Monday, February 17, 2014

Kyoryuger Episode 46 Review: A Knight's Tears (Major Spoiler Alert!!!)

For this episode of Kyoryuger, Daigo is ready to fight his father and to find what the real reason behind Torin's death meant to Dantetsu and the Earth. Meanwhile the three rejects of Debos are being chased down by Icerondo.
The first thing to mention is Daigo taking a stand against his father. This wasn't the main focus of the episode which surprised me and it's something I can like out of Daigo. He heard some of the Earth's melody, but it's still unclear of what the Earth truly wanted so the only way he can find out is to fight his father. I will say the build for the fight was absolutely bad. It plays out with the usual cliche that the team doesn't want Daigo to do this because his father to them is a killer. There is even the moment where one of the teammates tries to hold him down, which was Souji. Ian starts to believe in his idea though and Ucchi gives back his batteries. It was okay, but it just played out like one would expect. The massive dump though was with Amy. She gives Daigo an advertisement for a strawberry parfait as Daigo promises that the two would have some when this is all over. I mean wow, how unsubtle could the series have gotten with this forced romance. The last time I can really think that the King and Amy love issues was brought up was the movie episode, but that had more of a focus of Yayoi being crazy. They even have the tenacity to show a little clip show during that scene, just no. You can have the clip show with the whole team and not just between two characters that have a forced romance.
Continuing on, Daigo ends up fighting his father as he got permission to take him down thanks to Debos. I actually like their little brawl since that how it played out; it was just a pure physical fight. Daigo even says no to the use of Carnival mode as he was just fighting his father with his fists. The guy even had a smart idea in this episode as he knew about his father's special move using the Earth's melody. Daigo ends up trying to use the same move and doing this caused the melodies to harmonize as Daigo knew how to translate this somehow. I won't go on about that since that would be major nitpicking, but also because I don't want to be mad about Daigo being smart for a change. Pretty much it was a nice fist to fist fight between father and son as the son wasn't looking to beat up his father, but to find out what exactly is happening.
During the two Kings' fight there was a scene with the other members. Souji finally remembers that he had Torin's sword and in the sword was a last message from Torin. Is the series trying to convince me that Torin is dead for good? Well keep trying series because I know what you are exactly doing. Again Torin already had near death situations and with how safe the series plays things out I'm not expecting a big death. Even though this episode does have a death, I know Torin is going to do something and probably come back. Getting back on the topic though is that the message basically says that Torin was expecting this it seems. Torin lived for a long time and he has no regrets as he leaves the future to the Kyoryugers. So he was expecting this, again series you already revealed yourself! Whenever someone expects a death coming, mostly with themselves there is a reason and high chance it leads to their comeback. Then guess what? There is a comeback for Torin which I will get to later.
For the villains their plan consists of killing their own kind and end up backstabbing Dantetsu. Since Torin is gone there is no need for human being alongside of Debos. Also there is no need for the three rejects of Debos so their deaths are heavily wanted. With betraying Dantetsu, Debos actually had the clock moving still and the clock will open up the Debos Hell and release the past monsters. So they wanted to kill Torin like a Debos monster so that means he is in that Hell right now. Wouldn't opening that hell be good and bad thing? I mean really what was the point of Torin's death to the Debos. They are literally opening up a passage way for him to return! I know the other monsters are important to the whole plan, but you just sent an enemy to a very important part of the plan. It even backfires, what a surprise!
Now with the stupid parts aside, Dantestsu's plan isn't bad. He got on Debos' side even though they would betray him anyways, but all of this ended up distracting them for his true intentions. Dantetsu killed Torin so that his righteousness could live on in Hell. This way Torin could take on all the past Debos monsters and prevent them from getting to the Earth. First, give credit to Torin for this part of the plan. In a literal sense he does actually die unlike the time he just turned into a statue. Still I won't really call it a true death if he was stuck there. Since Debos monsters can exit that means Torin can as well. At first I thought the Mad Torin would just revert to the normal Torin and then Torin just laughs at Debos. The Earth didn't want any evil in it so Dantetsu got Torin into a deeper part of Earth to clean it out. I mean he had to fight all the previous Debos monsters including his evil counterpart, that's pretty cool. Overall there was a huge predictable outcome in the end and this made the villains look idiotic, but it does give some good contrast to two of the heroes.
