Super Samurai Episode 16 - "Fight Fire with Fire" Discussion
 

The episode many have been waiting for has finally arrived as Jayden's secret is revealed!

Spoilered just case there's anyone out there who's not seen Shinkenger/doesn't know what's about to happen. Discuss!

Is it over yet?

Should be by now.

Unfortunately no Samurai is not over yet series and current shoe at time of writhing. However I will say this about this episode they manged to handle the Shinkenger female red plot point better by having Lauren show some actually interest in Jaden (as any "good" sister does) and the team .....and then immediately made it worse by apparently you cant have two red ranger because ranger team would want to protect Jaden more, however that makes scene now that I'm thinking about it. Also Lauren uses the shadophone witch is her fathers from the stoke footage nice touch and kinda emotionale. Also this episode does have some "real" emotion with Jaden leaving at the end. Overall for samurai Id say a pretty good episode if only it didn't have to line up somewhat with Shinkenger stoke footage plot point and character traits like mines gold and male red during an ark.

He meant "is Samurai over yet?" :p

The lack of reaction from the rest of the team is what killed the episode for me. I'm going to use Shinkenger 45 as an example, not of how to do a Samurai episode but how to pay attention to human reactions.

When Kaoru entered and Takeru revealed his secret of being a shadow to allow her to train, and he wasn't even a Shiba clan member, it DEVASTATED Mako, Chiaki, Genta, Kotoha and Ryunosuke. Why did it tear away at them and drive them away from their duties, almost ripping them apart emotionally? They had spent their lives training under their family's guidance, knowing that their goal was to serve a true lord. They meet this lord, fighting alongside him, pledging their life to him as he's the only way to defeat the enemy. They spend the year bonding with him, risking themselves, devoting every second of their life to him because they believe in his conviction.

Not to mention Genta, Takeru's childhood friend, has to realize that his best friend in the entire world, who he believed to be a role model and the most important person in the world to him, and he spent his life training to join teams with has been feeding him a lie. However, Genta soon realizes and affirms to Takeru that although he had been leading this double life, they were still best friends and had identities outside of being Samurai.

The severe attachment to the Samurai mission, the bonds with each other, devotion and loyalty are what caused the revelation of the secret to have an intense, to say the least, emotional reaction over several episodes. How does Samurai approach this? Mia and Emily ask Lauren to go shopping. Mike gets a hamburger and oogles Lauren's Shodophone. Kevin and Antonio enjoy the cookout. This isn't about comparing it to Shinkenger for the sake of, "oh, this is how it happened in the Sentai." This is the fact that there has been dozens of episodes of build up, and devotion to a red ranger, without none of them realizing what it means for them to be lied to about such a thing.

However, if I'm seeing this wrong. Please correct me.

I haven't seen the episode yet unfortunately. raz, do you have a DailyMotion link or anything to this episode you can share?

It sounds like it was a great episode with a horrible pay off at the end and I'm intrigued to see it for myself and share my thoughts. If it's as shallow as you say it is, it means this whole build-up was for nothing.

No, nothing. Samurai Cast has a bunch of clips though: http://www.samuraicast.com/episodes/...re-episode.php

This show makes me weep for humanity. Honestly. They're acting started out this Super Samurai season better than the first, and I had hope. But good ole Saban proved how idiotic hope is. I'm with Raz. They're reaction was horrible. And the fact they took Kaoru Shiba and made her some blonde cheerleader really pisses me off.

So many issues. Like there being no explination why there's a Shinto Shrine in an American City, why the letter was in Japanese when neither Jayden, Lauren, or their father was remotely japanese. The acting. And I think, on that note, the only reason they were even upset Jayden was leaving was because they knew all they're acting would look that much shittier. When he's around they have a buffer.

I cannot wait for this season to be over already.

Meh, Washington and Hawaii have Shinto shrines so I don't see why that's a particularly big deal. It'll probably be a few days before I get a chance to watch the episode and comment on the other stuff though.

I know it was a stupid complaint. This whole episode just frustrated me to unknown levels.

I can piece a lot of things together from those clips and it seems like an emotional episode. Hopefully it's up on Nick tomorrow.

Thanks raz.

Emotion? From these idiots? Riiiiiiiiiiight.

I thought the group's reaction to Jayden leaving was pretty on target actually. I dunno. I need to watch the whole episode and not just clips. But I think you're being a little harsh, Sentai.

No. I'm being kind. What I'm thinking in my head about this episode is so much worse than what I'm posting.

I think they still did okay with it though.

- Lauren appears, saves the day
- Jayden's secret is that he has a sister? That's cool. We can use the help!
- Girls want to get to know her, invite her shopping
- Guys are interested in her morpher, etc.

