (entertaining) lack of sense.

For me, though, I think the thing that ended up most making me like J was the whole aspect to him where he's also -- of all things -- a lover of nature? It actually makes perfect sense given his background of being created in some hellish alternate dimension, which is a nice bit of logic, but even without that, I'm always going to find it cute to see a robot going around excitedly looking at bugs with a magnifying glass, and that feels all the more special when so many way more obvious facets of daily life seem to completely escape J's attention so regularly.

This is a very strong episode in terms of moving the big-picture Plot forward, thanks to how it pushes ahead with Jin's storyline and gives Enter at least two new tricks in the process, but maybe the smartest thing it's doing is simply deciding to be about Jin by being about J instead, because while the former has always gotten the greater story focus, the latter's comedic antics, on top of just being so funny, are also rooted in stuff that gels perfectly with a lot of the themes this show is always exploring, so to get an episode after so long that treats J with so much dramatic weight -- while still having him be kind of insane -- is very much appreciated.

This is an episode that doesn't really feel like a typical episode of Go-Busters at all, that I've also always been quite fond of because the ways in which it's atypical for this series are what make it so fun to watch.

Like Die says, there's a tried-and-true charm to the genre stuff it dips into, and specific to Go-Busters, it lets the show goof around and create situations it wouldn't otherwise get to explore. Mouri being Mouri, he also keeps it from feeling too out-there by making sure a character we know being thrown out of their comfort zone is the whole point of the story, and naturally, it doesn't take much to sell me on the idea of Hiromu's usual prideful professionalism clashing with the unusual mission this one faces him with. Even just the joke of the title is great? Where it almost sounds for a second like some late-series new hero is joining the team if you don't know better? This is actually the last episode of the show Mouri wrote, and I like that he got to do something so knowingly weird and silly for this series before the inevitable dramatic escalation of the final stretch.

To clarify, Loupeloid isn’t a weird translation choice. The Metaloid is based off a loupe (those monocle/telescope hybrids jewellers use to test gems for value)

Anyway, we’re at the last “regular” episode, before the endgame kicks into full force. In Sentai, that’s normally the first or second episode of the 40s, and this isn’t an exception. And it goes for a seldom used plot, in the form of a “wannabe Ranger” (previous notables including Henshin Papa from Goggle Five, a middle-aged dad who stole a strength enhancing suit from the monster of the week, Magne Warrior from Bioman, a local eccentric who the bad guys empowered, AbarePink from Abaranger, the group’s teenage girl ally trying to convince her parents she was too busy to come with them to Thailand and more recently to this series, Shinken Brown from Shinkenger, a middle aged white man who stalked Blue to try and become a samurai). I don’t have much to discuss here though unfortunately, but I’ll have something interesting to note about Pink Cat when you get to the Returns V-CIN.

I can say that, given we’re in December, which is their last chance to sell toys before a new Sentai appears in the new year with their own toys, we get the unusual pairing of Buster Heracles with Tategami Lioh, with Loupezord somehow managing to be stealthy enough to steal the former’s cannons, in what is probably my personal funniest scene of the series.

The one thing I desperately wanted from this episode and didn't get was some explanation of what Pink Buster's fake gear was. Her Transport module was clearly some sort of remote control -slash- door opener, and I really wanted to know if she had some janky wristwatch that shot sunglasses onto her face or something.

TOKUMEI SENTAI GO-BUSTERS MISSION 42 - “PLUNGE INTO THE MEGAZORD!”

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While this definitely has the feel of a Final Act episode – doubling down on Messiah’s evolution, giving Escape a Papazord to pilot – it’s not at all the part I was into. Once we got into the final few minutes and every cast member had to do the UHH?! sound to the debut of the Papazord, I sort of checked out? It’s fine, but it just wasn’t anywhere near as interesting to me as a basic Go-Busters story about recognizing your flaws without beating yourself up about them.

