EPISODES 6 and 7
Damn, it's been nice to not have mecha battles! And we've had to see the Ohranger find different ways to finish off threats, which has been cool, you know? They brought down one giant on their own; they had to stop the host parasite to save the day in another episode. Bacchushund cruelly executes another. But now we're headed into mecha snoozeville. And Ohranger eventually drowns itself in boring mecha stuff, so...ugh.
Actually, this two-parter is all around solid. Its focus is on Miyauchi, which is never a bad thing. Learning of the Choriki Mobiles, the Baranoia dread the Ohranger getting mecha as much as I do, so they devise a plan to target an exhausted Miura, drawing him out into the field where they can capture him and learn of the mecha, preventing its completion.
Niibori's the action director of these episodes, and he delivers some cool scenes (like Oh Red and Miura being attacked in a jeep). I liked the team split in two on separate missions -- Red, Green and Yellow out to save Miura while Blue and Pink take it upon themselves to debut their mecha. (I still wonder what kind of craziness Yamaoka would have given us for this big two-parter, knowing how far he likes to push things.) Episode Six is also the first to have a scene with the untransformed Ohranger fighting off Barlow soldiers -- maybe they're supposed to have developed a bit of Choriki ability out of suit, but I missed how unstoppable the Barlows seemed, that they COULDN'T be fought off hand-to-hand, untransformed. Grunt fights always contained the potential for cool choreography, though, so I won't begrudge Ohranger the opportunity to have more fights with the actors involved.
Sugimura always liked relying on dei ex machina; they're throughout all of his shows. Here Ohranger is bailed out by a praying girl that ends up helping the Choriki shine through and pull Ohranger out of a jam and successfully use Ohranger Robo. It's later said by Miura that nature is what responded, helping fuel the Choriki. This further establishes Ohranger's theme -- we have technology vs technology, but it's the human and living component on the side of the heroes that makes them persevere, a technology without heart is a dangerous sort of thing...
...too bad the Baranoia aren't cooler. I know I said I wouldn't harp on that too much, but it's hard when they're always just having hissy fits in their scenes. For cold machines without feeling, they sure like their hissy fits. It's really Bacchushund I have the biggest problem with -- I know it's supposed to be special that they got Toru Ohira, narrator of nearly every Sentai up until '83, to voice him, but he makes him far too buffoonish. I tend to really dislike the voice acting in Power Rangers, but I remember thinking David Stenstrom had the right idea when voicing Bacchushund's counterpart, King Mondo -- he put on this snooty royal voice. I think Seizo Kato would have been a better fit as Bacchushund.
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MOVIE
What is this shit? Who thought this was acceptable to put on the big screen?
I guess the meeting went something like this...
Producer: Hey, Uehara. You know how you stunk up last year's Superhero Fair with Kamen Rider J? You got anything worse than that?
Uehara: Do I!
Keep in mind, I actually like those crazy Metal Hero episodes Uehara does where there's no real plot and it's just the hero thrown into wall-to-wall weirdness for the episode. But I don't think that sort of thing makes for a good movie, even though that scenario with a movie budget has the potential to be really nuts and memorable. But the Ohranger movie spares all expenses.
It just doesn't work here. It's not done well; it doesn't feel at all like Ohranger or a Baranoia plan. The filming location is mainly a sparse ranch that's so creepy it wouldn't be a surprise to find out the Japanese branch of the Manson Family lived there. The movie has a group of new monsters that are so cheap and poorly designed they look like Zyu2 rejects. And I find Miura to be kind of a dick in this.
And this sucker is 40 minutes! Why in the hell did they make every bad decision they could? "It's the movie for the anniversary series! Let's get back Uehara and have it be the first thing he does for this series! And you know his famous 20-minute-acid-trip-in-lieu-of-plot schtick from the Metal Heroes? Let's get him to do that for 40 minutes! And besides, if nobody likes it, we're sure to win some people over with the B-Fighter movie! Yeah! And we're already printing money knowing what a success Hakaider will be!"
Geez, and I wonder why Sentai theatrical works died for six years after this. It's really one of the top worst Sentai movies -- maybe THE worst, even by toku movie standards. Not even Yamaoka action helps much. This was only my second time watching this stinkfest; it's so bad, that's how strong its stench stained the memory.
Who would think that a movie with the premise of Bulldont making snuff films -- one which will hopefully star Ohranger -- could be so stupid? Who expects a movie like that to start with our villains being shat out of a metal horse? (The same place the script came from.)
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They had to drag poor Yoshinori Okamoto into this mess?! |
So, OhRanger Episodes 6 & 7 are way superior in terms of a story plot than Power Rangers Zeo's "The Shooting Star" (a few of 6 & some of 7 were taken), where Tanya Sloan (Juri Nijou's counterpart) met Shawn/Shaun. Also, the OhRanger Movie (16:9 Widescreen) has a longer time & a better storyline than Zeo's "Invasion Of The Ranger Snatchers" (Analog 4:3) that cuts the time in half.
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