That Tokusatsu Thread

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A post stirred by a recent incident where I sort of, almost, came close to making a purchase of what might have been a hard to find physical copy (only released on DVD in the UK and Germany, no proper distribution in the States and this was before streaming) of a film directed by Koichi Sakamoto, veteran fight choreographer and director whose credits include action choreography on Steve Wang’s 1994 live-action manga sequel, Guyver: Dark Hero and Wang's 1997 film Drive, starring Mark Dacascos, featuring the work of the Alpha Stunt Team started by Sakamoto.

Sakamoto and Alpha Stunts have worked on various toku franchises, including Super Sentai, Ultraman and Kamen Rider, and they also worked on Power Rangers back in the day. Alpha Stunts became known for being so dedicated to the craft while working on the Rangers franchise they would go as far as to sleep on set to get a head start on choreography for the next day. It was here Sakamoto got to know Johnny Yong-Bosch.

Who is the star of this film, 2008's Broken Path which also went by a couple of other titles Attack of the Yakuza in Germany, Broken Fist in the UK. It boils down to ten minutes of set-up - Bosch plays "Jack", just a regular guy living on a remote ranch with his wife and daughter. One morning the house comes under siege by a group of masked assailants, all of whom seem to have history with Jack. One of the assailants in particular, a man named Yoshi, played by Dan Southworth claims to want to help Jack. It turns out Jack has one of those pasts that's caught up with him violently he’s never told his family about, and he's going to have to kick a lot of people. What follows is about 80 minutes flowing from one action scene to the next strung along a very basic story, as Bosch, Southworth and Stunt Team regulars throw themselves into various fights with verve, fearlessness and panache. It also gets bloodier than a lot of slasher films. Frankly, it deserves greater recognition and distribution - I know one person who managed to get a copy of the UK DVD and it was a long, drawn out sequence of events. It's available on Youtube but with all of the boutique companies releasing oddities, rarities and even vintage DTV movies on BluRay, who knows, maybe one day.

 
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Forcing myself to watch Revice, as of episode 11 still can't be bothered to care for any of these characters except Hiromi. It's more watcheable than Saber but holy shit it's boring. KinoBrothers is the superior toku this season.
 
Himitsu Sentai Goranger

E4XouQEX0AEzzNX.jpg
 
There's some interesting nuggets to be found on Archive.org, toku-wise.

For instance, there are raw VHS rips of the three-episode independent production Majin Kishi Jack Geist, circa 2000.

Features a soundtrack by composer Michiaki Watanabe, whose resume includes songs for numerous toku shows, and an opening theme by Akira Kushida, whose vocal credits include various Sentai show songs, and for the Metal Heroes franchise too including the Space Sheriff themes.



Episode 1

Episode 2

Episode 3
 
hooooooooooooooooooooooooly shit them spoilers coming out of Shin Ultraman
Shin Baltan
1652415092873.png
Shin Zoffy
1652415205743.png
parts 2 and 3 to come
1652415237874.png
and part three is Shin Ultraseven
various Shin monsters
1652415365007.png
apparently one is from a cut Ultra Q ep
1652415413816.png
random stuff
1652415447283.png
1652415466919.png
1652415487434.png
so basically Anno took one of the "very clearly not just recycling a Godzilla suit" and then did it with Shin Godzilla
sasuga, Anno
1652415508579.png
more stuff
1652415620884.png
 
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XYZpdq said:
hooooooooooooooooooooooooly shit them spoilers coming out of Shin Ultraman
Shin Baltan
View attachment 3276034
Shin Zoffy
View attachment 3276043
parts 2 and 3 to come
View attachment 3276045
and part three is Shin Ultraseven
various Shin monsters
View attachment 3276052
apparently one is from a cut Ultra Q ep
View attachment 3276053
random stuff
View attachment 3276054
View attachment 3276056
View attachment 3276058
so basically Anno took one of the "very clearly not just recycling a Godzilla suit" and then did it with Shin Godzilla
sasuga, Anno
View attachment 3276059
more stuff
View attachment 3276065
Click to expand...
Using Shin Godzilla to create Shin Gomess is such a soulful power move. I'm smiling like a dope over here.
 
I really can't wait for Shin Ultraman now. Been browsing the spoilers on 4chan and the early reviews seem pretty exciting. Decker's staff announcement was good too. I was pretty happy to see a new director and some new writers. Since I wasn't too impressed with Trigger's writing, especially early on.
 
Goddamn it, they're doing Kiji Brother dirty. Can't just let the poor guy have a happy marriage, the fuckers.

