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TokuGAF 2016 |OT| Fantastic Beasts and Ghostly Beats

Watch Da Birdie

I buy cakes for myself on my birthday it's not weird lots of people do it I bet
I lost it at seeing those meme horse masks in my Toku.

Jesus Christ. Sorry guys, but I think I'm already out of Zyuoger.
 

javadoze

Member
Oh Sentai giant battles, what should we do to make you cool? The sword slashing finisher motion remains the same since ages, only now with updated visual effects.

To be fair, Zyuohger employed quite a bit of practical effects in its first mech battle (I'm surprised how even the cubes unfolding themselves and the sword finisher weren't CG) and was pretty visually interesting. That said, I can understand the feeling of most giant battles being a bit braindead nowadays (the last show to not have me skipping them was Kyoryuger).
 

jwk94

Member
Big story events were always cool, but in general? I wasn't here for it.

The mech fights were the worst part of the Psycho Rangers arc.

I might have to agree with you on that. I honestly don't remember much fo the Psycho Rangers arc other than the hilarious scene where TJ knocked Andros out when they enabled self-destruct in the Mega Voyager. But, yeah the psychos lost all their sleekness when they were in monster mode.
 

vareon

Member
To be fair, Zyuohger employed quite a bit of practical effects in its first mech battle (I'm surprised how even the cubes unfolding themselves and the sword finisher weren't CG) and was pretty visually interesting. That said, I can understand the feeling of most giant battles being a bit braindead nowadays (the last show to not have me skipping them was Kyoryuger).

Mech combining sequences are the best part of mech battles, and one we always look forward to. But battles are always limited to guy in a clunky suit fighting another guy in an even clunkier suit with limited camera angles and prop, or using CGI entirely.

Though I think most agree that entirely replacing mech suits with CGI is unacceptable? And the last Sentai known to stray far from tradition was declared a financial failure, too.
 

Tiu Neo

Member
Go Busters did Mecha battles right, with them being (at least sometimes) something separated from the ground battle.

Did you watch the special version of episode 31 at least (the one that ends
with the Rider War dream coming true, rather than just the 8 Heisei Riders appearing
)? The original episode 31's ending (and the movie teaser at the end) basically leads nowhere since the final movie was heavily changed during production (they were going to make a standalone Decade and a W movie, but then merged both into the single Movie Wars 2010 crossover, which sidelines Decade in the crossover part). The special version of episode 31 tweaks the ending, removing most scenes related to dropped plot points from the movie.

The ending of the episode was the Rider War coming true, so I imagine that yes, it was the Special Version. Will check when I get back home, anyway.
 

WillyFive

Member
iNTEResting lists, will look up those Sentai series since Gokaiger was my fav. and the later ones just didn't catch my attention :/
Also
KGwGiC0.jpg

Odd that they used a Kingsman poster but decided to translate Oh as Champions instead of Kings in their subs.

Mech combining sequences are the best part of mech battles, and one we always look forward to. But battles are always limited to guy in a clunky suit fighting another guy in an even clunkier suit with limited camera angles and prop, or using CGI entirely.

Though I think most agree that entirely replacing mech suits with CGI is unacceptable? And the last Sentai known to stray far from tradition was declared a financial failure, too.

The thing with CG is that Toei can't do good CG, they don't have the production pipeline for it the same way they do for suit filming. It will look terrible. It needs good animation to sell it.
 

NeonZ

Member
Go Busters did Mecha battles right, with them being (at least sometimes) something separated from the ground battle.

The ending of the episode was the Rider War coming true, so I imagine that yes, it was the Special Version. Will check when I get back home, anyway.

The original technically was the Rider War coming true too, but with only the 10 Heisei Riders and a bunch of random lasers flying around. The Special version reuses footage from the 1st episode to show a Rider army there like in the dream. That's not the actual important differences though. The original ending shows
Onodera being brainwashed by Kivalah into an evil black eyes Kuuga, and then Diend betrays Decade and shoots him in the back. That's the final shot of the series. The special version removes those events, since they aren't mentioned in the movie at all, which also starts with Decade being known as a destroyer and killer of Riders, which works much better when the Special version of the episode ends with him destroying the Rider army.
.
 

Mr-Joker

Banned
Oh Sentai giant battles, what should we do to make you cool? The sword slashing finisher motion remains the same since ages, only now with updated visual effects.

