Wild Instinct Awaken! Doubutsu Sentai Zyuohger Episode 1 (Spoilers) · 2:51pm Feb 19th, 2016
FINALLY, Ninninger has gone away, and the 40th Super Sentai has come out to play! I just finished watching the first episode of Zyuohger, and I am pumped for this anniversary series!
Here's my review of the first episode.
Our theme this year is animals and cubes. And callbacks. Lots and lots of callbacks.
Kazakiri Yamato, a zoologist, is leading a group of children on a wildlife study when he loses his lucky charm, a strange cube. When he finds it, it starts glowing, reacting to a giant spinning alien cube that has appeared in a clearing. There's a hole on the side of the alien cube that looks like his cube will fit. He inserts it, and the cube unlocks and opens, sucking him in. When he lands in a grassy plain, he's surrounded by strange and frightening animal people! There's a shark-girl (Sera), a lion-guy (Leo), an elephant-guy (Tusk), and a tiger-girl (Amu), among others, all gathered around strange buildings made of stacked stone cubes.
Right out of the gate, Zyuohger does something we haven't seen before:
While we've certainly had past Rangers who weren't human outside of their Ranger forms (Dekamaster/Doggie Kruger and KyouryuuSilver/Torin come to mind), this is the first time the core members of the team have been suit actors in their normal forms. Yamato is the only human in the core team. The rest are suited-up animal people...for now. (This changes at the end of the episode, of course.)
After the opening credits, we meet our bad guys for this series, the Deathgaliens, who are apparently intergalactic game hunters. Instead of hunting single animals, or packs of animals, they hunt entire planets at a time. Charming.
Back to Yamato and the zoo people: they lead him through a vibrant and colorful city teeming with life, built in the middle of the jungle out of big colorful cubes. I love the set design here. It's distinctive, vibrant, and imaginative. Amu explains that this is Zyuland, the home of the "Zyumans", which is apparently what we're calling the zoo people. *snap* Okay!
Amu explains that the huge cube Yamato went through, the "Link Cube", is the only link between Zyuland and the human world. The four Zyumans Yamato first met are the guardians of the Link Cube, but haven't been able to access it since one of the six keys ("Mark of the King") was stolen. The stolen key is, of course, Yamato's "lucky charm" which was given to him as a child. As soon as he realizes this, Tusk comes riding up holding the cube and accusing Yamato of being the thief who stole it.
On the other side of the Link Cube, a Deathgalien attacks a group of humans, using cannon fodder monsters to drive them out in a stampede. The Link Cube starts shuddering like crazy; Yamato grabs the key cube and slams it in, opening the gate. He and the four soon-to-be Zyuohgers are sucked through the cube. They arrive in the middle of all hell breaking loose, as people and animals are fleeing from the flames and chaos created by the Deathgalien. Yamato risks his life to save a child from being killed, then demands to know who the enemy is and what they want. The Deathgalien announces his intention: to turn Earth into their playing field for a blood game.
The Link Cube falls still, seemingly damaged--meaning the Zyumans can't go back to Zyuland. The Mark of the King falls out, and the Zyumans recover four of them, which begin shining with a mysterious power, transforming into what will be our henshin items for this series.
Yamato, of course, will transform with the fifth Mark, meaning the sixth one is reserved for the guy we'll meet around episode 17 (if the usual pattern holds).
Anyway, the Zyumans use their cubes to transform.
Sera becomes ZyuohShark.
Leo becomes ZyuohLion.
Tusk becomes ZyuohElephant.
Amu becomes ZyuohTiger. (She's actually a white tiger with a white Ranger costume, but white text on white and all that, plus she fills the Pink Ranger slot. 
)
As Zyuohger, in addition to the usual Super Sentai powerups, they have the ability to "Unleash the Beast", gaining animal-themed upgrades to their suits and powers--claws, shark fins, big elephant feet, that sort of thing. Which is a bit of a weird headscratcher for this particular series because these are actually things these four already HAD as Zyumans, and lost when they assumed their more human Ranger forms.
Watching the four Zyuohger rampage through the wave of cannon fodder monsters, Yamato is impressed that the animals are protecting the Earth. He sees another Mark of the King lying on the ground nearby and picks it up with determination.
The sixth Mark is picked up by an unknown cloaked figure...
The Zyuohger, meanwhile, are in trouble. They've thinned out the herd of cannon fodder, but now they have flying enemies strafing them, and the big guy with the big gun is unloading on them. Yamato charges blindly into the fray, trying to stop the Deathgalien from firing on the helpless Zyuohger, and is thrown callously aside.
ZyuohLion: "Are you stupid? Why'd you put yourself in danger?!"
Yamato: "Because I also want to fight...to protect this forest! And the life on Earth! Please...lend me your power too!"
ZyuohElephant: "It's useless! Only Zyumans can use that!"
Yamato: "How are we different? HUMANS ARE ANIMALS TOO!"
The Mark of the King shines in Yamato's hand.
