Time For Lovestruck Rangers

Toshiki Inoue's OTHER episode of Timeranger? Back to back? That's kinda weird, especially since they were pretty spread apart in Timeranger. (And both were pre-Naoto.)

I've never really liked the Timeranger episode. The Timeranger cast thought they were so cool and serious that they don't play comedy well, except for maybe Izumi. (Well, Masaru Nagai THINKS he does. He really thinks he can do it all, that he's Kamisama's gift to entertainment.) The episode also has that creepy backstory driving the plot, that Yuuri basically moves in with a middle-aged guy to take care of him after he's duped by a woman. I don't know why Tomorrow Research thought this assignment was acceptable, but I guess it just means they're stupid.

But the worst part of the episode to me was always how it basically degraded Yuuri to snap the guys out of their trance. Even though I don't think they ever succeeded in making Yuuri seem as cool and strong as they wanted her to be, it's still a big betrayal to what they were trying to do with the character, all for the sake of a laugh that wasn't worth it. It's supposed to be funny to see her out of her comfort zone, but that's just their excuse for the sake of the creep factor in having her glam out to appeal to her colleagues.

The only thing the Timeranger has going for it is that Changerion's Chika Kochihira plays the heartbreaker, a femme fatale monster of the week who brainwashes men and ruins them. She's the best part of the episode, and a good femme fatale appropriate for a cop show. Time Force doesn't quite go with the femme fatale angle, but has the woman-disguised monster taking the appearance of each of the Time Force guys' type. (A WB -- that was what the CW used to be called, kids -- starlet look for Lucas; a super-nerd for Trip; a preppy tennis player for Wes.)

This episode beats the Timeranger episode overall, though, by wisely getting rid of that Yuuri becomes an old dude's wife subplot, wisely getting rid of her degrading herself, and replacing it with actual character stuff that goes into building the Wes-Jen romance. Jen being upset and bothered by seeing Wes so head-over-heels in love with someone else is a scenario that could have been played lightly and made Jen look stupid, but it's not and it doesn't, and Erin Cahill's performance here is good as Jen feels hurt. Wes has liked her for a while, but this is the first time where she's realized she's on the same page. This show's already wiped the floor with Timeranger's pitiful attempt at forcing a romance out of nowhere.

You know something I found really funny about this episode, though? When the monster's disguised as the nerdy girl to pick up Trip, she's testing out a stupid robot she built. That robot is...Time Roboter from Timeranger. Time Roboter is a stupid addition to Timeranger, kinda the Butchy of Timeranger, where it just reeks of some higher-up being like "The show's a drag and toys aren't selling! Put a cute robot thing in there, that will turn things around!" So they write in that tech-maniac Shion creates this stupid robot that does nothing but squeak things in an obnoxious anime voice. (It COULD have been cute, having an alarm-clock robot in a show about time, but Timeranger screws that up, too.) Time Roboter is just stupid and pointless, and it's hilarious that Time Force turns this unnecessary thing from Timeranger into...an unnecessary thing.