My Thoughts On Gogo Five In 26 Episodes

"Your mission is far from over, you've only seen 26 episodes for now!"

So I've watched Gogo Five a few weeks ago and I can say, I have finished my 26 episodes plus the movie in a short amount of time, because it's FREAKING AWESOME. What's better is that, now that I can understand it thanks to the English subs provided by Another Imagination Station, it's time for me to share my feelings on this series.

Although I haven't felt any dislike for Fiveman and I still like Fiveman, I felt like Gogo Five is an improved version of Fiveman but I felt there's more nostalgia to this show than just the sibling team. I can go ahead and scream, "FIVEMAN! FIVEMAN! FIVEMAN!" to this show but I thought the idea of a rescue team, where have I seen that before? There was the Rescue Police Trilogy (which these shows had no real main villain in contrast to Dekaranger which had Agent Abrella but as a sideline salesman), what was amazing was that in 1990, we had Fiveman (for Super Sentai) which aired on March 2, 1990 while we had Winspector (which I am yet to see) which aired on February 4, 1990. So did producers dig up a lot of old shows to create something new? If they did, they surely created such a brilliant way of moving forward compared to most of the modern Super Sentai today.


For starters, I think the Tatsumi Family might be the improved version of the Hoshikawa family except they only have one sister. Matoi himself is a more pressured version of Gaku, Nagare is the scientific guy of the family who pretty much follows his father's footseps, Shou is an expert in aeronautics which explains why he's in charge of air operations, Daimon is a policeman and Matsuri works in a hospital. They have lost their father several years ago and doesn't immediately understand the reason, until later they realized that their father had no pleasure in leaving them for ten years because a much bigger threat called the Saima Clan had appeared. If they are not fighting the Saima Clan, they are also rescuing people like they always did and they learn what life means the more the show moves forward.

As usual, beware for spoilers!


In the process of watching Gogo Five, I still can't help but everyone's taking ideas from Soda's era and improving them which this show did. Matoi reading the newspaper on the breakfast table? Got that from Fiveman? Scientist aware that something dark and sinister is about to destroy the world? You got that from Maskman. In fact, I am even feeling that the whole idea of the Grand Witch Grandienne absorbing negative energy? Didn't that happen in Fiveman? It just made me think that Gogo-Five was a season where you are taking Soda's classic moments to a whole new level. In the case of Gogo Five, I feel like it's throwing back to some of Hirohisa Soda's and Takeyuki Suzuki with the head writer is Junki Takegami (assisted by Yasuko Kobayashi, Junichi Miyashita of Metal Hero fame and Ryota Yamaguchi) with Jun Hikasa as the producer. But I cannot deny the show is sort of an "upgrade" to the Soda era which ended with Fiveman and the last series he got involved with was Ohranger where he already left a good framework to follow.

If anything, I thought this show also had shades of Metal Heroes like why does the narrator keep repeating stuff like Pierre's growing up of the monsters, the repeated dialogue was somewhat existent in Fiveman when the Gorlin absorbed the monster (but that's Super Sentai) or when the mecha appeared. Hmmm...


The first twenty five episodes of the show was focused on the supernatural phenomenon known as the "Grand Cross" where its ruler Grand Witch Grandienne is a malevolent creature born from Negative Energy. I always thought that in some way when she speaks to her children, it reminds me of how Empress Meadow in Fiveman would talk but she's real and much bigger nightmare fuel. She reminds her children of the need for the ritual to complete so she can descend in full. The family itself for me has some shades of old cliches but at the same time, having a more gloomy atmosphere. For example, Zyphleeza is a cruel adversary but he's a loving son to his mother, you have Pierre acting as a more evil version of Acha from Ohranger, Dinus carries typical the mistress of deception title (comparable to Farrah in Bioman and Dordora in Fiveman to name a few) and Cobolda... well I can't really say much yet. We also have Drop who would later become the very cruel Salamandes... quick growth from infancy to adulthood?

My impression is that compared to the very light and fluffy world of Magiranger, the Saima Clan really have the nightmare fuel of a ghoul-themed family. The conflict of Gogo Five is pretty much science vs. the supernatural. If anything, I think the Saima Clan are much better than the villains in Magiranger, 'nuff said.


I always thought the appearance the Grand Liner robot is really well, why didn't ToQGer make its mecha as cool? I know the show deserved its award but I thought, come on, people should still watch Gogo Five regardless. I always thought this train robot was a really badass design. Which reminds me, when I played that Lightspeed Rescue game way back in the first Playstation system, I enjoyed the Supertrain Megazord's design the best. The disadvantage behind this robot is even when it's stronger, it's still pretty slow.


The show managed to take Tetraboy's and Tackleboy's concept to another level with Liner-BOY. Hmmm... what's with the suffix "boy" to all these robots? I really thought that this one could talk and operated as a "sixth member" and the latest member of the Tatsumi family.


Eventually, we see the eldest son Zylpheeza get destroyed by this new combination called the Max Victory Robo. I pretty much like this badass combination. The episode where Max Victory Robo formed was for me, one badass toy commercial that would convince me to buy the toys. Now moving on...


Midway the series presents Grand Witch Grandienne who at first, appears pretty much incomplete since the Grand Cross ritual failed. I really felt like the ritual needed some children to be sacrificed like Zyuranger's calling for Bandora or Kakuranger's ritual to bring Daimaou to the surface world, I guess nobody wanted to repeat that gag but I thought it could have worked. I thought that even with the big bad appearing in her incomplete form, I always felt like... this is pure nightmare fuel. So really, I've seen some of her shots where she's completed and looking at her, ugh, she's cold and cruel towards everyone. Her counterpart in Lightspeed Rescue wasn't any less cruel than she was as well.


The cute baby drop is now the Draconian Prince Salamandes, who's got that badass design. While I've seen some of his footage in raw, I just want to see more of his dialogue subbed. As said, I really can't wait to add this splendid series in my list of Super Sentai series I've watched from start to end.