The mecha fight were one of the biggest reason why I found it difficult to get into Super Sentai since it was formulaic and time spent on the mecha fight could have been better spent on the plot, so that the episode doesn't feel compressed as most Super Sentai episode don't flow like Kamen Rider with an ongoing plot.

Plus I find it hard to believe that a giant robot piloted by the heroes just happens not to cause any damage or killing any civilian, nah it's always the villain that does that crap.
 

Tiu Neo

Member
The original technically was the Rider War coming true too, but with only the 10 Heisei Riders and a bunch of random lasers flying around. The Special version reuses footage from the 1st episode to show a Rider army there like in the dream. That's not the actual important differences though. The original ending shows
Onodera being brainwashed by Kivalah into an evil black eyes Kuuga, and then Diend betrays Decade and shoots him in the back. That's the final shot of the series. The special version removes those events, since they aren't mentioned in the movie at all, which also starts with Decade being known as a destroyer and killer of Riders, which works much better when the Special version of the episode ends with him destroying the Rider army.
.

Oh, then I watched the normal version. Will watch the special edition of 30 and 31 tonight then, thanks!
 

WarRock

Member
There are two problems with mech fights in sentai.

First, most of the time they feel useless since the monster returns for no reason and provides no additional/interesting challenge or threat. It's specially boring when the monster of the week is more of a cunning villain, a saboteur or similar and then his "climax" is becoming a brawler just because.

Second, a lot of them feel empty as heck since the episode is already ending and the fight NEEDS to happen, so they just pose a bit and them the heroes throw the finisher (maybe a a some shooting/punch before) and win. There is no conflict or struggle at all.

GoBus did it better but even then it would be a better show without the mech fights being tucked in every episode.

Show me more individual mechs doing something besides throwing CG lightning, being actually important to the heroes' job. Make it part of the fucking plot too, instead of a rushed bloat that doesn't even make the toys look cool.
 
What I liked about Early GoBus was that the mechs actually had a purpose besides just showing up during the last few minutes to do a finisher. We need more episodes where their usage is dynamic, Like a monster occasionally appearing as a giant right off the bat, or needing to defend the city against enemy warships while part of the team is having a ground fight. Even doing something like that just every once in a while can work wonders on making the mechs feel like an actual part of the show.
 

NeonZ

Member
There are two problems with mech fights in sentai.

First, most of the time they feel useless since the monster returns for no reason and provides no additional/interesting challenge or threat. It's specially boring when the monster of the week is more of a cunning villain, a saboteur or similar and then his "climax" is becoming a brawler just because.

Second, a lot of them feel empty as heck since the episode is already ending and the fight NEEDS to happen, so they just pose a bit and them the heroes throw the finisher (maybe a a some shooting/punch before) and win. There is no conflict or struggle at all.

I think the problem is exactly the opposite. In some 80s Sentai sometimes the giant battle was just "combination sequence -> a few attacks of the robot -> Finisher. But in modern Sentai they always make the monster stand up, even if in a clearly pointless way, like retreading the ground battle's gimmick or adding some new gimmick that's quickly defeated before actually going for the finisher. At least in the old method meaningless battles ended very quickly and the combination sequence was cool. In fact, combination sequences in most modern shows are pretty bad nowadays...
 

WarRock

Member
Agreed. The finishers and the mechs/stock scenes of their summoning or combination are also pretty lacking nowadays.
 

javadoze

Member
This kinda reminds me how Gokaiger never used its own team mechs and went straight to Gokai-Oh (outside of the Go-Onger tribute, I think?).
 

BatDan

Bane? Get them on board, I'll call it in.
Ghost 18

Alain is starting to feel the effects of the humanity bug. Face-Turn incoming. Also, cool on O-T for using his official romanization.
Igor is another interesting villain. Very much a Dark Akari.

One thing I appreciate is that the the counter between episodes isn't sudden skips of time. That early one where a MONTH passed was so dumb... at least now it's only a couple days

This kinda reminds me how Gokaiger never used its own team mechs and went straight to Gokai-Oh (outside of the Go-Onger tribute, I think?).

Yeah that was kind of dumb... you'd think a major celebration would warrant more individual use but apparently not.
I think even PR knows how pointless the mech stuff is as the Megazord fights in Dino Charge happen really quickly. At some points it feels sped up.
 