I mostly… I sort of don’t care about Enter’s potential resurrection of Messiah? I don’t think it’s a bad story, but it misses for me the stakes and tension of the earlier hyperspace stories. Messiah’s plots back then were as Gathering oriented as Enter’s are here, switching out Data for Enetron, but they felt like something that required the Go-Busters to learn and improve in order to combat. Here, it just… doesn’t? The first scene of this episode is about how in sync the Busters are, and how easily they defeat the Trainroid (who is back for no established reason). A later incredibly good scene is about how Yoko’s abduction to a pocket dimension is met by the non-Jin parts of the team with both a coherent strategy and a belief in Yoko’s abilities. Messiah got beat by this team before they got cool power-ups, an additional Buster Machine, and tons of earned confidence, so it's hard to muster up much enthusiasm for a rematch. I’m just not seeing a point to Enter’s schemes if this is the team he’s up against?

But that’s a minor thing! I really liked the first 18 minutes of this episode, specifically for how it kept the scale human-sized. The threat isn’t really the Megazordroid, it’s human failing and the pressure we put on ourselves when we’re weak. Seeing Yoko ineffectively try to cheer up depressed people by powering through their hesitation and doubt, and then accidentally realizing that her best example is in allowing herself to be weak in order to show the ways we’re all capable of both weakness and strength? That’s the best part of this episode for me. It’s not about some amorphous Gathering Data scheme that percolates in the background as Enter increasingly needs a haircut, it’s about Yoko trying to help four depressed strangers find the strength to forgive themselves for being weak, and allow for the fact that weakness is as much a part of them as strength is. It’s a part of this show I’m going to remember long after I’ve forgotten what the last dozen episodes have been building towards.

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IT’S TIME FOR Plot Holes!

So, Yoko gets abducted to the Megazordroid’s train car, which exits regular space into some pocket dimension. (Hyperspace? It’s never established.) As soon as she gets on the train, she finds out that CALL MODE is blocked, due to her being extradimensional now. She immediately realizes that this also means -- and this is stated on the show -- that she can’t Morph. This holds up, because she doesn’t Morph during the fight with Bugglars, and Ryuji and Hiromu have to be Morphed before they get on board. (Hiromu doesn’t even use Powered Custom until he and Enter fall off of the train back into regular space!) But then, near the end of the episode, back in the pocket dimension… Yoko shouts LET’S MORPHIN’ and she’s the Yellow Buster, like nothing was ever stopping her before. Ryuji also calls for Powered Custom, like nothing’s stopping him. What happened to the block that kept Yoko from being Yellow Buster back in the first half of the episode?

And people told me ToQger was light-hearted.

Anyway, aside from the still fairly cool idea of a naturally giant Metaloid, and Escape getting the next Megazord in the Greek alphabet, the thing people remember most from this episode is the nursery rhyme Yoko sings, but for weirdly convoluted reasons. Namely, the same song appeared in episodes of Fiveman, Kakuranger and Dekaranger, and fans like to latch onto there being a concrete connection between all those instances. While the first two have one (the actress playing Yellow in Fiveman was one of the regular villains in Kakuranger), the other two go into fan wank (in the case of this episode, the actress playing Yoko was a regular villain in Kyuranger, just like FiveYellow).

Well, I'd imagine if you want to make a Metaroid out of a Megazord, there needs to be a Megazord first, right? In which case the reason Trainroid is there was established like 40 episodes ago. Heck, even the fact that it's Trainroid seems specifically relevant to Enter's plan here?

At any rate, the whole overall situation of Yoko being stuck on that train with a bunch of civilians is another one of those things from an episode of this show that really sticks in my head for whatever reason. I think it's because it's just kind of a strong scenario for a late-series episode? Isolating the youngest member of the team like that and having her try to take charge of cheering up those people and making them feel safe and all that... it'd literally never be the first episode about Yoko, you know? It's inherently set up to speak to the growth the characters have gone through up to this point, and as you point out, even the way the rest of the team handles everything here is in support of that basic idea.

That is very weird! Thank you for sharing it!

I guess? This is maybe related to my criticism of the lessened tension of the post-Messiah phase of the show, but this is another episode where I can't really tell if Enter has a deeply layered plan, or is just taking advantage of circumstance. A lot of it is, like... I don't understand how all of this goes together yet? The problem I usually have with Gathering Data schemes is that it's hard to understand why this data needs to be collected in this way in order to advance a strategy. But I'm probably just not giving this show enough credit! Thanks for the clarification!

