Hasbro's Power Rangers era and General Tokusatsu discussion

[Christopher]

Kiramager 25: Interesting new twist with the new villainess. It's been getting pretty dull with just Kurantula and Garza as the only baddies. She's fairly striking too.

But wait... She's Emperor Yodon's private secretary? So... she's his Izu? I was expecting crown princess or something.

It was quite unexpected that we'd get actual actor to play a female villain. I think it's been quite some time. Kyoryuger's film was the last time we had villains in human form.

Well, Kurantula has a human face partly visible under his mask. This suggests that the people of Yodonheim all look human.

At the 9:13 mark did I detect a hint of the MMPR theme? with "Go Go Power Rangers"?

Oh yeah, that cue. I've heard it before on this show, but I don't think the similarity occurred to me.

But it wouldn't be the first time a Sentai music cue has resembled that theme:

To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Accept third party cookies

 

[Samurai8472]

Kamen Rider Saber episode 5

The side plot with Blades and Mai went nowhere when they were searching for bubbles. What was the point of the lottery scene? Why were they wet later on?

Looks like the generals in Calibur's book club all have monster forms, with Zoous revealing his at the end of the episode.

I guess this is the start of Mei becoming part of the Logos

I like that Buster trying to be a father figure to Kento

There seems to be something related to the Avalon legend that Calibur is seeking. Also Touma is the key to it

Next episode. A ninja kamen rider? It's not 2022 yet

 

[Christopher]

Kamen Rider Saber episode 5

Hmm, a step down from last week. Some nice attempts at advancing the drama with Kento, but the story felt kind of unfocused and cluttered. And there was some clumsy exposition in the scene with Kento and Ogami. "I'm sorry my father betrayed you and became Calibur." "Don't forget he was my best friend too!" Yeah, like they haven't ever mentioned those things to each other before in the previous 15 years.

It struck me just now that the problem with the henshin sequence is that, as verbose as the drivers' audio sequences are this year, they never actually state the Kamen Rider's name in the midst of all that verbiage. I never would've known that Kento is Kamen Rider Espada if I hadn't looked it up on the wiki.

I thought I recognized the actor playing Calibur, or rather Kento's father, and I was right. Mitsuru Karahashi was Kaido in Kamen Rider Faiz and Fuwa in Shinkenger. He also appeared in Kamen Rider Ghost a couple of times as Miyamoto Musashii, the historic swordsman. He's pretty good. Both his main roles were morally ambiguous, sympathetic characters with a monstrous side, though Kaido was an eccentric, flighty joker and Fuwa was solemn and driven. If he's playing Calibur, that suggests he'll be a sympathetic villain, quite possibly a redeemable one.

The side plot with Blades and Mai went nowhere when they were searching for bubbles. What was the point of the lottery scene? Why were they wet later on?

It felt like there were some bits missing here and there. Either that or it was just clumsily edited.

Next episode. A ninja kamen rider? It's not 2022 yet

I'm still hoping they actually make Kamen Rider Shinobi in a couple of years.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

I'm still hoping they actually make Kamen Rider Shinobi in a couple of years.

Me too. I've been wanting a Ninja Themed Kamen Rider for quite a while.

 

[Christopher]

Saber #6: Some decent character interplay here, but I found it too cluttered, with too many subplots and character dynamics going on at once. The newest swordsman, Ren/Kenzan, is ninja-themed but far from silent and invisible; he's a childish hothead who treats it all as a big game and is obsessed with strength. Touma clashes with him right off, but meanwhile starts to connect more with the shy mechanic Daishinji. I wonder if Daishinji might be on the autistic spectrum, since he avoids eye contact, is meticulous in his work, and bonds more readily with inanimate objects than with people. (Also, Ren might be gay, because he seems to have a crush on Kento, or at least Touma thinks he does.)

It still feels like there are scenes missing with Rintaro and Mei. For the second week in a row, they just show up in the middle of doing something and we seem to have missed the exposition. Rintaro also gets a tragic backstory sprung on us out of nowhere, as it turns out that Zoous killed his mentor, the previous Blades. There's a bit of tonal whiplash with the quick cutting between Rintaro's vengeful grief and the more upbeat, zany action elsewhere.

Zoous's monster form is apparently based on the White Tiger of the West, paralleling (or rather, orthogonal to) Ogami's motif as the Black Tortoise of the North.

We get the weirdest Wonder Ride Book power yet, as a book based on The Three Little Pigs produces actual 2D cartoon piglets who fight the monsters by building cartoon straw houses or brick walls. This stuff is crazy.

This show is turning out to be a mix of engaging elements and frustrating or irritating ones. For one thing, I'm still finding the narrator Tassel to be obnoxious and pointless, contributing nothing to the show. He's only there to bookend the episodes, to do the recap and a closing comment, but even that's enough to wear out his welcome.

