Zyuohger - Episode 30, Review

Episode 30: 伝説の巨獣 (The Legendary Great Beast)

Airdate: September 18, 2016

  

Synopsis: After wondering about the whereabouts of the Cube Whale, the ZyuOhgers investigate sightings of a giant whale at a nearby beach. The group finds themselves up against Bungrey, once more, and his surprise ally.

Review:

First Impressions

 After the wonderful return of the Gokaigers in the last two episodes, I was not as excited for this episode. However it proved to be rather entertaining.

Put-ups

 The search for the whale worked as a natural progression of the story and also provided a good explanation behind the whale not appearing in the previous episode, which definitely would have felt way too rushed!

 I liked the reveal the Quval agreed to team-up with Bungrey after their battle all those episodes ago. I also liked Genis’ enjoying the development as an interesting twist. Genis feels like a surrogate for the viewer in some ways, his only real investment in the Rangers and the whole struggle is for it to be interesting.

 Seeing Sela still be useful was good to see. Especially now that Yamato has his super powerful power-up mode.

 The end of the episode had adequate tension with the debut of the Cube Whale and it attacking the Rangers, Genis & Naria hijacking Bungrey & Quval’s plans, as well as with injured/poisoned Sela & Misao washing up on shore. A good cliffhanger for the next episode.

Put-downs

 Misao’s pouty behavior was borderline Light-esque this episode and was irritating me a bit. I get he wants to be helpful and I can appreciate his being sensitive but it’s getting a bit old for me. At least Light had the excuse of being an actual child, what’s Misao’s deal?

 Two more recycled monsters? Boo. If Quval was helping out, couldn’t he have brought one of his monsters along? I guess you could argue he didn’t want to tip Genis off to his involvement and that he didn’t know that Genis knew and didn’t care. Still, I do wish we could have gotten a fresh monster. These recycled costumes are really feeling stale and lazy.

Final thoughts

I enjoyed this episode quite a bit! Interesting development and pay-off, a tense and interesting battle that I was invested in. However, there were two things that I realized as I was watching/reflecting on this episode that are not at happy.

 I realized that after 30 episodes, it still doesn’t feel like much has happened. Only a few major developments since the team’s formation - the introduction of the Birdman subplot, the introduction of The World/Misao and Bungrey. Sure the Gokaiger team-up was great candy and I loved pretty much every minute of it, the events of the episode could have easily been re-worked without them. Not that I wish the team-up didn’t happen, because I am very happy we got it. 

 I’ve been really enjoying ZyuOhger and each episode is a pleasure to watch, so I haven’t really had many complaints. But, now, here we are at Episode 30 and I don’t feel we have much of anything to show for it. I’m hoping that the next 17-20 Episodes (however many are left) pick up the pace and we see the story really going places. Aside from the Genis reveal two-parter and the debut of Misao/The World, it doesn’t feel like the heroes have had much true struggle. Maybe if I went back and re-watched all the episodes over, I’d feel differently. 

Another thing that I realized this episode is that we really don’t know much of anything about Misao. He just appeared captured by Genis at the end of the Episode 16 and then little was done to establish who he was before that. Is there a reason for his being so sensitive/pouty? What does he do with himself when he’s not fishing or being a Ranger? I hope after all of this we get some good backstory and meaningful focus on Misao. His dynamic with the team has been well established and the writers are continuing to play with and develop that – which I do appreciate. I want to know more about him and his existence outside of the Rangers.

 

Final Grade: A-