Now for something I really like in this episode, but the overall evaluation of the premise still fails in the end. This is regarding how Aigarion and Ian were treated in the series. Both have great moments and the story of revenge is a simple to do. Sadly, the series heavily ignored it and only brought it up in small portions. The most focus of Ian's revenge was his introduction episode, episode thirteen, and when Ian had to become the leader of the team. There are really only three episodes in the series that actually focuses on that excluding this episode. That's not enough to develop the issue and thanks to heavy amount of filler and Daigo focus it ends up getting washed away. Aigarion's part of the story was heavily washed out as he wasn't even mentioned in many episodes and we even get an explanation of why Aigarion had those black eyes, but its so last minute. I can like the villain as his idea is strong and again the ending is excellent regarding both Ian and Aigarion. The series should have focused on this more and many other character arcs. All I can say is that the series should have taken a page of Dairanger's story telling because I can see that style working for the series.
So what ends up happening to the tin man? Since the time he exploded with anger he actually was dead. His armor kept intact though and hence kept his spirit in it. Chaos gave him dark energy to make him a zombie basically. Aigarion was already dead, but was forced to live on and even when he learned of this he still did what he wanted to do. His love for Candy was obvious in the early episodes and there was soon a filler episode that looked at that for a little while. Again the series should have put more focus on this to make it more developed. The series pretty much wants us to think that it's fully developed as the dynamics of this knight protecting his love is well done in this episode. There is tension and suspense for this villain, but when you look back to it, it's so last minute. Even Ian's part of this is strong, but again it just wasn't fully focused on.
When Ian and the others shown up, Aigarion was asking them to protect both Candy and Lucky. He is fine with himself dying since he knows the crimes he has done. Aigarion is fine with dying as long as the two innocent ones can stay alive. Again this is real bravery and it fits with the theme that was brought up with Torin being a Debos. Good can come from evil as the three rejects to do show this. The more I keep saying three rejects I think of Dairanger. Ian is completely ticked off at first because out of the people to be saying this it's Aigarion and he doesn't even want to help at first. When Ian hears of his fate though and seeing him continue to defend Candy, Ian takes helps him out. Ian attacks him when he is done and breaks his armor so that his soul can finally escape and rest in peace. Ian was even crying when he did this because even though Aigarion killed his friend, he still weeps for the foe. This is because Ian saw the good in him at the end and it hurts him to do this. This was perfectly executed in this episode, I won't lie I felt for these two. The idea that is presented is a strong one and this ending shows why. The sad part though is that there wasn't enough focus for this and that softens the whole blow of the impact.
The fight that comes after this is another part of this arc that is well done. Ian is full of anger for Aigarion's fate and will take down Icerondo. He uses the best weapon in the series which is the double armed on weapon. The other members even use their attacks to help Ian out. Souji uses the Trinity Straizer with Torin's sword and all five of them do their combination attack. Even though Icerondo still stands, Ian comes to deliver the final blow with Aigarion's ax. Ian's character song did come at that point, but it should have played for the whole fight. There was some nice imagery to go alongside this mostly with the tears representing the overall sadness of this event. Ian crying for Aigarion and then his having Icerondo's blood represents Agarion's last tear was great. They even put in some Candy and Nossan as he comes to comfort her and there Ian tells both her and Lucky to live on like Torin. Again the only flaw here is the lack of focus that the series had. With this episode though, it's my favorite moment for many reasons even with the lack of focus. I still feel the impact and can see how this could have been done better and I would easily have a similar moment like this episode had. Overall, this episode had a change of tone for the best in these last episodes and I have a feeling I'm going to have a similar feeling continuing on with the final episodes.
In the end the heroes have their moment to fight back Debos and the rest of the villains thanks to Dantestsu's plan. So what would I give this episode? I am saying it's a B as there was something really strong in this episode and looking at this episode alone it does it perfectly. I am easily referring to Aigarion's death as that whole scene was perfect and the only thing I would change about it would be having more focus on it. Daigo was even smart for a change of things and Dantetsu's plan was smart. What ruins the episode is the forced romance and the overall predictability of Torin's fate.
Next Time: New Kyoryugers?

2 comments:

  1. DaigoXMeeko would make a lot more sense. Yayoi is too young for Daigo. However, his relationship with Meeko is a lot more developed...

    As much as I like Kyoryuger, the only thing I can never forgive was DaigoXAmy. I was even hoping for an episode that focuses on Amy and Yayoi's rivalry over Daigo, especially after Yayoi becomes the new Violet. Maybe that could have helped develop the DaigoXAmy love team. And like I said, I don't like Yayoi for Daigo simply because she is too young for him...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I wouldn't have a problem with age differences or anything like that. I just want good characters and well written chemistry. The only love connection that is close to that is Nossan and Candy and they did that in one episode!

      Delete