[justsomeguy]

Go-Busters review: "The Good, the Bad, and the Different"

* Excellent fight scenes. The differing style (escrima?) emphasizes skill over flashiness and hot blood. All of the victories are achieved by planning and execution, not by raging and hoping for the best. Even the finale was brought about by analyzing the regenerating villain for a weakness, with the logical solution fitting everything the show had presented.

* There are no miracles in this show. Everybody who got send to Hyperspace before the story began dies, permanently, sacrificed by the Go-Busters themselves in order to defeat Vagras. This is a show where there are no "other ways" pulled out of the ass in the nick of time.

* Some of the early fights are very short, and there was barely any time to appreciate the monster suit designs. Gunroid comes to mind as deserving better.

* Some of the best mecha battles in sentai. Go-Buster Ace is a thing of beauty, and the mechas are all used individually quite often. They're also all treated like the machines they are, with large hangars and maintenance staff.

* Unfortunately, Go-BusterOh had some crappy battles in the beginning, literally copy-paste combine and use final attack battles. It's good for emphasizing the mech's mass and relative lack of maneuverability compared to Ace, but doesn't make for exciting battles.

* Enter was a great villain. He spent a lot of time trolling the Go-Busters, doing his own thing, gathering up Enetron, and becoming the BBEG at the end. And the show acknowledges his success (unlike the show that aired 30 minutes earlier, which treats its villain trio as failures even though they successfully gather up 1/12 of the energy they needed every episode, and completed the task twice!). His motivation at the end to become the ultimate human being, and having full understanding of sentai tropes like drawing strength from emotions was unique among villains.

* Escape was really underdeveloped. Her character was loyal to Messiah and liked a challenging fight, but that's all. She never even got a cameo in either OP, and was used like a MOTW in the end. I got the sense that she was in the show fo rthe sole reason of having one more villain.

* Same impression for Li-Oh. Despite being sentient like the Buddyroids, it was used as just one more mecha. The introduction of its forms and combinations were oddly understated. There was also an error where the Li-Oh Blaster was used even while the mech was being piloted. I get the sense that Kobayashi did not like Escape or Li-Oh.

Final score: 9/10. Yes, it's a serious show, and the characters act seriously most of the time. However, the plot and its deviations from typical sentai story structure definitely make the show interesting, and I disagree with all the criticisms of "boring." I can see why the show would not really appeal to kids, though. And I'm stuck wondering where Kobayashi would have taken the show had the executives not demanded a retool halfway through, which pushed the show into more usual territory.

Next week: The exact opposite end of the spectrum. There's dinosaurs. There's samba. But no yellow.