Fiveman Episode 15

 

EPISODE 15

The first good episode since Episode 2, dealing with Garoa's hatred for Gaku. And it's not some meaningless, pointless, empty thing like Fire Candle's "beef" (more like "cruelty-free beef substitute") with Gozyu Wolf -- it stems from the encounter all those years ago, the wound Gaku gave Garoa -- the scar that remains on his face, the scar that remains on his pride.

Garoa lures Gaku to a location for a showdown with the growing of a Shidon flower -- the flowers the Hoshikawas were growing in the first episode, the flower Gaku was growing with his students, which were both destroyed by Zone attacks. This creates a bit of a plothole for a later episode, but for now it just remains nice symbolism. Gaku and Garoa both take quite a beating and each retreat; Garoa sulks and bleeds in a cave, angrily shouting away the other Zone members who come to check on him. (It's a cool scene, with fellow warrior Billion being the only one to respect his privacy.) Gaku spends day and night trying to strengthen his sword-fighting, worrying his siblings...

Garoa challenges Gaku to a final showdown; a cage match that only the survivor can exit. Ken decides to disguise himself as Five Red and fight in his brother's place, but Gaku soon learns of the truth and makes his way to duel Garoa, where he ultimately ends up re-opening the wound he gave him as a child.

It's a strong episode with cool, nonstop action, believable motivations, tension and emotional ties to the characters' pasts. And I think they should have killed Garoa off in this episode because it's all downhill from here for him.

Garoa never quite worked as the intimidating presence he was meant to be. I blame actor Takeshi Ishikawa. He has moments where he's really good at selling Garoa's rage, but there's something awkward about him. It really seems to me like he has a problem with the suit, he's uncomfortable, can barely move. So he can move kind of clumsily; he often makes weird faces. (Out of discomfort? Feeling like he's practically masked, so he's overexaggerating?) 

Garoa's supposed to be a tough-as-nails, hardened warrior. Garoa had a nice moment a couple of episodes back in which he asked Meadow to punish him, rather than every Zone officer, for their failures. Tough, competent. But the way Ishikawa can awkwardly come across, I feel, leads the show to making Garoa comedic and putting him into embarrassing situations. It's really out of place and really ruins the character and ends up making him seem like one of the worst, weakest villains in the franchise. And they completely drop the rivalry with Red! I feel like Garoa would have been the perfect Sentai role for Shinzo Hotta -- he would have been a little older; which I think would help the character, and he he nails that growling, stern, pissed-off boss guy.

The plothole, BTW, is that Garoa has a Shidon flower to grow and that Meadow turns it into a monster. In the final stretch of episodes, it's revealed that the weakness of "Meadow" is the Shidon flower. The show obviously wasn't so planned out.

Fiveman Episodes 11-14

 

 

EPISODE 11

Ho-hum. It's nice that they thought to include a student character, but this episode is just half-baked -- although it's a premise you can easily imagine working in a better made show that had care put into it and whimsy.

It begins with Ken saying he plays the lottery in hopes of winning and rebuilding their school; at the same time, an old student goes on a treasure hunt because he wants the riches to rebuild the school. Meanwhile, Dongoros wants to go on the same treasure hunt because he's a greedy bastard. You can picture an earlier show making the emotional connection between Ken and the student and the kind of crazy, dangerous, race-against-the-clock scenario of them getting to the treasure before Dongoros. This should be whimsical and adventurous! It should be The Goonies!

But it's cheap. It's all set at the rocky location. And, in the middle of the episode, we learn that it's not a treasure the map leads to, but...a stone which can make whoever holds it fly. And the Zone decide they should keep this out of Fiveman's hands because they'll somehow be REALLY fucked if Fiveman can fly, but not when they keep coming up with plans so bad they'd embarrass Rito Revolto. (I think Dongoros should have been like "Fuck that" once he heard the treasure wasn't gold or silver he'd been hoping for, but a rock.)

It's not like the kid guest star is bad or anything, but there's no real bond with Ken. (This show lacks heart! No money + no heart + no whimsy = Fiveman.) Think of Ultraman 80, the way Yamato taught a full class, but he had those five that were focused on and regulars. You could get a little more emotionally invested there. If Super wanted to go treasure hunting with Yamato, you'd care a little more. Not with this rando who seems more like a regular kid guest star than a supposed pupil the Hoshikawas had off-screen.