Also, lol, at half the monsters in the show being created because Momotaro is too autistic to realize he's being rude to people.
 
in honor of Austin St John getting popped by the feds watching Turbo - A Power Rangers Movie
that sequence with the gattai with 10x budget and greeble was dank af. generally it was a fun enough movie if a little light in power rangers being power rangers

also it's noticeably horny in very specific ways
like, Kimberly is especially sweaty in some shots, gasping for air in others, also Divatox exists
a lot of cleavage and ass shots
check the credits
>Sakamoto
as expected of the master
 
XYZpdq said:
in honor of Austin St John getting popped by the feds watching Turbo - A Power Rangers Movie
that sequence with the gattai with 10x budget and greeble was dank af. generally it was a fun enough movie if a little light in power rangers being power rangers

also it's noticeably horny in very specific ways
like, Kimberly is especially sweaty in some shots, gasping for air in others, also Divatox exists
a lot of cleavage and ass shots
check the credits
>Sakamoto
as expected of the master
Click to expand...
They spend as much time on that damn boat as the Gokaigers do on theirs.
 
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Revice? More like Kamen Rider Jeanne.
I have had an uneven opinion on reiwa rider thus far.
Zero One was fine, despite the fact Aruto ended up becoming a massive hypocrite and that Izu has had so much exposure (thanks to SEAmonkey coomers.) Saber was an unexpected surprise with me. I liked it a lot, even if the writing was uneven and there were way to fucking many riders in it. It felt a lot like a Phase 2 Heisei show. Also Yuri was a joy to behold.
Revice has been extremely underwhelming, if not infuriating to watch. Hanta Kinoshita, the main writer, wanted a rider show with a female lead, and was told no by Toei. In response, he made Sakura AKA Kamen Rider Jeanne, the unofficial main rider by focusing so much attention on her and her totally-not-a-lesbian rival Aguilera that Ikki, Vice, Daiji, and everyone else became paper thin background characters. Hell, Kinoshita even killed off the one character that rivaled Sakura in terms of popularity.
And of course shitholes like reddit are eating up the fact Rider finally has gone woke and now has (unofficially) made a female the main rider.
All at the expense of the plot, the characters and the tone, which on paper was awesome but has since turned into a joke.
Forgive my overwhelming autism.
 
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Tsukasa Kayoda said:
Revice? More like Kamen Rider Jeanne.
I have had an uneven opinion on reiwa rider thus far.
Zero One was fine, despite the fact Aruto ended up becoming a massive hypocrite and that Izu has had so much exposure (thanks to SEAmonkey coomers.) Saber was an unexpected surprise with me. I liked it a lot, even if the writing was uneven and there were way to fucking many riders in it. It felt a lot like a Phase 2 Heisei show. Also Yuri was a joy to behold.
Revice has been extremely underwhelming, if not infuriating to watch. Hanta Kinoshita, the main writer, wanted a rider show with a female lead, and was told no by Toei. In response, he made Sakura AKA Kamen Rider Jeanne, the unofficial main rider by focusing so much attention on her and her totally-not-a-lesbian rival Aguilera that Ikki, Vice, Daiji, and everyone else became paper thin background characters. Hell, Kinoshita even killed off the one character that rivaled Sakura in terms of popularity.
And of course shitholes like reddit are eating up the fact Rider finally has gone woke and now has (unofficially) made a female the main rider.
All at the expense of the plot, the characters and the tone, which on paper was awesome but has since turned into a joke.
Forgive my overwhelming autism.
Click to expand...
Revices seemes to have a huge problem balancing characters arc. Though the entire show devopment is give to one person at a time while everyone else just pauses. First you had dajijs dealing with his demon that seem like a large overarching problem for the character but no he's defeated with brotherly love and just fades into the background at Fenix for dozens of episodes so we can get hiromis arc. Hiromi arc was great but was completely personal and isolated from the rest of the show before just going home to gagas, beside feeding vail he is completly incidental. Tamaki/julio is probably the best example, his backstory lead perfectly to his character and going berserk was awesome...then he does nothing for 20 episode beside being a creepy stalker to remind people him and aguilera exist for when it's time for there arc. We genuinely had the same scene over and over of him creeping, telling her to smile. Then her walking away.
The sakura and hana arc has taken the problem to the nth degree just continuing to focus entirely on shit no one care about while the lead is washing old people's backs.
At least akaishi's ham is delightful
 
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Found on Archive.org, there are some toku gems and oddities and indie productions, and then there's this that caught my eye. Masked Rider AMC

"Masked Rider" what the what? Oh, but a handy synopsis explains all.

Okay, this is gonna be a long post. Tl;dr is that it has no relation to Masked Rider. It’s (un)known under a ridiculous amount of titles, among them Power King, Power Warriors, Outlaw Power, Armicron, Armicron in Outlaw Power, Armicron – Savior from Space… are we done yet?

Originally made by Korean director Shim Hyung-rae (known for Dragon Wars and the godawful 1999 Yonggary remake) as a direct-to-video movie in 1995. A year later, it was picked up by American distributors to capitalize on the Power Rangers craze. Instead of just dubbing the movie, they went the Saban way and only kept the special FX scenes, everything else was reshot with American actors. Years later, it was released on DVD in Hong Kong – in classic bootleg tradition – under the name Masked Rider AMC.

But what else is there? Hilariously inept acting, even worse dubbing, braindead dialogue, bullies that make Bulk & Skull look like intellectuals, stolen character designs, stolen plotlines, and tons of stock footage. In short, it’s a forgotten gem of the VHS era!
Click to expand...
 
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