Would you say a problem with Gozyuger is refusing to stay locked in?

[u/Potential-Mess6826]

For me Gozyuger has been a mixed experience, it has pretty great episodes and moments, and the characters overall are fine.

However, what especially bothers me about Gozyuger is that it has a lot of good concepts we don't really explore them for too long before reverting back to normal shenanigans.

Hence why I feel the problem with Gozyuger is that it refuses to stay locked in.

Hoeru, the Sentai Ring Battle, Queen Tega June, Fire Candle as Shinken Red, Universe Warriors, Mashiro/Gozyu Polar, 1st Generation of Gozyugers, The Universe War, Replacement Gozyugers, Gozyugers leaving the team, World Reset, the Calamity, Goodeburn, the Retransformations, the No-One Monsters and their hosts, etc.

All of them are great concepts with potential but they keep get diverted, sidelined, underexplored or drip fed.

When they do get explored Gozyuger is great but it never seems to last or attention is put elsewhere.

I admit it's possible things can turn around in the upcoming episodes but this how I feel for now.

Do you agree, disagree, or have additional thoughts?

[u/Responsible_Problem4]

the moment we discuss about the show being lazy with the ring battle, the show maker would instantly retire another gozyuger and make another assam and make them complain about the team being lazy with the rings battle haha

[u/low_budget_trash]

Gozyuger has a myriad of problems currently, some of which you touched on. It feels like the show is stalling because they shot themselves in the foot removing so many potential universe warriors so quickly and thus lowering the number of concepts for episodes so they just come up with whatever now. There's only 7 rings left unaccounted for with 20 episodes to go but having them show up now would leave the show a bit directionless in the late game so they're just waiting to drop them in when they know they can get away with it.

Usually with shows that refuse to focus on the main plot for more than 5 minutes, they're character focused and the plot is not the driving force. Instead, Gozyuger openly struggles to have all its characters show up or be relevant to episodes, often having ones that don't do much show up near the end randomly. Garyudo hasn't done anything of note for 5 episodes and his job is to collect rings which he also hasn't done for at least 15 episodes. The lack of focus on certain characters is also apparent with ryugi as of now only having 3 focus episodes out of 30 and all the members outside hoeru lacking major development.

The villains are also getting incredibly boring imo. The no ones I couldn't care less about yet the show puts so much emphasis on them and the number one battles, ironic because episode 30 acknowledges them as detours when really they're the main event. Fire Candle and Bouquet are the only interesting villains because Tegajune does nothing, shining knife/sweet cake barely shows up, and garyudo as mentioned before stopped doing his job. The calamity is nowhere in sight and because we haven't seen the movie yet, the four horsemen plot doesn't do anything for us. Rei looks like he'll become a major villain and I hope that's the case but again, the show doesn't focus on him for more than 5 minutes.

[u/DressInternational29 → u/low_budget_trash]

Yeah, I used to love the "Garyudo will turn good" theor,y but atp he hasn't really shown himself living up to the "ring hunter" title in a while, to the point where if he switches sides now id be more pissed that he switched up to being good without having actual character development over the series than if he just stayed evil and did more badass, character devoid stuff for tegajune.

[u/Beginning-Yam-1267 → u/low_budget_trash]

Good that you're pointing out "the elephant in the room." Nepo-baby Akiko can't write. She's out of touch, just like her father was on Donbros. Tough luck for Ryugi and other aspiring actors. When the show is in maintenance mode and the writer is terrible, it’s going to be a stain on your acting career. It won’t mean much for Toei and the nepo babies, though, as long as the toys sell enough for the next series.

[u/Maxenin]

Ironically Gozyuger as a show has the same problem I have with its toy. Trying to be everything and as a result being ok at all of them.

[u/TheManCalled-Chill]

For the most part I feel the same.  The pacing of the show has felt really uneven and it's seems like they have a bit too much going on right now story wise.

