I've seen a lot of people on Twitter talk about what they think are the worst Sentai designs -- it's a lazy topic, but one that's kind of been popular lately. I wanted to throw in my two cents, but at my own leisure and not have to run it through English-to-Prince at Google Translate that Twitter requires you to use. ("Y U h8 DenGman?") So, here we go, in chronological order.
Goranger
I ain't gonna lie -- it took me a very long time to get used to these suits. And it's not like I was prejudiced against '70s designs or designs from the pre-Bioman shows. I remember having Sentai retrospective books when I was a kid and loving the way Battle Fever and Denjiman looked. (Yes, even as a kid I was a weirdo who liked the Battle Fever designs.) Come to think of it, I must have had books from that period where Goranger and JAKQ were not included as Super Sentai, because I don't really remember seeing them. Huh...
Anyway, I always thought the Goranger look was a little off-putting, with the HUMONGOUS helmets, that make them look like bobbleheads, and the strange, protruding visor designs. There's also little things I question like the way Blue, Yellow and Green have black boots and gloves instead of white like Red and Pink -- it makes them stick out and it clashes to me. The chest design being broken up to indicate what number they are on the team -- like Pink having four stripes and Green having five -- makes them seem a little busy. I like the shades of color they used. They're not exactly my favorite suits, but they're the first, what can you say? But you know what helps? The way the suit actors carry themselves. Despite having a weird design, they still manage to look cool in the show, thanks to the suit actors. (Niibori, most especially. Of course.) You can find a lot of still photos where they just look really cool, despite the design's shortcomings.
JAKQ
I used to be too puzzled by the seemingly random card-based designs -- I guess having card-related cover names for these spies was supposed to sound cool -- but, anyway, I like the core four's suits. The orange capes are kinda weird, and something about the design makes the suit actors look short, but I think they look cool and are far more pleasant to the eye than Goranger's suits. Big One's a sore thumb. Look how plain that suit is! I get why he's white, as in he possesses all of the other JAKQ members' powers, so it's kind of like all of the colors going into him = white. But it's just a weird mix to have a suit that's 85% white, and the rest rainbow. Speaking of which -- they just needed to have the balls to put Heart Queen's pink on his suit. They use yellow instead, I guess thinking pink would have been too girly to put on him. Well, guess what? You still have fans calling him the GLAAD Ranger. Joke's on you, JAKQ.
Battle Fever J
I've always loved these suits. I can get why they're not everyone's thing, but I don't understand why there's such hatred for them. Four out of five "Worst Sentai Suits" lists will include BFJ. They're unique, they look appropriately comic book-y, they work in the flag designs and world elements well. (It makes far more sense for these guys -- secret agents of the world -- to be wearing flags than JAKQ being cards.)
Denjiman
Another team who always finds themselves on Worst Suits lists. I don't mind the Denjiman suits. I remember having a Super Sentai compilation book when I was a kid, and seeing the photos of Denjiman and thinking they looked cool -- I especially liked their helmets, with all of that neat mechanical stuff in the forehead. The suits are a little plain, but they try to pay homage to Goranger without getting as crazy as those suits -- the white stripes on each member's chest denoting their rank on the team.
Sunvulcan
I've always liked their helmets. Suits aren't bad, I just never understood why they have the V theme when it's a three man team. (Sunvulcan being the "third" Super Sentai, hence the "San-vulcan" pun and everything.)
Goggle V
These guys...ain't pretty. Their suits make them look like Pilgrims, their helmets look squished, giving their "face" a kind of unhappy or what I usually refer to as constipated look. Between their suit designs, crazy gym weapons and ugly poses, Goggle V was kind of daring you to like them. These suits are truly generic -- when MMPR was at the height of its popularity, there were a TON of cheap knock-off toys, and most of them all looked like Goggle V. THAT's how generic they are.
Dynaman
Ditching the cloth suits results in better action scenes, and also helps with certain designs. Like, I think a lot of people's problem with Denjiman isn't really the design, but just how baggy their cloth suits make the design look. Look at all of the teams up until Dynaman and Dynaman just looks slim and shiny and colorful and cool. People like to make fun of their baseball uniform look, but be honest -- you saw these suits hundreds of times and never realized they were baseball uniforms until you read that tidbit from the show's production history.