And the kicker is...Dongoros gets the treasure and it just rolls out from its location to the battlefield, blinds the villains with a light and...disappears into the sky. And nothing is said about it! It's all forgotten about! The Fiveman never even knew what this thing was. What the hell's the point of it? Where's the flying Fiveman I was promised?!? 

 

 

EPISODE 12

An episode that almost works but not quite. Again, Fiveman leaves out some of the building blocks of emotion and heart that previous shows had.

Arthur G6 takes a hit shielding the team and winds up an amnesiac, in pieces in a junkyard where a nerdy outcast hangs out to tinker with electronics. The kid apparently puts Arthur back together yet is shocked with Arthur's up and about and helping him deal with bullies? Was a page missing from the script or something? Once Arthur regains his memory, he enlists the kid to help him access the programming which will allow him to become the Earth Cannon.

Once again Fiveman brings an episode that's reminiscent of a previous show's more successful attempts. Here, you're reminded of the Bioman where Peebo loses his memory and befriends a nerd. I also feel like a better show would have given Arthur more of a reason to put himself in danger and take the hit for the team or have gotten drama out of it by having one of the team have just gotten into an argument with Arthur or something. But, no. Between their lack of chemistry and lazy scripts like this, the Fiveman at times barely feel like the stars of their own show.

 

 

EPISODE 13

Hey, Fiveman invented STOMP!

This episode may be called "Do Re Mi Fight," but the action I'm appreciative for here is the teachin' action, because it's nice of the show to remember they're teachers! Remi's subbing for a music teacher friend and, wouldn't you know it, the music they're rehearsing interferes with the latest monster's attack. We've seen this plot before, it's getting redundant to point out. (It's a Maskman and Liveman episode squeezed together.)

There's two things that bug me about this episode...

1) The bad guys think the problem is eliminated once they trash Remi's classroom. Like, they thought there was ZERO chance of ANY other type of music interfering with their easily distracted monster.

2) I hate that Gaku's the one who's looking around the classroom and realizes that they can turn any object into an instrument. That obviously should have been an observation of the team's MUSIC TEACHER.

 

 

EPISODE 14

This episode almost gets a right amount of heart and whimsy. Almost...

Another familiar scenario, in which a kid is bullied for telling tall tales, like she's friends with Fiveman. She learns her lesson after nearly leading the villains to their base and is rewarded with the Fiveman showing up and acting like they're her friend and she isn't a liar, so...she gets rewarded for her lying? (Yeah, yeah, I know it's that she learned better and vowed not to lie anymore and that's why they're helping her save face, but it still plays funny.)

The guest star is likable enough, but in an episode called "Cute Liar," you expect a really ornery and rambunctious character -- and that's where you get a lot of fun and comedy, but she's just pretty normal. She creates a rift between Ken and Fumiya, the former not wanting to trust her, and they unbelievably nearly come to blows about it. 

When I covered each Sentai member, I talked about how Ken and Fumiya seem interchangeable -- they'll both be depicted as goofballs but then hardheaded. To me, the elementary school Phys Ed teacher should be the fun-loving goofball who wants to play around, so I feel like Ken should have been on the kid's side here. (It's middle and high school gym teachers that are psychotic assholes.) They often put Fumiya in light, comedic situations and point out that he's the youngest, but Kobayashi always seems like a grump who thinks he's too good for the show (or is still bitter about losing Kamen Rider) and "fun" moments with his character don't work -- so just have Fumiya be the argumentative pissant all the time.

Fiveman Episodes 7-10

 

EPISODE 7

Anytime I try to rewatch Fiveman, this episode is a roadblock. I hit the preview and am like "Oh, no." I start the episode and am like "Oh, no." I finish the episode, and I'm like "Oh, no."

There's worse episodes out there. There's worse Fiveman out there. There's dumber episodes out there. There's dumber episodes of Fiveman out there. But there's just something about this episode that I can't stand. It's bad and dumb.

Dongoros pays a giant monster to terrorize Earth. Because he's cheap, he picks a kid, ha-ha. The whole episode is Kazumi and Fumiya trying to find out the kid's problem, and his problem is he's bad at math. So the whole episode is Kazumi teaching him math. (One of the methods is by getting him to subtract how many Zone enemies the Fiveman kill in their battle. Wholesome!) I have to say, though, that I like how the show always has Fumiya being able to figure out alien languages. It's been said that the show had originally planned for Ken to be an adoptive brother, but wouldn't it have been more interesting if Fumiya was maybe an alien child the Hoshikawas adopted, explaining his knowledge? 

