Well it's time to discuss about one of my favorite rangers of all time, it's all about Jasmine herself. Just like one of my lesser favorites Mako, Jasmine who is another lesser favorite becomes a subject to being loved by fans for shallow and pitiful reasons and two, both her and Mako aren't exactly my top-tier favorites considering that I think most of the rangers back in the 80s/90s were usually more kickass. Moving on, I felt like it's time to really ramble on Jasmine because I suddenly remembered the silly club I used to join with peers who I felt had made her a goddess of sorts. Considering Dekaranger has reached its 10th year months ago and a 10 years after special is coming out, I felt like writing about her.
I would believe Jasmine is liked for shallow and pitiful reasons. When I started telling my friends about Super Sentai (without telling them Power Rangers is fake since that's an outrageous lie), the age of Google had already awakened by then. So I told them about Dekaranger and I will admit, I wish I never did because after they saw Jasmine, it was time to go, "WOW JASMINE IS THE BEST THING EVER!" Which of me was, "Oh boy, I wish I never told them about Jasmine in the first place!" The bomb blew up and the "damage" was done ever since. What was funny was that I supposedly gave up on newer Tokusatsu when I first told them of Dekaranger which they watched on raw, and later they watched the complete subs. They didn't bother to finish Power Rangers SPD for dumb reasons... they just simply viewed it that Jasmine makes Dekaranger way better. That is, our group failed to really give where credit is due... in my case, I got neutral with Power Rangers after Power Rangers Ninja Storm... which I might talk about Nanami another day.
Now I can agree Jasmine is really hot. She's really pretty, she's really slim, she's really steamy which had me like her for so many shallow and pitiful reasons. If you're thinking about Sentai men and ladies between Showa, Heisei 90s and Heisei (2001-2010), I still can't help but think that while she can fight, maybe they forget the better fighters back in the 80s-90s among the female yellow rangers. Again, remember that I am pretty biased when it comes to most characters post-Timeranger, I may like certain characters like Takeru Shiba and Retsu Fukami but I'll always like Takeru (Maskman) and Ken Hoshikawa above them.
Okay I'll talk about some female yellow rangers I think are better than Jasmine. Ran seems to be an exception to the rule but if you want better female yellow rangers who can fight, well haven't you checked out Mika and Jun in Bioman, Haruka in Maskman, Remi in Fiveman, Juri in Ohranger and Natsumi in Carranger. My favorite examples might be for example Jun has filled up where her died too early predecessor Mika left and well Natsumi fills the void of a season long Mika IMO. I always thought fight scenes back then were usually better. While Jasmine had fought out of suit a couple of times but you may never see her as daring as Natsumi's disassembling bikes that were running towarsd her (and that was man, VERY DANGEROUS), Haruka's out of suit ninjutsu, Jun's use of her archery and tightrope... those types of scenes were for me were what I felt Dekaranger needed since it was a cop series aside from Hoji's badass out of suit battle. Come on, why hasn't Jasmine gotten that kind of scene?
Meanwhile I think Umeko is pretty much overshadowed by Jasmine. Correct me if I'm wrong but I feel like the Jasmine fanbase would actually overshadow Umeko. While I think Mako and Kotoha is just a matter of Mako has a slightly higher margin than Kotoha in terms of popularity... but for the Jasmine and Umeko team, it feels like the former overshadows the latter. Just my confession, I personally couldn't warm up to Umeko as much compared to Kotoha. I guess it's because Kotoha reminds me of Ako in some way even if they have had more differences than similarities. On the side of Boukenger, I think Sakura and Natsuki both tend to balance each other out, just that Sakura may be the more popular one. Umeko still has her moments, sadly she tends to be overshadowed by Jasmine and I am also super guilty of doing so!
Then again, even if Jasmine is not as great as other characters that I've mentioned, I still like her and still do and there are other good reasons to like her but never use she's hot as the reason. She's a likable female character, she's got a dark past and she's helped a child who had a similar experience (remember she can't control her powers), she's got her team heart characteristic and she isn't afraid to speak her mind against bad guys. She's had a partnership with Hoji, she's managed to balance Ban and Umeko and she's just well, a good friend to the whole team. Such characteristics go beyond her beautiful exterior to a beautiful interior that she has that outshines the former. Sad to say again, it's very easy to like her for the WROOOOOONG reasons RIGHT?
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