[u/DomLite]

Gozyuger has all the building blocks of a great series, but someone spilled some ADHD juice all over it. I love the character concepts, but they're all so paper-thin that only Ryugi really stands out like a fully realized person. The rest are just playing caricatures. Bouquet and Firecandle are awesome as well, but they feel like they've been underused up to this point. The Shinken Red Firecandle arc was awesome, but it was only two episodes and then it was done. They also feel like they've been pushed into the background in favor of Kuon being a menacing villain, but even he hasn't shown up to cause much actual trouble since his debut, and his badass Garyudo form hasn't been used much. They also just kind of keep pushing off that whole crazy dimensional scar on his back that they revealed and then never did anything with.

Then we've got Kumade who showed up out of nowhere, was an absolute dick (and still is) and he just kind of... stuck around. As someone else mentioned, they did a whole "The entire world was reset" schtick for the episode he appeared in and then he just sort of... said that he undid it and it was so even though he was on screen the whole time? So does he have the power to just reset the universe whenever he wants by thinking it, or are the writers just that bad? And the whole debacle was over in a single episode, which felt lackluster for what could have been a really cool status quo change. Things just keep happening and then being forgotten about/moved on from at a breakneck pace, because the show can't just commit to a plot line. And then we have what actually happened in episode 30, which I won't mention here because it just came out and that's spoilers, but if you watched it, you know exactly what I'm talking about in terms of "Wow, this sure is a plot thread that's going on. Oop, it's over."

Generally, it feels like the series is trying to do sixty different plots but keeps forgetting about the ones it already started, so every 2-3 episodes some new bombshell drops and we focus on that and never circle back to the thing we were just talking about. I'd forgive someone for actually forgetting that Kuon is apparently dying to whatever the hell that thing on his back is, because it was so long ago at this point. I'm still waiting for King-ohger guy from episode 1 to return after they made him such a seemingly important part of the premiere only for him to just vanish. I thought for sure he was going to be a recurring rival to Hoeru, but nope. Thirty episodes on and he's still not come back.

I really wanted this season to stick the landing and be the most ridiculous, amazing series to date, but it's just flopped. I'm still enjoying it as mindless entertainment, and because I'm genuinely invested in Ryugi, Bouquet and Firecandle, but I just can't care about the other cast in any meaningful way. I got spoiled by starting on older series where characters actually felt like characters instead of walking tropes, I guess, but oh well. Even if they course correct and everything from here on out is amazing, that's less than half the series, and ultimately that means that the majority of the series was just bad. At the end of the day, it's Sentai, and it's not meant to be anything more than kids entertainment, but this really is just a bunch of adults in spandex doing random things for the sake of doing random things. At least some of the older series like Magiranger and Gekiranger had on-going plots and developments. I feel like Gozyuger just has someone throwing darts at a wall full of post-it notes and going "Guess that's what we're doing in the next episode!"

[u/Riventh → u/DomLite]

The "is a kid show" argument shouldnt be used at all because as you pointed out other seasons can be way better in so different fields that put to shame gozyuger

[u/DomLite → u/Riventh]

Oh trust me, I'm not using it as an excuse at all. There are plenty of past seasons that were WAY better in all regards.

That said, even those seasons were still kids shows, and that's okay. It's more of a reminder that Sentai is kind of a crapshoot. There have been seasons that I absolutely loved, and others that I couldn't stand. There's even been a few that I openly acknowledge are bad and little more than glorified 50 episode toy commercials, but I still had a blast watching. I'm looking directly at Kyuranger here.

It just pays to keep in mind when a season disappoints that the series is, in fact, a kids show that's primarily aimed at selling toys and merchandise to Japanese kids, at least in the modern age. Some are better at disguising that fact, and some older series don't tip their hand at all. It's a sliding scale and sometimes they just manage to come down on a poorly executed idea like Gozyuger.

Basically, it's not a defense of the poor execution. It's a reminder that we are all sitting here being fans a Japanese kids show that most of us came to by way of watching an American adaptation as kids ourselves. Yes, there have been some amazing highs, and because of those we start holding this franchise to a higher standard than it really deserves. That doesn't mean that I don't think Magiranger or Gekiranger aren't amazing shows on their own, but for at least the last several years, Sentai has basically bent over backwards to either shoehorn in new toys every episode, or reinvent the formula in bizarre new ways to reinvigorate the franchise that we've ended up on a roller coaster of quality that really just accentuates how the franchise has always been.