The monster's design isn't cute enough for this scenario. And this episode is an early but good encapsulation for why Fiveman fails in most endeavors -- it's going for this cutesy, whimsical, offbeat vibe, but nobody's heart is really in it. Kazumi actress Kazuko Miyata tries her damnedest here, but a lot of the times, I don't feel like the Hoshikawa cast is caring and present enough to make these situations soar. Nobody is in sync, nobody clicks, nobody seems like they want to be here. Fumiya especially. The guy really seems like he hates everything and he'd rather be anywhere but filming this damn show. Don't give him anything sentimental or emotional to carry.

You want to be Flashman so bad, Fiveman? Well, you gotta listen to the complaints. Look at the Flashman cast. From Episode 1 they're just with it and on the same page and they really gel and you get the sense they all get along -- when I was a kid, I was under the impression the Flashman team were siblings. They ARE, in a sense, but not officially -- but they feel far more like a family than the Hoshikawas, Sentai's first family team. The Flashman cast are enjoying themselves, they elevate the work, they make the fantastic seem plausible. Now look at the Fiveman cast, who seem like they're being forced at gunpoint and don't really have chemistry -- and the only one with the presence to ever make things interesting is Keiko Hayase, and you know she's going to be shortchanged because Remi is Character Five of five.

 

EPISODE 8

This isn't a bad episode necessarily...it just has no oomph or emotional weight despite its tragic script. While it's a familiar scenario from writer Kunio Fujii, the fault is in the execution, and it's a shock that it's directed by such a great like Nagaishi when it falls so flat.

An alien prisoner of Zone's uses the last of her power to telepathically contact Gaku and arrange for an area where he can find and save her. The Zone use this opportunity to attack, and when things look bleak, the alien sacrifices herself to save Gaku. And...nobody cares.

The guest star IS sympathetic. You feel for the character, who is the last of her kind, as Zone uses her as basically a human battery to power Doldora's experiments, discarding her into a skeleton-filled pit when they have no more use for her. She's desperate to get out; the episode hammers home that she's the last survivor of her planet. You don't expect the show to kill her, but it does. Gaku failed in saving her, but she saves Gaku. And there's just no emotional impact to any of it. No tears for this young girl's sacrifice, no fiery rage for the perpetrator's of her demise, no swelling music... The episode ends with Gaku wishing for the girl's remaining crystal tear to return to her planet and be planted as a seed to restore it TSUZUKU.

This episode reminds me of that early Maskman episode Fujii wrote with the alien who contacts Takeru via his Aura Power for help. I never cared for that episode, because Maskman was meant to be grounded and here was a really out of place episode involving space and aliens for no reason. But that episode had an urgency, Ryousuke Kaizu gave a performance of intense determination, it was filmed well, it had tension and the alien was saved in the end...

This Fiveman has the gutsier ending of killing the guest off, but it's just such a flat episode with no emotion. All of the Fiveman just seem so...deflated. No connection to the material or each other, HOW THE HELL DO TWO OF THE CAST MEMBERS MARRY ONE ANOTHER WHEN THERE'S NO CONNECTION?!?!

"But Shougo, this wasn't an important episode, why get hung up on it?" Because that Maskman episode wasn't important, either, but Kaizu sure acted like it was! Effort is the key word here, and it's what Fiveman lacks. 

 

EPISODE 9

I know this episode's a kind of fan favorite -- more notorious for having the "evil" Sentai team, Gingaman, rather than anything truly noteworthy, and more notorious for them sharing a name with a later real Sentai -- but it's never worked for me. I *think* it wants to be a wild and crazy episode like Changeman 21, which straddles the line between serious and out there comedy, but...the "funny" portion of this Fiveman isn't funny, and its "serious" portion...isn't all that serious. (Ooh, the bad guys want to hijack the airwaves and hypnotize the world into worshipping Meadow.)

I know it's easy to play ghostwriter on an old episode or movie, but I would have preferred for this episode to be played a little straighter. Have the Zone send out a fake Sentai team -- it can be their ragtag group of aliens, but give them a Sentai-esque design to hide behind. By having them be Zone's rejects, our heroes immediately recognize them and know something's up. To me, it would have been a little more interesting if the Fiveman saw the public take to this new team and so they were able to think, "Hey, maybe we could leave the safety of the Earth to them and go find our parents* or resume teaching or..."