Bioman
Honestly, I've always gone back and forth on these suits, but have always leaned towards the "I don't like them" side. I love the electronic junk in their forehead, but I think that's what led to what I DON'T like about the helmets, which is the top head is humongous and the rest of the face looks squished. Look how tiny the chin and lips are. Look at the Bioman helmet and try to picture a human face, it's all out of proportion. How'd the stunt guys even see out of them when that forehead pushes the visor down to the nostril area?
Anything bad people say about the Changeman suits should go towards the Bioman suits instead. Bioman don't just have sports bras, they have, like, cropped sports bras. And then they have all of those pieces of flair on their cropped sports bras. And then they have the white on their legs, giving the male suits boxer shorts and the females a bikini. And there's something about the colored necks that throws things off.
Another weird thing about the Bioman suits is how they get lighter halfway through the show. They're better looking early on -- Green Two's forest green versus the pea-soup green he wears later on.
Sad thing is, whenever there's drawings of the Bioman suits -- in comics or in promotional material or on merchandise -- they look pretty damn awesome, like real futuristic superheroes. If only that could have come across that way in live action.
Changeman
Who do you think you're talking to? It would be very sad to me if I didn't like the Changeman designs, considering how much I worship everything else about the show. But I love 'em, I think they're lean and clean, with a good use of colors; they each have little things that don't necessarily match up with the other members, but they still all go together, forming one coherent team design. There's no mistaking that they're all on the same team. (I could picture another team trying to be matchy-matchy; instead of just the guys having the yellow coloring, they'd all have it; all of the animal symbols on the helmet would be the same color; Mermaid and Phoenix would be made more generic by taking away what makes them stand apart from the guys and making them solid, instead of the interesting choice of inverting the colors.)
The big complaint is the "wife beater," but...really? The Bioman design has something very similar, but is cluttered with a design, so I guess people never realize it, because nobody ever talks about it. The "wife beater" is most likely a holdover from Changeman's original design, which looked more like leotards and athletic wear -- the '80s loved basing things off of sports and exercise -- but, to me, I just kind of look at it as being a military uniform vest. "But it's a tiny vest then! It doesn't reach to the belt!" Well, that's a designer's choice. That would be too much white and then they're just look generic or like abandoned designs. (Or would TRULY be wife-beaters if they covered the entire torso.)
I just think they look cool, man. I've looked through a lot of Sentai books -- pretty much any photo you find of Changeman, they just look cool.
Flashman
Basically a cooler, better version of the Bioman suits. I've always liked the use of black, it really helps make the suits pop and not be so plain. I always thought these suits were just so sleek and well made and I think they really hold up.
Maskman
Maskman's suits have been accused of being generic, but I disagree with that. I especially love their helmets, which have a lot going on, but is restrained so they're not cluttered or busy. The white lines on the helmet are a nice touch, and they have the electronic forehead the way Bioman does, but are done in a smaller, improved way. The suits have just the right amount of white and color breaking up the white, so they're not as plain as a Denjiman. I think they're just really cool, subdued designs. Maskman was kinda attempting to be a little more grounded, and these suits fit that idea. They're subtle.
Liveman
The best animal helmets of the franchise. They're so damn cool and creative. Every subsequent animal team rips off of what Liveman did, and none of them come close. Even Bison and Sai's helmets are cool, when the later-joining heroes never usually match with the team or have the same creative quality.
Much has been made about their all white legs, but it never really bothered me or stood out. The length of the boot's colors, the colored gem in the belt -- the whole suit design just flows so well that the all-white legs was never an issue for me. And like I've said on Twitter and got crap for -- I have to wonder if the white legs are a nod to Daisuke Shima's biker punk past, since the bosozoku favor those baggy white pants. The white arms of the Liveman suits look sleeveless, too, like a vest. Honestly? I was watching a Yokohama Ginbae concert where they all had the white baggy pants and sleeveless leather vests and for some reason the Liveman designs jumped into my head. And Daisuke Shima wasn't even with them at that concert to perform his song with them, so I didn't have Liveman on the mind!
Turboranger
I like the helmets more than their suits, but never saw the problem with their suits. There's something about the design that makes the suit actors look a little chunky, but it's not a bad design, IMO. I also think the Turboranger helmets are the best of the car-themed helmets. They're unmistakably vehicle-based, but it's subtle. Subtly is something designers forget, and subtle does not equal generic.
