Let's Watch Wednesdays Week 5 Gekiranger 13-15!
 

Rio has bested Katas' first round of training and Geki Elephant Touja reigns supreme, for now.

Next! The Gekirangers must seek out the third Kensei, Master Bat li, and Retsu must attain a new power!

Geki Geki Geki Geki Geki Geki Geki!!

AND: DVD GIVEAWAY!!

I watched it yesterday mistakenly assuming it was Wednesday. Anyway, I really love Bat Li. He's such a mellow character, and while I'm too dense to understand his lesson (Abandon your technique; in trance, there is training), it was kind of nice for Retsu to learn that doing things meticulously isn't always the best route.

Also, the crow and swan Rin Rinshi whose names I can't remember for the life of me. They're...Odd. I like their duo mentality, and they do seem to have a sense of comradarie far stronger than the 5 Venoms, but I'm not exactly angry or sad seeing them get picked off.

And Geki Bat Touja. It's kind of neat, but I do wish the backpack/wings weren't as cumbersome.

I actually don't like Li much myself. Retsu is a great fit for his pupil though and the Geki Fan is a neat weapon. I'd say I think Bat Touja is the best of the 3 combos though. Elephants big goofy shoulders don't really appeal to me.

And the crow & swan make for decent villains for this arc. I especially liked 15 when the swan when nutso and thought his sword was his brother. And little Jan transforming was hilarious. Just running up on the swan at like 2 feet tall :lol Funny coincidence, the kid who played young Jan is the same kid who played young Wataru/Kiva in Decade.

Bat Li is probably my least favorite of the Kensei. He's just too low key and he's a dick to Sharky Chan in a couple episodes. His fan music is awesome, though.

One thing I've been finding kind of interesting about Gekiranger is how much all of the Rio/Mele stuff was directly translated over for Jungle Fury, while pretty much none of the Ranger stuff was ported over. It's an odd way to do the translation. I wish I could say whether or not it works, but I remember sod all about Jungle Fury unless a parallel comes up in Geki. :p

Yeah Li just struck me as boring and quiet. Elephan is loud obnoxious and perverted, and Sharkie is loud fun and full of energy, so Li just seems flat compared to them. And the next arc, where he treats Sharkie so assholeishly, made me like him even less.

Ah yes, the Hisshou Ken arc(I'm feeling a tad weaboo today, forgive me). I'll try to make some order to my thoughts.

First we have Kata starting Rio's training. It's more mindscrew and it revolves around hatred. Really painful mindscrew that drives Rio for a bit. Mele doesn't trust that, and neither would I. Speaking of Kata, was have Ruutsu and Rasuka, the driving antagonistic antagonistic force while the Rin Jyuken members of the cast do their thing. Really liked their angelic and demonic left and right design theme. To be expected of Kenma bodyguards, they are pretty tough. So that means Gekirangers need some training. BTW, anyone think Bae was lucky to get sat on by Mele :lol?

Enter Master Bat Li. I always loved that dance he did as an introduction, as well as the music(really need to grab that one day). His training is a bit abstract, but I find it makes sense. Sometimes you need to zone out to get in the zone. Which is something a person like Retsu could use because he can tend to overthink. I always enjoyed him effortlessly take on the bodyguards with the GekiFan, and the music the fight to was awesome. Though I kinda wish the GekiFan was something new for Retsu like the GekiHammer was for Ran. The GekiFan just felt a natural extension of what he's already used. And the GekiBatTouja is awesome.

And then we have the B Plot episode that allows the Rin Jyuken plot to progress again. We have Ruutsu yank the age out of Retsu and Jan and turn them into a baby and child respectively. It was funny to watch Ran struggle with them, but at the end of the day it was rather heartwarming to see the bonding between her kid Jan. And kid GekiRed was funny. Then we have the real plot of the episode, Mele looking for the next Kenma body. Loved it how Bae calls out her jealousy over Rio spending so much time with Kata. And 2he finds it and arrives Rageku. Once again the stakes of this show are going to be raised.

Also "Peeing Retsu! Peeing Retsu!":lol.

It was the same kid? I thought he looked familiar this time around.

Crane. The white Rin Rinshi is a crane.

Nit-picking aside, here's a nit-pick.

Anyone else find KibaRanger, KingRanger and Justin to be odd in retrospect when you see Mini-Jan henshin into Mini-GekiRed (and also the ShinkenRed boy from Gokaiger)? All three are kids (KingRanger is a kid because his actor was, I know the character is 600 or so) and, probably because of it being the 90's (and Justin because of limitations of the Sentai footage), their suit actors are grown adults as to not offset the visual appearances, but years later that status quo was dropped.

Dismiss this all you want, this is just the ramblings of my overanalysis.

I want Bat Li's training music!

I think they were trying to be funny with that part rather than be serious like the other examples you give...well, the kid from Gokaiger aside.

Derp. I really don't know what the hell I was thinking.

Anyway, I liked that kid Jan didn't grow when morphed. Just funnier that way.