TOKUMEI SENTAI GO-BUSTERS MISSION 43 - “CHRISTMAS RESOLUTIONS”

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Always a little surprised when this show has episode titles as straightforward as “Christmas Resolutions” (no exclamation mark, even), rather than “SANTA VERSUS THE GO-BUSTERS!” or “CHRISTMAS GIFT OF ANGER!”, y’know? It’s a little jarring.

But this episode was a really good one! Beyond just reminding the audience that Christmastime has very specific connotations for the Go-Busters, this one reiterates how far they’ve grown beyond their defining traumas, and how much they’ve dedicated themselves to finding the joy in their tragedies.

It’s fun to base an episode around the fallacy of Enter’s Gathering Data game/scheme, because it shows how little he’s changed in the past year compared to the Go-Busters. Enter continues to learn about humanity, but he himself doesn’t really get any more insightful because of it. Once again, his scheme fails because he has fundamentally misread the motivations and weaknesses of the Go-Busters. He can get them angry one time by dropping buildings on orphans and making fun of the Busters’ dead parents, but that’s just taking them by surprise; the Go-Busters don’t carry their rage around like Enter presumes they do. Enter just assumes that the Busters will give in to anger, and will use that anger to be more powerful, so he can rob them of their power. But that’s not the primary source of their power, it’s a reaction to cheap shots they aren’t expecting. Once they see it coming, they can choose to focus on the other motivations in their lives: altruism, generosity, love, hope, etc. Defeating Enter isn’t about ignoring anger, it’s about choosing something better.

And, y’know, easy to applaud that sort of personal growth when it’s wrapped up with a bow by Hiromu absorbing shot after shot from the Swordandshieldroid (perfect) until he learns all of its patterns and can kill it in two shots (also perfect). A rousing speech is well and good, but this is a toku show – you gotta wed that sentiment to superheroics and pyrotechnics!

This one totally worked for me, all the way through. The little scenes of the Busters working on their arts and crafts for their yearly Orphan Christmas Pageant was adorable, the cheap shots by the Vagras were almost hilarious in their cruelty, the Go-Busters taking a breath and instantly devising a counter-scheme to save Christmas (!!!) was energizing, and then Hiromu’s little monologue – with Nick playing the music box (!!!) in the background to focus Hiromu – was a stellar end to a very sweet episode. Total win for the good guys!

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IT’S TIME FOR Papazord!

Oh, except for Escape stealing the two Messiah cards, using them to power up the Papazord, and squishing Enter like a bug.

I enjoyed the Enter/Escape stuff in this episode, for how it’s their relationship in microcosm – which one will betray the other first? They can collaborate on a specific plot, but any warmth between them is just prelude to betrayal. Escape slowly realizing that Enter’s version of “resurrecting Messiah” isn’t her version of “resurrecting Messiah” is a terrific end to their brief alliance, because they aren’t really in opposition on a scale of morality, just in the specifics of evil’s victory. More a difference of opinion than anything else, right up until Enter is popped like a zit.

Well I don’t have much to say here compared to the next episode, but I can say these things.

The whole fighting without anger thing… Liveman did it better.

Nick singing jingle bells came out of nowhere but is one of those moments that really works.

If I hadn’t seen it in a toy review, I’d assume the Lio Blaster/sword combination was just the producers gluing the two together to try and contrive a new weapon.

Also, how the hell is Jin able to pilot Lioh if Hiromu is using the Attache? Telepathy?

And finally, I’m not sure who they were trying to fool by making it look like Enter died so anticlimactically.

It really did! Hiromu's plan could come off too sentimental, or cloying, but Nick being like This Is Boring HERE'S A SONG was the perfect antidote to keep things fun.

Well, the youngest member would be J.

Understanding the Infinite Potential of emotions is more effective from a first person perspective, so there's a limit to how much Enter can learn just by watching others. Anger can be a useful emotion when expressed healthily, but Enter has only ever been angry at others, rather than for others. That's just hatred and the Gobusters are much too heroic to rely on that. Even Escape fights for love and loyalty to revive Messiah. But then, this failure is also valuable data for Enter, as he won't repeat the same mistake.

Already mentioned above, but I also love the music box's significance here! While it used to represent Hiromu's hope of bringing back his parents, Nick plays it now to remind him that it still carries his parents' hope of Hiromu's happiness. It's such an awesome "screw you!" to Enter, who thought he could exploit their trauma from 14 years ago, to see the Gobusters fighting for everybody's Merry Christmas with the classic cheerful version of Jingle Bells motivating them.