I do like the incidental music this season, but then, I usually do. The composer's the same one who did Kamen Rider Gaim and the Sentai seasons Gokaiger and Ninninger, all of which had impressive scores. I really like the main henshin/action theme for Saber, which was used twice here during Touma's research breakthroughs. I'm also fairly fond of the main title theme, aside from that very shrill "Mi-rai!" at the end. I wish the singer's voice there were an octave lower.

 

[Samurai8472]

Kiramager episode 26

Interesting idea to put a time limit on the power up. It meant that its usage was brief, but really dynamic and effective.

Also the Jyuruu and Yodonna have different tactics. She powers up her men to fight; killing them in the process from too much power. Jyuruu refuses to power the others up to that degree, and so imposes the 100 second limit.


Juuru: "Limits weren't meant to be broken. All you have to do is to add a twist."

Koh: "Limits were meant to be broken."

I believe this could be the disagreement between Kirameiger VS Ryuusoulger if we get a teamup


Kiramager episode 27

A mini Gekiranger tribute with a little bit of "Speed" thrown in. They did a brief video recap at the start to get today's kids up to speed with a Sentai that aired before they were even born.

This episode was also written by one of Gekiranger's original writers too.

I notice in the intro there's a spot for a 4th Yodon lieutenant. Wonder who that'd be.

I gotta sit down and let that sink in that Gekiranger was 13 years ago.............

Miki also got to use her Leopard Fist, and Natsume dodged the MotW with some dance skills

Janese" is an actual language now how about that lol

Too bad half of the cast of Gekiranger has retired. We only have Jan's and Gekichopper actor(Who was also in Kamen Rider Ghost) still active

Sena going GoKirameiGreen evokes a Mele reference. She was a green and got phoenix powers during genjuu arc. So fitting

Interesting to see Garza protect Yodonna.

 

[Christopher]

Kiramager episode 26

Pretty effective. Well, mostly. I find it kind of a cheat when they follow up a big cliffhanger at the end of one episode by having something conveniently power down the monsters/villains just before they finish off the Rangers so that the story can get back to quieter, less expensive dialogue scenes. But at least here, the power-down served an additional plot point by setting up the dilemma of how to keep the same thing from happening to the Kiramagers. So it wasn't as gratuitous.

Yodonna is an effective villainess. I prefer her in her cold, detached mode to her attempts at laughter, though. The actress's performance is interestingly creepy and kind of sexy.

Interesting idea to put a time limit on the power up. It meant that its usage was brief, but really dynamic and effective.

I'm reminded of the very first Toei tokusatsu power-up (that I know of), Kamen Rider Stronger's Charge Up mode, which would kill him if he used it for longer than one minute.

Of course, there's also Ultraman, where there's traditionally a nominal 3-minute limit on Ultraman's presence before having to change back to human form (although this is often ignored if the climactic battle takes longer than that).

It's not exactly a time limit, but there was that Kamen Rider Build power-up where the power drove Sento berserk if he used it too long, until he invented a further power-up to fix it.

Kiramager episode 27

A mini Gekiranger tribute with a little bit of "Speed" thrown in. They did a brief video recap at the start to get today's kids up to speed with a Sentai that aired before they were even born.

This episode was also written by one of Gekiranger's original writers too.

Mixed feelings here. I wasn't that fond of Gekiranger (it's one of the few seasons where I prefer the Power Rangers adaptation), but Miki was my favorite character and it was good to see her being awesome again. And it's nice when there's a sense of continuity and history with past Sentais and organizations being referenced. But it was annoying that the story relied so much on Jan's gibberish, which was even more contrived with Jan not being in the episode.

Other than that, though (and the cheapness of recycling a monster with a name change), it was a pretty clever story -- and Sena spending nearly the whole episode in that skimpy running outfit was a definite plus too (and the camera ogled her as much as it could get away with in a kids' show).

Oh, and interesting touch how they worked one of their own camera drones into the story.

Too bad half of the cast of Gekiranger has retired. We only have Jan's and Gekichopper actor(Who was also in Kamen Rider Ghost) still active

Hey, Mio Kudo (Sayo) was in Ghost too.

 

[DigificWriter]

Reading/watching stuff about Beast Morphers put me back into a Power Rangers mood, and so I went ahead and finished off my Ninja Steel watch-through.

I don't know if it's the fact that they got rid of Tzachor or if it's just learning from experience, but Saban Brands finally found the perfect formula for synthesizing MMPR nostalgia with new storytelling just as their tenure with the franchise was ultimately coming to an end, which is kind of sad.

Thankfully, we got a really fun and interesting two-season story with a really likeable cast, a great concept and theme, some really memorable villains, and some fun and organic and callbacks to/crossovers with previous seasons that helped to send the Saban Brands era out on a high note.

