Sunday 10 March 2013

Zyuden Sentai Kyoryuger 03 – Superior Ripping Edge

Badass.

Souji's father is disappointment with his swordsmanship because it is a feral fighting style, something that is opposite of the Rippu School's traditional sword style. Can Souji's father understand his fight style? Will Souji realize something to improve his sword style?


Now that there are officially three Kyoryugers fighting in unison, we finally saw more of their personalities. Nobuharu or should I say, Nossan likes to make bad puns that makes him sound old. Amy still works in the Tiger Boy Family Restaurant and by the looks of it; it seems that she is working in that place for quite a long time now. I made this conclusion because Souji is one of the restaurant's regulars and she knows his usual order. This then leads us to what this episode is all about, it is about Souji.

This is first proper non-Red focus episode in this series, the previous episode didn't count for the reason that it is an episode featuring both Blue and Pink. What's more, this episode gave me the same feeling while watching some of the new hero introduction episodes back in the 90's. To give you guys an idea, shows such as Jetman and Kakuranger didn't immediately introduce the full team. What they did is to slowly build the team till all five of them are complete. If you will compare it to the sixth hero introduction episodes, these new hero introductions are not fancy and feels more of a character focus episode.


In this case of the episode, it is about Souji's swordsmanship and how his father is disappointed with it. To be honest, there is nothing wrong with his sword style; the only thing is that his father has this high sense of pride with the traditional sword style. I can understand what his father is trying to say, he wants his only son to inherit their sword style but nope, his son refuses because he found his own style. So what about the sword style of Souji's father? I find it really cool even though the strikes he makes felt a bit too traditional to my taste. In short, I find some of his moves too generic.

The first set of fights in this episode is fantastic thanks to director Koichi Sakamoto's love for great wire action. The MOTW of this episode's ability is to put strong individuals inside his jail. The reason why he is doing it is not clear for now, but thanks to Dogold's appearance, guess it is safe to assume that this monster is Dogold's subordinate. The fight between Dogold and our heroes is fantastic, which then showed us that the team is not yet that united thanks to a short quarrel between Red and Green. Because of this, Dogold leaves, same goes with the MOTW.


Back in the base, Daigo wonders what's wrong with Green and why he is too sensitive with his sword style as this is one of the reasons for their defeat earlier. This leads us to a duel between Daigo and Green. If Daigo wins, he will know what's wrong with Green and if Green wins, Daigo will call him King. The duel between the two is fun. Much to my surprise, Daigo wins not because of the sword, but because he shoots Green when he had the opportunity. To be honest, it makes sense why he did it. Green didn't specify that guns are not allowed in the duel. So yeah, his teammates are just overthinking things.

Now that it is all settled, we know that Green is Souji and later, Daigo and Amy talked to Souji's father. But before talking about it, we are introduced to the Deinochasher, a bike that is composed of two dinosaurs and they are quite wild, especially for Nossan. We also learned that there are Voltasaurs who protect the main Voltasaurs called Guardians. Now I am curious who these Guardians are. Hopefully, they can expand it in a later episode.


Back to Daigo and Amy, their chat with Souji's father gave us a better idea about Daigo's past. That his father let him chose the path he wants in life. To have adventures like his father or to return to Japan. Daigo decided to follow his father's path. Daigo assuming that Souji is just finding his own path because the two of them are similar in understandable. But for Souji, that is not the case, he is already firm with his path that he chose and he didn't want to become like his father. But it changed thanks to what happened to Souji's father and Daigo were taken hostage by the MOTW.

The fight the followed after it is amazing. One thing I observe is the transition between the stunt double and the actors and to be honest, if I didn't pause the episode and watch it frame by frame, I will not notice that the faces of the stunt double are removed and the speed of the fight made it unnoticeable. The only time you'll notice that there is something wrong with the actor and the stunt double footage is with Amy's legs and Souji's hair. Their doubles have thinner legs and bad looking wig hair respectively.


While Amy is busy fighting some of the foot soldiers, Souji decides to follow the MOTW after he defeated his set of foot soldiers. Using the Deinochaser bike, he chases the MOTW whose modus operandi is to force strong men to become angry because of irritation being inside a cage. The Deinochaser formation sequence is kinda cool even though it's just a stock footage shot. Now that he catches up with the MOTW, Souji realized something when it comes to his sword style. He realize that he can incorporate his own sword style and his own father's style, creating a superior sword style that both of them can be proud of. With it, he was able to free his father and Daigo and yes, his father is proud with what his son did.

Now that four Kyoryugers are assembled, it is time to fight the MOTW. One thing I notice in the fight is that they never had a shot featuring Souji's father watching his son transform into KyoryuGreen. Guess that means that he evacuated in a place that is safe then. The fight scenes are still as impressive as ever and I barely saw any difference with Souji's current fight style with his previous fight style. Oh well, at least the bike action in this episode is fantastic.


As for the giant fight, it feels like I am watching the giant fights back in the 80's and the 90's. It's short and I think it only lasted for 1-2 minutes, not including the mecha formation sequence. Speaking of which, this episode also introduced us to Kyoryuzin Stegochi + Zakutor, all I can say is that Zakutor's first fight in the series is really well made. Lastly, the finisher, I find it too lame to be honest. As for Dricera in this episode, what this guy did is that it freed the guys captured by the MOTW. At the end, Souji's father accepted his son's new style and even encouraged him to improve it over time and create a style that he can be proud of. Oh and Amy finally saw Souji smile for once! Will this be a start of something new between the two?