Not sure if it was your intention, but it's kind of humorous how you took a Greek letter and replaced it with a NATO letter instead.

Everything I do is intentional! How dare you suggest that these posts are anything other than the result of rigorous and precise effort! (No, it's a happy accident. I just think Escape should canonically be piloting a Papazord!)

So, I believe I've neglected to bring this up in this thread yet, but I've always loved Christmas, and a lot of that comes from my love of storytelling, and how much I feel that specific holiday can offer to a story.

Of the many reasons I'm so fond of Go-Busters, one of the bigger ones is how much I love that decision to have the tragedy that forms the backbone of the narrative happen on Christmas, and everything the show gets out of that. This episode, in a lot of ways, is the ultimate payoff for that.

Christmas as a storytelling tool can be a symbol used to emphasize cold and lonely feelings just as often as warmth and togetherness, and the former is where Go-Busters starts out. That music box especially, when it's introduced, it represents a melancholic longing to be reunited with lost family, and of course, in the end, that dream didn't end up coming true for the Busters.

...Which is what makes it all the more satisfying that, due to the nature of Sentai starting early in the year and airing *for* a whole year, taking place vaguely in real-time the same way Kamen Rider does, we actually come up to Christmas towards the end of the show, and the fairly usual routine of a holiday-themed episode becomes a huge opportunity to definitively show how much these characters have changed in the year they've been fighting the Vagras, swinging the use of Christmas all the way towards the other end of that symbolic spectrum.

It's for sure the use of that music box that's really the cherry on top. Easily one of the scenes from this show I'll always remember most vividly. It's handled in a supremely beautiful manner throughout, to the point that even Nick's goofy singing, which might seem like undercutting the drama of the moment, actually just perfectly cements the whole point of the drama, especially with that shot of Hiromu inside his helmet smiling. The whole reason a music box playing Jingle Bells makes for such a strong representation of sadness is because music boxes inherently have kind of an empty sound to them, so for that to suddenly burst into this joyous rendition of the song courtesy of one of the most important people in Hiromu's life, right as he's explaining how much Enter is failing to grasp? It's brilliant, plain and simple. The show set itself up perfectly to knock an episode like this out of the park, and they didn't waste that opportunity when it finally came around.

Yeah, it ends up being a nice bridge out from Hiromu's heroic stand against the Swordandshieldroid (love it, always) into a larger showcase of how the entire team is literally fighting for Christmas. The former is this individual showcase of resilience and gratitude, and then Nick leads us into a boisterous All Hands recognition of the Go-Busters saving Christmas for all the orphans of the world. It's very sweet!

TOKUMEI SENTAI GO-BUSTERS MISSION 44 - “SILENT NIGHT - IT’S TIME FOR BUSTER”

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Of the series finales we’ve had so far, this is maybe the best one, but I want to hold my final judgment until the third and final series finale next week.

Even if this isn't the best of several series finales, it’s still an exceptionally good episode of Go-Busters. I love how it clarifies the gift the Go-Busters were given thirteen years ago – not a vendetta or a mission, but the chance to live and be the best versions of themselves. It was never about creating soldiers that could eventually save the world (although that’s definitely a good thing, as a citizen of the world), it was about these three kids just getting the chance to grow up.

It’s a nice message, that your ability to change the world for the better exists as a consequence of your life, not as the direct result of sacrifice or training or having a giant transforming lion motorcycle. Hiromu wasn’t saved so he could throw his life away, he was saved so that he could decide to help his friends save the world. The Go-Busters stop Messiah’s rampage, but they also helped a little girl love Christmas thirteen years ago, and she’s been paying it forward ever since. The Go-Busters are heroes through their belief in humanity and their desire for people to be safe and happy, not just because they have cool costumes and a giant fire-breathing robot lion.

It makes the team less a collection of Very Special Boys And Girls, like a lot of superhero teams, and more a collection of motivated individuals who want the best for everyone. There’s a sweetness to that message that’s perfect for a holiday episode. It’s celebrating community and kindness, rather than just heroic declarations of awesomeness and steering wheels that turn into laser cannons. (Seriously, Li-Oh is a pretty crucial member of the team!)

