[Kamen Rider Lucha]

This is such a good topic!

Here are mine...

MASKMAN - Yellow Mask/Haruka. Haruka is the only main character who didn't annoy the crap out of me. In fact, she ranks high on my all-time favorite sentai character list, despite starring in one of my least favorite shows. Her sensitive tomboy character was unique, strong, and appealing.

JETMAN - The easy choice is Black Condor/Gai, for all of the reasons Red5 mentioned. And I agree, Gai is awesome. But the more interesting choice is Red Falcon/Ryu. Ryu goes through so much shit in this show. He starts out as this ideal-red paragon, but as he faces tragedy and emotional torture, he loses his way, unravels, and goes to some pretty dark places. I'd say he easily goes through the most growth of the five. Plus, Gai wouldn't be nearly as awesome if he didn't have Ryu as a foil. So I'm going with Ryu.

DAIRANGER - Tenmaranger/Shoji, I guess? This one is hard because I feel like all of the Dairangers are pretty dull, character-wise. I f-ing love the show, but these guys aren't really the stars of the story. They're more like facilitators for growth in those who surround them. If we expanded beyond the Dairangers, there's a plethora of characters I would choose as my favorite -- Jin, Kujaku, and Kaku are all complex and fascinating. But the Dairangers? Not so much. If forced to choose, I like Shoji the best because at least he's funny.

KAKURANGER - Argh. Do I choose NinjaBlack/Jiraiya or NinjaWhite/Tsuruhime? On the one hand, Jirayia has my favorite backstory in all of sentai. On the other, I feel more emotionally connected to Tsuruhime because of all the burdens she faces as the Kakurangers' leader. Since there aren't a lot of ladies on my list, I'll go with NinjaWhite/Tsuruhime.

OHRANGER - Admittedly, I'm only 20 episodes into Ohranger. But only one character has stood out to me at all so far, and that is OhYellow/Juri. She's kind of a ruthless mega-bitch, and I love it. She's also the victim of a lot of inconsistent characterization -- but that inconsistency inadvertently makes her a complex, contradictory character. So far, she definitely stands out amidst the cardboard cutouts that are the other Ohrangers -- but a lot can happen in 28 episodes, so my opinion may change by the time I reach the end.

MAGIRANGER - I don't like Magiranger at all. But... I do like MagiYellow/Tsubasa quite a bit. He wins by default.

SHINKENGER - ShinkenBlue/Ryunosuke. I think. It might be ShinkenYellow/Kotoha, though. I love Ryunosuke's dedication to Takeru and his utter, blind faith in his team. Yeah, it's definitely ShinkenBlue. Or ShinkenRed/Takeru. Or ShikenGreen/Chiaki. Argh, Shinkenger has some great characters, it's so hard to choose!

GOSEIGER - GoseiRed/Alata might be my favorite Red ever, if only because he's such an off-center choice to be the leader. Sweet, kind, and unassuming most of the time -- but still a relentless badass when the situation calls for it. Perfect leader for a team of angels. Alata is awesome.

GOKAIGER - Wait, no, GokaiRed/Marvelous is definitely my favorite red. His aloof, bad boy attitude masks an inescapable, can't-not-be-a-hero morality. As much as he acts like he's above the idea of being part of a sentai, he can't help becoming one of the best sentai leaders ever. I think Gokaiger has the franchise's strongest cast of characters. I love them all so much that if any of them were on another sentai team, they'd probably be my favorite. But of them all, I especially looooove Marvelous.

GO-BUSTER - BeetBuster/Jin. A mentor-hero who hides his profound inner pain and guilt with wacky humor and hijinks? Sold. And oh, hey, this actor turns up twice on my list! Hiroya Matsumoto for the win!

KYORYUGER - KyoryuBlack/Ian. An ice-cold ladies man with a tragic past. Ian is just about as cool as sentai heroes get.

TOQGER - ToQ 4/Hikari. He's the only member of this team with a brain, which is a huge plus. I also dig his loner nature, always standing slightly apart from the group like he's annoyed by all of their tomfoolery. Plus, he's cute as hell. I just want to squeeze the misanthropy out of him.

NINNINGER - This is the easiest choice so far. MomoNinger/Kasumi is an archetype-busting classic in the making. Brilliant, funny, sweet, ruthless, childlike, kind, devious, and willful in equal measure -- Kasumi is like a whole sentai team smashed into one character.