Hikari Sentai Maskman 19 – Akira, Friend to All Children

Badass? Badass.

Anagmus finally makes his move and grants the MOTW, Baraba and Igam his Phantom Magic. Akira later meets Anagmus, only to get hit by his magic, losing his memories. Can Akira regain his memories after meeting the kids he saved one year ago?

Before talking about the main contents of this episode, I'll first talk about the opening fight scene. To be honest, I don't see the point of having a MOTW considering that it feels like he was just there so that the episode can have a giant battle. I mean, if they need three people to use Anagmus' Phantom Magic orb, they can have Oyobu or Fumin! These two are more competent compared to a single Dogler because they are the soldiers under Baraba and Igam for crying out loud! Now for the first fight, it is really great.

What I like about it is that it showed us the effect of Anagmus' Phantom Magic because Baraba, Igam and the MOTW are strong enough to resist the attacks of the Maskmen! Heck, they were able to free themselves from the Masky Ribbon tied around them! During the fight, Akira ends up finding Anagmus who is hiding inside the cave performing incantations for his Phantom Magic. Now that I am done talking about the first fight, it is time to talk about its main contents.

After learning that this episode is about Anagmus, I was expecting to be disappointed because he is my least favorite Tube commander. That is until he accidentally caused Akira's amnesia and thanks to this, this episode is currently my favorite Akira episode. Akira focused episodes are in my opinion, are one of the best character focused episodes in Maskman. It highlights his youthfulness and showed us that he is more than just a kid, he is a superhero and this episode showed us that.

As for this episode, this episode showed us that even before becoming a Maskman, he is a superhero in his own right. He saved one of his friends when she was drowning and his kindness repaid him as the kid that he saved and his friends are trying their best for Akira to have his memories back and along the way, play with him. It's one sweet scene and showed us that kindness indeed pays back. This short reunion is interrupted because of Tube and after seeing that Akira is having fun, his teammates decide to save him and the kids. To make it a bit worse, the same kid that Akira saved from drowning is now drowning!

In short, while the Maskmen are fighting Baraba, Igam and the MOTW, Akira is saving his friend. Thanks to this, Akira regains his memories and decides to help his teammates. I just love the fact that Akira can't say goodbye to these kids because he knows how heartbreaking it is. But he has no choice, he is a superhero and his friends need him. His arrival in the battlefield is just awesome. I still don't get why the heck he is wearing his kung-fu outfit all of a sudden but what the heck, it just made the scene more awesome!

After he is done fighting the foot soldiers, it is time to transform and trap Anagmus with his Aura Power! This scene made me realize that the show rarely uses Aura Power based attacks in character focused episodes. Oh well, at least they used Aura Power in a really practical way! After Akira destroyed Anagmus' orb, the Maskmen decided to finish the battle with the Shot Bomber. Compared to the previous episodes, this is one of the rare times wherein they use new footage for the Shot Bomber as the scene ended up becoming a fight on whose beam attack is more powerful.

As expected, the MOTW is defeated; Baraba and Igam survived in the blast and the giant battle starts. There is nothing worth talking about the giant fight because the quality of the fight is the same like the ones in the previous episodes. At the end, Akira properly bids goodbye to his friends as he continues his duty as Blue Mask with his friends. But with Anagmus becoming more active, the next fights with Tube will become tougher for our heroes.