I'm not yet sure where exactly NST ranks for me overall, but I really enjoyed it.

Also, I didn't do this with Dino Charge, but I decided to list my "best of" episodes for NST:
* Return of the Prism
* Forged in Steel
* Presto-Change-O
* Drive to Survive
* My Friend, Redbot
* Gold Rush
* Family Fusion
* Galvanax Attacks
* Echoes of Evil
* Tough Love
* Making Waves
* Attack of the Galactic Ninjas
* Outfoxed
* Dimensions in Danger
* Love Stings
* Prepare to Fail
* Sheriff Skyfire
* Tech Support
* Happy to be Me
* Doom Signal
* Reaching the Nexus
* The Poisy Show

I wasn't initially sure if The Poisy Show was going to work out in either concept or execution, but my skepticism turned out to be unfounded, and it ended up being a fun Epilogue to NST that captured all of the strengths of the season and even threw in some fun clip show and team-up action to top it all off.

Now it's on to a Beast Morphers "super-binge" so that I don't lose my on-Demand chance to watch the second part of Season 2 via Youtube TV.

 

[JD]

I decided to get back to work on Jetman, so I watched episode 9: Muddy Love this morning.
Up to this point, it felt like Raita wasn't really getting as much focus as the other characters, so it was nice to get a big episode for him.
The whole thing with the clothes from Fashion Dimension controlling people's behavior kind of reminded me of the Buffy episode with the cursed Halloween costumes.
It took until the big fight at the end to realize how what Fashion Dimension and Tran were doing was meant to reflect how Satsuki was acting. Then I felt like an idiot for not picking up on sooner.

 

[Christopher]

New announcement:

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/h...om-im-not-okay-with-this-co-creator-exclusive

Hasbro is "rebooting" Power Rangers as an interconnected film, TV, and multimedia universe, headed up by Jonathan Entwistle. That would seem to suggest that the current TV continuity will be coming to an end.

Too bad -- I've found it interesting how Beast Morphers has tied into the history of PR, with the concept of the Morphin Grid being central to its narrative and with the villain turning out to have links to a past PR villain. And it looks like Dino Fury will be continuing to tie into that mythos, delving into the origins of the Grid. It'll be too bad if that gets erased in a reboot. Also, I gather the current comics continuity is pretty well-received, but it sounds like the reboot will encompass all media.

This is very unlike Super Sentai, where pretty much every season is a reboot, except they still pretend to share a universe when it's convenient.

 

[1987SpaceGuy]

well I'm curious how it turns out...

really a shame about the good 2017 movie cast (and their chemistry on and off screen) being shelved
They still had ugly zords and suits, as well as too little PR action though, even if the "human" part of the story was absolutely ok.

 

[JD]

So this will be replacing the current version of the PR universe then? The article I read on IGN doesn't say either way.

 

[Christopher]

So this will be replacing the current version of the PR universe then? The article I read on IGN doesn't say either way.

They say it's a reboot. And it's a shared film/TV universe, and it stands to reason that the films would drive the whole thing, as they'd be the highest-profile, potentially most profitable part. So it doesn't seem likely that they'd just expand the current TV universe into films; they'd presumably create something new for the movies and then spin TV series off of that.

 

[Samurai8472]

Sounding more and more likely the illumenerdi were correct and Hasbro is slowly distancing themselves from sentai/Toei reliance's


The official press release direct from Hasbro:

JONATHAN ENTWISTLE SIGNS ON TO REIMAGINE
NEW FILM & TELEVISION UNIVERSE BASED ON HASBRO’S POWER RANGERS FOR ENTERTAINMENT ONE

Further driving forward eOne’s strategy to produce wide-appeal film and television content
from Hasbro’s rich library of world-class IP

LOS ANGELES – October 20, 2020 – Entertainment One (eOne), Hasbro’s entertainment studio, announced today that producer and director Jonathan Entwistle has come on board to shepherd new film and television adaptations of Power Rangers. eOne will develop and produce the projects with Entwistle set to direct across both formats.

“Jonathan has an incredible creative vision for this iconic and hugely successful franchise, and is hands down the right architect to join us as we reimagine the television and film worlds of this property,” said Nick Meyer, President, Film, eOne and Michael Lombardo, President, Global Television, eOne. “Across our slate, we are looking forward to working with the most talented storytellers as we take on Hasbro’s rich fan-favourite brands and build entertainment universes around them.”

“This is an unbelievable opportunity to deliver new Power Rangers to both new and existing generations of awaiting and adoring fans. We’ll bring the spirit of analog into the future, harnessing the action and storytelling that made this brand a success. I’m looking forward to working with the teams at eOne and Hasbro. Together, we can’t wait to share more Power Rangers with the world very soon,” said Entwistle.