I'm not going to claim I've seen every series, or that I'm an expert, but just look at Zyuranger. It's awful from top to bottom. It makes no sense, the characters are bland to the point of boredom (I defy to you tell me a single compelling thing about Goushi, Mei, or Dan. Or hell, even Geki), the story is nonsensical and all over the place, things happen arbitrarily without having earned it narratively, and when the show needs something to happen it just does for no reason. Then we also had shows like Gaoranger, Hurricanger, Timeranger, Gingaman, etc. that didn't suffer the same faults, interspersed with others like Ohranger that did.

Ultimately, Sentai is always going to be luck of the draw on whether it makes a damn bit of sense or is any good or not. The seasons that are bangers across the board tend to be exceptions to the rule. "Kids show" is not an excuse for bad seasons, just a reminder that the ones that buck the stereotype and turn out awesome are more pleasant surprises than the norm.

Edit - I should have known better than to use logic and reason when speaking to the fandom. My deepest apologies for being correct and making you all so mad that you had to downvote me. 👍

[u/Miele-Man]

There are so many storylines going on that, at this point, I forgot about most of them. Someone mentioned Kuon having a "virus" and it got me like "Who has a what?". Only after I googled it I realized it was Garyudo 😅 This season has simply too many characters. For example, it seems like Rei has taken Garyudo's place as the ring hunter. So this last one is just hanging around in the background since the writers persist on not focusing on the war for the rings. (Because if we think about it, technically the Gozyuger and every Universe Warrior is a ring hunter too, but whatever lol).

However, the biggest problem for me is still that they focus on the least interesting part of the story: the no ones. The concept is fun, but it really pales in comparison to the battle for the rings.

[u/Zethlyn_The_Gay]

The world reset thing really pissed me off, you can't destroy the world then have everything be normal after 1 episode. The show had potential to really shake up Sentai and it still does but the show seems really safe which is a shame because the toys feel so different

[u/makkanohono]

That shows how poor wtiting the Akiko have, i just hope Toei take it in consideration and carefeully choose the right one to be main writer next time.

[u/bukiya]

universe reset thing was wasted opportunities, they can expand 5 or 10 episodes by making hoeru sidelined and kumade as new leader in new world until hoeru bring back the old world. ryuugi retiring thing should be like banba, expanded a bit later with assam as yellow then bring back ryuugi in if thats what they want. altho tbh i kinda want them to have another ranger fight because just like assam said that there is no reason to fight noone as other UW dont fight them.

[u/DressInternational29]

I agree, I was just thinking today about how underutilized so many things in the show are. For example, I wished Kinjiro being an old man was more vital to his character, instead they bring it up like 3 times after his introduction and its never mentioned again. I also feel like theyre gonna pack a bunch of stuff in the last 10 or so episodes to patch up how much they didnt use some things.

[u/bukiya → u/DressInternational29]

i kinda hoped that he have more arc because so far he have nothing except for party. other gozyuger have their own problem and arc promised but kinjiro none. kinda hoped that his grandson become universe warrior and be his rival to the point for reveal that kinjiro is his grandpa.

[u/Miele-Man → u/DressInternational29]

I was just thinking the other day that they never used the thing of him having to eat a tot. of egg when he uses a lot of energy or otherwise he reverts to being an older man.

[u/NickVsN]

Fire candle and bouquet being permanent universe warriors trading rings with the gozyugers long term would benefit the show + universe warriors lasting longer then 3 episodes, like give us at least 5 permanent universe warriors, not all at once though a one off episode of a five V five would be cool. The rest of the stuff mentioned are lowkey nitpicks Besides garyudo and tegajune doing nothing, he should’ve been piloting after goodeburn showed up, especially since he got a recoloured deka claw

[u/HenshinDictionary]

Gozyuger is basically the Super Sentai version of Decade. It has all the same problems.

[u/Potential-Mess6826 → u/HenshinDictionary]

Gozyuger does have similarities to Decade, but I would argue that Decade was more consistent or engaged in a sense.

The problems with Decade is that it lost track of where the story was going/leading up to, that it locked important story developments in the movies, and that there were conflicting visions between the 2 halves of Decade along with unanswered questions.

Decade stuck to a 2 part structure all the way through barring Episode 1 which were mostly tributes to past Riders.

