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Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

I can think of a good number of teams that got hit hard enough that their transformation broke but typically that usually happens late in the show as opposed to just 10 episodes in. They might still wind up turning things around next episode but yeah, things seem kinda dire right now.

BattleCattle posted:

That time Joker stole Candy probably counts.

It was pretty rough.

As a lot of enemy generals in this franchise (and even a few major antagonists) typically wind up getting redeemed/pacified by the end it’s refreshing to occasionally get a few that are just straight up sadists to the very end (Joker, Northa, probably more I’m forgetting). I’d kind of like to see a return to that this season.

Larryb fucked around with this message at 03:26 on Apr 8, 2019

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BattleCattle
May 11, 2014

Why are clowns always such good villains?

Like, across the board.

This one doesn't even have the dumb nose.

I mean, yeah, he has a lot of dumb noses, but he doesn't wear 'em.

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

Probably because clowns are just inherently terrifying (especially to kids).

Speaking of Smile, while it's not one of my top favorites (it's typically a lot more filler heavy than your average Precure season and it rather blatantly cribs a few aspects/designs from Yes 5, not all of them successfully) it's got a great cast pretty much across the board and works well as a decent starter season.

It's also interesting that (if you count Futari/Max Heart and Yes 5/GoGo as one show each that is), it's about the only season that doesn't add an additional Cure or Cure-like ally later on (technically you could count Royal Candy I suppose but she only shows up towards the very end).

SatoshiMiwa
May 6, 2007


10 just feels real early for a end of cour cliff hanger plus usually they only do 2 episode arcs mid-season and at the end so this feels really unique. Also Hikaru probably had more mistakes that didn't get resolved this episode than most pinks do.

On the fun side I loved we got an actual gravity joke and the alien dunking on earth people for being slow. Felt like a great way to make things feel like space.


Larryb posted:

Probably because clowns are just inherently terrifying (especially to kids).

Speaking of Smile, while it's not one of my top favorites (it's typically a lot more filler heavy than your average Precure season and it rather blatantly cribs a few aspects/designs from Yes 5, not all of them successfully) it's got a great cast pretty much across the board and works well as a decent starter season.

It's also interesting that (if you count Futari/Max Heart and Yes 5/GoGo as one show each that is), it's about the only season that doesn't add an additional Cure or Cure-like ally later on (technically you could count Royal Candy I suppose but she only shows up towards the very end).

Oddly enough I enjoyed the Filler more than the heavy plot episodes of Smile. Smile really worked best as an episodic comedy and really fell apart when it tried to be serious Precure (especially since the serious bits were just less good versions of Yes serious bits). Also Dark Dream is so much better than Bad End Precure. It doesn't help that Pierrot is probably one of the weaker End Bad guys (really Joker should of been the final boss).

BattleCattle
May 11, 2014

Joker never really lost entirely. Gotta give it to him, he died happy.

or, feigning happiness, I can never read that guy.

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

Bad End Precure was one of the aforementioned Yes elements that didn’t work that well in Smile (it just kind of felt hollow and unnecessary). And yeah, Joker was a creepy bastard who probably should have been the main villain (though he kind of was in a sense).

I agree that it worked better as a comedy show than a serious drama though (especially when you had characters like the Bad End Trio and most of the Cures except maybe Reika). After the 2011 disaster in Japan (which apparently resulted in a bit of a script change for the back half of Suite as well) I'm guessing they wanted to do something more lighthearted as a breather season (though there is kind of a weird tonal shift near the end).

Like I said, not one of my favorites but it's not a terrible show either and generally stands on its own well enough despite the obvious Yes 5 influence (much like KiraKira, it's the cast that really carries the show). There’s some good fights in there as well, like Sunny vs Wolfrun and Beauty vs Joker.

Of course, they then immediately followed it up with DokiDoki which was one of the darker seasons in the franchise, probably only second to HeartCatch in my opinion (at least Makoto gets something back at the end even if her princess is now technically three people, compared to Yuri who the universe seems to hate on a deeply personal level).

Larryb fucked around with this message at 12:38 on Apr 8, 2019

Captain Cappy
Aug 7, 2008

I'm looking forward to seeing what a Precure training arc looks like. I'm hoping it's just Hikaru learning to windmill both her arms around instead of just one.

Fruity20
Jul 28, 2018

Do you believe in magic, Tenno?
what's your guys thoughts on the latest previews on star twinkle?

BattleCattle
May 11, 2014

Looks like the monster in the preview has Kappard's bald spot. Dunno what's up with the long nose. Maybe Kappard and Tenjo gattai somehow?

Iwan has some crazy ideas.