But, no. The Gingaman are those Zone extras (the BB Saloon crowd they ain't). Our heroes know they're bad, and it's the bad guys themselves who expose themselves and stop their own plan so...

I think this episode might have worked in a previous show, with a Soda who was more on the ball and a more game cast.

Oh, and that reporter woman is obnoxious.

*I know at this point in the show they believe their parents are dead, but still...you could have had one or two of them holding out hope and being like, "We could spend this time searching for mom and dad..."

 

EPISODE 10

I'm beginning to beat a dead horse, but here's a good episode that's marred by there being a lack of emotional connection. It's the first episode written by Inoue, and you're kind of thankful because it at least has a spark of life to it. The episode is also marred by the guest character, Zoba, having one of the dopiest outfits they spent all of four minutes designing and throwing together. (A shame, because the guest actor is pretty good.)

The big mistake of the episode is giving it to Fumiya. (Not the actor you want to give emotional stuff to, remember.) I wouldn't say he takes a liking to Zoba. He just for no known reason decides to put himself in danger and try to help him without much motivation. Zoba is a former royal, the last survivor of his planet, who has undergone cybernetic surgery in order to get revenge on Doldora, who led the attack, the first planet taken by Zone. Consumed with revenge, Zoba doesn't hesitate to attack anyone in order to replenish energy, which is by drinking human blood.

So he's kind of one of Inoue's tragic, gothic antiheroes. I know it's predictable, but give this episode to Kazumi. Hint at some romantic undercurrent, but you don't have to go there -- have it be that she responds to his sorrow over losing his younger sibling since she's the caretaker of her younger siblings.

Zoba has a speech where he tells the Hoshikawas about losing his family and they at least had each other. Fumiya begins this episode by playfully stealing food from his siblings at a cookout; you can look at this episode as Fumiya getting the focus because he feels bad for Zoba because he realizes how much he himself gets through because of his older siblings, that maybe helping him is a way of paying them back. (He steals his siblings' food but offers himself as food to this vampire he just met? Nandafuck?) I just don't feel that connection because Kobayashi just doesn't seem to work at that kind of emotional level.

At least it focuses on Doldora. Nishi is probably the best actress in the show, it's like an Atsuko Takahata situation in RX where a good actress and performance is being wasted in a show of lesser quality.

Fiveman Episodes 3-6

 

EPISODE 3

This isn't really a bad episode, per se, but quite a drop from the first two episodes. The first two episodes made the world of the show seem big -- from the Shidon planet to the packed school, to that island they filmed at in Episode 2. And this episode is a really reduced, isolated, small-scale thing focusing on Gaku and just ONE former student, and they're always just outside.

You still have to wonder why they even bothered making the Fiveman teachers only to immediately do away with that. The Japanese Wikipedia claims they moved away from it because they thought the younger members of the audience wouldn't care about teacher-student relationships. And if that's the case, I once again ask...why bother doing it in the first place? But I won't harp on that...too much.

It's always been clear that Fiveman was intended to be more lighthearted and kid-friendly after the late '80s Sentai shows focused on being "seishun dramas." I think that's a bit of a step backwards, that the shows had been aiming higher and evolving and the writers and staff were getting more comfortable with that style and now they're yanked back and tied down to wearing an outfit the franchise outgrew. Soda was obviously burning out, but I don't think he had his heart in doing a show like this at that point. And slap on top of that the way the show looks like it has zero budget and you end up with this half-cooked show that pleases nobody and nearly ended the franchise.

This episode is meant to show the parallels between Gaku and his student -- the lengths a teacher would go to in order to save his student -- and Billion and his cohort and the lengths a bad guy will go to in order to win, even at the cost of his good cohort. It's not entirely successful to me because Gaku's student is mischievous and not as amusing as the show thinks, so a bit bratty and unlikable, and the show is sugarcoated when it comes to the bad guys, so they don't go far showing Billion's cruelty. One of Soda's better shows would have established how close the two were with flashbacks at least. Billion doesn't act like Torarugin is anything but an ordinary monster of the week and not a former partner-in-crime. For me, it would have helped if Torarugin had been a face actor -- I really don't like his design.

Bottom line -- make Takeshi less of a shit, beef up the Billion/Torarugin side and maybe the episode would have worked more. 

 

EPISODE 4

I like this one -- I've always liked Remi and Keiko Hayase, and when I first saw this episode, I had a strange fascination with drunken fist. Win-win!

