[Switchblade]

I actually just finished this show a few weeks ago, but I'll at least chime in with my thoughts.

I actually remember Dairanger getting off to kind of a slow start. I didn't get really sucked into the story at first and it took me a while to get a good sense of who the characters were. Honestly, I don't think the show really grabbed hold of me until around the time that Kujaku first showed up.

I do remember liking the puppet episodes, though. That was when I started really getting a handle on Shouji and Daigo's characters and they remained my favorite members of the team up to the end. If I remember correctly, this was also the first time we saw Daigo get really pissed off. If you haven't seen the show yet watch for that - Daigo getting mad usually means things are about to get freaking awesome.