CAA: Christian Anime Alliance

"It looks just like Power Rangers!"

A phrase I hear all too often. It annoys me, and some may ask, why do I care? I care for the same reason that anime fans get annoyed when someone looks at Miyazaki and says "Hey isn't that one of those ultra-violent Japanese porno cartoons?" I care for the same reason a Half-Life fan would be annoyed if someone said "Hey that looks just like Halo!"

And I don't want to speak for her but I'm sure Crimmy would be just a bit annoyed if someone saw her watching Gamera and said "Hey it's Godzilla!"

Anyway, when you actually sit down and take a good look at it, the Super Sentai series (this is the series Power Rangers is based on) doesn't look anything like most other tokusatsu shows (tokusatsu is the Japanese word for "special effects" which is what live-action shows that use them are called).

So here is a quick, handy guide to show you the differences between Super Sentai ("Japanese Power Rangers") and other shows, starting with the obvious visual differences and going down.

PART ONE: The helmets

This is the easiest way to tell Super Sentai from any other toku. The helmets in Super Sentai have black visors, and are styled somewhat, but they look like regular helmets for the most part. Here we have the Green Ranger's helmet.



Again, note the black visor, and the relative lack of anything sticking off the helmet itself, and nothing really special about it.



Here, we have our good friend Tsurugi's helmet, also known as Kamen Rider Sasword from Kabuto. Note the lack of black visor, an immediate clue that it is not related to Power Rangers (as I said before, black visor is a definitive property of Super Sentai). Also notice that stuff comes off of the helmet, almost never seen in Super Sentai.

Another clue is that if the helmet has recognizable facial features...



...like good ol' Ultraman here, it's not Super Sentai, since they never have facial features on the helmet. At the most they will have a mouth (as visible on the Green Ranger's helmet) but that's about it.

PART TWO: The outfit

The helmet's the biggest and most obvious clue, but there's also the rest of the outfit. Super Sentai/Power Rangers always use spandex. ALWAYS. Unless you're talking about the earlier stuff (like Battle Fever J), and then it's cloth. But for the greater part of 20 years, Sentai has always used simple spandex outfits, and always will. And when I say simple, I mean that. Simple. Sometimes you have small additions (like the Green Ranger's shield or the MagiRanger's cloaks) but for the most part, there's nothing else on the spandex suit.



Go-On Red here shows us the standard simple spandex suit of Sentai.

Now other tokusatsu do sometimes use spandex. However when you're talking Kamen Rider there's only one word you need to know: PVC. Kamen Rider NEVER uses spandex, and probably never will. Further, Kamen Rider always has plastic/foam armor attached to the PVC suit. It looks ornate, detailed...not simple like Sentai's.



And here we have Kiva showing the complexities of a Kamen Rider suit...lots of stuff on there eh? Not just a simple suit, that's for sure.

PART THREE: Common suits

Sentai is a show about teamwork. I'll get to that later. But what I'm saying is that in Sentai/Power Rangers, you have five guys (sometimes less, sometimes more) that are a team. As such, they have matching outfits. They have slight differences between them but for the most part they look exactly the same, just different colors.



Here we have Fiveman showing us that the helmet designs are varied, but the suits themselves look basically the same, just differently colored. It shows they're all part of the same team, they're related. It's like when your mom made you and your brothers all wear the same kind of shirt when you went somewhere so you could be easily located.

Now here's the four main Riders of Kamen Rider Blade.



Completely different suits! The only two that look remotely similar are Blade and Garren (the red and blue guys) and that's for storyline reasons, but even then they don't look THAT much alike. Certainly not as similar as the Sentai groups.

PART FOUR: Giant robots

Sentai has 'em, Kamen Rider and most other toku don't. Ultraman actually grows in size, so he doesn't use a giant robot. Kamen Rider J was able to grow too, but he's the only Rider that has ever been able to do that. So basically what this boils down to is, if you see a giant robot, it's Sentai/Power Rangers. If you don't, it isn't.

HOWEVER. One addendum to that rule.