Also, looking at my previous post, I forgot to comment on Mele and Rageku! The second Kenma! If I recall, Rageku trained Mele just as much, if not more so, than Rio, too. It's nice to have such a power dichotomy for the villain ranks, as Rio is intentionally reviving characters he acknowledges as stronger and superior than him. While I don't think this is explored much until the 3rd Kenma is revived, it is interesting to see that, while Rio is the primary antagonist, he's not the strongest one around. I would've liked to see a moment where Kata's personal underlings, Rutsu and Rasuka, acknowledged that, while Rio is current head of Rin Ju Den, he's not the strongest, thus, they don't take orders from him, instead of just being dicks to Mele.

Anyway, I still like Bat Li. He and Xia Fu are the only two who actually give off the vibe of being a master. Calm, serious, and straight forward. He is dull, and I do like Elehung and Sharky too, but I just don't feel like he's a bad character.

I really love the fans Retsu gets during these episodes as it makes me think of Kitana from MK. Not to mention Bat's mask is pretty awesome.

Outside of those, I really cannot say much about the next episode when the rangers were turned into kids, as it was all right. It could have been worse, but I wish it had been better. I don't know, I'm just not a fan of the turn the ranger to kids stories.

Eh. It's kind of a mixed bag, since that episode also had the major plot point of Rageku's revival :lol

I honestly liked Master Swoop better.

I don't remember him.

I guess I was the only one who likes Master Li :lol

I honestly liked all the Masters in Jungle Fury much as I liked RJ, always wished they'd use them more.

Which one was that?

He was the JF equivalent of Bat Li.

Personally, I liked all the Kensei in varying degrees. My personal favorite was Sharky though. Because he's a shark.

Good enough reason for me :lol

You're not the only one. I like him too. Sure, he was kinda mean to Sharkie, but it's hard to hate anyone for being mean after you've seen the last three kensei.

This. And Sharky was just awesome anyway. Sneaking up on the boat going down the river :lol Shakin!
The other 3 kensei are douchebags I'll give you that, but they had to impart some pretty hard lessons to the team. They had to be tough.

Oh. Yeah, JF stopped being shown around me about 5 episodes in, so I never saw the rest of the series.

I really need to get back to watching these on Wednesdays :lol

Kata's bodyguards were really cool.One,I like asymmetrical designs and two,I LOVE bird motifs.They worked really well as a duo and I liked how Rasaku's death affected Ruutsu's sanity.

Bat Li isn't my favorite of the kensei so far,but he had some pretty sweet dance moves and that's good enough for me.Really interesting choice to give Retsu fans as a weapon.Maybe it's just Mortal Kombat,but when hear bladed fans I think woman user.Geki Bat Touja,doesn't beat Elephant Touja for me but still pretty cool.

Mele is just knocking it out of the park every episode.She wants to do anything she can to protect Rio and I legitimately want her to.I feel a real connection to her character which is pretty astounding.Also ep 13,lucky Bae ;)

The Ranger to kid plot for ep 15 was eh.It was bugging me the whole episode who the kid playing GeKid Red was.Man,that kid got to be a Rider AND Ranger.I was really surprised to see they made a kid-sized Ranger suit.

Cool little 3-part arc.I wanna see what Rageku's about and what she may do with Mele since she took an interest in her.Hopefully I can actually watch the next eps on Wednesday.

Honestly out of any "ranger becomes child" type of episode I've ever seen, this one is the most tolerable. But little Jan is also hilarious so that helps :lol

Watched them last wednesday, but forgot to post in here. Better late than never I guess =p

Okay, Bat Li... he's okay I guess. Not as fun as Elehan, looks a bit weird too.. more like a monkey. Geki Bat Touja is pretty cool though and so is the Fan blade weapon, although I felt like it would of suited Jan more and that he would have learnt more from the 'lesson.'
The Rin Jyuden also stole these episodes for me, especially Ruutsu. His character and design were all kinds of awesome.

I also thought the 'rangers as kids' episode was one of the better I've seen. It was also funny that kid Jan seemed more sensible/less energetic than adult Jan. Mama Ran was strangely adorable, I really like her character, probably one of the best female rangers I've seen. With that said I'm still sort of impartial on my feelings of Retsu, I don't love him or hate him, he's just kinda there. My opinion of Ran hasn't changed either, largely because he hasn't...

Wait till GekiViolet's introduction. That's when I came to like Retsu.

Sweet, I'm looking forward to him appearing anyway =D

I haven't gotten around to watching the final episode of the three, but the Bat Li episodes were pretty awesome. I think Retsu is definitely my favorite Blue Ranger of all time. Bat Li was also really cool, I definitely like him better than that crazy Elehan.

Most importantly the fans are some of the coolest weapons ever, and the style is graceful and beautiful.

Retsu is certainly bland. I can't argue that, though ShockerCon is right. He's great during GekiViolet's introduction.

I love the concept of fans as weapons. It's pretty awesome, if wildly impractical :lol