[GoldenXtreme]

I finished Shinkenger. I'm unimpressed.

There's definitely a few highlights. The choreography and suits are very striking in this show and even going into the show aware of the whole "there is a female Red Ranger" spoiler, I was still unable to see through Takeru's true identity as a decoy until the last minute. Genta was fun and the Renegade Corrupt were interesting. But... to the very it didn't really manage to impress me. Ultimately I the show was too meandering and the cast just couldn't hold it up.

I think the Shinkengers are generally *fine* are characters, but also did not have very moments that struck me as innovative or even particularly well implemented. Takeru has imposter syndrome and an accompanying sense of guilt, but he isn't really analyzed until very late in the show and the conflict is very quickly resolved without any sort of lingering impact. Ryunosuke is inflexible but talented. Chiaki lacks proper training and aspires to get stronger. Kotoha doesn't have high faith in herself. Mako is sisterly but serious. Genta wants to make Sushi and help Takeru. Most of the cast feels some conflict about balancing their normal lives with being a samurai. But I feel like the show was never able to elevate the characters beyond their initial concepts, make me re-evaluate them as more and more layers are revealed. Some of this I think is because the episodic plots are also not all that great, a lot of stuff that just feels like they were ripping pages out of the Sentai playbook. The antagonists were also lacking overall. The more conflicted and tormented Renegades were better, mostly consumed with their own self-satisfaction, but Dokuku is just a nothing burger who spends most of the show drunk in spite of being the final villain. I was hoping the climax would impress me, but I thought it was more of the same. Not too much else to say, I don't think the show actually gave me too much to talk about. D tier, really needed more substance.