Let's Watch Wednesdays Week 7 Gekiranger 19-21
 

Last week Kensei Sharkie Chan bestowed the Geki Sabers and Geki Shark on Jan. Shakkin! This week Rio is ready to destroy Gekijyuken for good. Bust Master Shafu has made Rio a promise. If he gives the Gekirangers enough time, they will obtain Kageki, the ultimate geki. And then their defeat will cement him as the ultimate Jyuken user. So let's watch Gekiranger 19-21!

Super Beast On!

SUPER GEKI RANGEEEER~!...No! Bad Mido, save that for the end! Ahem, my thoughts on this trio of episodes.

So one minor note before I get into the meat and potatoes of 19. Eruka was another user of the Toad style. Keep that in mind for the future that there can be more than one practictioner of a certain style. Also we get to see how the Gekirangers have grown again like their remwatch with Moriya. When they faced Maga he was nearly invincible, while Eruka was a complete joke. Just shows you how far they have come. Now onto the fun stuff, Rio getting serious and trying to wipe the Gekirangers out. I always loved how Butoka and Wagataku had been staring us in the face the whole time and now they are brought to life by the Kenma. So while I mentioned earlier we see how the Gekirangers have grown, we quickly see how much Rio has grown as well, as he hands the Gekirangers their asses. They probably would have been killed if Shafu had not showed up and made a deal with Rio spare them so they can learn Kageki. Also, we learned that Rio might have had something to do with the disapperance of Retsu's brother.

Then we move onto the training episode and we quickly meet the remaining 3 Kensei: Michelle Peng, Gorrie Yen, and Pyon Piao. Their training takes place as a contest between thme and the Master Triangle, which each of them matching up against their weakpoint. Jan understandably loses his contest with Gorrie to raise the stakes on Ran and Retsu, but also due the fact Jan probably could never stack coins like that. I don't think anyone could. It'd drive Two-Face crazy :lol. Next we have Ran vs. Michelle on a half-pipe. To be expected, Michelle gets a perfect score putting pressure on Ran. After a botched first run and some mid second run coaching from Retsu, she manages to tie with Michelle. Then it comes down the match of Pyon Piao and Retsu. Definitely my favorite part becaus Retsu steps the hell up and manges to win after taking a really nasty beating. So the competition ends and the Master Triangle acknowledges the Gekirangers and give them the Super Geki Claws.

Now onto the main event, episode 21. Rio vs. the Gekirangers round 2. Once again Rio shows us how much he has grown, even using some of the Kenma techniques during battle to beat them down. He even brutalizes while they lay on the ground, which leads to Jan discovering the secret of the Kageki, the ability to protect others. SUPER BEAST ON! Now we get to the really good stuff with the debut of the Super Gekirangers. Just moments ago the Gekirangers couldn't really do anything against Rio, Butoka, and Wagataku. Now they effortlesslt defeat them in combat. Defeat them to an awesome insert song and some hella Koichi Sakamoto stunt fighting. Probably the best part of the aftermath of that battle is the look on Rio's face. He's is genuinely surprised and spooked after Jan beat him. Then we meet the new Geki Beasts and GekiFire as they smash the beetle statues for good this time. Not really much to say about them aside from some neat moments like the Gorilla swinging along the Penguin's contrail. Of course, the GekiFire finisher is arm swinging, albeit vertical instead of horizontal this time. And at the end Rio mentions someone called the White Tiger, that should be interesting ;).

One side note I'll make is that we are now at episode 21. We have the Super Mode and no sign of new teamates. Goes to show again how Gekiranger is not your typical Super Sentai.

All I need to say is: SKATEBOARDING. PENGUIN.

That bit of :D tells you exactly all of my thoughts this week.

19 was a great episode. Really awesome to see Rio finally step up his game instead of lurking in the shadows again. Jan's sudden burst of new geki fire was incredible. the first time I saw it I got shivers from just how powerful his character felt at that moment. It's also interesting that it gives hints towards Rios past with Dan.

