Recap: The Deboss unveil their most evil, wicked, diabolical scheme yet.

Aqua’s thoughts: Was there any doubt in my mind that an Utsusemimaru-themed episode would be anything but awesome? Channeling some of the complete nuttiness that has been absent from the franchise for way too long, Kyoryuger delivers its best episode to date, with several laugh-out-loud moments, completely nutso twists you would not even dare to anticipate and a pretty efficient, if not a tad bit overdone moral.

While this episode surprisingly strayed away from Utchy’s fish-out-of-water character arc — though we did get some more glorious shots of moustache Daigo — our favourite samurai still stole the show as he tried to help out a spoiled child who loses his parents to a surprisingly competent scheme from the Deboss crew. While the quirky Kyoryuger villains are usually about as intimidating as Pokémon‘s Team Rocket, they made some rather clever use of their completely bizarre Monster of the Week this time. Not only does it teach kids to not be too dependent on their parents and learn to take care of themselves, it also struck some emotional chords as the entire episode basically revolved around kids thinking their parents hate them.

While I think this episode did occasionally take its moral a bit too far — Is it that obvious for grade schoolers to be able to walk home on their own or cook their own meals? — it eventually delivered a neat message that organically fit Utchy’s established backstory without revolving entirely around it. While this means the other Kyoryugers get sidelined a bit, they eventually make up for it with some very funny gags. Daigo simply shooting the Kewtie monster in the face when everyone else falls for its act was a fantastic joke we would not even have dared to ask for. From resident butt monkey Luckiero suffering a whole world of comical abuse at the hands (?) of the shapeshifting Kewtie to the latter being lynched by a horde of lovestruck mooks, this episode overdosed on Kyoryuger‘s trademark accessible, wacky humour and showed once again that the franchise currently rests in some very capable hands.

Random Observations

• Hands up if you expected one of the villains to tell the kid to “give in to despair and give rise to a new Phantom”.
• The department that designs the monster costumes this year must be on drugs.
• One minor disappointment, though: Utchy never bothers to give the kid actual lessons on how to live by himself, which could have resulted in some of his trademark hilarious costume changes.
• Cheaters Dancing Heroes of the Week: The dancing crew girls with colour-coded skirts who might actually be better at the dance than the actual cast.

Zigg’s Thoughts: It’s like someone got all of the writers drunk, high, or both, then locked them in a room with a bunch of typewriters and waited to see what came out the other side. I’m glad they did though as with this episode Kyoryuger fully embraces its transformation into wacky sitcom mode and it’s glorious. There’s just so much bizarre, off the wall crap going on it’s difficult to pick just one bit to praise.

I think what I’ll go for though is how well this episode managed to balance all the crazy stuff with an actually pretty heartfelt story. You can’t go wrong when you put Utchy at the centre of things and he’s just perfect here, mixing goofy optimism with a slightly sterner edge. Even in his tough love moments though he’s never anything less than a pure hero and it’s great to see his straight-man persona be rewarded with good stories like this one. Plus, it just makes all of the silliness surrounding him even funnier. The writers also cleverly tie the moral of the story (anyone can grow stronger than they are) to his own personal experience in a neat call back.

There’s so many standout moments one could pick from here – Kewtie blasting off through the window like a rocket, Daigo’s headshot (which Aqua and I joked about immediately beforehand, never believing it would happen), the completely insane finish where Kewtie is dogpiled under her own mooks…the list goes on. Really, what I’m trying to say is that this episode was a riot from beginning to end, had me pounding the table in laughter throughout, and was overall one of the most enjoyable slices of television I’ve seen in ages. If you’re not watching this, you’re missing out on the most entertaining show this season, animated or not.]

Random Observations

• Why yes, I will be including an image of King Mustache every time he appears.
• Even the rape alarms are cute in Japan
• Luckiero as the whipping boy is the gift which keeps on giving
• How many permutations of the morphing sequence can they possibly go through?