Gekisou Sentai Carranger 15 – Zonette Heart Red Racer?!

Dun, dun, dun, dun. Dun, dun, du-dun.

For days, Zonette has a dream that she is married to Red Racer in a Catholic church officiated by Glutch, who looks like a Jewish (?) priest in this one. For some reason, it seems that she fell in love with Red Racer! Can she tell her true feelings for her dearest Red Racer?

Zonette having a crush on Red Racer was hinted in episode 13 but never had a chance to expand it on episode 14 thanks to the Crackaboom Legend. Speaking of which, Zonette was barely in that episode. And thus, along with the newly upgraded G.G. Roachy, they decided to go to Earth. While she is buying imo-yokan, she saw a video of Red Racer in action on television. For once, we saw her heart flutter and learned that she's in love with Red Racer.

It's quite rare to see a villain fell in love with a hero. For starters, seeing a villain fell in love with a hero is something that is quite rare in a superhero show. Since there are no other female villains in this series, she needs love advice. Much to my surprise, instead of reading romance novels like most girls do, she decides to read shojo manga. This scene gave me this idea when it comes to Zonette's level of reading comprehension and what type of literature she likes to read. She prefers pictures over words. Kinda makes sense since she is part of a biker gang and it's kinda rare to see a member read fine literature.

Some cool side stuff in this scene, we see Ichitaro and her mom in the bookstore and asked her mom if he can have what Zonette is wearing! For a kid's show, this is some weird stuff. Back to Zonette, I find it funny that she is reading Sailor Moon considering that the anime adaptation is produced by Toei Animation! Now comes the fun part in this episode, instead of using G.G. Roachy for wrecking major havoc with dancing, Zonette just used him just to call Red Racer's attention! The best part about this scene is that she took the words of the manga too literally!

By too literal, I mean she took the words "attack" and "love letter" in her plan! The "attack" has something to do with attacking the Carrangers, and the "love letter" has something to do with giving Red Racer a love letter while the other Carrangers are busy with G.G. Roachy's attacks on them! It's so literal that it hurts not to laugh how crazy Zonette is when it comes to understanding English. The bad thing about this plot is that G.G. Roachy ruined it in a way that Red Racer reverted back to Kyosuke!

What's funny about this scene is that Zonette didn't figure out that Kyosuke and Red Racer is just a single person! It makes sense since she didn't see any of the Carrangers transform in front of Bowzock and second, she can assume that he just picked up Red Racer's letter during the quake. Before he can hand over the letter, the other Carrangers appeared and save this "civilian", causing Zonette and G.G. Roachy to retreat. As for the contents of the love letter, you can see the sincerity Zonette put in it when she wrote it. Guess Zonette is not really bad after all, plus she is quite a hottie.

Back to Zonette, she once again consults a shojo manga for another love advice. From all the advices she took, she took the love umbrella one! Because part of the charm for it to be effective involves the size of the charm, what she did is to turn G.G. Roachy into a giant for him to paint a large love umbrella charm! Oh the things you can do for love... even if it has something to do with vandalizing private property! It's quite cheesy and I love this kind of dedication for love.

Stopping G.G. Roachy is Signalman and the Sirender! Just like in the previous episode, Signalman is once again back in the sidelines. To put it simply, you can remove Signalman out of the picture and this episode will still be the same. Also arriving to stop G.G. Roachy is RV Robo! Now that the Carrangers are here, Zonette calls out Red Racer and shows him the love umbrella! It's seriously romantic that if I were in Red Racer's position, I don't know how to react about it! Will I be glad that a super villain will give me Wumper support if my team is in trouble or will I pull a poker face? Red Racer did option 2.

What's more, Zonette gave Red Racer her feelings for him, which is in a form of a stuffed heart figure. Instead of Red Racer answering her feelings in a proper manner like every guy does, he reverts back into Kyosuke. As Kyosuke, he told his true feelings for Zonette that they can never be together. To be honest, I find this decision a bit bad. I mean, the girl did the first move and you will reject her without giving her a proper chance?! That's cold man!