If the giant robot is NOT a guy in a suit, it's not Sentai. For example, Rescue Force has a giant robot, Rescue Max.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmw0Cvim2zM

But as you can see, it's completely CG. Sentai never does CG for the giant robots, they always use guy in a suit.

PART FIVE: Henshin! and the rest

Now we get to the less noticeable stuff. The first is that Sentai uses a lot of stock footage. Stock footage for the transformations, stock footage for the attacks, stock footage for the giant robots, stock footage for the ultimate attacks...you get what I'm saying.

Kamen Rider on the other hand uses very little stock footage. In fact the only series I can think of with any was Kamen Rider Ryuki, when they went on the Ride Shooters through the Mirror World...but even then it wasn't that often, and they basically never showed it at all after episode 15 or so.

Basically Sentai thrives on stock footage, whereas many other tokusatsu don't even use it at all.

Another difference, though slight, is that Sentai will have a different transformation phrase for each series. "Let's Go On!" "Ippitsu Soujo!" "Megaranger Install!" "Dinobuckler!" What I'm saying is, it's always different.

With Kamen Rider (except for Hibiki) the transformation phrase is always the same..."HENSHIN!" It's like the trademark of the KR series.

Next we have the themes. Sentai is about teamwork. Though occasional episodes will showcase one certain character and give him/her a chance to shine, for the most part Sentai/Power Rangers will show you a person working by themselves is weak, but when friends combine their powers, they become even stronger. That's why the finishers always use all five members.

Other toku doesn't rely on teamwork as much. Kamen Rider especially is usually about one main person, who's normally a "lone wolf" type and can handle everything themselves.

This mainly only applies to Kamen Rider, but there's also "sexism." It's mostly a joke among fans, but the way it works is, Sentai almost always has a woman on the team. Sometimes two. Kamen Rider on the other hand is notorious for never having female Riders. It's strictly a boys' club. There actually HAVE been a handful of female Riders over the years, but they're either minor characters or barely Riders at all.

Anyway. This was a long post. And I'm sure almost nobody read it, or even really cares that much. And I'm sure I'll have to continue to deal with "Hey that's Power Rangers!" until the day I die. But I wanted to show that if you really look at it, the differences are obvious between Sentai and other toku shows. It's just that, like people who think all anime is hentai, the people who don't understand don't care to take the time to learn.

But, I just wanted to get that off my back.

Actually that was pretty interesting. I will make a better response tomorrow after I've slept. Just wanted to let you know I read the whole thing. XD

Nate (post: 1316903) wrote:And I don't want to speak for her but I'm sure Crimmy would be just a bit annoyed if someone saw her watching Gamera and said "Hey it's Godzilla!"

That would be incredibly unbelievable and I would think that person was blind, yes. There is a very obvious way-too-big difference. Gamera is a giant turtle that flies and breathes plasma fire, Godzilla is a giant mutated dinosaur that despises humanity and breathes atomic breath.

And actually, this was kinda helpful. I've sorta been getting into toku myself with Garo, so a nice guide is nice.

To be honest though, I wouldn't get too frustrated about it. Someone who doesn't know anything about toku besides watching Power Rangers on Sundays as a kid can easily get them confused. Toku isn't a very well-known genre. So of course, the first thing they'll recognize is the guy in the suit and remember "Go! Go! Power Rangers!" Unfortunately, I have a similar problem with people who have watched the horribly dubbed Godzilla movies which are so far below the originals it's funny yet sad.

So yes! Nice guide, I loves it.

Looks to me like sentai shows are similar to super robot shows, which I have grown to enjoy quite a bit.

" wrote:Super Robot (スーパーロボット, Sūpā Robotto?) is a term used in manga and anime to describe a giant robot or mecha, with an arsenal of fantastic super-powered weapons, are extremely resistant to damage unless the plot calls for it, sometimes transformable or combined from two or more robots and/or vehicles usually piloted by young, daring heroes, and often shrouded by mystical or legendary origins. This is distinct from a Real Robot, which is a mecha portrayed as a relatively common item, used by military organizations in the same manner as tanks or aircraft.