It wasn't until Jayden pops at the door with a bag that they realize Lauren is *REPLACING* Jayden, and that's when the emotion starts. That's when the REAL secret is out. And I thought that was an okay transition.

Hmn. I did enjoy Lauren overall more than I thought I would, I will give you that much. I just think I'm burned out on Samurai. The toys are awesome but the show is just.. alot of meh.

Samurai was a missed opportunity, that's for sure. I'm hoping that Saban was just rusty and that Samurai was their way of getting themselves back in to shape. If Megaforce shares the same issues that Samurai has, I'm going to be really disappointed. I want to love Power Rangers, I do, and I'm going to remain cautiously optimistic. Can't write it off yet until we see the first episode of Megaforce.

My hopes are higher than they should be given Samurai. And not every episode of Samurai has been horrible. There've been a couple in there that can show you these guys can act, and the show can be good. Just for some reason they give up on an episode to episode basis.

One thing I do like is Mia's apparently crush on Jayden. I am a huge Mia fan.

I thought they paired off:

- Mia and Kevin
- Mike and Emily
- Antonio and Lauren
- Jayden and Mentor

:p

That episode wasnt that that bad at all. The Nighloc's voice was ANNOYING though. 4/5

Her design wasn't bad though, was it? Shinkenger/Samurai does have some of the better designs for Monsters of the Week, I think.

The design was one of the better designs. Only the voice was ANNOYING.

Alot of the voices from the Monsters are annoying. But for every annoying one, there's a truely epic one. Xandredd I love.

... I don't understand you. Xandred's voice is only capable of three emotions: really angry, really REALLY angry, and ridiculously angry. Doukoku's voice oozed with evil. The anger was their, but it came in a few flavors: rage, fury, annoyance, and indifference.

However, I really do like Serrator's voice over Ayakashi's. Ayakashi didn't really sound threatening, but Serrator definitely was sinister. Really, Serrator was a victim of poor dialogue.

Lauren is probably the best thing to happen to Samurai. Kimberly Crossman is a great actress, and already she has more character than Kaoru. Kaoru wasn't bad- she just didn't have enough time to develop completely. Lauren managed to seep in a lot of character in the limited screen time she got.

The other Rangers... are there.

Jayden told Lauren that he saw the other rangers as brothers and sisters. That pretty much kills any Jayden and Mia or Jayden and Emily shipping.

It's on Nick.com

http://www.nick.com/videos/clip/powe...l-episode.html

You know, I remember myself wondering just what the voice for the Nighlok would be like when I watched the Shinkenger episode.

Anger is an emotion I understand :lol

Emily's romantic with Mike, so that'd kill anything too. But. Mia does like Jayden. Look how she was looking at him at the sart of the episode. Not to mention he might be into the incest. The way he so creepily said "now we can be together" to Lauren.

Personally I've always been shipping Jayden with Antonio :lol

Kevin's the worse of them. Look in his room and I bet you anything he has a shrine to jayden, complete with old underwear and locks of his hair.

I'm....indifferent to this episode. It was a good watch and I thought all the characters were on top form (like Kick said, the emotion came from the fact that Jayden was leaving rather than the fact he'd be lying to them the whole time) but on the other hand, Jayden's reasons for leaving were utterly ridiculous.

It made sense in Shinkenger because of the far different relationship between Kaoru and Takeru and the fact her servants were much more aloof and authoritative. But here the only real reason Jayden is leaving is because he's too proud. It just doesn't work.

The writers were trying to express that Jayden was leaving because the team had grown to care for him and would be more willing to rush to his aid than to Lauren's aid. And that can't happen ("mistakes are bound to happen" - Jayden) because Lauren has mastered the sealing power to defeat Xandred, she has to be kept alive long enough to seal away Xandred for good.

Jayden's presence would only cause the team to be divided if he was in trouble as they'd rush to protect him ... but Lauren is the one they need to protect.

However the writers at the very end made it more of a "I am Jayden. I must go. Because I must go." Keeping true to his stick-up-the-rear character-type, but really defeated the whole "THE REASON I AM LEAVING IS SO YOU WON'T PROTECT ME OVER MY SISTER" idea.

Still sounds like a dumb reason in hindsight.

Dumb reason or not it was entirely possible to write it in a way that worked. I do not know how or why they failed to deliver.

This is one of my biggest issues with PR Samurai. It's not that it's too similar or too different from its sentai counterpart. The show never comes together emotionally for me, and there's no excuse this year because the writers had the entire sentai season played out before they even started the first episode translation...I mean, "script."

Every season before this had to go into the overall season arc blind and work with whatever the sentai gave them a few weeks ahead of time. PR Samurai had a WHOLE YEAR, and then some thanks to Nick's airing schedule.