I don’t want to make this all sound like it didn’t work on a Toku Finale level for action, because the show absolutely didn’t skimp on that end of things. (Every single Megazord type! Except Enter’s!) But the core message of your life being the gift you give -- not through sacrifice, but through showing up and being there for people? I love that. Best message for one of this show’s multiple series finales to have.

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IT’S TIME FOR Enetan?!?!

Much like Yoko, I lost my shit when Enetan ended up being Jin’s secret weapon. Enetan didn’t really end up doing a lot as a character (I genuinely would not be surprised to learn that all her dialogue was recycled from the movie), but there’s something special about even one-off movie characters rallying with the cast to deny Messiah his kingdom. I missed that weird frog!

I believe this episode aired around the time the DVD and Blu-Rays for the summer movie were out or were being promoted iirc.

Androzani84 also watched Tokumei Sentai Go-Busters ep 44

The tl:dr of the review above is that while I wasn’t sold in bringing Messiah back after his previous end (I felt it was perfectly serviceable), I liked how they went about executing it. I also thought the orphanage Lady was about as necessary to the plot as the Siskel and Ebert take that in Emmerich’s Godzilla. At least have Messiah almost step on her.

Speaking of villain endings, I also like how despite Escape thinking that she was superior to Enter and more valuable to Messiah, not only did he delete her without batting an eyelid, but as I pointed out last time, Enter didn’t really die that anticlimactically. His reappearance isn’t even played for any kind of drama.

And also speaking of the orphanage lady, the actress playing her, Mizuho Hata, has made a few appearances across different Sentai shows in a variety of different roles. She was in Boukenger as a cat-turned-human, Shinkenger as a food critic, Dekaranger 10th as half of the henchmen duo (the other half being Asumu from Hibiki), the child character’s dead mother in Kyuranger and a recurring unlucky victim in Boonboomger.

That makes sense! Thanks!

Oh, man, I'd completely disagree? The absolute best part of this episode to me was the Busters realization that they saved that lady's life over the last thirteen years by just showing up at Christmas to cheer her up, and how that's paid dividends down the line. It's the episode taking pains to say that the Busters' heroism is more than just giving their lives to defeat Messiah, which is a pretty huge point of the episode to me.

I often forget Enetan was in this one, which I think is because I devote that part of my brain to remembering that it's the other time Stag Custom shows up instead.

It's not even that hard to remember, as Sentai making the final episode before the New Year's break a big mecha action showcase that often also features the movie-exclusive one for the dual purpose of calling attention to the movie coming out on home video is a fairly regular tradition. On one hand, it's obviously to make the kids out there want every possible toy, but viewed more generously, I kind of like to think of it like, no matter what random Sentai toy they get for Christmas, they probably just got to see it do something cool on TV, even if it isn't the absolute newest thing.

Also, you know, the end of the year, the last stretch of the show... it's inherently a good time for big climactic episodes and/or episodes that are like big parties before the dramatic last stretch, and for Go-Busters, thanks to that extra Christmas significance, gets to be both at once. My broad opinion of it pretty much echoes Die's -- it's another strong "finale" that does a great job celebrating the heroes as just like, fully-formed people, before they're anything else. When you've invested in these characters for nearly a whole year already, it's hard not to be satisfied seeing everyone do such a great job fighting back the bad guys that they still have plenty of time left to spend chilling at a party at the end.

And the thing that aired right after this was Kamen Rider Wizard's Christmas episode, to boot! December 23, 2012 was a real good day for Christmas-themed toku episodes!

TOKUMEI SENTAI GO-BUSTERS MISSION 45 - “HAPPY NEW YEAR - TINY BUT DEADLY, AGAIN”

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This was an incredibly fun episode, but one that’s sort of difficult to really dig into.

Mainly it’s an HBV? The vibes on this are real HBV-ish: The Metaroid is a reskinned riff on a previous suit, the combat is minimal, and the characters are all competing to see who can be the most cartoonish version of themself. And I mean that last part as a compliment! It’s a goofy episode of misunderstandings and pointless secrets, complete with ridiculous disguises and unconvincing lies. The whole thing is a clown show, despite Hiromu not literally dressing like a clown for this one.

