[Fish Sandwich]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matrixbeast

I love the part where Hyuuga realizes he still has Earth Power

That whole scene was the highlight of the finale for me. The role-reversal bookending with him and Ryouma going on there was great.

Quote:

it never really reaches a high point and stays at that point.

This is definitely the big thing working against Gingaman. It maintains such a consistent level of acceptability throughout, the whole thing kind of becomes white noise. There's a lot of genuinely great scenes but I would struggle to name even a particular episode that really stands out as being amazing, let alone a particular stretch of them.

Again, it's a very frustrating kind of average for me. I don't think my opinion on Gingaman's quality will ever drastically change or anything, but I do think I could have a lot more fun with it if I wasn't futilely waiting for it to "take off", only to be disappointed when it doesn't.

[Matrixbeast]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich

Again, it's a very frustrating kind of average for me. I don't think my opinion on Gingaman's quality will ever drastically change or anything, but I do think I could have a lot more fun with it if I wasn't futilely waiting for it to "take off", only to be disappointed when it doesn't.

Ah, I can understand the idea of rewatching it then, at least.

Anyway, Geki 7 and 8.
Dance fighting!
Scorpion x Toad shipping!
Pork Cube Stew!

I love these episodes. Beautifully silly.
I love Mele sympathizing with Maga over his unrequited crush. It's just sublime to watch as they trample over the rangers, but then get caught up in their flirting and literally just walk away from the fight.
Even Mele gets sick of it all. Can't blame her, considering they literally let the rangers survive 3 times.

Anyway, we're introduced to Miki's daughter, Natsume, who is introduced as a bratty kid. When I first saw the show, I figured I wasn't gonna like her. She wants to stand out as the star, so in dance class, she intentionally dances in her own style to stand out.
Jan ain't having that, though. Telling her she's ruining the synchronization for no reason.
Utilizing the power of the dance, our heroes defeat Sorisa, but she's rescued by Maga, the Toad fist fighter and his unbreakable defense.
So now we're introduced to our newest weapon, the Geki Bazooka (That escalated quickly...Tonfa to bo staff to nunchaku, and now a bazooka...). By harnessing Geki energy, it can break Maga's iron defense.
But uh-oh! Our heroes aren't efficient enough to charge it in a timely manner, so they need Jan to stall while Retsu and Ran do the charging.

And in a moment that swiftly made me reconsider my thoughts on Natsume as well as continue to incorporate the "Training in our daily lives" lesson, Jan learns patience through waiting for pork cubes to properly cook with Natsume's help, and Ran and Retsu train dexterity through piano. Yay~

Jan gets beaten the hell up, displaying his unbreakable body, but they overcome and destroy Maga's defense, and GekiTouja destroys Sorisa, with her weak ass secret technique...Methinks she should just stick to kicking really hard...
Oh no, it seems Braco is the one with the Madoku, and he's plotting something. I wonder what...

Super solid, super fun episodes and I love them.
Something that irked me on my first watch was why the 5 Venoms went after the Rangers 1 by 1 after their introduction, thoroughly stomping them when all 5 were present. Hell, even now, Maga and Sorisa together managed to consistently defeat them. I know all 5 were cocky bastards, but it just seemed foolish to go at them one by one afterwards...Oh well.

[Matrixbeast]

Geki 9 and 10.
Braco reveals he had the Madoku all along! Shocking! He tries to convince Mele to join his side, but she turns him down and kills him. Using the Madoku, he revives himself before he explodes then tries to kill Mele.
Mele trains with the Gekiranger's Geki Bazooka, specifically to deflect the shot, and Jan notices she doesn't have the same evil aura as the other Rin Ju Den.

In the meantime, Braco uses 2 of the 6 total Madoku fangs to revive Kademu (Centipede) and Moriya (Gecko). No reason for why Maga and Sorisa weren't brought back, but whatever. They all attempt to kill Rio, but Mele returns and saves him last minute, awakening him from his meditation and kills Kademu. Moriya runs off and gets killed by the Gekirangers, while Braco tries to woo Mele over to his side once more by pointing out that, with only 3 Madoku left, she can't be revived since Rio would use them on the 3 Kenma. Mele don't care, takes the Madoku, and kills Braco.

Episode 10 has the rangers on an errand up a mountain, only to run into a pervy elephant man to train them in a special weapon style. Meanwhile, Rio is on the search for the first Kenma.

Edit!
Geki 11+12

So, I do just like to point out that most shows would give Red the first power up.
Gekiranger decides it's better than that. The first character to get a new power is Ran, who learns how to use the Geki Hammer and with it, gains the ability to call down the Geki Elephant for Geki Elephant Touja. Love it~
I also like that Ran quickly deciphered the "Lesson" Elehang was trying to teach her, but missed the point of it. Was nice.