The problem is that it's a little too early to have such a funky episode, and Fiveman doesn't want to commit to the comedic heights of the concept. I'm not saying the Fiveman should be running around going "EHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!?!?!?" and screaming and mugging at the cameras like recent idiots Zenkaiger. (Pointing out how funny the situation is supposed to be doesn't make it funny, new shows.) But there's a happy medium, and Fiveman kind of holds back and doesn't take full advantage of the scenario -- and a modern viewer is probably under the impression it's a case where an old show is presenting a situation that hasn't aged well, so it comes across as unintentionally funny, when...no, it's supposed to be absurd and amusing. Take the scene with the cars being drunk by alcohol-poisoned gasoline and they fight each other -- Carranger would have gotten way more mileage (awful pun not intended) out of that situation, but here it's a tiny blip, played almost as a news clip. And you're just like, "Huh. That was amusing." Fiveman has such Flashman Envy -- it needed to jump into the bonkersness the way Flashman would with something like that pumpkinhead episode, for example.

I don't like Akihiko Yoshida's "zany" music for this show; the way it's used here is as bad as the new idiots who mug and yell at the camera.

Drunk Five Yellow piloting Five Robo to do drunken fist. C'mon. You don't see that everyday.

EPISODE 5

The first sucky thing to note about this episode is that Dongoros is now voiced by Osamu Katou instead of Takuzou Kamiyama -- and Kamiyama is SO MUCH BETTER. Katou just sounds like an old man thug; Kamiyama has a weird snobbish yet smart-ass sound to him -- it just went so much better for the character Dongoros is supposed to be. (The greedy guy worried about spending too much on their war, keeping track of every Dolyen spent? A pretty funny character...now ruined with irritating and mismatched voice-acting.)

This episode's a weird one to me. You have Dongoros leading a plan (?) to kidnap babies, put them into eggs and hatch them as birdpeople. Fiveman has Flashman Envy, but when Flashman depicted Mess messing with babies, it would always be in dark, disturbing ways. Here it's shocking that babies are targeted, but it's not treated as the screwed-up plan it is. Fumiya and Remi jump into the spotlight to save the babies to avenge losing their parents as babies. OK, that could work as good motivation, but it's undermined by the two hatching a freaking Kakuranger scheme with Fumiya pretending to be a baby to lure the monster out. Tonal inconsistency.

And if all that's not enough, we have an alien egg that finds its way to Earth, looking for its parents, mistaking everyone it encounters as its parent and hilarity...ensues? They discover the thing probably lost its parents in a Zone attack, and it cheerfully leaves Earth after the day is saved. Yay? Where exactly is it going?! The thing's design is also pretty shoddy, and it's one of voice-actress Akiko Muta's less sympathetic roles.

None of this comes together to work as any kind of unifying dramatic theme. Thumbs down!

EPISODE 6

The first episode of the show to be written by Mami Watanabe. She wrote some Turborangers I liked, but...whoo-whee, although it's a Remi episode, is this one a stinker. It's like one of those tween Zyuranger episodes, that lull after the introduction, where they dump some stinky episodes all while you know Burai's around the corner and you're waiting for the show to get to THAT...

Doldora hatches a cockamamie plan to make people lazy and is VERY smug in her success. They would have gotten away with it, too, if not for Remi tricking them into thinking she's a hard worker, so they walk into her ambush. This is just only one episode after the Zone falls for Fumiya being a baby and walking into THAT trap. So, while a big head rules Zone, they don't have much in the brains department.

An all-too-brief kung-fu fight courtesy of Remi is this episode's sole highlight.

And it all ties up with a nice message of working hard to please your family, mankind, and your corporate overlords, kids. TSUZUKU!

Fiveman Intro & Episodes 1-2

 

Fiveman...

It's kinda been my punching bag for a while. I'd like to like this show more than I do. Hirohisa Soda's my favorite Sentai writer, it's his last show as main writer. When I first got back into toku in the late '90s, and I was sampling post-Liveman Sentais, I remember getting to Fiveman, seeing its credits, and being like "Ah! This has the feel of the shows I grew up with." Other than the first episodes and the last episodes, it was hard to find the entire show for a while, and when I first watched it all in '05 or so...I was happy to be watching the show in full, but I was massively let down. It was generic as could be, and not the greatest way for Soda to go out. 