Yamato becomes ZyuohEagle, completing the core team.
Interestingly, while Yamato is yet another Red With A Sword (TM), the Eagriser is actually a whip sword, which is a nice change of pace. With the Eagriser's Riser Spinning Slash (which is AWESOME--basically wrapping the whipsword around the enemy and turning it into a binding chainsaw), ZyuohEagle effortlessly defeats the first Deathgalien, walking calmly away from the massive explosion like a true badass.
The Deathgalien chick who does the Make My Monster Grow thing is based on Insarn from Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger. The gimmick for growing the monsters in Zyuohger is...interesting, in that it combines not only a past Super Sentai gimmick, but also a Kamen Rider gimmick. In fact, the Deathgaliens have a huge callback to Kamen Rider OOO going on all over the place. The Moebas (their cannon fodder) are summoned by scattering silver tokens, and the "Continue" is a special medal (there's OOOs again) infused with the cells of the Deathgaliens' leader Genus (a callback to Deboss from Zyuden Sentai Kyouryuuger). When Jagd (the Monster of the Week, by the way) grows into a giant, the Zyuohger discover a new power, summoning the Zyuohcube, giant flying colorful cubes that will become our mecha: CubeEagle, CubeLion, CubeShark, CubeElephant, and CubeTiger.
The Zyuohcubes looked stupid in theory. In practice, they're yet another callback, this time to the Origami from Samurai Sentai Shinkenger. They even wander around in miniature mode when the team isn't transformed and probably have non-combat uses, just like the Origami.
In case you were wondering about all these callbacks, just remember that this is the 40th anniversary of the Super Sentai Series. While I doubt they'll be doing as many callbacks as Gokaiger did (which would be impossible), they're working in as many "spot the thing" things as they possibly can. Including, incidentally, the animal powers of their suits being callbacks to Hyakujuu Sentai Gaoranger and to a lesser extent Bakuryuu Sentai Abaranger.
Anyway, after the individual mecha get their chance to shine, three squares of fire appear in the sky. Only the first three cubes can pass through them, meaning we start off with a three-mech combiner for Zyuohking: Eagle, Shark, and Lion become the base form of Zyuohking, while Elephant and Tiger get to watch from the sidelines.
Unfortunately, Zyuohking is about as dumb-looking in practice as it was in the promotional stills. It's just a big, blocky, chunky, boxy mess.
After the battle, the Zyumans discover that they can't return to Zyuland because the sixth Mark of the King has once again gone missing. Yamato says he'll help them search for the missing Mark, and take care of them in the meantime. Their Cubes give them human disguises (though they still have tails), and Yamato suggests they start over with a proper first introduction. Sera, Leo, and Amu reintroduce themselves with their new human faces, but Tusk refuses, indicating he doesn't want to depend on Yamato and possibly doesn't entirely trust him yet.
The ending theme is basically "Minna Atsumare! Kyouryuuger" all over again but with a softer beat and an animal focus. It even has a similar dance.
So far, I'm liking this a hell of a lot more than Ninninger, which was excruciating to watch after only two episodes and which I'm seriously considering not bothering with going back to. (Seriously, at this point the only reason I'd bother to watch Ninninger is for the sake of completeness and compulsive behavior.)
I am actually looking forward to their sixth ranger.
3764403 At least the sixth Zyuohger won't have a cowboy hat and transform with a hamburger, am I right?
3764407 True, and three different modes makes look even better.
3764407 M-M-Mythril... Did... did the sixth... Ninninger... seriously transform... with a hamburger...?
3764421 Yes. Yes he did.
I can't wait to see how this one plays out. It looks like it going to have just as much fun and crazyness as Kyoryuger.
Gokaiger was awesome until I saw what they did to it when they made it for kids here...that was a travesty. I only watched a couple episodes of Ninninger before giving up on it myself. This looks to be interesting. Gonna have to check it out.
3764431 I can't... I just can't...
Don't give Ninninger another shot. Please don't. Spare yourself.
3764539 Yeah, I'm already leaning in that direction. Ninninger...everything I've read about it says it massively lacks direction, forgets its own plot, doesn't let anyone but the red ranger shine, and the red ranger is the most annoying red EVER.
Fun fact - The narrator to this animal-filled adventure is done by none other than the seiyuu of Brook of One Piece, so...YOHOHOHOHOHO~!
I know this is probably a noob question, but an issue I have is, how did they know to initially do all that stuff with the cell morphers and the megazord? Wouldn't there be a more trial and error thing going on whilw they fight the baddies?
3764739 In some series, it is. In other series, they just instantly know how to transform and fight. It depends on the writers. It's something you're more or less expected to just accept as a handwave usually.
3764739
3764755
Along with what MythrilMoth said, I think this time its implied that its either animal instinct that guided them, or at least for Leo, Sele, Amu, and Tusk, they already knew what to do beforehand. If the second one is the case, then Yamato could have known what to do by watching them.
I'm probably reading too much into it. Then again, I LOVE reading too much into things.
3764755 huh.