Wednesday, September 25, 2019

Kaitou Sentai Lupinranger VS Keisatsu Sentai Patranger Number 36: Shoot the Bomb - Summary/Review



Back again for episode 36. This is an uncommon episode focused on the Patrangers. The poor Global Police have been getting the short end of the writing all season and I doubt this episode will be different. Hope I'm wrong Click "read more" and let's get this over with.




Analysis


This episode starts off strong by opening up with a Gangler conflict. The 4 Patrangers ambush a new Gangler as he is doing some shady business on a computer.

Kinda looks like a tank

Pecker Zeppelin
The two sides exchange a few blows, but Pecker uses his computer eye to analysis where his rocket will ricochet and hits Sakuya. This rocket has a weird side-effect that causes Sakuya to become careless where he slips on metal robs and fires his gun randomly hitting the other Patrangers. Like an exaggeration of his worst trait. Keiichiro and Tsukasa lecture Sakuya while Noël Takao investigates the computer screen. Cut to Intro! So far, so nothing.

One theme song later, Sakuya is sitting on a bench in a plaza moping about his mistakes when some stranger walks up to him and asks what's wrong. See the title card. This stranger gives Sakuya a necklace that is supposed to calm all feelings of anger. I don't think anger was his problem.


Sakuya instantly believes everything this stranger says and excitingly asks for two more of them for the others and rushes off. Just like a cop would do. Although, this could be the result of the carelessness attack that Sakuya was hit with.

Cutting to the Lipinranger's Bistro, this stranger that Sakuya was just speaking with is their next target, a Gangler in disguise. You mean that nosy stranger who walked up and asked about police business was suspicious? Yup, it's Pecker. Pecker has the Lupin Collection Piece called L'homme sage, which raises intelligence. I could use that.

Back at Global Police, Sakuya convinces Keiichiro to try on one of the necklaces and tests it by confessing to stealing his snack. Unfortunately, something goes wrong. Flames of rage begin to emerge from Keiichiro

Sadly those flames would fit even without a cursed necklace
I need an adult

It is unclear if the others can see the flames.

However, the flames all get absorbed inside the necklace and Keiichiro becomes completely calm. Impressed, Sakuya puts a necklace on himself; only to realize that he doesn't get angry and tries to take it off but can't. This should be a red flag, but Sakuya accidentally smacks Keiichiro and the same process happens again so, no one thinks about it. I'll admit, this seen was pretty amusing.

After some exposition, Jim Carter and  have decoded Pecker's plan which is to create bombs from anger causing humans to destroy their own world. The in-direct plans always work the best.


They can't understand the principle because it makes no sense.

More bad news
Needless to say, this causes a mass panic among the Patrangers as they try desperately to remove the necklaces again, but cannot. Tsukasa decides to find Pecker alone in order to find the bomb since she is the only one without a necklace. 

That just ruined it. I thought the necklaces were the bombs but they are all connected to a bigger bomb. But, if the big bomb is already in place, why not just detonate it? 

Back at the plaza, the Lupinrangers find Pecker handing out the necklaces and they expose him as a Gangler to the public. The 3 of them henshin and begin to attack only for the episode to cut back to the Global Police. I hate these intro to fight scenes this season keeps doing.

Back at the Global Police HQ, Sakuya is still suffering from the carelessness attack and spills hot tea on Keiichiro. Not a little spill, he trips and throws the tea at Keiichiro's head and it shatters into steam. It was funny. Finally, Sakuya breaks down in tears. He says all he ever wanted was for someone to be glad he joined the Global Police but he keeps getting in the way. 

Good news however, due to the tea incident, Jim was able to figure out how the bomb works. Basically, it transforms emotional energy into thermal energy when transmitted. That still makes no sense. Keiichiro rushes into action and gets Sakuya to come along by motivating him the way only he can.


I'm not sure if that was cleaver or condescending but it worked.

Back to the plaza, the Lupinrangers have the traditional battle with Pecker and successfully steal his collection piece.

Let's rock it!
I'm no longer surprised to see an old morpher.

The Lupinrangers are about to finish off Pecker when Tsukasa shows up and stops them because they still need to learn about the bomb. 


The Patrangers have repeatably lost to the Lupinrangers. How was she able to take them all on alone?

Now the race is on to find the bomb. Keiichiro and Sakuya are searching frantically while Tsukasa tries to get information from the Gangler. There is no way Pecker will tell them, but Tsukasa gets the idea to use his own carelessness attack against him. She charges in and gets Pecker to fire his missiles, Tsukasa uses Umika's shield to knock it back and plan accomplished. 

Your zipper is showing
Why couldn't the episode be focused on the careless attack? This is amusing. 

I appreciate the Eggman colors.

Unfortunately, Sakuya and Keiichiro are too far away to reach the bomb before it hits 100%, so Keiichiro puts his faith in Sakuya's sniping ability to shoot the bomb's antenna. 

Sakuya did make an off-hand comment earlier that he was an expert sniper before the carelessness attack got to him. If the Patrangers had more focus, that fact could have just been established by now without needing to be seen. At least, that's what past seasons did.

Doesn't take a genius to guess what happens next. Sakuya doesn't think he can do it, Keiichiro gives him a lesson on having confidence and of course he hits the target with only 0.02% left till full. The Lupinrangers destroy Pecker just as Sakuya fired which broke the carelessness spell so there is some mystery. 

Continuing the train of predictable, Pecker grows big and the Lupinrangers get a new mech combination. Of course they get to steal the show.

Lupin Magnum Superieur

Lupin magnum combines with the blue and yellow VS vehicles and the Rangers don't even need to pilot it. Looks like Goodstriker is out of a job.

Patkaiser (the Patrangers megazord) also joins in the fight and the two double team Pecker by putting the bomb into his safe. Good thing the bomb also grew in size because reasons. They knock Pecker into space, (literally) Lupinmagnum fires a giant bullet, monster goes boom and the Patrangers declare another "Mission Accomplished". Despite not getting the final blow in.

The episode ends back at the Patrangers HQ where Sakuya is grabbing excitedly about his miracle shot. He then accidentally spills more hot tea on Keiichiro and gets yelled at. Status quo returned, THE END!

Final Thoughts


I'm happy, I was proven wrong. This episode had both exciting and funny moments while maintaining a quick pace. Sadly, it did end with the Patrangers still looking inferior to the Lupinrangers despite being the focus of the episode. Another issue that was confusing was the lack of action from Noël Takao. He was part of the first fight but then stayed behind in the base studying the bomb for the rest of the episode. Even after everything was figured out, they didn't even bother having him try to re-join the battle. Too many faces to focus on. Other than that, I am satisfied. This was a good episode and hopefully it wasn't the last one to give any attention to the Patrangers. 4/5

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