[Sh Ranger]

Gavan Infinity: "Put down your sword, then we'll talk."

Setsuna: (puts down sword, raises gun)

For a guy with a sadness motif, he sure has a sense of humor.

I haven't seen any of the Uchuu Keiji trilogy yet, so I can only compare to the Heisei content. Honestly, this episode didn't blow me away or anything like that. The opening Gavan fight scene is just Reiji in pursuit of some random human criminal and his use of the Tokimekki Emorgear was kind of lame. The second human criminal in Λ8018 has more clear motivation, but he still functions mostly as a plot device to prompt heavy exposition of the show's theme.

At least, this is an improvement for a Tomioka show, as our protagonist Reiji isn't screaming about handles every other sentence, but there is still a lot of talk about emotions, rather than emotional talking. Otherwise, I feel like I want to like Reiji. He's generally cool and the lack of respect he gets as part of the Documents Division makes him sympathetic. The Gavarion warp scene shows he's deeply angry about something that happened in the past and his expository dialogue emphasizes the importance of controlling strong emotions and not letting them control you, which actually reminds me of Kamen Rider Build.

I have basically no opinions on the other A0073 characters. Date is Reiji's best bud. Agi is Space Izu. WaniPat are Space Victor and Monty. Commander Wigless seems like he'll be interesting, as he has some kind of clairvoyance, but he doesn't have much screentime so far.

Setsuna's a lot of fun. I want to see more of him next time!

Aesthetically, I love how Gavans illuminate for their finishers, like the classic Metal Hero eyes taken to the next level. Now we can see Gavan Infinity's expression of anger, which is totally appropriate for the emotion theme and shows that anger is a power that can be channelled for good. They really didn't have to talk so much about the emotions, since watching them occur naturally is much more satisfying.

However, I'm not feeling the sci-fi genre as strongly as I did with stuff like Planet Bird. Like, the Gavarion bridge and some of the outfits don't look very Gavan-y (or is "Gavai" the right word?) to me, too simple, too practical. I want to see more imaginative futuristic-looking designs outside of the marketable stuff.

This show has potential and that's pretty much all I can confidently say about it for now.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Switchblade

I am missing the classic Space Sheriff villains lair full of absolutely bonkers monster designs that will never do anything, though.

The last Kuji-Tomioka show also lacked a prominent villain base, so I'll be a little disappointed if we don't get one here either. Well, I suppose we'd actually need some regular villains first.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sunred

I had a random thought just now. What if it turns out to be the name for Infinity's power-up form later on?

Maybe they could take inspiration from Leo Red Orion, Super Zenkaizer and King Kuwagata Ohger and give all the REDs non-red Final Forms, as long as everything else stays mostly red.