20 was a standard fair "train to get upgrade" episode but I liked the new Kensei. I like how their specialities are variations of what the 3 Gekiranger stand for (body heart techniueq). And Gorie is awesome, I love monkeys in my sentai. But the Bunta costume from Dekaranger is still so hilariously bad/awesome that it trumps Gorie :lol

21. Dear god 21. Easily one of the best episode of the series. I'll say it now in case you guys haven't realized it before. But I am a power-up/power spam whore ;p Seeing an awesome power up that's executed as well as Jan going Super Geki is something I just can't resist. Absolutely loved it. I still think Geki Fire is a pretty bland robo though. Having handled the DX toy I can safely tell you that it's simplistic as all hell.

I'm pretty sure I said it in the What Sentai Are You Watching thread, but I'll say it again here: Jan activating Super Beast Mode was cliche as hell, but it was also incredibly freaking awesome.

Also, Mele is still hot.

But it has a PENGUIN ON A SKATEBOARD!
That make the whole thing worth it.

Giant robot penguin!! That is all I am going to say.

You and me both. :rock:

After watching these eps I need: Figuarts of the Super Gekirangers,SRC of GekiFire and a GIF of Ran doing her little penguin dance.

These episode are such a well done and complete package.First of all is Jan's first taste of Kageki,I did NOT expect that out of Jan.Rio hasn't been messing around either,even after the Gekirangers do some training and get some new weapons they still don't stand a chance against Rio.The last 3 Kensei,even though they were pretty big jerks I still kinda like them.Gorrie Yen especially,even though he was the biggest jerk of all I still liked his design and character.

Super Gekirangers,kinda bummed but also glad to see Accel Booster isn't the first user of jet boosters all over the body.It is such a cool power-up,the design of the suits alone make them awesome.The white highlights around the helmets details help make them pop so much.I really need these suits as Figuarts.GekiFire is really cool,Penguin on a skateboard pretty much sums it up.Bringing in all of the GekiBeasts was amazing,but I think it might have happened a little too soon.

One of my only issues with these episodes though is that they kinda undermine the training that the Gekirangers did with the other Kensei.Makes me feel like they only needed those new weapons and GekiBeasts to deal with regular monsters.Even when all the GekiBeasts were assembled,they didn't do much to stop the statue guards.Seeing Sharkie in the preview hopefully means their training with the Kensei isn't over and they'll combine the styles with Kageki.

These episodes were just so good and I can't believe we're almost halfway through and we still haven't seen any sign of GekiViolet.This series just keeps giving and giving.Can't wait for next week and I wanna know,are we gonna cover the movie on here too?Seeing Rio and Mele in GekiTouja with the Gekirangers looks to be something worth discussing.

My thoughts on an episode by episode basis.

19.
Rio walking through the Gekirangers was just totally badass. I particularly enjoyed his little speech on the virtues of strength. It was awesome, and the power gap between him and the Gekirangers was evident. That fight was just awesome.
I also enjoyed that the Gekirangers, while getting somewhat confident, didn't get cocky. Their loss was humbling, but it wasn't so overblown that it was ridiculous.
Anyway, a couple other things to comment on in quick succession: I like the statue enemies. I've always been a sucker for beetle designs, and that's no different here. Miki keeps her pimp hand strong. And some Gou foreshadowing is always nice!

20.
Something that I particularly liked was that they kept the battle damage from the last battle.
Anyway, the Master Triangle was pretty awesome. They're kind of smug bastards, but considering the situation, they need a wake up call that Shafu's more laid back training won't cut it this time around.

21.
Super Geki Mode! Kageki! It's so cool. I will agree that they obtained it in a super cliche manner, but that doesn't change that it was still awesome. Seeing Rio get beaten so soundly hurts my soul, but that just comes with the territory of being the bad guy.
Anyway, I'm not a big fan of Geki Fire. Though he moves faster than most other mechs by virtue of being a fist fighter, I still don't like that he pretty much overtakes GekiTouja until later on (Which I won't spoil).