But it isn’t really about much, beyond the gags. The idea of Ryuji looking to a future beyond fighting the Vagras is interesting, but he has zero chemistry with this girl and seems like he’s a scene away from gnawing his own leg off in order to escape the date. Similarly, Hiromu and Nick’s desire to make sure Rika enjoys her date feels untethered from the narrative at large, because haven’t there been about 44 other battles going on in the background for the past year while Rika was living her life? Why would Hiromu going off to fight the Mochiroid be something he needs to hide from Rika, other than For Laughs?

Like, this isn’t really an episode about being there for each other, or family, or whatever. The episode leans in that direction, but this one’s just a frothy comedy episode and that’s all. But it’s really good at being that, so why kick?

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IT’S TIME FOR Costumes!

Look at these three. A+ episode for this shot alone, but if I’m being honest? I’d’ve maybe preferred the episode where J dates Ryuji.

Here we are at another type of episode Sentai does more often than Rider. The New Years episode, which tends to have lower stakes, a much weirder monster and an overall more comedic tone. So it’s fitting that this is Shimoyama’s last contribution to the main series (he still does the two movies you’ve got upcoming), which also means I’ll be in less of a 100% good mood for the last few episodes.

As for the episode, I love how what seems like a goofy set-up (the henchmen create a monster) turns into a partial deconstruction of why they’re the henchmen. If Enter found out about these events, I imagine he’d wonder what the hell happened.

And back to the talk of upcoming movies, the ending has been replaced with a remix of the usual song that’s equally about the Gokaigers, complete with parts of the backing instrumentals borrowed from that show’s ED, Super Sentai Hero Getter (a rather simplistic song that PokeRaps the Super Sentai), wih the visuals changed to a trailer for Go-Busters vs Gokaiger, showing off a black version of Gokai Galleon, the fact that the “vs” isn’t just to sound cool, they are actually fighting, Enter interacting with the movie villains (which is one notable difference from Rider crossovers, where the regular villains are cameos at best, non-entities at worst) and the debut of Zyuden Sentai Kyoryuger’s KyoryuRed.

Video for Super Sentai Hero Getter.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=p-3KRSAm...TpiIqHvKroUTBu

Interesting! Thanks!

Hard to say too much when I'm only skimming back through the odd episode here or there for this thread, but having poked around this one, I feel like it's more that it doesn't have a singular specific point to make, or message, or whatever you'd call it, which ~maybe~ isn't quite the same thing as the episode not being about anything beyond the raw comedic value?

There's a particular level of familial intimacy to this one, with the whole thing predicated on the characters being worried about potential additions to that family, and even Yoko and Hiromu explicitly introducing themselves as Ryuuji's younger siblings to his date, and all of that is about the laughs, first and foremost, for sure, but... like, I think the true value of the episode is that it gets everyone out of the house for a bit, so to speak?

The last time we had a gap in the stakes, everyone had to go shill Gavan for two weeks and then the plot started right back up before we could explore that idea too much, but here, Shimoyama gets to give us one nice episode where everyone can get out of their uniforms and mostly goof around as flawed people instead of fighting as trained professionals.

It's an episode that's worth it anyway, because, again, it IS pretty dang funny, but I feel like in a more amorphous sense than usual, it's probably adding a lot to the series as a whole. Either way though, definitely not a bad note for Shimoyama to leave on as the last episode of the show from the sub-writers. Between this and Pink Buster, I actually really like that both of them got to use their final Go-Busters scripts to focus on just playing around and stretching the style of the show in their own way.

Yeah, that's probably a better way to put it. It had Traditional Sitcom vibes, in that a random Cheers episode wasn't necessarily about stretching the characters into new shapes, or progressing the narrative, or exploring a metaphor through the lens of the cast -- it was pretty much just about running a concept through established character relationships and seeing which jokes would come out. That's basically what this one was, and I'm okay with it!

Christmas is my favorite holiday as well! I think it's easy to see why Japan fell in love with it despite it being adopted from the west. The themes of good will and festive fun are totally fitting for these Tokusatsu shows and it's cool how Gobusters is able to make even more out of it by framing it around the heroes' shared tragic backstory and their unyielding hope to continue believing in the spirit of Christmas for all the good that it brings, just as their families believed 14 years ago on that exact day. Vaglass can ruin one Christmas, but it will always come back as long as people have hope.

