Ninninger Episode 42- "Otomo-Nin Wars! The Nekomata Strikes Back!" Discussion
 

Third time's the charm! Can the Ninningers finally overpower the evil Yokai Watch?

We've had some pretty great Christmas episodes over the past few years, but this one just felt a bit underwhelming. Mangetsu simply hasn't been around long enough to achieve the kind of stakes this episode was going for. Hopefully with him out of the way now though this show can actually start utilising the few interesting villain elements it has. The Kyuuemon was pretty obvious once the exposition was dropped but I have to say it was still damn satisfying.

Was a pretty great role call too, I really enjoyed that. As was the mecha fight at the end, although this would have been the perfect time to drop Dinomaru into the action somehow like they usually do at this point.

Welp. It's official. Mangetsu was a completely pointless diversion. The "scary villain that you think is gonna be a big threat but is taken out pretty quickly" idea worked better with Gabi Raizo at the beginning of the series. Playing that same card this late in the game was more frustrating than clever, especially because Mangetsu did nothing particularly interesting or unique.

BUT ASIDE FROM THAT...

I quite liked this episode. Involving Tsumuji in the action is always refreshing, and they used him well here. Based on this episode and the Kyuuemon reveal, I suspect we're headed toward a finale that involves a lot of Tsumuji

I thought the stuff with Last Ninja was pretty satisfying. The mecha all-stars battle was fun. The end was neat.

This was an improvement over the last three episodes, but I still feel like the show has tread water with this highly unsatisfying Mangetsu arc.

The Mangetsu story arc is over, so that means the final episodes are approaching. I'm excited for what's coming up. Kyuuemon being Gengetsu's son was a surprise honestly. I wonder if they'll come back to that.

Fffffff I came here to get initial impressions before watching, ended up with more than I bargained for lol