In episode 12, Jan gains a new skill!
Using a towel.

God, I love this show.

In the meantime, Rio is off to find the first Kenma, awakening Sky Master Kata in 11, and then fighting him in 12.
In deadly battles there is training.
That's...One way to go about it.
Kata tries to turn on Rio, using Rio's past to eat his despair and kill him. Rio decides to eat his own despair and try to kill Kata, but decides that, since he managed to push him so far, that he's worth becoming his new teacher.
G'Job, guy.

This is why Gekiranger works so well. I hesitate to call them A and B plots since both of them can be equally important, while on other occasions one can be irrelevant. So I just go with Hero and Villain plots.
Here, the Hero plot is just filler. Eel monster who fights using slime, so find an alternate method to overcome him.
But the Villain plot is a major advancement. We gain a new villain and see his strength, we see Rio achieve a new level of power, and Rio accepts him as his new master.
This balance makes sure every episode is worth watching~

[KyoryuGreen]

CarRanger vs OhRanger the Movie: Well this was kinda of something else. Overall the CarRangers were great like they always were, the OhRangers were kind of assholes in this movie. I mean they had their whole we're military we save the world elitist vibe going; so coming off as elitist pricks of course Kyosuke is going to side with Monster who is acting nice. I mean sure this lead to the obvious fight and crazy shenanigans that only CarRanger can bring us lol. I find it either very telling that Car Magic is more powerful than the Cho-Riki power if the CarRangers were fighting the more trained OhRangers to a stand still. SignalMan probably stood out the most in the movie from the beginning being awesome like normal and at the end when he joined the Giant Robo battle. The OhRangers were kind of just there and didn't do much but I mean even some of the newer Sentai Team-Up Movies aren't that great at showcasing the past team either. OhRed stood out the most for the OhRangers. The CarRangers being trained by the Chief was hilarious and to see all of them succeed one by one was great. The CarRangers each had great moments in this movie and it was well done for them. The very end with them all celebrating was a lot of fun. I wish this movie would have had more spots and more of each of the Rangers interacting with their counterparts. Though it was fun and gave me more CarRanger to watch.

[Fish Sandwich]

Watched Gingaman VS Megaranger. It was solid but unremarkable. I only really have a couple things to say about it:

- Is there a space pirate in this universe who ISN'T obsessed with having Godzilla attack the planet? You know, pirates here on Earth have ships that are actually ships. Man, even in the VS movie it's the same plan as always.

- The best thing about this movie was how nostalgic it made me for Megaranger. The second Kenta showed up and the theme song started playing I was instantly transported to a couple weeks ago when I was having the time of my life watching it. I'm tempted to just stop talking about the topic at hand and start raving about how great Megaranger is for the rest of the post.

- The Megaranger side of things is definitely downplayed here though. It keeps things focused, which is nice given the relatively short length, but the lack of Yuusaku is tragic, and the absence of Kubota unforgivable.

- Speaking of unforgivable, early on Giga Phoenix and Giga Rhinos are shown losing to a monster and appear to blow up like a MotW would, and they never get around to showing them again, so... what other conclusion am I supposed to draw here? They totally killed off my two favorite characters in the entire show (only sort of joking here). Screw this movie! This is straight up non-canon as far as I'm concerned!

[Matrixbeast]

Well, here's the tragedy of the situation.
Either they died in this movie, or they died in Gokaiger's first episode.
Because Gokaiger established nearly all the mecha were destroyed, and they made it clear in the Gaoranger tribute that even sentient, living mecha weren't safe

[Fish Sandwich]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matrixbeast

Because Gokaiger established nearly all the mecha were destroyed

Wait, then that means Galaxy Mega...!

...

[dexilay]

So I started rewatching ToQger with my boyfriend and, man, I forgot how much I loved this Sentai.

[Matrixbeast]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fish Sandwich

Wait, then that means Galaxy Mega...!

...

Oh, don't worry about that. It can be rebuilt~

Anyway, Geki 11 and 12.

Kata has his two body guards show up, who can fly and thus run a train over our heroes.
They travel to find another master, Bat Li, who can train them in the way of the dance.
And it just dawns on me that this show has 2 episodes dedicated to dancing.
Bat accepts Retsu as his student, and teaches him to enter into a trance while fighting. Not over thinking things and just go with the flow.
Using his new style and his new tool, the Geki Fan, he manages to defeat Kata's body guards, and using their new Geki Bat, Geki Bat Touja manages to defeat one of the two giant birds. The other swearing revenge.

In the meantime, Rio is trained by Kata to give into his hatred. His hatred would fuel his Ringi even further. Going into a berserk rage, he beats up all his Rinshi and starts hamming up as he unleashes his hatred.

[Scorpius]

Oh noes Gokaiger just HAD to introduce an annoying self-insert protagonist... I hope he grows on me...