[Switchblade]

Power Rangers happened when I was in, I think, sixth grade; probably "too old" to still be watching Saturday morning cartoons, but whatever. From the second I first heard the name I thought the whole concept was completely stupid. Then I caught the first episode... and I still thought it was completely stupid. Honestly, I watched Power Rangers as a "man, this is so dumb it's hilarious" diversion for most of its pre-Tommy run. It wasn't until Green With Evil aired that I really got legitimately into the show. I generally kept watching it up through the end of Zeo. Turbo lost me, but I unintentionally wandered back into the show for In Space and Lost Galaxy, then I left again and lost track for years. I didn't come back until Dino Thunder, which I watched because I'd heard that Tommy was going to be in it and I was a huge Tommy fan as a kid (he influenced both my wardrobe and hairstyle for years). I kept up with PR through its cancellation following RPM.

I didn't get into the broader tokusatsu scene until 2009. I'd seen some of the other Saban shows back in the day, but it was Vangelus and TJ Omega's video reviews that got me interested in checking out Kamen Rider. I watched the first episode of Decade on YouTube and immediately fell down the rabbit hole, marathoning the entire Heisei era over the course of the last half of the year, then going back to some of the Showa stuff while watching W live. Awhile after that I found Garo and then Sentai pulled me in with Gokaiger (tried Goseiger first and any Tokunation veteran can tell you how that went). By that point I was pretty much fully into tokusatsu and taking active part in TFW's Rider Kick thread then HJU and then here.