He runs away and realized that his approach is quite cold and decides to start first as friends with her. As for Zonette, it seems that her feelings for Red Racer are now gone and thus, she ordered G.G. Roachy to attack Sirender and RV Robo! Instead of seeing him get defeated by some epic finisher, he was defeated because of a couple of punches that destroyed the tape, causing him to revert back to normal. Well this is one disappointing giant battle. The episode ends and they have to do some clean-up on Zonette's love umbrella mess. But as for Kyosuke, he is just staring from afar for some reason. If only you didn't act like a bit of a jerk when you rejected Zonette earlier in the episode...

Gekisou Sentai Carranger 14 – Of Lightning & Eels

Also, new opening sequence!

In this episode, Zelmoda wants to break the speed barrier for him to fulfill the Crackaboom Legend! Accordingly, once you break the speed barrier, the one who breaks it will receive great power! Problem is, part of breaking the speed barrier attracts lightning... and Zelmoda is scared of it, same with Green Racer!

Unlike the previous two episodes that is Signalman centric; Signalman lies low in this one as he acts more of a support character rather than the main character like he claimed in one episode preview. So who is the start of this episode? Obviously, it's Green Racer and Zelmoda! Aside that we learned that Minoru (Green Racer to those who forgot) has a sideline of selling obviously defective products, we also learned more about there are other space legends aside from the ridiculous car constellations that we had in the first episode. This legend is the Crackaboom Legend, and Zelmoda is desperate to fulfill it.

Seeing Zelmoda's determination to fulfill it is something that I really liked. What's more, he is about to pull it off only to chicken out in the end because of his fear of lightning. Speaking of lightning, Minoru is also scared of it! For starters, this is the perfect opportunity for Signalman to capture Zelmoda but nope, Minoru's fear of lightning disabled Signalman because he keeps on clinging on the guy! Minoru must explain how the heck he acquired this fear!

The reason behind Minoru and Zelmoda's fear of lightning is simple, they got hit by it. In Minoru's case, he is just fishing some eels and before he has the chance to bring it home, lightning struck him... and lived. Wow, as far as I know, most people die once they got hit by lightning. I guess Minoru's body is quite special that is why he lived after the shock! As for Zelmoda, it is just him basically teasing the lightning clouds that he is not afraid of it. So yeah, nature decided to have revenge on him! Comparing the two "origin" stories, I prefer Minoru's story because he is just a regular kid fishing some eels, and the fact that lighting just hit him for no reason? Heck, I will be scared if that will happen to me!

We also learned the closeness between Gynamo and Zelmoda that at one point of the episode, we learned that Zelmoda thinks that he is not a partner good enough for Gynamo. Even though they are the bad guys in this series, I love the genuine friendship between these two. It is because of this friendship that Gynamo is willing to ride for his friend, but nope, Zelmoda must prove to himself that he can be a better partner for Gynamo, and thus, he begins his second attempt to fulfill the Crackaboom Legend.

At the end, he succeeded but instead of seeing him have a new form or receive some upgrades like how it was illustrated in this episode, he only received a new partner named Elekinda and a new bike. Since Elekinda's bike has the positive sign, Zelmoda's bike has the negative sign. To put it simply, their attacks are quite similar to how lighting is created in simpler terms. But since Green Racer is afraid of lightning, and he is more of a nuisance in battle, Dapp devised a plan for him to lose this fear.

Dapp's plan is what you can say a jerk will do. Though his intentions are noble, the way he execute it feels like he is a jerk and not a helpful mentor. What I mean is that, who in the right mind will let a guy touch electric eels without warning him?! Since this one failed, Dapp proceed to plan B, let Minoru eat electric eels. The first thing that bothered me is how the heck they killed the electric eels? But screw it, they just showed us that they are broiling electric eels! If there is one thing that I learned in this scene is that Minoru is one simpleton. I mean, after eating the eel, he suddenly overcome his fear of lightning?!

Now that he doesn't fear lightning, he is now powered up and with this new power; he easily defeated Zelmoda and Elekinda! I can't believe that a plan so stupid worked wonders in this episode. After the giant battle, which I find fun since for the first time, Sirender and RV Robo teamed up to beat a MOTW, Minoru decided to treat his friends with eel now that he overcame his fear of lightning. But first, he must pay the electric eels he ate that Dapp bought! Speaking of Dapp, he ran away. Oh, Dapp you lovable alien jerk~!