The weirdest thing about these designs, if you ask me? That they were Toei's choice for the tenth anniversary. I don't know how you look at Battle Fever and Turbo's predecessors and decide the best way to celebrate is cars, but...maybe that's me.
Fiveman
I hate myself for liking these suits. The V-theme is in your face, but works here, the silver V being a cool centerpiece. The helmets are on the plain side, but I like how they have simple icons indicating the school subject each member teaches. I feel like nowadays they'd go overboard in obviousness, like having Red be in a karate gi or Pink being a giant calculator or something like that. Black would be fighting with a giant calligraphy brush.
Jetman
I basically only like the helmets of these designs. And even then I have a problem! I don't care for how they did the bird eyes on the helmet. Some people might think the undies is a cool nod to a traditional superhero look, but they just look weird here, and so does the design coming off the shoulders. I don't get why Jetman, which was supposed to be the end of an era and targeting older fans, had such questionable, unimaginative, kiddie designs all around. The heroes, the horrendous villain and monster designs. Damn. You have Keita Amemiya, make HIM the designer. (He only did Veronica's design.)
Zyuranger
I wasn't one of those kids who was into dinosaurs. I don't know why dinosaurs are supposed to be such a mind-blowing thing for kids, why kids like 'em so much. So dinosaur heroes don't appeal to me, and the Zyuranger just don't look cool. I have an attachment to their suits based off my dark, dirty history as an MMPR fan, but that's it. I don't like the diamonds on the chest. I don't like lips on the helmets, so those teams always have an instant strike against them. Dragon Ranger's all right, I think the shield helps.
Dairanger
Cool and stylish suits that do a good job incorporating the mythological animals, but also at conveying the Chinese theme without looking silly or cliched. Kiba Ranger's a bit of a let-down in that I don't think he goes with the others well, but is a cool enough design on his own. (Maybe I just have a thing against Kiba Ranger for not only being the obnoxious Kou, but for dredging up memories of Tommy and the fact that when White Ranger came along, MMPR started going down the tubes.)
Kakuranger
Does for ninjas what Dairanger's suits did for kung-fu fighters. Just very cool, very sleek suits. Very understated, almost simple -- appropriate, considering they're stealthy ninjas -- and somehow without being generic. The Bandai designer earned their paycheck this year.
Ohranger
Never liked these things. Even when I was a kid into PR, when they switched to Zeo/Oh is when I stopped watching. Coincidence? I remember standing in the toy aisle, looking at the Zeo toys and just being like "In the words of the immortal J.W. Pepper, 'You's is ugly.'"
The creepy colored lips. The laziness of just slapping a shape on the front of the helmet and calling it a day. (The Playstation control faces, as the Japanese fans have called them.) The bib. The gaudy gold. They were meant to look royal and Egyptian, but they don't. But in a curious unintentional throwback to Goranger, the suit actors carry themselves well -- they move with such force and power -- and the action scenes are awesome, so you can almost forget the designs.
Carranger
It had to be tempting to go with stupid designs for the franchise's first all-out comedy, but they surprisingly didn't. The Carranger designs get the job done. They go hog-wild with the car theme, without being stupid or overkill.
Megaranger
Megaranger was meant to be a kind of throwback to the sci-fi and scientific- and tech-themed Sentai shows of the '80s, and these designs are meant to be a modern update of the suits found in those shows. I get the most '80s vibes from the helmets, which are like a less detailed Maskman to me. The suits are OK, but I never really liked the Kraft Cheese Singles around their neck, or colored squares across the chest (Mega Silver's suspiciously Yugande-like green grids looked cooler).
Gingaman
Honestly, it took me a while to warm up to these suits, but I just really like them now. I always thought the helmets were cool, but for a while I had a problem with the torso. (No, not because of the Charlie Brown stripes. Can we retire that? People have been making that joke since 1998. It's a tribal look.) People talk about Liveman's bare legs, but Gingaman has it worse with the bare torso. It really seems a bit like "OK, we'll come up with something unique later. Let's hit the pachinko joints!" And then they forgot until the last minute, the sketch was uncolored, and they were like "Yeah, just squiggle, and there! Finished! Whoo-hoo, let's hit the bar!"
Bull Black's design, though, is inexcusable. I HATE that design. The bananas on his helmet don't help.