Entwistle most recently co-created the Netflix original series I Am Not Okay With This and created Netflix original series The End Of The F***ing World. He is a graduate of the prestigious Chelsea School of Art in London and is represented by CAA, 42, Grandview and Jackoway Austen Tyerman Wertheimer Mandelbaum Morris Bernstein Trattner & Klein.

Power Rangers is an American entertainment and merchandising franchise built around a live-action superhero television series, based on the Japanese tokusatsu franchise Super Sentai. The first Power Rangers entry, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, debuted in 1993.

In 2018, Hasbro acquired the Power Rangers franchise from Saban Brands, releasing their first products in early 2019. In addition to the new non-kid projects under Entwistle, Power Rangers-inspired kid series Beast Morphers is currently in season two. Hasbro’s film properties include DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS, as well as the TRANSFORMERS and G.I. JOE film franchises.


About eOne

Entertainment One Ltd. (eOne) is a talent-driven independent studio that specializes in the development, acquisition, production, financing, distribution and sales of entertainment content. As part of global play and entertainment company Hasbro (NASDAQ: HAS), eOne's expertise spans across film, television and music production and sales; family programming, merchandising and licensing; digital content; and live entertainment. Through its extensive reach and scale, and a deep commitment to high-quality entertainment, eOne unlocks the power and value of creativity. eOne brings to market both original and existing content, sourcing IP from Hasbro’s portfolio of 1500+ brands, and through a diversified network of creative partners.

About Hasbro

Hasbro (NASDAQ: HAS) is a global play and entertainment company committed to Creating the World's Best Play and Entertainment Experiences. From toys, games and consumer products to television, movies, digital gaming, live action, music, and virtual reality experiences, Hasbro connects to global audiences by bringing to life great innovations, stories and brands across established and inventive platforms. Hasbro’s iconic brands include NERF, MAGIC: THE GATHERING, MY LITTLE PONY, TRANSFORMERS, PLAY-DOH, MONOPOLY, BABY ALIVE, POWER RANGERS, PEPPA PIG and PJ MASKS, as well as premier partner brands. Through its global entertainment studio eOne, Hasbro is building its brands globally through great storytelling and content on all screens. Hasbro is committed to making the world a better place for children and their families through corporate social responsibility and philanthropy. Hasbro ranked No. 13 on the 2019 100 Best Corporate Citizens list by CR Magazine and has been named one of the World’s Most Ethical Companies® by Ethisphere Institute for the past nine years. We routinely share important business and brand updates on our Investor Relations website, Newsroom and social channels (@Hasbro on Twitter and Instagram).

 

[JD]

They say it's a reboot. And it's a shared film/TV universe, and it stands to reason that the films would drive the whole thing, as they'd be the highest-profile, potentially most profitable part. So it doesn't seem likely that they'd just expand the current TV universe into films; they'd presumably create something new for the movies and then spin TV series off of that.

I understand it's going to be separate from the TV shows we have been getting, I just wasn't sure if we were getting it along with the other shows or instead of them.
If we can have multiple Star Trek, and Star Wars shows at the same time, then there's no reason we couldn't have multiple Power Rangers shows at the same time.

 

[kirk55555]

the press release does specifically call this new thing a non kids series and Beast morphers a kids series, so it's possible that the kids version, aka the old show, will continue being made even while this new thing comes to life.

 

[Christopher]

I understand it's going to be separate from the TV shows we have been getting, I just wasn't sure if we were getting it along with the other shows or instead of them.

Naturally it will take time to develop and produce, so I would expect it to begin the season after Dino Fury ends.

If we can have multiple Star Trek, and Star Wars shows at the same time, then there's no reason we couldn't have multiple Power Rangers shows at the same time.

Yes, but all the Trek shows are in the same universe, and all the Wars shows are in the same universe. Again, the announcement says they're going to "reimagine the television and film worlds of this property." This is a unified multimedia push, so it sounds like they want it to be a cohesive reality.

 

[JD]

Oh, OK, I guess that makes sense.

 

[Samurai8472]

Animation is also something Hasbro is considering diving into

https://twitter.com/PwrRngrSite/status/1313561554068148227

 

[kirk55555]

Animation is also something Hasbro is considering diving into

https://twitter.com/PwrRngrSite/status/1313561554068148227

I thought I'd heard that Toei wouldn't allow Sentai stuff in animation, not wanting to compete with the live action stuff or something, but if they abandoned the Sentai stuff altogether I suppose they could do animation with completely unique designs, although I don't know how many things might be considered sentai related, and what could be considered generic enough to not be counted as a spinoff of that property. Then again the animation ban was just a rumor, so who knows.