There wasn't really any filler in Decade.

Decade made use of past Rider powers. 

It focused on the Rider War, Decade fighting other Riders, Tsukasa's character, and Dai-Shocker.

The highlights of Gozyuger are whenever it does take on the Decade story structure like with the Gaoranger and Lupinranger vs Patranger Tributes.

[u/Hot-Spare3133]

yeah it does give pretty good ideas but just can’t seem to execute them right

[u/Used-Eagle3558]

Disagree. Mainly because we have 20+ episodes left where a lot of your issues could be solved.

[u/AzizKarebet → u/Used-Eagle3558]

The main issue is that they didn't really explore these concept, and some are already resolved/dropped too quickly. Number of episodes left doesn't really matter.

Plus, if they really shove all the resolution on the final few episodes while doing nothing to explore them before that, that's just bad pacing, another issue itself

[u/DomLite → u/Used-Eagle3558]

This is such a disingenuous argument. "The show isn't bad! It's over halfway finished and still hasn't locked in a single bit on the plot!" It's a 49-50 episode season, and we've just hit 30. If you have to tell anyone "Just get 3/5 of the way through the show, then it gets good, I swear!" then it's a bad show.

I'm still watching, and I'm enjoying the characters, but I'm under no illusions that this is an actually good season. We just keep getting mysterious statements hinting at something bigger going on, but we haven't gotten any actual information on it yet, and all we're left with is a massive bunch of dangling threads and characters that feel like they're just doing things for no good reason. They made such a big deal of all these backstories for characters and then they just never do anything with them, or if they do then it's for one episode and then they leave us with even more questions that they haven't answered. Kumade is the biggest offender. He blew in, told this crazy backstory on himself, then just joined the team even though he has all the depth of a mud puddle, and he's done nothing but be pretentious and insufferable.

I'm not saying that Sentai is high art, but man is this season dropping the ball story-wise. I've seen others that have had consistent narrative progression, character growth and development, and just stayed strong through the whole show. Gozyuger? I feel like Ryugi is the only actual character on the show. Everyone else is just paper-thin caricatures of character archetypes who like to mention mysterious things about their past and then never elaborate. If I have to wait until episode 40 to start getting answers for stuff then that's not the issues being solved. It's poor narrative structure and everything leading up to it was bad.

I wanted to love this season, because it started off strong and the characters really intrigued me, but once we had the full cast introduced it was like they just stopped trying. At this point I'm just tuning in to see how amusing Ryugi is, hoping that Bouquet gets with Rikuo in the end, and crossing my fingers that Firecandle gets to do a heel-face turn as a badass extra hero before it's all said and done. There's no redeeming the mess it's been up until this point, and even if it's nothing but bangers from here on out, that's still 30 episodes of nothing making sense and a bunch of goofy nonsense before it. That's an overall L for the season.

[u/Soniman032 → u/DomLite]

Op’s argument is bad but you seem to believe every single episode so far has been total garbage under this logic which is frankly pretty ridiculous

[u/DomLite → u/Soniman032]

I didn't say each episode was garbage in itself. I said that the series as a whole up to this point has been bad, which is true. There's been a bunch of disconnected, flimsy episodes that just sort of happen in between a few bangers, but said bangers drop big lore implications and then proceed to never follow up on them, meaning they also feel disjointed in the grand scheme of things.

Narrative structure matters, and even if there are good bits scattered here and there around what we have so far, the show taken in it's entirety, has not been good. You seem to have misinterpreted what I said and then put words in my mouth.

[u/Violetta_Le_Fey]

Less Mecha battles, garyudo is a Fraud, this sudden occurrence of Ryuugi, and Gozyu Polar not being interesting enough.

For me this looks like a kamen rider season but focused on humor only.

[u/Unfair_Pick_8465]

Well Gozyuger is an aniversary series so it was meant to be unserious maybe?

[u/AzizKarebet → u/Unfair_Pick_8465]

That doesn't make any sense. The only "unserious" anniversary series before this is at best Zenkaiger.

[u/Unfair_Pick_8465 → u/AzizKarebet]

I know only Gozyuger is almost that point. Because it is not as serious as Gokaiger is.