Overall, these aren't the same people who weren't taken down by a pissed off Mele. The extent of their training yields obvious growth.

Also, you have no idea how badly I want to watch episode 22 :lol

I don't think so.
Their training with the first Kensei were to bring out their potential in their original strengths. Their fight with Rio was to show that relying solely on what they knew wasn't enough.
Their training with the original Kensei was the exemplify the epitome of their original strengths. Their training with the new Kensei was to become their own triangle, training up their weakest attribute (Though Jan did fail. I guess screaming loud enough makes up for it :lol).

I never have understood why Jan failing made sense and just worked itself out. And I think there's a basis for the argument that training for Kageki with the new Kensei almost completely replaced their training with Bat, Elehan, and Sharkie. It's took Jan almost another 20 episodes before he used the Geki Saber in Super Mode. Once they could access their new forms the old weapons were hardly used anymore.

Yeah, that didn't make sense.
And while it does suck that they don't utilize their individual weapons.
But that's not the purpose of their training. The purpose of their training wasn't to learn how to use a new weapon, the purpose was their learning. The philosophy behind it all.
What was more important? Retsu learning how to use the fans, or Retsu learning the purpose and utility of entering a trance?

It could be considered undermined because they don't pull out the weapons as often, but the lessons learned and the growths that occurred aren't gone.

I really do enjoy that they always learn from their training,but this IS an action show.I wanna see them use their weapons in cool ways and with a show like Gekiranger that's so heavily martial arts influenced,you'd think that they would.Hearing that Jan won't use the GekiSabers with Super Mode for 20 episodes really bums me out.I kinda thought that having all of these Kensei would mean that they would be combining teachings much like Rio is with the Kenma.

Of course,this isn't ruining the show for me at all.The Super Gekirangers are freaking cool.But I'm just really into seeing the heroes use everything in their arsenal.I really wanna see a fight where they have to use their signature weapon,the Bazooka,the Kensei weapons,the Super Geki Claws and whatever else they get in the series.

All of the above statements are true.

Another awesome set of episodes, possibly the best yet. Rio kicking the gangs ass was epic, as was them returning the ass kicking. I kinda dig Geki fire at a single component level, together it doesn't really do much for me, nice to see a penguin mech though =)

My biggest gripe with these episodes was that Jan had the chance to learn something, sure he got a reason to fight but beyond that he still hasn't changed. I really wanted him to succeed, but no he had to have a strop. Retsu though, man, major love for him in these eps. Ran was always going to do good, she's always had the determination to better herself.

I also dig how early we have the power ups, makes me intrigued as to why we're going to need more members of the team if they can already kick this much ass.

Took me a while...but I finally caught up! Amazing bunch of episodes! Episode 21 is easily the best in the series so far.

The training overall was really brutal and tough, especially on Retsu. I thought it was a nice touch that Ran was the first to succeed and even better than Retsu (who I'd argue is the most fragile of the three) would fight to the very end as he did. I was disappointed that Jan failed his training miserably, but it was a nice touch showing you don't always win. He did eventually learn his lesson in the next episode.

I always did like the GekiMaster modes in Jungle Fury and they're just as cool here. Simply marvelous! I must say, that mecha battle was epic beyond words. The appearance of every Geki Beast in the series so far was beyond words, and perhaps even more impressive for me, was the cinematography of the whole battle. It was set in a battleground that reminded me strongly of Chinese mountain scenery you often see in paintings and kung fu films. It was a really nice, subtle homage that greatly enhanced the look of the scene for me.

Lovely episodes, but when on Earth is Gekiviolet going to show up? 21 episodes without a Sixth Ranger, that's a record in all the Super Sentai I've watched.