Now, it's obvious it wasn't planned to be Soda's last show; it's Fiveman's poor performance that let producer Takeyuki Suzuki to clean house. Had they known, perhaps some of Fiveman's...let's say "familiar" beats...could have been more of a celebration of Soda's accomplishments and all he did for the franchise. Fiveman mainly has Flashman Envy -- Flashman's one of the best, most consistent, tightly planned and unique Sentai shows. It's a good show to want to imitate, but don't be so damn lazy about it. (Fiveman even steals Flashman's narrator, Eiichi Onoda. "But, Shougo, a lot of shows share narrators!" Yeah, well, these are the only two Sentais Onoda narrates. Coincidence? Nope!)

So, as it is, instead of loving homage, or a pastiche of past series, the show plays like a writer desperate to reclaim past glory, recycling ideas from better shows for this lazy and aimless one that's just on auto pilot and constantly reminding you of those better shows. With Maskman, Liveman and Turboranger, the franchise had left the space shows behind, so Fiveman's also a curious step backward in that regard, when sci-fi was no longer so dominant in the zeitgeist.

The thing's a frustrating mess. Super Sentai Fivefingerdiscountman.

But before I get started...

People always like to poke fun at the team's name. They're "Earth Sentai" because Earth is their home. "Fiveman" may have been a rejected name for Maskman, but its origins are the same -- a nod to Goranger. ("Goman" doesn't sound good, c'mon.) During this rewatch, during one of the episodes with Star Five, I had the idea that "Starman" would have been a pretty cool name for the Hoshikawas.

 

EPISODES 1 & 2

A truly excellent premiere. One wonders how the show had its act so together to deliver this and then just fall on its ass for the rest of the series. I'm thinking through not just Sentai or toku, but all TV to try to find an instance of a show having a good pilot, but the rest of it falls so far in quality... It's like, if these two episodes were its own little movie, like ZO or J, then it would be like "Fiveman's awesome! Why didn't we get more of that?" Well, we did...we got 46 more episodes, and it's all downhill from here.

These episodes are more of a continuous piece than even the Maskman or Liveman premieres; you can watch the first episodes of those shows just fine, but Fiveman's first episode is deliberately paced to flow into the second episode and make one piece. If you watch just the first episode of Fiveman on its own, you might be bored or wonder where the superhero action is or why people like me call it a great premiere.

But it's good that it takes its time. We spend just the right amount of time setting up the Hoshikawas on Shidon, the tragedy that strikes. The Hoshikawa Kids' escape is tense and dramatic, with nice little details like Arthur's printing the family photo as an upset Gaku clings to him, accidentally hitting the print button. Arthur's the MVP of this premiere -- I like his vow to raise the Hoshikawa kids, his disappointment at Ken rejecting him as just a robot, his sadness that he knows he couldn't be the parental replacement, but how damned hard he tried anyhow... (I've said before that the ONE thing Fiveman has over Flashman is that Arthur's a better, more meaningful character than Magu could ever be.)

It's always funny to me that the show made a big deal about the heroes all being teachers, and then their school is destroyed in the first episode, so they never do much teaching. (In the first "This Seems Familiar..." segment regarding Fiveman's FIVE-finger-discounting past Sentai shows, the destruction of the school by enemies from our heroes' past might make you recall Liveman.)

Bad guys Zone are like a mash-up of Gozma and Mess, but nowhere near as interesting or threatening as any member of those groups. Empress Meadow is a nice design, reminiscent of Star King Bazuu, only not at all frightening or intimidating. Overall, I don't really like anime designer Koichi Oohata's designs for the main Zone officers, and it's sad that they're the last real group of face villains as I recognize them. (I like the big group of face villains Soda gives you over the two or three that had been the norm for Uehara, or the one human + thousands of suits of later Sentais.)

Patience pays off for Episode 1's slow build-up as Episode 2 is front-loaded with action; this was the first time SFX director Hiroshi Butsuda takes over Sentai's effects from long-time director Nobuo Yajima, and the show tries to remind you of it every chance it gets. (Check out Five Red's flying attacks or the cool way the team transports into the mecha's cockpit.)

The OP and ED theme songs and credits are also top-notch, with emotional lyrics, cool visuals for the OP, nice dramatic bits dealing with the heroes' being raised by Arthur for the end. Seriously, so much care and effort went into these first two episodes and the credits sequences and...where does it go?! 

Endless Super Sentai Spirit

 

Fifty years. 49 shows. Thousands of episodes. An adaptation that became a worldwide phenomenon. So many memorable characters, performers, soundtracks. So many unforgettable action scenes on your television every week. So much varied creativity and imagination. So many cool toys.

