Recap: With Violet hospitalised, Daigo and the team prepare Plezuon for an upgrade. Little do they know that Chaos has his own scheme in the works.

Aqua’s thoughts: No! Why the heck are you shoehorning in a sudden crush, Kyoryuger! You can’t break up Amy and Utchy! Okay, I do think her little jealous streak came all the way out of leftfield — Can’t you find anything else for girls to do aside from falling for and fighting over men, Japan? — but it did make for an adorable little scene in which the both of them get so confused they just end up acting like awesome bros and punching mooks anyways. Kyoryuger simply has great character interactions overall, ranging from Ian subtly pushing Yayois buttons (not like that, ew) and casually holding onto a struggling henchman while eavesdropping on his younger teammates, to Yayoi’s adorable puppy crush on King, who seems all too busy bonding with giant toy dinosaurs on a spiritual level.

After the space dinosaurs and old man Rangers last week, Kyoryuger ups the ante once again — with a surprisingly solid plan from Priest Chaos himself. It thrives a bit too much on the age-old trope where the villains manage to achieve their evil goal despite earlier episodes implying the exact opposite, especially with idiots as outrageously incompetent as Luckyero amongst their ranks, but it did make for a rare, actual cliffhanger. Is Deboss actually going to stay alive, or will another villain take the helm? The big man himself looks rather silly, though; a quite obvious reskin of the giant mookzilla the show likes to throw around occasionally. Is this cuddly stuffed animal really supposed to be our big baddie? He even makes little “raaawr” sounds!

… Am I the only one who finds that ridiculously adorable?

Random Observations

• I love how Computer Virisun wears a suit, sunglasses and speaks Engrish. Sure is nineties “hacker” in here.
• Admittedly, the whole “Yayoi has a crush” subplot would have been way better if it were Nossan she was in love with.
• Speaking of which, Toei, you had better make her take up her grandpa’s mantle. I know I should not be getting my hopes up, but hey, you brought Mayu back too. Now you have no excuse.

Zigg’s Thoughts: Yet another super fun, super flashy episode of Kyoryuger, although definitely one that also has much larger scale plot aspirations. These are something of a mixed bag, but as ever it’s strong character work and good jokes that make the story sing.

I have to say that the opening part of this episode was for me by far and away the more entertaining segment. Yayoi having a mad, borderline-stalkerish crush on Daigo is a simple but really effective piece of characterisation and the escalating reveals of her picture collection was an old joke done to perfection, and helped by Ian and Utchy’s incredulous reactions. Amy’s jealousy is a great turn as well – it’s cute and the fact that she’s not really sure of her feelings herself adds a nice little touch of realism to the character. It’s not vulnerability per se, but a reminder she’s meant to be relatively young and naive, and again Ian’s playful needling of her made for great interpersonal comedy. There’s also the setup for some interesting conflict down the line. Yayoi having failed Daigo and Amy feuding with Yayoi over his affections are two obvious routes that could be taken, either of which could be good.

The back half of the episode is less strong however. The fight is good but it all sort of goes to pieces once Deboss shows up. Let’s be blunt – he looks utterly stupid, and while that’s normally a plus in Kyoryuger land, it’s less so for the guy who’s supposedly your big bad. He should looks scary, but instead it’s painfully obviosu he’s a dolled-up version of one of the giant mooks and he has way too much random crap slapped on all over for the design to be effective or even coherent. Chaos’s plan to dump the base in the infused reservoir is actually pretty clever but the subsequent giant robot fight is just sort of bleh. I’ve had trouble getting into the mecha bits in Kyoryuger and I’m not entirely sure why – perhaps it’s because I don’t think they look very cool? Regardless this was something of a snoozer, but I do like we’re going to three episodes. It’ll be interesting to see how Deboss is ‘defeated’ while still ensuring the threat remains.

Random Observations:

• Yes, it absolutely looks like Virisun is pissing off the dam. This isn’t a problem because it makes the whole thing much funnier.
• Words cannot express how amazing the fact that Debo Computervirisun wears sunglasses is.
• Marie Iitoyo, who plays Yayoi, was born in 1998, which makes me feel unbelievably old.
• Dancing hero of the week – the kid in the dinosaur costume who chose to identify himself only as DINOMAN.