Mashin Sentai Kiramager Episode 1- "The Mashin Are Born!" Discussion
 

A new era in Super Sentai begins! Today we meet the heroes chosen by the KirameStones to protect the Earth.

Red reminds me of an even more airhead d toq ichigo without the confidence. Green kind of looked like mai from gaim and blue remind me of makoto from ghost. It's been a while since we have human hybrid monster costume. Usually human looking villains mean better flesh out villains. The sentient gems without expressions seems off. So far, the series give me the character over plot driven sentai vibe.

The gold on the alien princess's forehead looks like a gold penis. I'm also getting a goseiger vibe from the cast.

I know a giant monster was present here. Did the Mashin unite or was it the "individual Zords fight together and destroy Monster #1 without combining in the first episode" trope?

Thought it was a bit lackluster TBH.

I thought it was wildly entertaining. Pairs with Episode Zero really well but just fine standalone too. It's so absurd and weird, I quite enjoyed the premise. Reminded me of ToQger with the emphasis on imagination. I particularly enjoyed the gags with Yellow. Atsuta draws vehicles that relate to each Kiramager's profession in some way but he has no idea what to do for yellow so he just goes by colour and makes an excavator. I also assume Yellow will be vying for the position of leader as well.

Refreshing to have the rangers beat the kaiju with just their vehicles. Some really great effects work here, both practical and CG. And interesting that we didn't have a 'real' ground fight or roll-call. Dig the ending theme but the dances get lamer every year.

The overall aesthetic and style is nice. I'm in.

I wonder if this might be the opposite of Zero-One in that I like the Kiramagers themselves more than the supporting characters. I don't like the design for those blue creatures, they're not exactly cute!

it sounds silly to say out loud but I like that the pink ranger threw the two guys down then sat down on them and crossed her legs. It was so 'ladylike'.

Often I find the female rangers seem to be men (maybe?) when in costume because they act and move more manly. So it's nice to see the ranger very clearly being a female when in uniform.

That was one of the things i liked about Akibaranger also was that the Blue and Yellow rangers acted very female when in uniform.

Especially Yellow acted exactly the same as when out of uniform in her civilian clothes.

Details like that where the character seems like the same person in and out of uniform is oddly important to me. And it's not easy to pull off in the these shows because the suit actors are always someone different.

I mean, when the rangers are in their costumes it's usually because they're fighting, and what's practical in a fight is pretty gender-neutral. Even if you account for things like women having on average more strength in their lower body and less in their upper, that's just the average, not something that will be true of every fighter, and even when it is true it's rarely that big a difference. So it's realistic for the women to fight more-or-less the same as the men.

With all that said, when have Sentai fights ever cared about being realistic? :lol I like Pink's fighting too. I find when people try to make a "feminine" fighting style it usually comes out looking silly and needlessly sexual, so I'm glad they went with something that was just graceful and elegant.

I believe it was as of Gekiranger they started having more female suit actors play the female rangers, cause majority of the time male suit actors would play the roles if I remember correctly especially during the 80s and 90s.

yeah, that's what I was trying to say. She was even wearing a long dress before the henshin.

It's just nice to see is all.

So....has any group actually subbed episode 1? From what I've been able to find only episode zero got subbed by OT and TVN....

OT released episode 1 today.

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I know I should find Juuru to be annoying, but I can't seem to hate him! I love his energy and quirkiness. He's not Lucky-annoying so this should make it more tolerable.

Took 'em long enough!

P.S.: What kaijin did you choose for your profile pic, SHINOBIO3!? I don't recognize it!

Ok first impressions on thew show...

I'm not fond of their civilian outfits. I wish they just wore regular clothes with their respective colors. Those cape like things they're wearing bothers me for some reason. I do like the suits though. They're on the simpler side of things but they look sleek. And the helmets are pretty cool.

I like that the Mashins have their own personalities. I liked that in Abaranger and Go-onger so I'm probably gonna like it here too. It just adds more dynamism to the team.

The princess though creeps me out a bit. i don't like her design that much. Maybe because her mouth doesn't move when she talks? Just not really appealing to me at the moment. PPAP Guy is ok as a support character. I hope he does better than Ui and her dad in Ryusoulger.

