My Thoughts On Lupinranger VS. Patranger In 22 Episodes

WARNING YOU'VE GOT SPOILERS AHEAD!

Well, it's that time of le year isn't it? I already made a bit of a huge summary for Kyuranger in 22 episodes all the while I still continued with le weekly reviews for said show. Now, it's time for me to give my personal opinion on Lupinranger vs. Patranger in 22 episodes. While I thought last year was loads of crazy fun -- this year also presented some crazy fun itself. Last year was a weird mix of Spaceballs (Lucky and Garu), Star Wars (Tsurugi IS the head of the original rebellion and Don Armage looks like he a was a cross between Palpatine and Yuuzhang Vong) and maybe Star Trek (but I don't care about it). Now it's time to get down and dirty in giving my thoughts on Lupinranger vs. Patranger -- FRENCH TIME but not really!

Le opposing protagonist groups and le villains

It's somewhat tagged to be le show where you've got two teams and they can't get along. While it's possible that through Noel that both teams will eventually work together (and toy catalogs show a combination between the two teams) but I could talk about le first half where I was pretty much entertained in some way. Just remember that Kyuranger is the start of the Motoi Sasaki era -- le beginning of rethinking Super Sentai and I'm glad Lupinranger vs. Patranger defied my expectations in some way -- while it may also have flaws in some area. No series is perfect, right?

The Lupinrangers like their namesake Arsene Lupin (the founder of the Lupin Estate) are gentlemen thieves. Their mission is to regather the Lupin Collection to get people they care about back. Yet, Good Striker sides with both le Lupinrangers and their rivals the Patrangers. Le Patrangers are basically what it'd be if Inspector Ganimard (or Inspector Zenigata for you Lupin III fans) were a red ranger or founded his own team. They are at odds with the Lupirangers because of their motifs -- they are policemen while le Lupinrangers are well, thieves.

IMHO, I thought about how le Patranger team is somewhat imbalanced. Tsukasa is the only smart one while Sakuya and Keiichiro play dumb and dumber. Granted, Keiichiro is somewhat a younger version of Ganimard or Zenigata. He's a victim of a running gag where he wants to arrest the Lupinrangers and FAILS every time. It reminds me of le number of times the Tagalog dub of Lupin III comes into my head and wish that the subs were gag-dubbed in Tagalog. Keiichiro is such a poor hapless victim -- he doesn't even know who he's chasing right now. Think about trying to arrest Spiderman and you don't know who he is!

Yet, both of them have a common enemy in the Ganglers -- some alien criminal organization ran by Don Dogoier who's looking for a worthy successor to his criminal empire. I thought about how le criminal empire stole le Lupin Collection. Like le Precious in Boukenger -- these artifacts could destroy le world if they fell into the wrong hands. For some reason, both opposing teams have le Lupin Collection. Le Lupinrangers want to get le Lupin Collection from le monsters of the week -- each one of them resembling a Super Sentai item. If you can guess them all right then maybe you're along the 80s children.

Also, I'm enjoying le arrival of le new character Noel Takao -- a Japanese living in France. He even ships Sakuya and Umika in more than one level. He's working with both teams for a reason. I even have a hunch that he could be that young master we're looking for. What if Noel Takao is really named as Noel Lupin and the Lupinrangers aren't aware of it? I can't wait to see how he'd try to get both teams to get together to defeat the Ganglers! What if Noel realizes he can no longer just sit down and watch as le three-way conflict gets even worse.

Aesthetic designs

I thought about le suit designs themselves are fine. The Lupinrangers have good costumes and le capes fit pretty well. I mean, if you've tried watching some Lupin media they you'll realize that Arsene I had a cape with him in some incarnations. Lupin III's paternal grandfather was seen with a cape. Le Lupinrangers' use of colored visors is once again welcome. I didn't mind seeing them in Timeranger so why would I mind seeing them now?

One le other hand, I find myself not so fond of le Patranger suits. Do I find them horrible? Not really but I think they aren't as good-looking as the Dekaranger suits. I wish whoever did the designs tried to outdo Dekaranger's rather 12 year old designs for le Patrangers. So far, le only Patranger suit that stands out IMHO is the one when Noel is using his powers as Patren-X. I just don't find their part of the fence to have cool aesthetics. On le other hand, I do find them to be still pretty badass so I can let all le not so impressive designs slide!

As for le mecha, I love how the digital designs improved overtime for le combining sequences. I think about how le Lupinrangers' mecha almost looks like a modernized Great Five from Maskman. On le other hand, I don't like le design of Pat Kaiser too much. It's not awful but it's just there to be there. Fortunately, Noel has brought in his badass train mecha which are pretty cool designs though le magazine scan shows one downside in mecha design -- le use of cluster mecha can be very, very weird if you ask me. Still, that's too minor an issue for me to really pick on, right?

Final thoughts... for now!

Things are actually getting pretty exciting especially that Junko Komura has managed to learn newer tricks. While I'd say she somewhat did fine in Zyuohger. Here, Komura has managed to really improve herself to a whole new level -- in fact I dare say several levels of improvement. There may be some things to pick on but these mistakes for me are very minor. It's getting exciting as we're now in the "second half" -- where things can start to unfold even more than they started!