Now that Geki is aware that his older brother, Burai has hours to live, he becomes distracted in finding a way to extend his brother's life. This is when Bandora makes an interesting proposal, the DoraNarcissus has the ability to give life to someone and it did much to my surprise. Will Geki destroy the DoraNarcissus to fulfill his job as a Zyuranger or do the opposite to save his brother?
There are two things that surprised me in this episode visual-wise, the first is that they had a new opening sequence scene still without Burai and second is that Burai is not included in the eye catch team posing or the opening sequence team posing. Granted, Burai only has hours to live and that he only appears occasionally in the series but at least give the man his own spot in the show's opening credits and eye catches!
For the episode itself, this is one of my favorite episodes of the series since Geki is back in a similar situation he is in during the Dragon Ranger story arc except it is neatly compressed in a single episode. Instead of having a dilemma if he should fight his own brother or not, he is now having a dilemma if he will fulfill his mission as a Zyuranger or do his duty as a younger brother. I think the part that really hit Geki that his brother only has hours to live is his nightmare in which we saw Bandora's men blow off the candles that signify Burai's life. What I like about this scene is Geki's facial expressions that show his despair of losing his older brother.
The said nightmare affected Geki in battle when they first fought the DoraNarcissus in this episode. He wants to defeat the creature as fast as possible so that his brother will not fight the DoraNarcissus for obvious reasons, which involve saving the hours left on Burai's life. If there is one thing I noticed with Geki's recklessness in this episode is that Goushi is quite concerned with his teammate. In most of the scenes in this episode, Goushi acted more as the team leader and is quite level-headed to think about their next move in fighting the DoraNarcissus.
Speaking of which, when Geki decided to destroy the bud that contained the DoraNarcissus and Bandora revealed that the DoraNarcissus can save Burai's life, Goushi is there to persuade Geki to do the right thing and destroy the DoraNarcissus. And even when Dan decided that he will destroy it since Geki can't do, Goushi is there to calm Geki down who catches Dan's lance with his own bare hands. To put it simply, Goushi is not acting like the team leader of the Zyurangers in this episode, but he is the team leader for the entire episode.
Because Geki can't destroy the DoraNarcissus, the bud evolved into the DoraNarcissus whose ability is to absorb the beauty of everyone to make himself more beautiful. Wow, just wow. But for a creature that only sucks on beauty, he is quite terrifying since what if all beautiful creatures are gone in this world and all that is left are the ugly ones? He has no other option but to absorb the ugly ones for his beauty to shine more in a barren wasteland known as Earth. Also, he is quite good in the battlefield that is because Geki is too weak to fight seriously thanks to the dilemma he is facing.
It didn't help that the one who pointed it out is a mysterious black knight that has this familiar aura in battle. His duel with Geki is one of the best duels I saw in this series thus far since for one, Geki is out of suit when he dueled the guy and second, the man he dueled is competent enough to remove the Dino Buckler out of his belt, showing us Geki's true prowess in battle. The knight really pushed Geki in his limits, something we rarely see happen since the last time we saw Geki in this kind of situation was with his duel with Burai in the final episode of the Dragon Ranger story arc.
His duel with the knight made Geki realize his true goal, to beat Bandora and saving his brother with his own hands. With this resolution, he defeated the mysterious knight, stripping his armor and revealed that the man in the suit is no other than Goushi! Man, Goushi is seriously amazing in this episode. I just love the fact that he sacrificed his own life just to give Geki that lesson. By sacrificed his own life, he fainted after he was beaten by Geki in their duel. Also, this confirmed the hunch I had when I saw the knight in this episode since while they are fighting, I can't help but notice that the knight's voice is a bit muffled.
Because of the amount of energy the DoraNarcissus absorbed, he used it to grow in size to wreak havoc in the city. This is when we saw one of the coolest scenes in this series, Geki carrying Goushi's fainted body with the DaiZyuJin lifting the both of them. It's one of those moments that DaiZyuJin is not being an insensitive prick, an asshole you might say since for the nth time, unlike GaoGod, he doesn't tell the Zyurangers after a certain situation involving his dickery if he is just testing them. What made if cooler aside from DaiZyuJin carrying the two is Geki transforming on DaiZyuJin's palm.
Unlike the previous giant battles this show had, this is one of the rare moments in the series that they used a different tactic in defeating the MOTW. Thanks to Goushi's thinking that the DoraNarcissus is so in-love with himself, they used it to their advantage to defeat him... by slashing him on the back. Wow, for a kid's show, they can go this rather unconventional way to defeat the MOTW. The episode ends with Geki promising that he will save Burai's life with his own hands with his friends supporting him.