Combining super robots often have a team of at least three pilots who usually, but not always, wear similar outfits and helmets. A good example of a five-man combiner team with matching outfits is Golion (aka Voltron):



Most of the time there's a "combine" (or "gattai") command that the main pilot has to shout out, which is sort of like a henshin phrase. In Golion, Kogane Akira simply calls out, "Golion, gattai!" In Voltes V (Five), it's a little different-- Gou Ken'ichi calls out for the team to get into formation: "V (Vee) together!" Then the whole team calls out "Let's volt in!" to combine. You get the idea.

Much like super sentai teams, combiner teams often have an obligatory female member. XD But the teams are usually a little more...how should I say this? Well, usually a team has a little kid and a big guy, too. I think that's kind of different from sentai, where their body types and sizes seem to be pretty similar. Also, I don't know if this is the same in sentai, but the red guy is almost always the leader.

So yeah, the comparison between super robot shows and super sentai shows only goes so far, I suppose. Not all super robots are combiners-- for example, Mazinger Z (the first super robot). Kabuto Kouji is the only pilot and the only combining going on is when his little cockpit module (called the Pilder, haha) docks into Mazinger Z's head.

Not all combiners are created equal, either. Daitarn 3 is a combiner, but Haran Banjou is the only pilot! And Baldios is a combiner, but the pilots don't wear helmets (that I am aware of) and they all hate each other. The super robot genre is pretty diverse!

Also, almost all super robots, combiner or not, have attack names that are called out. And stock footage is abundant. Not all super robot shows use a lot of stock footage, but when they do, they use it for the same purposes that sentai shows do: attacks, gattai sequences, etc.

Anyway, don't let anybody tell you that all mecha shows are the same: super robots are worlds apart from real robots. Mazinger Z and RX-78-2 Gundam are like night and day! It's like saying tokusatsu and super sentai are the same thing. XD

Whew! I really wasn't trying to outdo you there, Nate. I just like blathering on about this stuff when I get the chance. >_>

CrimsonRyu17 (post: 1316951) wrote:To be honest though, I wouldn't get too frustrated about it. Someone who doesn't know anything about toku besides watching Power Rangers on Sundays as a kid can easily get them confused.

ditto from someone who has only seen power rangers. But this looks very interesting; I mean, no more annoying catch-phrases, over-used stock footage, etc....that actually sounds pretty good....

What if I said it reminded me of Power Rangers, only it's a billion times better?

Thanks for typing this out though. I (and probably many others when hearing about this show) tend to just group it with some sort of Power Rangers show; when it's actually very different. :\

*wanders out of this thread, more educated*

Woah. Thanks for explaining that Nate! Like I said a long time ago, you're like a human encyclopedia ^^.

CrimsonRyu17 wrote:I've sorta been getting into toku myself with Garo, so a nice guide is nice.

GARO. Everyone says that show is beyond super awesome. I need to see more of it.

Nette wrote:Not all super robots are combiners-- for example, Mazinger Z (the first super robot). Kabuto Kouji is the only pilot and the only combining going on is when his little cockpit module (called the Pilder, haha) docks into Mazinger Z's head.

Interestingly, the "first" Super Sentai series, Battle Fever J, had a normal giant robot that didn't combine or transform:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rOQdl1wnpw

The first one to have a combining robot was Sun Vulcan, which had a two-vehicle gattai. Still, there have been recent Sentai series that had non-gattai mecha, Megaranger (which became Power Rangers in Space in the US) simply had a space station that became the mecha, without any gattai (until they got a second set of separate mecha later).

Well, usually a team has a little kid and a big guy, too. I think that's kind of different from sentai, where their body types and sizes seem to be pretty similar. Also, I don't know if this is the same in sentai, but the red guy is almost always the leader.

Sentai has, as far as I know, only had one child member. That would be Kibaranger from Dairanger, who was 9 years old. However, he grew to adult size when he transformed (but his voice stayed the same).

Also in Jetman (which was kind of a live-action version of Gatchaman in some ways), Yellow Owl was a bit out of shape and overweight, the only difference in body type that really stands out to me in all of Sentai.

And yeah, Red is always the leader in Sentai series, with the exception of Kakuranger, where Ninja White was the leader...also making her the only female Sentai leader (since Red Sentai members are never female).

