REVIEW: Zyuohger 17
This week's episode combines equal parts of a Sela-focused story, a typical Monster of the Week plot, and the grand debut of Zyuoh TheWorld. The majority of this review will be about TheWorld, but first I'll cover the opening half of the episode, which would have served as a decent standalone story by itself.
This is the first episode this season in which the Monster of the Week does not die at the end. Card-themed player Trumpus is sent home by Naria after the debut of TheWorld. I’m not sure what surprised me more: that he survived or that he so easily impressed Ginis and the Dethgaliens. Kubar states that Trumpus is one of his most versatile players, but he is really a one-trick pony like all the others. It just so happens that his one trick is very complex and rather sadistic: he uses his evil deck to put magical cards on humans’ foreheads. They cannot remove the cards, and if they are near anyone with a matching card, they will electrocute each other. Trumpus also “shuffles” the humans and Zyuohgers, spreading them across the city. I must admit, it was a creative and troublesome strategy. Some scenes in this episode felt like they straight from a G-rated cut of Saw.
While everyone is scattered about in strange locations, Yamato conveniently crashes through the roof of his uncle’s house. Uncle Mori has to suspect something about Yamato at this point: he’s weird but he’s not stupid, and I don’t see how he couldn’t connect his nephew and his friends to some of the things that have happened recently. Especially when Yamato pulls out his Zyuoh Changer and communicates to the team right in front of Mori.
This episode also focuses on Sela, and we learn a little more about her family. She connects with a young boy who, during a reunion with his estranged father, was separated from him by Trumpus. Sela is distraught but can’t bring herself to tell him that if she tried to take him back to his father, they would both cause each other great pain: in the form of electrocution, that is, because they have matching cards on their foreheads. Because it is technically Sela's episode for a bit, we also get to see her fight more than usual. Her water moves are never that impressive (probably because they’re done on land), but it is still satisfying to see her kick ass.
While Sela does get to kick some Trumpus rumpus, we don’t get to see her kill him. Instead we get to see the Zyuohgers get their rumpuses handed to them by Zyuoh TheWorld, who quickly steals their weapons and their dignity. Naria provides a brief explanation of his existence before letting him loose on the Zyuohgers. Of course, the only one who stood more than a 1% chance against him was Yamato, but he also fails after a good but ultimately one-sided fight. Next week’s episode will focus more on the two of them, and I’m hoping for some more good fight scenes to come from it.
As I’ve noted multiple times, I am a huge fan of Zyuoh Eagle’s EagRiser because whips are such a cool rarity among Super Sentai heroes. This episode blessed me with the appearance of a second, more bizarre whip: Zyuoh TheGunRod. An absolute mouthful of a name, Zyuoh TheGunRod is a gun, a whip, and apparently a fishing rod. Beyond the disturbing implications of kindergarten-aged toku fans hitting each other with fishing rods to be like the cool Sixth Ranger, I love this silly weapon. I especially love that Zyuohger promptly fulfilled my just-created fantasy of a Whip versus Whip fight (in which TheGunRod defeats my precious EagRiser.)
I enjoyed this episode and especially enjoyed Zyuoh TheWorld’s debut. He is powerful, but it can be hard to get past the silliness of a man infused with the powers of a wolf, a crocodile, and a rhino. It just sounds like Toei chose random animal names from a hat, and the result left us with a villain who has A CROCODILE TAIL FOR AN ARM. The costume designers had their work cut out for them this season. But somehow the show made TheWorld menacing and I am greatly anticipating his future appearances.