Now the team. I like the first four. Character wise there seems a lot of potential from them. Shigeru is the silent, cool guy, Sayo is like the loving big sis, Sena is the cheerful girl and Tametomo seems to be the butt monkey.
They're all ok for me. Now as for Juuru, well he seems like he's going to be that Red that's gonna dominate all the story lines. He's the one that imagines the mecha and the arsenal. He's probably gonna be the one that leads the team to victory in the most ridiculous ways possible. And of course he's gonna hog all the upgrades (well most Reds do). I'm just hoping the I like him enough not to have a repeat of how I felt watching Kyoryuger. And I hope, though I doubt, that he stops that catchphrase of his.

That's Ninja Slayer, and it's not a Kaijin.

Yeah, it feels like it did not know if it wants to be Magiranger or Goseiger so it just fused the two.:lolol
Now the suits, easily my new favs. I liked them at first glance and still not a change of heart has occured. They are loud and saturated like no other but it just works and really matches the whole gem concept.

Welp, that didn't take long. One episode in, and I'm already head over heels for Kiramager.

Episode Zero didn't exactly wow me, but I've had an extremely good feeling about this show for a while now. The designs started growing on me rapidly, and almost everything it was doing seemed to be tailored specifically for me, you know? I mean, holy crap, you guys, this show has a fire truck robot voiced by Kenichi Suzumura. I swear Toei stole that idea straight out of my wildest dreams. :lol

So I was still maintaining my usual optimism going into the premiere, and as it turns out, not only can it stand on its own, it's great. Cacophonous, but great. The episode moves a mile a minute, continuing what seems to be a trend of Super Sentai getting louder and faster the longer it goes on, but crucially, it's making good use of all that energy. There's some nice substance here, and, as expected with Arakawa as the writer, we've got loads of loads of tropes pulled from all across Sentai history, some of which haven't seen use in a while. This show's approach to innovation definitely seems to be "if it ain't broke, don't fix it", and I'd be lying if I told you I was upset they're playing it safe this year.

The bottom line is, I like Super Sentai, and this is some definitive Super Sentai, right here. The atmosphere of the scenes with the bad guys, the vibrant, excited tone of the scenes with the heroes. The elements that we don't always get every year, like villains whose suits do the cool thing of incorporating part of the actor's face, the mecha that are characters in their own right or, heck, the mecha that can hold their own in a fight before combining into a robot. You'd better believe I was happy to see that one. Even the cockpits are just... like... that's a Sentai cockpit.

It's all bolstered by some exceedingly flashy visuals that, combined with Ryusoulger and Kamen Rider Zero-One, show that Toei is continuing to up their game every year. Parts of this episode are absolutely stunning to look at. The action here satisfies without a doubt.

The other important thing, the story, I'm feeling quite good about. The characters don't all get a ton of time to make an impression here, which might or might not be a downside of Episode Zero's existence. I can't know what it would be like going in not seeing that first, but, ultimately, it probably isn't a huge deal. There's more than enough banter here to get a basic grasp on everyone's personality, and I think that's all a premiere needs to do. Obviously the other four are also making way to focus on Juuru here, though. I'll say upfront, I'm not sure how well this guy could hold the show together by himself, so hopefully the spotlight spreads out more as the show moves forward. On the other hand, I'll also say I think he was used to great effect in this episode. His interactions with the rest of the team are amusing, and, especially given his scenes in Episode Zero, I get the feeling the show has a real message it wants to get across through him about not sitting back and allowing your life to be dull (you know, the opposite of being sparkly). We'll see how big a theme that ends up being, but even if Juuru isn't Arakawa's statement to disillusioned modern youth, he left a solid enough first impression as a character.

Just like Kiramager as a whole did for me, obviously. There's all kinds of bits throughout the episode that won it major points with me (easy example: saving the OP for next week and using it as an insert), and above all else, it put a smile on my face. You might even say it dazzled me. So heck yeah, bring on a whole year of this! I'm totally ready!

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

Excuse me? Could it be? A good... Super Sentai episode? I feel like I watched a Unicorn galloping by or something. This was... actually fun? Not offensively bad or just mediocre at best?

I actually want to continue watching this. Time will tell if I do like this series or if it's just a case of "At least it isn’t Ryusoulger".

All I got from this ep was toqger again so... I see where this show goes and if it will have some sort of plot.