Nate (post: 1317084) wrote:GARO. Everyone says that show is beyond super awesome. I need to see more of it.

Yes you do...the awesome levels in that show are off the scale.

Nate (post: 1317084) wrote:GARO. Everyone says that show is beyond super awesome. I need to see more of it.

It is actually pretty awesome, and toku isn't even rly my thing. Unfortunately, I'm having a hard tiem watching it (the youtube eps have become unsynced sound-wise and veoh is a butt) but I finished episode 6 and it's picking up. I've fallen in love with the amazing armor, the battles are flipping awesome, the foe are kinda weird but fun..

Yes, you do need to watch moar, foo.

CrimsonRyu17 (post: 1317122) wrote:It is actually pretty awesome, and toku isn't even rly my thing. Unfortunately, I'm having a hard tiem watching it (the youtube eps have become unsynced sound-wise and veoh is a butt) but I finished episode 6 and it's picking up. I've fallen in love with the amazing armor, the battles are flipping awesome, the foe are kinda weird but fun..

Yes, you do need to watch moar, foo.

Oh just wait untill the story starts picking up, the entire series become epic, especially the last few episodes.

So... Sentai is the series, Toku is the genre? I realize I'm probably being dense here, but I always thought Sentai was the genre.

Yeah, Sentai is the series...although it's called Super Sentai now. The first Sentai series was Goranger, followed by JAKQ.

Then the Japanese Spider-Man aired, and was the first show to feature a superhero piloting a giant robot. JAKQ and Goranger had large vehicles, but not robots.

So, when Battle Fever J came out, it had a giant robot in it. Thus, even though Goranger was the first Sentai, Battle Fever J is the first "Super" Sentai (the giant robot makes it super I guess). However, by the time Boukenger rolled around Goranger and JAKQ were retconned as Super Sentai (they hadn't been previously, which is why Zyuranger was considered the 20th anniversary of Super Sentai even though it's the 22nd series if you count Goranger and JAKQ).

But yeah, the series is called Super Sentai though technically it qualifies as a sub-genre as well, same as with Metal Heroes and Kamen Rider.

Well that was informative. I used the term "sentai" to refer to all those series. However it seems that it comes down to they being either "super sentai" or "kamen raider". Arent there other series of this style?

On other note, I remember a really old sentai series called "Liveman", even being a child I used to saw it if only to laugh at its sheer absurdity. The plot for each episode was: the heroes fight the newest alien monster tossed at them by the enemy and defeated it more or less effortlessly, then the head of the aliens would appear and wave a wand casting "phantom resurrection" on the monster, making it come back to life and 50 times its original size. That's when the heroes had to assemble into Liveman, the giant robot. Does anyone remember this?

Maokun (post: 1317556) wrote:Well that was informative. I used the term "sentai" to refer to all those series. However it seems that it comes down to they being either "super sentai" or "kamen raider". Arent there other series of this style?

Which style? Sentai or toku? XD As for toku, there are other shows besides Kamen Rider. Android Kikaider and Inazuman, for example.

Maokun wrote:However it seems that it comes down to they being either "super sentai" or "kamen raider". Arent there other series of this style?

Of what style?

The genre is called "tokusatsu." Tokusatsu being Japanese for "special effects." There really isn't anything comparable to it in America.

But yes, there are lots of other toku series. I mentioned a couple of them. Another popular one that may be familiar is called Ultraman. There's also the Metal Heroes series, which was fairly popular, and parts of Metal Heroes were used to make VR Troopers and Beetleborgs.

A newer toku series that I'm following is the Tomica Hero series, which started with Tomica Hero Rescue Force and is now in its second iteration, Tomica Hero Rescue Fire.

There's also the Chou Sei Shin series, which had Gransazer, Justiriser, and Sazer X.

There are also a lot of toku shows that were just one series, as opposed to a franchise. Stuff like Madan Senki Ryukendo, Garo, Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon, and even Giant Robo (it was a toku LONG before it was an anime, localized in the US as Johnny Sokko and His Flying Robot).