Gekisou Sentai Carranger 13 – Stand Up, Sirender!

Also, the debut of this guy.

Signalman is just standing on his Kobaan Base while waiting for some action, when Ichitaro passed by and decided to teach the kid some traffic safety tips. Ah, the things you can do while being bored. This is then interrupted thanks to Zonet... Zonko who claimed that the Carrangers beat her little brother!

This episode once again played on how gullible Signalman is. I mean for a cop, he easily fell on some obvious enemy plot! It didn't help that the younger brother didn't look any human if I will base it on the head alone! It didn't help that Signalman just eat up everything Zonko said, who happens to be Zonette in disguise! But hey, this is Carranger we are talking about, so it is understandable if they will have that kind of plots. So how the heck Signalman just eats up whatever Zonette is telling him? Simple, she used her feminine charms! For an alien traffic enforcer, he sure has great taste in terms of chicks!

After entrusting his Kobaan Base to a kid that he just met (Seriously?), he leaves and begins his search for the Carrangers with Zonette and the guy in the bandage, who is obviously the MOTW from the previous episode! Speaking of the Carrangers, we see Kyosuke and Yoko returning to the Garage, only to see Ichitaro guarding Signalman's police box. Unlike Signalman, it took them at least a minute to figure out that Signalman fell on some Bowzock plot. Well that was fast. Guess Signalman is just used to weird alien genealogy that is why he didn't figure out the Bowzock plot that fast.

And thus, the misunderstanding part of this episode begins. To be honest, I double checked the sub script of this episode before writing this one. Nope, Toshiki Inoue didn't write this episode, but series head writer Yoshio Urasawa! To put it simply, this misunderstanding plot will only last for just a few minutes then we will proceed to the debut of Signalman's robot. So yeah, it is time to talk about Red Racer vs. Signalman, something that felt a bit delayed to be honest.

In the previous episode, we see how Red Racer hated Signalman, and I guess this is the perfect time to show how much he hates him! The fight between the two is not that exciting; it felt too generic in my own taste in my opinion. I mean, we see them do some punches, flying punches and some kicks, and then they proceed with the swords. The sword clash at least, is quite interesting, not because on how intense it looks like, but because of the side comments coming from Zonette and the MOTW. In Zonette's case, she finds Red Racer hot while as for the MOTW, he finds Pink Racer her type, and begins glomping (?) Pink Racer, and thus, the jig is up.

Because of this, Signalman is aware that he as fooled by Bowzock and begins helping the Carrangers. Hopefully after this episode, he will not be fooled by the Bowzock. I repeat, hopefully. As for the other Carrangers, they arrived just in time to save Pink Racer from the MOTW. They were able to defeat the MOTW and it is time for the giant battle. Instead of summoning the Ranger Vehicles on the moment that they are about to be squished by the MOTW, Signalman arrives with his machine, the Sirender.

Sirender is basically a giant police car and I like this simplicity with the mecha design. What's good about it is that he has this cool transformation maneuver to become a giant robot. Sirender's robot mode looks really cool when it comes to its live-action suit but if I will base it on the model they used during the transformation sequence, it looks a bit blocky in my own opinion. But hey, it's the era when Toei didn't rely much on CGI when it comes to robot formations!

In terms of weaponry, it has the basics of a robot based on a police car; it has the handcuffs, the bladed weapon, in this case, a dagger. For some reason, the idea of popping blades in the sleeves seems like they recycled it years later in Special Police Dekaranger's DekaBike Robo. Also, just like every cop, Sirender is also equipped with a riot shield. As for the robot's finisher, for some reason, it reminded me of Dekaranger Robo's Justice Flasher finisher with more flame effects. This made me conclude that some of Sirender's elements were recycled in Dekaranger, no I wonder I instantly loved Sirender when it first made its debut!

At the end, they defeated the MOTW and the Carrangers promised that they will not be defeated by Sirender since they have their own robot, the RV Robo... which they didn't call when they have the perfect opportunity to do it. Guess they are just too busy screaming while the MOTW is about to crush them. Did I mention that Sirender wears this cool visor and has this really cool robot eyes behind it? Yep, yet another reason why I love Sirender.