Ohranger Episodes 35-38

 

EPISODE 35

A great idea for an episode, where Momo gets to honor Goranger's Peggy by spending the episode attempting to defuse an undetonated missile which is pinning a girl down. It works well enough, filmed tensely with Tamao Sato giving a good performance. You just have to overlook a couple of more outlandish moments -- there's a big danger in the missile being moved, yet the vehicle it's in is tossed about numerous times. If it's able to take THAT much beating then, surely, Red Blocker could have just tossed the explosive into space or something, right? No, you have to buy into the idea that it's a delicate procedure.

This episode sees the introduction of the show's Sixth Villain, Bomber the Great. He steals Bara Nightmare's backstory in that he rebelled against Bacchushund, but he's nowhere near as cool and creepy as that character. Bomber's kind of like a proto-Bowzock, although he's intended to be more serious, but, keeping in with Baranoia tradition, he looks freaking ridiculous. You can't take the guy seriously as a contender for the throne, he just doesn't fit in, and he's got total seat-filler villain written all over him. He just seems like he's not hanging around, so they didn't overthink him. He's a monster of the week who doesn't know when to go away. Still, I can think of dozens of better themes than a missile-shaped biker punk as this guy who rebelled and wants to take over now that Bacchushund is pushing tin daisies.

This episode begins with an upset Bulldont firing all missiles from the Baranoia base to Earth, which the Ohranger easily stop. It just made me wonder...the Ohranger have known since the start of the show that the Baranoia are on the moon. Why just let them off? Does that sound like any military organization to you? They'd be sending their forces there. (Especially at this point, when the UAOH are crazy overpowered and have 35 mechas.)

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EPISODE 36

A farting monster. A green message. Another new damn mecha. Our Red hiding in a pile of garbage in order to sneak attack the farting skunk monster. Yeah...

I have to say, though, for as doofy as a pollution-farting (and belching) monster is, it's played surprisingly seriously. More specifically, the heroes play it seriously. As the scripts have gotten lighter or weirder, the cast is still serious. A lesser production, they would have all caved in by now. Now, the characters and actors can run the risk of seeming stupid or lifeless for behaving in such a serious, dramatic way in these scenarios, but the Ohranger heroes remain one of the show's strongest aspects. Would I like this cast in a more serious production? Most definitely. But they remain good, never veering into that Adam West "take things overly serious to play up the absurdity of it all" or that obnoxious "we're so cool and above this, we're IN on it, we're winkin' at ya" mentality that a cast like Kiramager has. They also don't phone it in.

So while I prefer more serious villains with more genuinely threatening agendas, and more dramatic scenarios for our heroes to be placed in, the Ohranger cast is at least still bringing it and is one of the show's saving graces for me.

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EPISODES 37 & 38

Is Gunmajin the most unnecessary addition to any show ever? Have him be a one-episode guest ally, but to bring him in now just shows you how out of wack this show's priorities are at this point. We just had the unimpactful defeat of the head villain, we're trying to get this very out of place replacement villain to work, but let's also toss in this new, totally disconnected character in the mix. THIS is Sugimura's agenda, after the mess the show just made? It's just too late in the show's run for this stuff. There's a scene where he's fighting the equally square peg Bomber the Great and my thought was "What show am I watching? Because this doesn't feel like Ohranger."

It really feels like a backdoor pilot. Gunmajin is such an old kind of idea, one I associate with '60s or early '70s toku -- and not Sentai -- and I'm sure that retro vibe worked for some people, a further addition to the show's throwback vibes, but I don't think it works for Ohranger and I question its inclusion. That they wanted to test out the idea for a potential show with a Gunmajin-type would be the only decent explanation. (Two years later we get Kabutack. Coincidence?!)

And to top it off, Akira Kamiya is wasted as the voice of Gunmajin. He's probably my favorite of the classic anime voice guys. This guy is Kenshiro! And this is his one big Sentai role, and it's this random character. Gotta love the commitment by the writers, when Gunmajin's origin is being questioned and Riki's like "Yeah, we didn't know 600 million years ago, either. He's either a robot...or not." Thanks, Riki. The show doesn't even know how to handle its sixth hero properly, he just pops up whenever they remember him, so the show doesn't need to be adding another random ally.