Super Sentai has always been my favorite of the tokusatsu franchises. From the moment I was gripped by the Changeman my mom accidentally stumbled across while channel surfing -- I was a Sentai Kid. I loved Spielban, but other Metal Heroes I saw didn't capture my attention or interest the way Sentai did. Same for Kamen Rider.

I like superhero teams. The Justice League, the Justice Society, the X-Men, the Ghostbusters, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I could wax philosophical about it -- the importance of conveying the message of characters who have to put aside their differences, coming together as one for the greater good. That it teaches teamwork, open-mindedness, tolerance, fairness. Sentai provided the big, fantastic superhero action that most American hero shows at that time lacked, and that's part of what caught my attention -- and probably why I find so many American superhero shows so lacking.

Through its longevity, through its set-up depicting the various heroes, a Sentai show had more room to play and be varied. Kamen Rider and Ultraman need very key ingredients to retain their identity. Sentai can be more flexible, but that doesn't mean it doesn't have its own identity. Super Sentai can easily and successfully tackle different genres more than the other franchises. And its variety in types of stories, types of heroes, makes it accessible -- there's something for everyone, the entire family could enjoy it. Sentai's also really the only franchise to emphasize the importance of heroines -- it's a show that appeals to boys and girls without alienating one or the other. While Kamen Rider has slowly -- SLOWLY -- introduced transforming heroines, they're treated with a "You're lucky to even be here" kind of attitude. The female characters in Ultraman are almost always the love interest for the main character or the team's secretary, like it's perpetually locked in the world of 1930s comic books. Of 15 actual Metal Heroes, only six had transforming heroes, but only two true greats. (Yuku ze, Diana! And Sarah from Blue Swat.) Sentai treated its heroines as equals -- an essential part of the team, the fifth finger needed to make a fist punching out evildoers.

There's something magical and enthralling about Super Sentai. Notice how long it swept the world through Power Rangers, when attempts to bring adaptations of Kamen Rider or Ultraman wouldn't last. Besides my obsession with it, I remember coming back from Japan and showing friends episodes of Sentai I had on VHS and they'd be into it, transfixed, even without knowing the language. (And this was before Power Rangers. Also -- I always suspected one of my friends of stealing my Liveman tape, which kinda became my Maltese Falcon.)

"But Shougo, how can you claim to love Sentai so much when you've been so damn critical -- to put it mildly -- of recent stuff? You haven't liked a Sentai in 20 years!" I'm critical BECAUSE I love it. I know it can be more; I know it HAS been more. Even a lot of the recent entries I don't like, I'll see the potential that's there but ignored because Toei stopped caring and Bandai became too demanding. There's a lot of Kamen Rider shows where I'll be like "That premise could have worked, but the show needs completely retooled." With a lot of Sentai, I saw the ingredients were there, and it would have taken just some tweaks to be better, not a total rehaul. Maybe I'm biased, but I feel like Sentai's had a better batting average than the other franchises. I've watched countless Riders, Ultras, Metal Heroes, '70s randos...Super Sentai's the one that I vibe with the most. None of the others do it for me the way Sentai does, even when they're trying to emulate Sentai, like Ninja Captor or B-Fighter or Gransazer.

I'm going to repost something I previously posted, when ranking all of the Sentai:

"...if you think I'm somehow a bad fan for being harsh on a lot of those later entries, well...I love Super Sentai, dammit. I'll give a lot of those shows I don't like more chances than I would a show from another franchise. (Meaning...I'd be more likely to pop in something like Go-onger than I would something like OOO. Yeesh.) And I'd probably fight for those shows over something from another franchise, too. (Meaning...I'd make an argument for why ToQger has more depth over something like Ex-Aid. Yeesh.) But you can't like everything, and anyone who says they do or seems like they do are just full of it. Especially with something as long-running as Super Sentai.

It's like I've said before...I look at Super Sentai the way I do any long-running franchise, or a longtime band or author or director -- not everything's going to be a winner. They're going to turn out something you won't like and don't recognize as being the same thing you loved in the first place. But does that mean you hate them? Of course not. You just hope they get their shit back together for the next one."