That was definitely a Sentai.

I mean, I liked it, but like... it sure was just a Sentai.

This episode left me apprehensive in a way that Episode Zero hadn't, and it's pretty much all down to Juuru.

I can't tell if it's poor writing, acting, or directing, but Juuru doesn't behave anything like a human being. I might have been on-board if he came off as actually introverted and focused, but the insane emoting that they had him do just made him appear to be... yeah. Like no human being that ever existed. I found him to be Ninninger-Takaharu-level annoying. (Strongest Battle pretty much redeemed the character.) This is going to be our main character? Oh, god.

I want to be more excited for an episode in which the separate mecha components defeat the monster, but it's kind of hard to sell that with a crane. I guess I like the voices of the Kiramei Stones enough if we *have* to have talking widgets/mecha.

Something about all of it just isn't clicking for me. I like most of the other Kiramagers. (Jury's out on Blue, however. That the stoic guy is supposed to be an actor doesn't fit.) Our comedian-grownup is just kind of there and not that funny, and I'm not sold on our alien princess's design. Why does she have a bra on her head? I get that she's supposed to come across like a Faberge egg, but something's not working for me. My one thin, almost-certainly-never-gonna-happen hope is that she'll develop a spine and become our sixth hero.

I liked the notion of the summoning circle they needed to disrupt; I was reminded a bit of the Megazords from Go-Busters. I wonder how many episodes it'll take for one of those circles to be completed?

I'll keep watching, but yeah... this felt to me like no more than a two-star episode. Not nearly as a strong a start as our last few Sentai had.

It was...An episode. I wasn't blown away, but I didn't hate it. Red seems to be rather obnoxious, but considering I don't want to maim him like Lucky, I guess that means he's not too bad. Airheaded Reds aren't anything new, but I don't really like how...Strange he acts.
Either have him be an introvert, or have him be an idiot. The combination of the two just doesn't fit if he's too shy to interact with anyone, but also willing to get up in someone's face at moment's notice.

This was more in Episode Zero, but I didn't comment in that one, so I'll put it here. I like the idea of the jewels misunderstanding the characters. The cool swordsman is only an actor, the sharpshooter is just a gamer that's good at shooting games, the runner is only a high school runner, and the only "Competent" one, Pink, was chosen because of her looks, not her skill set. It's a cute subversion (I put competent in quotes because they're all competent at what they do, but there were obviously better choices that the gems didn't realize).
However, blue being the quiet stoic one doesn't make sense. Previous swordsman characters being quiet and intense make sense because they're actual martial artists...But he's just an actor whose sword skills are only for show, so it's a confusing call. I think having him be more similar to AbareBlue would've been better.

Anyway, I liked that the jewels have personalities of their own. Makes things more interesting, I feel. I also started to warm on the designs. I always liked the base suit designs, but the vehicles do look rather nice when on screen rather than as toys.

I'm not cautiously optimistic for where the series will go, since I'm not exactly hanging off the edge of my seat, but it was adequate enough to make me interested until the 6th reveal.

Juuru is slightly annoying but no-one can top Ban for me, I think we've come a long way from the mid-late 00s type annoying reds.

As a huge fan of Jetman, I'm really liking some of the themes and designs of Kiramager so far.

The talking gems definitely give me some Den-O vibes too. Love it so far!

Finally got around to looking at this!

Much of it didn't "Wow!" me to any great extent, but it wasn't absurdly awful either.

Garza gives me Geilton/Neo-Geilton vibes, and comes off as a much better design than Carantula.

The battle with the Mashin isn't anything spectacular, but it is different, and something that dares to be different is something that Sentai desperately needs right now.

I don't have good sense of rhythm, so I can't judge the end dance. However, I did enjoy the ending theme as one of the best we've gotten in some time! It's catchy, energetic, and optimistic.

I am curious to see what I else I find about this series.

P.S.: I truly believe that with a few adjustments, this could work as a Power Rangers entry!

Expect to play Where's Waldo regarding past sentai team references. They are LITTERED everywhere in almost every episode from the most subtle gesture to the most obvious.

Yeah. I've heard of that one. Basically, Toei is desperate for a win and is starting to lean toward a joint universe instead of an independent story with a single team! Or, that's my interpretation.