On that note, I'm grateful to the cat butler. He stopped Iwan from turning Mr. Tardigrade into a big monster for tactical reasons, but let's be real, he just didn't want to see a big tardigrade monster any more than I did.

Twelve by Pies
May 4, 2012

Again a very likpatous story
I hope cat butler gets to do cool things at some point in the series.

I'm also a bit curious about the Notraiders' motivations. Given his anger at Hikaru, it seems likely Kappard at least came from a planet with a pretty harsh environment where life was tough, and he resents her for being from a planet that supports life much easier. I wonder if that's just true for him or if all the generals have that in common.

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

I am sort of interested to see how the team is going to just narrowly avoid being detected by Madoka’s dad and the alien hunters considering they landed practically right in front of them at the end (plus a giant pink spaceship seems like it would be pretty hard to miss).

Like I said, even if they do avoid it this time around I have a feeling the girls are going to wind up being exposed eventually. The title of the next episode and how things went down in the most recent one seem to hint at a new powerup as well (our first team finisher for the season perhaps?)

It is interesting that the generals all seem to have their own unique styles though. Kappard typically favors confronting his opponents directly, Tenjo primally relies on grunts to do her dirty work for her and Iwan is the designated scientist/monster maker.

As mentioned above, I’m curious if Kappard’s anger at Hikaru means something deeper (like that all the generals were recruited from planets the NotRaiders already conquered or something).

I’m also still curious about the girl in the top hat and shades from the OP (do we even have an official name for her yet?). It’s likely she’s probably going to wind up being our fifth Cure but I wonder what her deal is (that is, whether she’s part of the NotRaiders, a separate agent who is also in conflict with them or something else entirely). She probably won’t be popping up until at least episode 20 or so though.

Larryb fucked around with this message at 20:20 on Apr 8, 2019

MonsterEnvy
Feb 4, 2012

Shocked I tell you

Twelve by Pies posted:

I hope cat butler gets to do cool things at some point in the series.

I'm also a bit curious about the Notraiders' motivations. Given his anger at Hikaru, it seems likely Kappard at least came from a planet with a pretty harsh environment where life was tough, and he resents her for being from a planet that supports life much easier. I wonder if that's just true for him or if all the generals have that in common.

He also stated that Earth was beautiful and he had no intentions of damaging it.

BattleCattle posted:

On that note, I'm grateful to the cat butler. He stopped Iwan from turning Mr. Tardigrade into a big monster for tactical reasons, but let's be real, he just didn't want to see a big tardigrade monster any more than I did.

Pretty sure Bakenyan did that cause he is good at pattern recognition. The last two times she did that, she lost the Pen.

Cipher Pol 9
Oct 9, 2006


Star Twinkle 10 was great. This is my first PreCure so I was fully expecting them to bust out the four (or is it only three?) Pens that they'd acquired so far and win with some cool new attacks but nope, TPK.

Dad Theory: The organization is anti-Alien because of bad aliens so they'll end up supporting the PreCures. I have no evidence to back this up, just my thought. Have any PreCures ever been revealed early on, if at all?

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

Only to the occasional one shot character and/or people who eventually become their allies. Otherwise the big identity reveal usually only happens once the final arc rolls around.

Of course, some teams maintain their secret to the very end (hell, in Splash Star I don’t think the general public ever realized that the Precure and Dark Fall even existed).

SatoshiMiwa
May 6, 2007


Generally Precure families are super supportive so Madoka's Dad should turn around but this season seems to be playing families different.

I also quite liked the Generals holding off on pursuing the Precure saying the power was temporary. Shows they are at least thinking about strategy

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

I personally like that the families seem to be a bit more dysfunctional this time around (Hikaru’s grandfather doesn’t seem to have a lot of patience for her antics and Elena’s parents are barely around right now) it’s an interesting change from the usual setup and feels a bit more realistic this way. It’ll be interesting to see how they react when the girls’ identities are finally revealed (which I can almost guarantee you is going to happen sooner or later).

Typically after a Sentai anniversary Toei likes experimenting with the formula a bit and it would appear the same applies to Precure as well (we did get HeartCatch after Fresh and Go Princess after Happiness Charge after all).

I am kind of curious what the NotRaiders’ actual goal is beyond resurrecting their leader as so far they seem way more interested in collecting the Princess Pens than they do in actually conquering any planets.

Larryb fucked around with this message at 04:54 on Apr 9, 2019

Twelve by Pies
May 4, 2012

Again a very likpatous story
"I like black cats the best."
"Why's that?"
"Well, I used to be a black cat..."

Oh Siren, you're the best. :allears:

I'm glad the Fairy Tones have gotten to be actual characters in the last few episodes. They always hung around and could always talk but never really did anything except show up for transformations and finishers. They don't have distinct personalities but that's fine, they're very cute and fun to watch and just the fact that they're out there doing things on their own is great.

