| GaoRanger
VS Super Sentai (2001)
Production: Toei Corporation
Duration: 72 Minutes
By David McRobie
Make sure to check out David's
site for more classic tokusatsu info!
Introduction
One of the neatest things about
Japanese TV shows is that they usually get a movie made out
of them. Kamen Rider, Kikaida,
Inazuman, even Spiderman
all had theatrical movies. The Sentai series were no different,
and more recently they've moved towards the team up movies
(although the first one was JAQK VS GoRanger
back in the mid 70s). Despite the titles, the teams never
fought each other.
The
Story
So now we get to the 25th Super
Sentai anniversary movie. Their enemies, who lure them to
a place where the spirit beast Rakushasa is asleep, are attacking
the current team, 100 Beast Sentai GaoRanger. He wakens and
strips them of their fighting spirit. Gao Red refuses to give
into that despair, and sends Gao White away with the other
three members. A mysterious monk who tells them they must
find the colors and retrieve their fighting spirits meets
them. Their G-Phones slip away from them in four different
directions, and they find four members of former Sentai to
help them - Red Falcon from Liveman, Mega
Pink from MegaRanger, Ginga Blue from Gingaman
and Go Yellow from Go Go Five. With the older
team’s help, they retrieve their will to fight and return
to help Gao Red in a spectacular finish!
Review
This is a pretty nifty movie.
You get to see many of the older teams in flashbacks as the
GaoRangers are shown how they can recover. It’s difficult
for me to tell the difference in many of the post “Power
Ranger” series, as the Gingaman costumes
look almost identical to the ZyuRanger ones.
I wish the teams looked different from each other, like the
first three did- you could tell them apart by more than color,
and they gave the members some real personality. You have
to credit the stunt-actors in those suits as well for acting
like their non-costumed counterparts.
It’s also nice to see Hiroshi Miyauchi
return as Big One from JAQK: Blitzkrieg Squad.
He easily steals the entire movie from the rest of the characters.
Hiroshi was also in Kamen Rider V3, GoRanger,
AND Vigilant Zubat, in case you wondered
or cared. Red Falcon was cool to see. Daisuke Shima, who recently
portrayed Captain Hiura on Ultraman Cosmos, reprises his role
here as well. These two really look like heroes, while most
of the younger ones still look like kids.
The ending is fairly predictable, but is still
neat to see. But what on Earth were they thinking, making
the transformation devices cell phones? Those don’t
look nearly as cool as the other gadgets from the previous
teams (except maybe the silly keys from CarRanger!).
There are some nice touches with all the robots from the previous
Super Sentai teams (that would be from Battle Fever
J on) showing up. The stock footage is integrated
nicely, and the miniatures make the cgi look like the cartoons
they truly are.
Conclusion
All in all, I highly recommend
this made-for-DVD movie. It’s a great introduction to
the entire Sentai series
David McRobie
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