A little disappointed...Gokaiger

[KingRanger]

I find it sort of funny when people use "they copied so and so from another sentai" as a negative.

 

[Loghorn]

the comedy written in Gokaiger (or Sentai in general) are catered towards Japanese audience and not towards viewers like us, so why waste your time ranting about it? :rolleyes2: if you don't like it, don't watch it and be done with it. other than that one rant, I agree with Burkion regarding the flaws the series had.

The only thing that I agree with him on is the villains.

Plus sentai series like Turboranger, Dekaranger, & Magiranger easily beat their "big bads" at the end of their series. Liveman didn't defeat their "big bad" villain at all.

 

[Lynxara]

the comedy written in Gokaiger (or Sentai in general) are catered towards Japanese audience and not towards viewers like us, so why waste your time ranting about it?

I don't think "if you don't find it funny, you're not Japanese enough" is any sort of defense of bad comedy in Sentai.

One of my favorite shows is Carranger, it was one of the first I found episodes of, and I loved the hell out of its comedy despite not really knowing much about Japanese culture at the time I learned it. As I learned more, I just found the show got funnier to me. I think that's because Carranger's comedy is just very well-written for the type of comedy it is.

Some of the comedy in Gokaiger was just bad, and came off worse because they let Carranger's head writer do a couple of genuinely uproarious episodes for the show. Arakawa wrote some great moments of comedy into his episodes, too. Sentai comedy in the modern shows is usually hit-or-miss, but in Gokaiger it was so hit-or-miss the show felt a little schizophrenic.

So you acknowledge that Juzo and Basco have nothing in common besides being a third party (just like Arakawa's own Abare Killer, for that matter), which is a tradition that started in the 80s, and you still think that Basco is a ripoff of Juzo? :sly:

Well, something to remember is that Shinkenger and Gokaiger share the same head producer, and Gokaiger was quite literally the second show that he headed.

I do think the producer was consciously trying to duplicate some of Shinkenger's more popular elements in Gokaiger, and I see that happening a bit with Basco... especially later on in the series, after the ratings had begun really sliding.

I really doubt the character as pitched was meant to have any sort of super-strong monster form. The character's core concept on a writing level clearly hearkens back to the sorts of 80s villains you mentioned, and those guys generally didn't have (or need) rubber suit forms.

So while I wouldn't say Basco is any sort of ripoff of Juzo, I think the character would've come off better if the producer had let him be more of a Sir Kaurel type, rather than clearly trying to force him into the Juzo mold later on in the show.

 

[KingRanger]

I will say this about Basco, and it's probably my only real complaint about gokai, I hated the super form he got. It was out of the blue and really not needed. I think they just wanted some one super strong as Marv's nemesis.

 

[Lynxara]

Yeah, I think the producer tried a bit too hard to duplicate the Takeru/Juzo rivalry. Marv and Juzo were rivals, but of a very different type. Juzo was something of a stalker who wanted to bring out the worst in Takeru. The issue between Marv and Basco was a classic tale of betrayal. If anything, Basco's concept would've worked better if he'd been explicitly weaker than Marv in a straight-out, but vicious and able to succeed through cunning.

 

[Matrix]

I find it sort of funny when people use "they copied so and so from another sentai" as a negative.

Have to agree here. Why stop something if it succeeded really well? Why not bring it to another series to continue having success in?

 

[The 2nd Evil]

I'm in the middle of the show for the first time (just finished the Jetman episode)

The show... is a good, entertaining show, but it should be a great, entertaining show.

I think the anniversary gimmick really prevents it from doing much of anything creative or unique, and the show suffers because of it.

Basco seems more like a villain than any of the Zangyack, and I've found myself missing him in some episodes he wasn't in.

I'd hardly call the Shinkenger villains "better characters." As effective villains go they were only about half a step up from Zangyack, if that. (Yes, I enjoy Shinkenger, but the villains were not its strong point.)

I've found the Shinkenger villains to be one of my favorite aspects of that season, though it may have been because they had some really good voice actors.

 

[Mou...Mou...TAUROS!]

In before someone harps, "Just because it's anniversary doesnt mean it has to suck. Better writers could write around all the tributes and callbacks and still flesh out the cast, villains, plot etc."

Yeah, go find those "better writers" and point them to Toei's direction. They werent available, live with it.

PS. Gokaiger definitely had flaws. Like any show would. It's all about personal preference and how much it can make you overlook those flaws. It can make "freezing over chickens" either quirky OR bad goofy.

 

[Burkion]

Freezing over chicken is bad goofy to me.

See the thing is, what keeps getting brought up in Sentai's 'defense' is....

It's a show for Pre K.

Except I don't see that.

It see it more on the level of, say, Avatar. Or Kamen Rider.

Or Spider-man the Animated Series.

I see shows like Kyrpto the Super Dog and Blues Clues for Pre-K kids.

...mostly because I have to watch those a lot.


Sentai often tries to be more than a Pre-K show.

So I judge it based on that fact.

And it can often come up short due to the fact.

 

[lazycoconut]

I've found the Shinkenger villains to be one of my favorite aspects of that season, though it may have been because they had some really good voice actors.

I'd agree with that completely, and I think Mitsuru Karahashi gave a decent live performance, too. I just feel that in terms of the plot they weren't as strong villains as they could have been

Freezing over chicken is bad goofy to me.

See the thing is, what keeps getting brought up in Sentai's 'defense' is....

It's a show for Pre K.

Except I don't see that.

It see it more on the level of, say, Avatar. Or Kamen Rider.

Or Spider-man the Animated Series.

I see shows like Kyrpto the Super Dog and Blues Clues for Pre-K kids.

...mostly because I have to watch those a lot.


Sentai often tries to be more than a Pre-K show.

So I judge it based on that fact.

And it can often come up short due to the fact.

But ... Toei's stated target audience for Sentai IS three to five-year-old kids. It's not like in the past where Sentai was (as I understand it) a general family show in an evening timeslot, which meant it could deal with slightly "darker" material, a little like Doctor Who today.

In purely personal terms, I'd place a "good" modern Sentai on a par with some of Pixar's movies like Toy Story, Monsters Inc., Finding Nemo etc. They are strong enough to entertain older viewers, and they have some more emotional or intense or scary moments, but there's a lot of wacky stuff and they are very much for kids.