Turboranger Episode 44

Mami Watanabe's third and final script of the series. I've liked the Turboranger she's written, they've all been strong and rooted in the characters and she likes to amp up the supernatural side of the show's setting. Minoru Minowa directs this episode, and I always like the grim, dark, quiet atmosphere he often gives his episodes. His episodes will be grounded and personal, and I like how he opts for silence a lot of times, not having BGM constantly going. Minowa's episodes of not only Turboranger, but other tokus he directed, have a palpable atmosphere to them. (While he directed some episodes of Kamen Rider Black that had the weaker scripts, he also directed the final two episodes of that show, which have GREAT atmosphere and a heavy feeling of dread.)

I love that this episode brings back Omamori Bouma (and Rika Matsumoto to again voice her), still trying to guide Sayoko/Kirika by providing her the information with which to gain new power. Omamori Bouma's spirit tells Kirika of a legend amongst the Nagare Bouma that provides the chance to purge the human blood and become a full Bouma. To learn more, Kirika must perform a black magic ritual. She returns to the abandoned Tsukikage home to carry out the ritual; the strangeness of her actions causes whispers in the neighborhood, which leads Riki to investigate. (I like the idea of the abandoned Tsukikage household becoming the neighborhood's whispered-about and haunted house.)

Riki overhears when the spirit of Omamori Bouma tells her that a meteor, which is actually a Bouma-Beast, is making its rare approach to Earth, and that if Kirika can manage to pull it to Earth and merge with it, she'll be granted a great power which will make her invulnerable and erase her human blood. Omamori Bouma leaves her with a hand-sized stone, adorned with the Mark of Bouma, which she'll use to attract the meteor/Bouma-Beast. (She spots Riki spying and leaves him with some nice wounds before setting out on her mission.) Riki's really determined to stop her, mainly because he doesn't want her to lose her humanity. He wonders to himself at the end of the episode what it is that makes Kirika push herself as hard as she does; he doesn't understand why she wants to abandon her humanity and it seems like it scares him; not only for what it would mean for her, but what it would mean to have an opponent who's willing to go to such lengths.

Kirika successfully lures the meteor to her location and it transforms into Armor Bouma, who merges with Kirika becoming Armored Kirika. The Armored Kirika suit is insane and you have to give Masako Morishita props for wearing it and carrying herself well. Because...I don't think I've ever seen a regular actor in a toku wear a costume that's so massive and bulky and inoperable looking -- that's usually given to the JAC people or the more action-oriented actors. It looks so damn uncomfortable. Armored Kirika is soon wiping the floor with the Turboranger and then sending them under the floor -- she causes a massive crack to open in the ground, which pulls the Turboranger under. Her power's so great, it worries even Yamimaru. Every once in a while, she'll stagger in pain, a sign that her human blood still remains.

Kirika goes a little power-happy, which Yamimaru warns her of. (He hates that she had a chance to finally kill the Turboranger, but chose to display her power instead. Yamimaru's the rare toku villain who genuinely wants his opponents dead. There's no showboating and there's no assuming it all went to plan -- we've seen him search sites after a battle to find the corpses of his enemies to make sure.) Zuruten thinks Yamimaru's just jealous, but Kirika recognizes Yamimaru's concern. She knows that he's worried about her changing and losing herself, and that gets her to remember that they're a team, and part of the reason she wanted to obtain this new power was to share it with him. So she sets out to finish the job...

The Turboranger are all beaten and panicking and unsure of their next move, but Riki pushes them on because they're the only ones with a shot of stopping her, and that her new armor has to have a weak spot they'll need to find. I like how once they track down Kirika and fight her, the Turboranger work out a plan where they act basically as the shield for Red, so he can get in there and search for the armor's weakness. It's samurai-esque. Red eventually surmises that the weak spot is the armor's center, which is the stone with the Mark of Bouma on it. I like that they don't instantly solve the problem, either. It's not just "There's the weak spot! *blast* Victory!" Red tries not only blasting it with the Turbo Laser, but he breaks his GT Sword trying to cut the stone, as well. He gets stabbed in the shoulder so hard by Kirika that her sword remains stuck in Red Turbo; when he yanks it out, he then uses IT to try to break the stone piece on the armor, and this is what works. The stone breaks, separating Kirika and Armor Bouma. Kirika, still weakened from the toll of wearing the armor while still retaining human blood, is whisked away by Yamimaru as the Turboranger deal with Armor Bouma with an ease that's kinda hilarious. (I guess it was Kirika who was pulling all of the weight when they were united.)

In the aftermath, an apologetic Kirika voices her disappointment in letting Yamimaru down, but he says they're good enough as is to get what they want. And that stab wound from Kirika was so severe, Riki ends the episode in a sling, a nice detail. There's so many times toku heroes just shake off their injuries or seem to magically heal, but this one was supposed to be severe, even for the Turbo Suit. The narrator teases us with a "new threat" that approaches them. Sounds interesting, but we unfortunately have to get through a very crappy episode before we get to that promising sounding one. *sigh*