Turboranger Episode 38

Now THIS is a Bouma plot. This episode is Mami Watanabe's second of three scripts for the series, one that's a little more traditionally Turboranger, prioritizing an eerie vibe with a memorably creepy monster of the week. Director Masao Minowa gives the episode a sense of dread, a quiet spookiness, a tense pace and inventiveness.

When Shunsuke breaks the art class's model statue while goofing off, his punishment is to clean and rearrange the storage room. (Shunsuke was hauling out gymnastic moves in order to look up classmates' skirts. Modern viewers will look back on this episode and cringe, but it was way inappropriate in even 1989. He gets punished at least! Even though it's probably more for knocking over that statue...) As he's cleaning, he backs into a painting, knocking it over, unknowingly breaking its wrapping. He doesn't realize what he broke was a seal bearing Rakia's image, and that the painting is a Bouma-Beast. Shunsuke takes a look at the painting, which looks like every early '80s metal album cover -- a demonic beast menacingly hovering over a hellish landscape, its right index finger dipping into a multi-colored pond -- gets weirded out and hides it from sight. He turns his back to continue his cleaning, as we get a POV shot from the monster, extending its hand out to Shunsuke, who gets out of harm's way just in time, being called to by his friends. (They're headed to a museum for a school project; it doesn't interest Shunsuke, but I guess it's better than cleaning up the filthy and creepy storage facility!)

I find it kind of interesting and creepy that a sealed Bouma was actually on the school grounds. Throughout the show, we've seen that sealed Bouma are spread out and the regular Bouma had to seek them out if they wanted to use them. It gives the show a freaky little addition that probably spooked the younger viewers, the idea that "you never know where a Bouma could be lurking!"

Once Kirika finds the Bouma-Beast, she takes him before Ragon. This Bouma-Beast looks down on Nagare Bouma and doesn't want anything to do with them, while showing respect to Ragon. (There's a moment where an outraged Kirika is about to give the monster what for, but Yamimaru holds her back. He has his reasons which will be revealed at the end...) So this monster prefers to work alone.

This Bouma-Beast is interesting and unique; he resides in a painting, which is where he traps people, torturing them in excruciating pain, draining them of their "colors" until they cease to exist. He's able to leave the painting and fight as a traditional toku monster, but when he's out of the painting, the show will add these lighting effects around the camera frame, which lends a surreal touch. The Bouma-Beast's name is Jigokue Bouma; the Japanese apparently have a precise name for paintings which depict Hell, and it's "jigokue." Jigokue Bouma has a pretty crazy yet appropriate design, too, looking like a goat, with blood red wings and skull armor...he's the dream mascot of a metal band. Eiji Maruyama voices the monster (he's one the regular monster of the week voices in the Showa era) and does a typically great job here, making him sound just so vicious and angry and confident. The design, the performance, the writing all make Jigokue Bouma stand out as an intimidating monster of the week, a confident one, and it's a great way to make up for Metal Zuruten Type being so random in the last episode.

The Jigokue Bouma places itself on exhibit at the museum the Turboranger are at. Haruna's the first to find it, and they make the painting seem ominous. The episode is pretty quiet, not having a lot of music, which gives it an unsettling feel. The monster quickly consumes Haruna, Daichi and Youhei; Shunsuke fights it off, wounding the image of Jigokue Bouma on its forehead, with him exiting the painting in order to fight the remaining two Turboranger. (In an interesting design quirk, Jigokue Bouma's right index finger is made entirely of bristles, which he uses to repair any damage done to him, the "painting.") He proves formidable and the two retreat.

Riki and Shunsuke are back at base, panicking that their three pals are trapped within the hell painting. (I give the production credit for trying to creatively depict the characters in the painting; they have wide, twisting colored cloths stretching across the actors, indicating the colored pond of the painting, with the actors just convulsing and twisting, selling the idea of the pain they're meant to be in.) Meanwhile, Jigokue Bouma tries to lure them out by absorbing more people as hostages.

Shiron reveals to them the way Jigokue Bouma drains people of color, absorbing them as "paint" into himself. They'll eventually die, and any attempts to destroy the painting will kill them. Dazai comes up with a crazy plan -- if Jigokue Bouma's taking "colors" away from his victims to power him, he has to be pulling it all somewhere; every color together makes white. So not only should the Riki and Shunsuke be able to safely enter the picture using their white Kuuga Growing Forms (leaving no color to be drained by the monster), but if they find anything white within the monster, that's where all of the energy is going, and it's probably susceptible to attack. (It sounds like it shouldn't make sense, but the episode makes it work.)

Red Turbo and Yellow Turbo then goad Jigokue Bouma into absorbing them, discharging their energy in order to turn white just before they get into the picture. Not-so-Yellow-anymore Turbo finds a white marking on Jigokue Bouma's head and strikes him, freeing everyone from the painting. Upon seeing Jigokue Bouma's defeat, Yamimaru makes cryptic remarks to Kirika, that that's what one gets when under Ragon, and that it's no longer Ragon's era. They join hands, setting up the next awesome episode.

The unique monster-of-the-week and the atmosphere this episode has makes it memorable to me. It harkens back to some earlier Turboranger feel in its depiction of the monster, its supernatural tone and the balance of humor and seriousness, while also making creative use of the Turboranger's white forms we haven't seen for a while.

Before anyone makes any Vigo the Carpathian jokes about Jigokue Bouma, I'll point out that this episode aired about a week before Ghostbusters II premiered in Japan, so I don't think it was an influence.