Watch Da Birdie

I buy cakes for myself on my birthday it's not weird lots of people do it I bet
You know people had been saying that "Javel's" name matched an old katakana rendering of Javert from the Japanese version of Les Miserables, guess that is what the show was going for. So, the mook Ganma are inspired by real people, more or less, while the higher-ups seem to be fictional ones since we had Javert and now Igor from Frankenstein.

Also Alain---that's the same romanization that the Alan from the Pokemon Mega Evolution Specials went with. That's such a goddamn edgy-sounding name.
 

Tiu Neo

Member
Ghost 17

The ganma having personalities was a good decision. A few cool moments because of that.

Alain and Kanon is totally a thing.
 

WillyFive

Member
This kinda reminds me how Gokaiger never used its own team mechs and went straight to Gokai-Oh (outside of the Go-Onger tribute, I think?).

Both the creative team and I think story-wise, they didn't think the individual mechs were worth anything and they always went with their strongest attack available.

I mean, seriously; one of the legs was a treasure chest.
 

delSai

Member
Another question from a noob: How's Ressha Sentai ToQger? Opening Song is amazing, if it's good i will give it a watch during a Kamen Rider break.

Ghost 18

Yup, Alain is totally going to do the Chase. For Kanon of course. And Igor is pretty cool.
 
Another question from a noob: How's Ressha Sentai ToQger? Opening Song is amazing, if it's good i will give it a watch during a Kamen Rider break.

ToQger is great. The villains are all amazing and each have their own little angle in the story, and I never found the team were grating. Also an amazing 6th.

I was worried at first thinking "How the hell are trains gonna work as a motif?", but its amazing.
 

Tizoc

Member
You gotta remember that the show is aimed at kids in japan and fancy flashy looking robots is something any child would eat up :p
 

WillyFive

Member
Another question from a noob: How's Ressha Sentai ToQger? Opening Song is amazing, if it's good i will give it a watch during a Kamen Rider break.

It's a bad show. It has great music, but the show itself is not worth watching in its entirety; just a few select episodes.
 

javadoze

Member
Another question from a noob: How's Ressha Sentai ToQger? Opening Song is amazing, if it's good i will give it a watch during a Kamen Rider break.

The main story is pretty nice, but it's plagued with lots of dull filler in between. So I'd recommend at least watching the vital plot episodes of it.
 

BatDan

Bane? Get them on board, I'll call it in.
Ghost Legendary Rider Souls 2

Spectre Double is one of the best Rider designs ever.
I marked out a bit when he did the wrist flick.
I'm surprised the Terror Dopant costume is still in good condition after all these years. Toei must be doing a better job at costume upkeep these days.
 

NeonZ

Member
Ghost Legendary Rider Souls 2

Spectre Double is one of the best Rider designs ever.
I marked out a bit when he did the wrist flick.
I'm surprised the Terror Dopant costume is still in good condition after all these years. Toei must be doing a better job at costume upkeep these days.

Well, they actually use the costumes now once in a while so there's a reason to take care of them. Previously, during the first 9 years of Heisei Rider, their only use was maybe spare parts for future minor monsters and even that barely happened (I think they reused some Undead suit parts for a couple of minor Worms in Kabuto, but that's the only reuse I can remember right now).
 

Tiu Neo

Member
Ghost Legendary Rider Souls 2

I wonder if those eyecons will be introduced into the series later, or if they'll be a special/movie thing only.

Makoto got the coolest suits. Onari was cool on this episode, too.
 

NeonZ

Member
Ghost Legendary Rider Souls 2

I wonder if those eyecons will be introduced into the series later, or if they'll be a special/movie thing only.

Makoto got the coolest suits. Onari was cool on this episode, too.

It's the first time these Legend Rider forms are reappearing after their debut (with Ghost Gaim in the Kamen Rider 1 movie), so I wouldn't rule it out completely. Ghost already did leave Newton's debut to the Drive crossover too.
 

Parallax

best seen in the classic "Shadow of the Beast"
http://natalie.mu/eiga/pp/xmission02

From what I can tell, it seems Kouta from Gaim is dubbing Johnny Utah in the Japanese release of the Point Break remake. Except it's called X-Mission there, or something.

I find it funny because the Point Break remake was fucking terrible.

its the closest it seems to a cloverfield game. looks interesting. especially with the giants seemingly out of detail
 
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