GoGoFive
Just as Gingaman was mocked for the Charlie Brown look, these suits were mocked for looking like peppermints. These designs are a bit simplistic, but not forgettable or lame. I think it was basically trying to keep with the show's attempt at a more grounded, realistic feel. They didn't have outlandish or loud designs, they were just simple. Colorful. The main distinction between each member being the visor, which bears the outline of the badge representing their field of work. And don't forget GoGoFive's cool through-the-visor concept, where we get a chance to see the actors in-suit, and the protective breathing mask they're meant to wear within. (The actors of this show logged more in-suit time than any of the actors in any other toku.)
I always thought the GoGoFive outfits should have made the white on the suits retroreflective, like a rescuer's uniform, but maybe that wouldn't have made much difference.
Timeranger
I like the helmets (mostly because of the black that lights up), and the suits are nice and shiny, but they just seemed a little too plain to me. Repeating the visor's pendulum design directly below on the chest? That's it? Kinda lazy. And I'll never understand Yasuko Kobayashi's love for the double Red -- Time Fire looking like a frowning Time Red just makes no sense to me.
Gaoranger
Pretty offensive suits, in my opinion. Not the best animal helmets, the animal emblems are ugly (look at that belt buckle, ugh!), all topped off by the Miss America sash. (JAKQ and Ninninger made sashes work; Gaoranger does not.) Continuing the tradition of having an anniversary series with bizarre and/or ugly design choices.
Hurricaneger
I've always gone back and forth on these designs. I like the suit portion, especially the gray arms with the netting. I like a couple of their helmets (not the way they open, though). The Gouraiger are cool looking with their darker coloring and the use of black, and the franchise's first of only a couple times at using an insect theme. Maybe it's just the show they're attached to that keeps me from liking them. As it is, there's just indifference.
Abaranger
Not being fond of the dinosaur theme, I really rolled my eyes in '03 when Abaranger news was hitting. But these designs just kept it clean and simple and, as far as the core three are concerned, barely dinosaur seeming to me. And as simple as it was, I really liked Abare Mode. (Abare Max was pretty cool looking, too, and one of the best looking power-ups, IMO.) I guess Abaranger's setting just helped more, the parallel Dino Earth where dinosaurs thrived. Makes more sense than the mess that is Zyuranger or the idiocy that is Kyoryuger.
Dekaranger
These designs never won me over, but I don't quite hate them. It's a neat idea to have the helmet with the badge and the sirens and stuff, but the visors seem like they're just lifted from previous Sentai designs -- mostly Megaranger -- and the mouthpieces are HUGE and odd looking. (On the up-side, at least they don't have lips.) They look like generic '50s B-Movie aliens to me. The giant number on the front, giving the suit one black arm is another strange choice, IMO. I think SWAT Mode looks best.
Magiranger
These suits are like if Jetman boinked Ohranger. They're just unappealing to me. Simplistic visor... I think it was a mistake to make the heroines' legs white, when the guys' are colored. It doesn't really flow. Magi Shine is one of the most hideous designs in toku history. Huge, ugly, stupid looking...glittery. And Magiranger's Legend Mode brings the Magiranger to Shine's level of ugly.
Boukenger
Probably my least favorite Sentai designs. If there's a show whose suits I hate, I'll at least reach a point where I either just get used to the design or will, at the very least, like the helmet or something. Not these uglies. They're just hideous from top to bottom.
You name it, it sucks. The protruding visor. The poorly conceived headlight helmets. The odd mouth shape, with the grates on 'em. The ugly silver junk on their shoulders and wrists. The white straight down the middle, like they're being pulled apart or something. The Quiznos logo on their chest. And let us not forget the hideous design and color scheme of Bouken Silver, one of the biggest eyesores toku has seen.
And Boukenger doesn't stop there! I find ALL of their designs to be ugly as shit. Their weapons, their base, their uniforms, their mecha. Especially their mecha, which looks like a bunch of junk randomly picked up by a magnet.
Gekiranger
I initially thought the main three's designs were kinda plain, and that the helmets looked like they were from a Chinese Sentai knockoff or a local hero or something, but the suits grew on me once I saw them in action. They ARE plain, but I think the idea was to just keep things simple. They saved the bells and whistles for Violet and Chopper, both who have pretty creative and original looks.
