I've made a habit over the years of
correlating historical events and concurrent media. Is it just me
engaging in totally specious reasoning? Absolutely! Does my Funko
collection prevent alien invasion? You betcha. Point is I've found
entertainment often lines up with life. Right now my household is in
flux. Classes are changing, living situations are in flux, even
vehicles are being swapped out, you get the picture. At the same time
Super Sentai is undergoing a strange flux state with a new
mini-series bridging the gap between main entries as a way of dealing
with the upcoming shift of Japanese eras.
Since everything is already
topsy-turvy, and because I need a break from term-papers, let's take
this special mini-series as an opportunity to experiment with the
recap structure around here. The biggest shift right off the bat is I
intend to review each episode individually as they come out, I'm
betting on two weeks before I break that goal but it's the thought
that counts. Anyhow; get comfy and let's take a look at the first
installment of Super Sentai Strongest Battle.
The Story:
The whole thing kicks right off with
the Gokaigers, sans yellow ranger Luka, getting their asses handed to
them by a freaky looking knight. Captain Marvelous notices the foe
uses a move from their missing teammate which is a mystery he intends
to solve as he receives a mysterious ticket that transports him and
many others to planet Nemesis a place that forms only during a
certain celestial event.
On this world a girl named Rika
divides the different sentai heroes into teams and has them battle
for the opportunity to grant their wish. And so a bunch of heroes
battle each-other while the big knight, Gaisorg occasionally shows up
to smack people around in search of “the strongest.” The green
and black rangers from the upcoming Ryusoulger make their first
televised appearance by... exploring a cave. Not really sure what's
going on there. Also the show is keeping Yamato's, of Zyuohger fame,
wish a secret for some reason. Even his team members don't know what
he's after.
The Characters:
Our primary team of interest is a
mixed bag of supposedly popular characters from the last decade or so
of the franchise. In some cases I believe that pitch as I know
Marvelous and Stinger were big favorites in Japan. I appreciate
having Yamato front and center as he's one of the better red rangers
around. Then there's Kagura from ToQger who seems a little misplaced.
No doubt she has her fans but I know there are much more popular
girls from the past few years. Not that it make much of a difference
as she's been given nothing to do thus far. Lastly the member that
makes the popularity argument totally fall apart is Takaharu from
Ninninger. Thankfully this is the more matured and slightly less
obnoxious version of him but if we gotta have one of the Igasaki
ninja clan around there are many others I'd rather reconnect with. On
the bright side at least it's not Kasumi.
The team isn't the worst but it feels
more like it was determined by actor availability more than anything
else. This becomes more obvious when we see that the different teams
have themes like swordmasters or serious-business. This main group is
“Team Weirdo” which makes very little sense. If you wanted
weirdos from these respective teams wouldn't you end up with
characters like Silver or Doc? Still it's nice to see Yamato again,
and to see one of the better Kyurangers removed from their dreadful
show. Marvelous is supposed to be awesome but I've only ever seen him
in team-ups or movies so his personality always seems a bit shaky.
And while I'm not against the other two I still question why they're
here exactly.
Beyond that are various small cameos
from different rangers. Many of them are just suit-performers with
voice-acting by the original people or good imitators. In this outing
alone we see people from Boukenger, Go-onger, Ohranger, Carranger,
and Flashman but the best spot goes to Patranger's own Keiichiro who
shows up in person. He ends up in a duel with Yamato that the two
settle with a good talk. Lord help me I'd actually prefer that to be
the entire series.
The Villains:
Already mentioned this Gaisorg fellow
a couple of times. He's big, strong, purple, and clearly has
something to do with Ryusoulger since they have the same helmet
design. That's about all there is to talk about so far. Looks like
he'll lose his helmet next time so maybe there will be something to
discuss then.
The Action:
Strongest Battle is directed by Koichi
Sakamato who has spent far more of his career working on Power
Rangers than actual Super Sentai which becomes pretty
obvious by how the action is staged. It's not horrible by any means
only it utilizes more wire-work and flash than normal Sentai action.
Beyond that everything is just really soft. Attacks don't seem to
have any weight or consequence. Some maneuvers barely even register.
Story wise this is further exacerbated by Gaisorg who just sort of
smacks people around and walks away. Nobody is seriously injured or
loses their powers or anything. Coming fresh off a show like
Lupinranger vs Patranger which
had excellent choreography and that crazy drone camerawork this feels
like a step back.
Review:
Let's
get this out of the way first. This is not the worst premier episode
I've reviewed on this site. That dubious honor still belongs to
Kyuranger and
I expect that tile to hold for quite some time. What we have here is
largely a meh scenario. The episode isn't without a few perks. The
interaction between Yamato and Keiichiro was delightful as is the
overall concept of a sentai-style Secret
Wars.
The vegetable eating bit between Boukensilver and Go-on red was
pretty charming as well. Outside of those pros there's just some
flabby storytelling combined with action that isn't bad, just not up
to par. If this were the beginning of a full-length show I'd likely
be more harsh but as it's the opening quarter of a short special
series I'm fine cutting it a little slack. With any luck it will
improve. If not then at least were right around the corner from
something new.
And
with that we conclude our first format experiment. You longtime recap
readers lemme know what you think so far. Right now I need to get
back to my term-paper or sleep. Quite likely one will lead to the
other.
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