Ninja Sentai Kakuranger 05 – Bad Luck Saizou

AKA Why Saizou is one bad ninja.

In this episode, Saizou's luck is so bad that he ended up in a labyrinth created by two yokai! To make matters worse, he can't transform inside this labyrinth! Can Saizou escape in this labyrinth? Also, can he save the kid who is also trapped inside the same labyrinth that he is stuck in?

This episode is probably the weakest episode of Kakuranger that I watched. Compared to the previous episodes in this series wherein they highlighted how awesome each member is in their own way, this episode made Saizou look like he is the weakest member of the team. It didn't help that he looked scared every time we see him wander around the maze. As for the kid, he tries his best to keep a straight face while he is trying his best to find Saizou. The only time we see him show his true emotion is when he encountered a ghost or when he must run away from an explosion.

At the end, Saizou escaped the maze, which caused Nurikabe to lose his money in his best with a friend. Anyway, Nurikabe is a yokai who has this losing streak in a labyrinth game that he is playing with a fellow yokai. Guess it is expected that he wanted to kill the kid because he lost for the fourth time he made the wrong bet. As for Saizou, he received a gold coin coming from Nurikabe's friend. I guess his luck is slowly changing thanks to this coin.

Now that he is out from the maze, he finally discovered that he left some Western style house and realized that he must save the kid left in there. After transforming into Ninja Blue, he enters the house and begins his attempt to rescue the kid. While as for the other Kakurangers, they need to figure out what Western style house Saizou is talking about and yes, Sandayuu appears just to point it out while telling them to use their instincts. Wow, it took me at least a couple more episodes to realize this, Sandayuu is an eccentric mentor.

Inside the labyrinth, he finally saves the kid by doing something I expect him to do, break the walls in the labyrinth. Considering that he attempted to transform earlier, it is likely that this is the plan that he has in his mind. It's simple and less mind wrecking compared to running around in circles while the MOTW has an attempt to kill the victim. Ninja Blue was able to save the kid with a little help from his teammates who used their instinct to find him.

The fights in this episode continue to be fun and much to my surprise, the foot soldiers are wearing some military gear and it looks great on them! As for Ninja Blue, his fights in this episode are seriously fantastic that for just 2-5 minutes, the mentality that I have that he is the weakest Kakuranger slowly disappeared because of this fight scene. Did I mention that Ninja Blue did a lot of cool stuff in this really brief moment that showed us how cool he is?

As for the giant fight in this episode, I am quite surprised that Muteki Shogun didn't appear in this episode; instead Ninja Blue's Blue Rougan did most of the fights in this episode. Blue Rougan in this episode is fine I guess. I guess it has something to do with the large shoulder pads that hinder the movement of Blue Rougan. This giant fight also showed us that it is likely that all Juusho have their own special weapons. In Blue Rougan's case, he has this spear-like weapon that he used in destroying the Western style house so that he can prevent the duo from gambling again.

But before he can finish the Yokai, his friend helped him escape! At the end, Saizou's luck is still the same... except that he had a gold coin coming from a stranger! What's more, it's likely price is around 50,000 yen and that is quite hell of an amount! The sad news is that he didn't get the money because his teammates are fighting over the right for the gold coin! As for the Yokai, they have plans to avenge Nurikabe's failure. Guess this will not be the last time we will see this Yokai duo.