Go-onger
Ugh. I like a couple of their helmets, like Blue and Black's, and Go-on Wings' look is all right, but the Go-on suits are the first (of several) that actually looks like they were designed by a kid. Just stupid looking, putting anything on there they could think of. "Cars! Vroom, vroom -- they're going to have tires! And seatbelts that look like suspenders! Oh, and maybe throw in some random animals, too! Yeah, that'd be boss!"
Shinkenger
Although not at all what I always envisioned a samurai Sentai to look like, I like these suits. They're bold, they're clean, I love the use of black where white's usually used. I have to say, though, I wonder what these helmets look like if you were born and raised in Japan. Is it as stupid as an American hero with "FIRE!" written on his face would be? Because the kanji visors aren't all that stylized -- they could have done them in a way that was more subtle, like you had to look or unfocus to make out the word.
Shinken Gold sucks, though. Between the squished looking helmet, the gold tinfoil paired with blue, and Jiro Okamoto's paunch, he throws off the team's tight, stylish look.
Goseiger
I still find these pretty weird designs for them to go with; it's kind of surprising they went with these in this day and age. I pretty much assume Toei felt a little bold here; it was the strange but promising time when there wasn't a Power Rangers to contend with. (Disney lost interest; Saban had yet to get it back.) I always thought Power Rangers hindered a lot of what Sentai could do, in not only content, but in design, as well.
So, with freedom, Toei goes a little nuts and gives you these weird designs. People like to say they're retro or a throwback, but they're just too much. I like the helmets, but the suits themselves...you got those weird matador looking jackets, the priest collar -- with the plain white legs, they look like a pervert flasher wearing a jacket, but no pants. The heroines' skirts really needed to be their color, too. Like I said: pantsless.
Gokaiger
They pretty much just took a play out of the Shinkenger book here, going for bold and cool, using black once again. I wasn't thrilled to hear about the pirate motif, but they incorporate it here nicely.
Go-busters
I've long wanted Sentai to push itself in new design directions. Beginning with Ryuki, Kamen Rider took a Sentai-y approach, distinguishing each Rider with their own color. I thought Sentai could have a similar leather-y look like that. I always thought a Blue SWAT look for a Sentai team would be awesome. There's a lot of room to play, but again: I always suspected Power Rangers required them to stick to the familiar.
With Go-busters, Toei intended to "reboot" the franchise. We all know they failed, but at least we got some fresh suit designs out of it. I think the Go-busters suits are pretty cool and sharp, the use of silver and black a nice change of pace, giving them a subdued and appropriately low-key spy look. My big problem with them is forcing the animal motif onto the designs, though -- it just doesn't fit, they needed to just come up with an original design. They don't want to commit to the lazy animal theme, so it's just kinda bare and throws things off.
Kyoryuger
The show itself is so loud and obnoxious, it only makes sense for their suits to be loud and obnoxious, as well. These things...they just threw everything at 'em, not giving a shit if it worked at all. They take the worst part of every previous bad design -- Gao's sash, Deka's weird mouthplates, Bouken's random metallic junk, etc. -- and combine them all into being the Supreme Ugly Design. (Supreme Ugly Design should have been the name of Red's Carnival form, which brings the ugliness of the past decade's mecha to a human design.)
ToQger
If Kyoryuger had too much of a bad thing going for it, ToQger has too little of a bad thing. They look like the Sentai pajamas for kids. (Just because the ToQger were kids doesn't mean their suits had to be cheap and lazy and UNIMAGINATIVE.) How did these things pass inspection? How did the numerous people at Toei and Bandai, upon seeing these suits, not have my immediate and initial reaction of laughter? (Really: I laughed at the suits when I first saw them. And then shook my head in shame.)
Ninninger
Nice looking suits -- well, at least the main five. Too bad the show wrapped around them is so mind-numbingly dumb -- mind-dumbing. Star Ninger is stupider than shit, though, he really matched the show.
Zyuohger
ToQger 2.0
Kyuranger
Nice and creative, with some truly impressive craftsmanship to bring them to life. Bonus points for the awesome idea of the starry visors. Too bad I can't stand the show they're in. (And there's one suit I really dislike: Yellow's and his stupid needle-nose visor.)
Lupinranger + Patranger
Lupinranger are the bastard sons of the Timeranger and Patranger look like local heroes, or from a fake Sentai like the Tomica Heroes or like the lame stuff the square cops of Demolition Man wore. Also, there's omething about the Patranger suits that makes them all look very short and very fat.