Pretty tragic that Escape ended up losing her life for somebody who never reciprocated her love. She deserved a much more honorable death than that.

Santa jumpscare. :lol

Gnawing off the leg is even worse than losing shoes!

Fun Fact: Stagbuster isn't the only Sixth dude to go undercover as a cute girl. Deka Break is also known for this.

Personally, I think Zenryoku Zenkai Zenkaiger did the whole Sentai celebration thing better, since it focuses on the thematic parts of each Sentai in a way that compliments Zenkaiger's theme, rather than Getter which forgets that it's supposed to be a Gokaiger song.

I also think that Ryuji could do a lot worse than J!

Definitely an apt comparison. Heck, you could edit a laugh track over all those scenes in the restaurant and it'd probably fit in perfectly. :lol

TOKUMEI SENTAI GO-BUSTERS MISSION 46 - “OVERHEATING, AND A NEW UNISON!”

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It’s interesting to do a late-series Ryuji/Yoko episode, maybe more so than any other Buster pairing on this show. No one’s really got the history of Yoko and Ryuji in this show (at least as far as just the human cast is concerned), and spending a little time with them to showcase how their relationship is changing and growing – because Yoko is changing and growing – feels like a smart move before the finale.

And yet, I didn’t love this one? I think telling it more from Ryuji’s perspective than Yoko’s perspective robs it of some really interesting angles, most of which don’t show up until the climactic cliffside sequence between the two of them. We get a little bit of Ryuji’s depression over his sister -slash- daughter finding him to be less of the beloved protector he used to be and more of an overbearing pest, and then a billion fight scenes with Enter, and then Yoko’s realization of what Ryuji’s going through as she’s about to leave the nest. Not getting Yoko’s perspective on things until the very end kept it -- for me -- from feeling like a story that respected her agency or intentions as much as Ryuji's depression; it’s just a story about Ryuji feeling bad for most of the episode.

But I do like how Yoko’s cliffside sequence feels like it’s in conversation with the first Ruji Overheats episode. That one is about Yoko needing to reconcile the loving older brother with the flawed soldier, while this one’s about reconciling her own autonomy with a need to respect Ryuji’s feelings. She had to learn how to see Ryuji before, and now she has to learn how to see what she means to Ryuji. All that, plus she has to physically confront the monster that used to terrify her, all to save him from himself. It’s as neat a bookend as you could get for that relationship, regardless of how the episode chose to get there.

I thought this one had its heart in the right place, even if the way it expressed itself was not as much to my liking. More fun for me to think about Yoko’s side of things than Ryuji’s, honestly, and I wish the producers felt the same way.

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IT’S TIME FOR Enter and Escape!

I never really talked too much about Escape’s death, because it felt so hilariously inconsequential that I assumed she’d be back in some form before the final finale. (Although, I really did like her devotion to Messiah being of absolutely no interest to his howling hunger. Good note for that arc!) Enter’s destruction was of the same Question Rather Than Answer variety, so I barely mentioned it. And here they both are! Ironed-hair Enter and Flowered-hair Escape! I like the evolution of Enter’s powers to something that can alter plants and animals now, since it feels appropriately god-like. Should be fun to see what Papa Enter gets up to next!

Funnily enough, this aired alongside the episode of Wizard where the female villain makes the secondary hero fight his allies (granted, the plots that result are different, but still).

About the episode, wow was I not keen on Escape being back. In fact, this and Messiah’s return helped form one of my pet peeve tropes in Toku: giving a villain a fitting send-off and then bringing them back for a more generically “epic” death. It annoyed me here, it annoyed me with Manmarva in Hurricaneger and it looks like it’s about to annoy me with MadRex Fury in Boonboomger. There aren’t any Rider villains that come to mind (mostly because most of them either have rather lame first deaths, tend to stay alive after their resurrection or have the good decency to stay dead). But I’ll discuss more of this next time.

And to end on a more positive note, Kuwagataloid/Stagloid/Stagroid/Kuwagatroid (delete as appropriate) is probably my favourite Metaloid design, so I can say they saved the best for last at least.