The reason Kamen Rider and Super Sentai are the big names in toku is because well...they earned it. Kamen Rider hit its 35th anniversary with Kabuto a few years back, and Super Sentai hit its 30th anniversary a couple of years ago with Boukenger. Kamen Rider stopped being produced after '84, but was revived again in 2000 with Kuuga, which is why the KR series is divided into the Showa (the stuff before 1984) and the Heisei (everything after) eras, whereas Super Sentai doesn't have that distinction...it's been running continuously since its debut.

If you're asking if there's other series in the style of Super Sentai, then yes. The Chou Sei Shin, Metal Heroes, and Tomica Hero series are all very similar. There's not a whole lot out there like Kamen Rider though, but that's hard to judge since Kamen Rider isn't formulaic like Super Sentai is. Although, one common theme in KR is that the main character usually is related to the main baddies in some way. This has been true since the original series, where Kamen Rider 1 was a super soldier created by a terrorist organization to be their evil servant, but was saved. It's even true in the Heisei era, Faiz is an Orphenoch, Den-O has contracts with Imagin, Kiva is half Fangire...it's just a common theme.

head of the aliens would appear and wave a wand casting "phantom resurrection" on the monster,

Gash wasn't the head of Volt. Professor Bias was. Gash was just a high-ranking official in Volt.

GIGA PHANTOM!

Anyway I've seen the first 20 episodes, a fansubbing group is (slowly) subbing it.

Nate (post: 1318392) wrote:But yes, there are lots of other toku series. I mentioned a couple of them. Another popular one that may be familiar is called Ultraman.

Ultraman is also part of the kaiju branch of toku. It's so full of kaiju that it's insane. Haruo Nakajima, the suit actor of Godzilla in the Showa Era up to Godzilla Vs Gigan in 1972, acted in most of the suits in Ultraman.

In other words, Kamen Rider > Super Sentai.

Right?

...Right?

Generally yeah, I'd say Kamen Rider > Super Sentai.

They're both good, but I prefer a good KR show to a good SS show. Kamen Rider (usually) tends to take itself more seriously, and it doesn't use stock footage. There also is usually less filler episodes in KR, and the effects tend to be a little better.

Hey Nate, what do you know about Magiranger? I ask because the opening made it look awesome and I kind of want to see it.

There also is usually less filler episodes in KR, and the effects tend to be a little better.

And the guys are hotter.

Usually.

ShiroiHikari wrote:Hey Nate, what do you know about Magiranger? I ask because the opening made it look awesome and I kind of want to see it.

From what I've heard from people, it's one of the best Sentai series. So yeah, I'd say go for it, I've heard nothing but good things.

Also this scene was pretty funny.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKv8Q_gmUfQ

Pardon for jumping in, but in lieu of what ShiroiHikari said about five-man teams in Super Robots, I'd like to put in a few observations and stock knowledge of my own. From what I heard at least, the first that integrated the five man band (hero, loner, big guy, smart guy, chick) formula into the Super Robot genre was the predecessor of Voltes V, Combattler V; which was in turn taken from Gatchaman, which was the first "sentai dynamic" in anime. But again, that's according to what I heard. Anyone's free to correct me if I'm wrong.

It probably could be. *shrug* It's been said that Gatchaman was the inspiration for Goranger, though whether that's true or not I couldn't say. The man to ask, Shotaro Ishinomori, is unfortunately dead. However, he created a LOT of popular toku, and also a lot of popular manga and anime.

He did create Cyborg 009, which wikipedia says is the first Japanese superhero team (whether or not that's true, who knows). He also created Kamen Rider, Goranger and JAKQ (the first two Super Sentai series), Inazuman, and even Kikaider. So yeah he's basically the man.

Lols, I saw a Kamen Rider preview on TV and thought of you, Nate xD. Apparently there is an "American" version and it's going to be on some 4Kids thing.

Yep, that'd be Kamen Rider Dragon Knight, the American adaptation of Ryuki. XD

I personally haven't seen it, though I'm sure it's better than the last time a Kamen Rider series was adapted for America. That would be when Kamen Rider Black and Black RX were adapted into Saban's Masked Rider. *shudder* Man that show was hideous.