And now...there is no "next one." People have taken almost a schadenfreude-like delight in Sentai fans' upset. But Sentai's ending isn't a loss. It isn't a failure. The show was on the air constantly for 46 years. FORTY-SIX. A new episode, nearly every week. Nonstop, uninterrupted. In American television, Gunsmoke is considered impressive for running for 20 seasons. Dick Wolf wanted to beat that with his Law & Order shows, which have been on and off the air. We talk about The Simpsons running for 35 years. People act like the Berman era of Star Trek is crazy, for there being four overlapping shows in a period of 18 years. All of these shows ran for the typical American television season -- 22 or so episodes before a summer hiatus. Or then look at something like Doctor Who, with its sporadic schedule. Soap operas are the only things with a similarly nonstop production schedule, but those aren't exactly ambitious productions, are they? Dismiss Sentai as being a kids show, but it's not easy work to do an episode EVERY WEEK, nonstop, 46 years with the scale and imagination required for it -- coming up with all of those premises, all the different costumes that needed making, the work and risk that goes into the action scenes. All of the original ideas, nothing taken from or adapted from a previously existing work. You know how dedicated the Japanese staff are to the level of work and detail that goes into these things. I'd dare to say that it's probably five times the work they put into Gunsmoke back in the day.

Sentai's been a nonstop presence in television, and it wasn't kept on the air out of the kindness of Toei's heart. It was popular, it was loved, it was successful. It made its impact on pop culture. The other franchises lacked that versatility which led to that longevity. Kamen Rider and Ultraman had long dry spells, Metal Heroes were a blip -- while Sentai kept on. Yet Sentai was kind of taken for granted, kind of underestimated, kind of the underdog franchise, despite its victories. Later Toei regimes (*cough* Sneaky Shirakura *cough*) didn't respect it, ignored it, actively wanted to see its end. Super Sentai didn't end because it was a flop but because Toei thinks only Kamen Rider matters, and they have misplaced faith in the Metal Hero franchise. Super Sentai was there for them in the years Kamen Rider spent off the air. It was there for them when Metal Heroes died. And now it won't be there for them...unless they need to make some quick cash, like with an anniversary to prop up or a Premium Bandai thing to sell. (BTW, they needed to attach the Metal Heroes to Sentai to try and make their last Metal Hero revival work. How do they think they can sacrifice Sentai and get a new Metal Hero to stand on its own?)

One negative of Sentai's nonstop rule is that I feel like the franchise might have become too daunting to people. Because of their hiatuses, there's certain shows from Ultra or Rider that are considered the giants, the absolute classics. While the die-hard fans have carved out the biggies of Sentai, I feel like, as time went on, they started to get buried by all the shows coming down the pike, leading to this idea that Sentai doesn't have its classics. Ideally, Sentai going on hiatus could possibly mean a reevaluation of certain shows, and the important entries can be highlighted. Sentai's time away can get the people who have taken it for granted time to miss it and realize how special it is.

Gozyuger might have failed in being a decent, respectful anniversary series, but there were at least some bright spots in the 50th celebration: cast reunions for shows like Goranger and Ohranger; the big NHK poll; Sentai teaming up with pro baseball teams; and the Super Sentai exhibition, which saw dozens of former cast and staff members turn out to show their continued love for the franchise. And then there were all of the former cast and staff members who voiced their shock at the leaked news of Sentai's ending, before writing love-filled notes for the franchise.

Sentai as we know it might be ending, and that's sad. When I decided to look these shows up on the internet in the late '90s -- spurred on by my school beginning to teach Japanese -- I was surprised THEN that it was still going. It's a bit surreal to think there won't be a new show debuting. But Sentai's left us with 49 shows. (50 if you count Akibaranger. And why wouldn't you when it's one of the best shows Toei's put out?) You can go and give an older show a chance; you can go and finish a show you might not have. It's not a time of sorrow -- it's a time of exploration, a time of rediscovery. Watch 'em, rewatch 'em, re-enjoy 'em, reevaluate 'em. Celebrate them. Celebrate Super Sentai. The five-colored flame of Super Sentai can't be so easily extinguished.

And don't forget! There might not have been a show airing in '78, but Goranger vs JAKQ hit theaters that year. So Sentai HAS actually run nonstop for 50 years. (I don't know why people are quick to "correct" someone who says Sentai's been on for 50 years by pointing out there wasn't a show in '78, but they're just fine celebrating Rider or Ultra anniversaries which, to use these people's criteria, shouldn't count since they each spent long periods of time off the air.) So...GO, GO SUPER SENTAI! Shine on, Super Sentai Spirit!

-Shougo B'Stard, a Sentai Senshi since 1985