Recap: Amy’s butler Gentle decides she needs to be more ladylike, while a new Debo Monster attempts to whip Luckiero into shape.

Aquagaze‘s Thoughts: Kyoryuger seems to be smack-dab in the middle of the classic spotlight episode filler month, but don’t hold that against it. It took a while to get the team up and running, but with the addition of Utsusemimaru, the cast is now strong enough to support entire episodes based around their wacky antics. After Souji’s high school romance misadventures last week, it’s Amy’s turn to shine now, in an episode with a rather obvious, yet nonetheless neatly delivered message.

In a rather nutsy twist on both My Fair Lady and the Super Sentai classic “parents disapprove of the rich kid being a Ranger” episode, Amy’s butler Gentle steps up to the plate to teach his young master a thing or two about proper manners. Sure, Gentle can be a bit of a jerk, and I wonder why exactly learning to wear a kimono and sitting properly is for your own good, but I cannot doubt the motives of a guy who hires Utsusemimaru as his assistant. I swear that guy is just being possessed by Deneb from Kamen Rider Den-O 24/7. What this episode does very neatly is how the same theme of the heroes’ story is carried over to the villain’s side, with the hilariously designed monster of the week, Debo Stricteach, subjecting Luckiero to his school of hard knocks. It allows the show to teach kids to listen to their teachers, but at the same time gives them the joy of seeing a cartoon jerk teacher getting blown to bits. With toys!

A nice addition to this episode is how it manages to acknowledge several little details that popped up in earlier episodes. Luckiero’s love for shoujo manga shows up again as an important plot point, and Amy’s slouchiness even helped her escape Dogold a good few episodes ago. While there were some minor mishaps, most gratingly the narrator explaining why there is a shoujo manga lying around the Kyoryugers’ base in stead of just showing Amy reading it at the beginning of the episode, the combination quirky characters and some awesome jokes made this episode a winner. More of this, please!

Random Observations

• Amy’s little English squees are still adorable.
• For the first time, we actually get to see how the Kyoryugers access their base. According to Torin’s explanation at the end, there appear to be multiple entrances.
• A rather unfortunate implication, but of course, it’s the girl of the team who gets her morpher stolen and tied up. Admittedly, she did end up being the only one smart enough to use Kyoryujin to throw Luckiero’s bouncy ball bomb into space.
• Stricteach’s “analysis” of Utsusemimaru’s equipment sure made for some pretty bloody obvious toy adverts, did it not?
• Speaking of toy adverts, the commercials Over-Time included specifically point out that “toys are intended for children”. Sorry, guys!
• Adorable kids wearing sweet homemade Kyoryuger uniforms in the credits. I love this show.

Dragonzigg‘s Thoughts: The teens are typically a relatively barren time for Sentai as it’s too early to begin major plot machinations yet the novelty of the early episodes has largely worn off. This leads to large chunks of filler, which prove the acid test of whether a show is going to sustain your interest in the long term. Fortunately, as we’ve seen through the last few weeks, and again this week, Kyoryuger is more than up to the task.

Though they’re both comedy episodes, Kyoryuger stands in stark contrast to this week’s Wizard because the comedy is natural, free flowing and never feels forced. I’m attributing this to Kyoryuger‘s much more likable and dynamic cast. Sure, in some was they’re just a collection of cut-out character archetypes, but they’re so enthusiastically brought to life by the script and by the actors that it doesn’t really matter if they’re just playing broad stereotypes. Likewise, we’ve seen this basic plot a thousand times before, but the specific embellishments this time round are enough to make it more than worth the time.

I think what really makes this episode tick is the fact that Luckiero is almost as much of a protagonist as the Kyoryugers and we’re not so subtly encouraged to root for him against the fantastically jerkish Debo Stricteach. His silly childishness diminishes his threat as a bad guy but significantly;y boosts his comedy value, and we’ve got Dogold and Chaos for legitimate wrongdoing anyway, so why not have some fun with him?  There’s tons of neat little comedic touches evident here, from the amazing vocal performance of Debo Stricteach to Torin’s warnings about ‘restraining bravery’ to the continuing delightfulness of Utchy. If I’ve got a criticism it’s that the back half of the show descends a little into classic Sentai toy commercial status, but the stuff they’re hawking is fresh enough even that sort of bought a smile to my face. It’s just that kind of a show dammit.

Random Observations

• This episode sort of allows the writers to have their cake and eat it, as the ultimate message is still ‘teachers are doing what’s best for you’…but we still get to see a dastardly teacher blown up onscreen in a hugely kiddie-pleasing move.
• Love Utchy entering the classroom simply by exploding the door.
• Those who saw Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger may recognise Gentle as the dickish owner of the Gold Tree.
• Toei continues its longstanding tradition of not being able to stick to a single romanization by spelling Deboss ‘Deboth’ on Luckiero’s textbooks.
• Adorable dance of the credits – the little girl and boy who go last correctly mimicking Amy and Souji’s ending poses.