Nodosaur
Dec 23, 2014

obvious pretool
they're smarter than the Precure

BattleCattle
May 11, 2014

Larryb posted:

I personally like that the families seem to be a bit more dysfunctional this time around (Hikaru’s grandfather doesn’t seem to have a lot of patience for her antics and Elena’s parents are barely around right now) it’s an interesting change from the usual setup and feels a bit more realistic this way.

Makes me wonder if they’re trying to teach parents how to parent, now that some of their base has grown up enough to have kids.

If so, I. Like. It.

In other news, I’m up to episode 9 of Yes! Precure 5 GoGo. It’s a mystery episode! Someone Stole the Cake, and They must Pay the Price.

It’s up there with episode 12 of Fresh, as far as my favorite episodes go. My favorite part is that poor, innocent Bunbee-san was mistaken for the criminal and punished accordingly, which makes his actions during the movie seem a little bit more reasonable, though nonetheless dastardly. You Don’t Steal a Girl’s Birthday Cake, that’s just bad form.

Also, Coco trying to calm the infighting situation down, only for everyone else to become immediately suspicious of him, was really funny to me. There was also a moment where I thought Mint and Lemonade were about to throw down, and never before has a special attack animation had me on the edge of my seat like that. “Who’s she attacking? Is this happening!? Is this real!?” were my thoughts.

The whole episode bucked the formula, and I appreciate it deeply. Not because I don’t believe in the franchise’s message of trusting in your friends, I believe with all my heart, I just really enjoy seeing that trust realistically strained every now and then. Especially if the catalyst is something delicious and mundane, like cake.

MonsterEnvy
Feb 4, 2012

Shocked I tell you

Larryb posted:


I am kind of curious what the NotRaiders’ actual goal is beyond resurrecting their leader as so far they seem way more interested in collecting the Princess Pens than they do in actually conquering any planets.

From the comments thier boss is going to come back on his own, they just want to present him with the Pens and Fuwa when he returns.

SatoshiMiwa
May 6, 2007


BattleCattle posted:

Makes me wonder if they’re trying to teach parents how to parent, now that some of their base has grown up enough to have kids.

If so, I. Like. It.

In other news, I’m up to episode 9 of Yes! Precure 5 GoGo. It’s a mystery episode! Someone Stole the Cake, and They must Pay the Price.

It’s up there with episode 12 of Fresh, as far as my favorite episodes go. My favorite part is that poor, innocent Bunbee-san was mistaken for the criminal and punished accordingly, which makes his actions during the movie seem a little bit more reasonable, though nonetheless dastardly. You Don’t Steal a Girl’s Birthday Cake, that’s just bad form.

Also, Coco trying to calm the infighting situation down, only for everyone else to become immediately suspicious of him, was really funny to me. There was also a moment where I thought Mint and Lemonade were about to throw down, and never before has a special attack animation had me on the edge of my seat like that. “Who’s she attacking? Is this happening!? Is this real!?” were my thoughts.

The whole episode bucked the formula, and I appreciate it deeply. Not because I don’t believe in the franchise’s message of trusting in your friends, I believe with all my heart, I just really enjoy seeing that trust realistically strained every now and then. Especially if the catalyst is something delicious and mundane, like cake.

Bunbee stole 40 cakes. That's as many as 4 tens. And that's terrible!

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

MonsterEnvy posted:

From the comments thier boss is going to come back on his own, they just want to present him with the Pens and Fuwa when he returns.

Does the Notraider leader have an official name yet? I could also ask the same question about our mystery girl from the opening.

And yeah, the Precure just beating the poo poo out of Bunbee for allegedly stealing their cake is one of the funnier moments in the series for me. I also enjoy the Cure Gorilla episode of Smile even if Fresh technically did it first, mostly due to some great facial expressions from Miyuki and Akane.

Honestly the goofier episodes of the franchise are some of the best in my opinion and they should do stuff like that more often.

Larryb fucked around with this message at 10:15 on Apr 9, 2019

Nodosaur
Dec 23, 2014

obvious pretool
Cure Gorilla is from Suite

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

Nope, that was from Smile (unless there’s another one I’m forgetting):

https://youtube.com/watch?v=Za79k513slk

Edit: There is a scene early on in Suite where Hibiki acts like a gorilla in front of a bunch of kids, could that be what you’re thinking of?

Larryb fucked around with this message at 18:21 on Apr 9, 2019

Nodosaur
Dec 23, 2014

obvious pretool
Huh. Yeah, that makes more sense now.

BattleCattle
May 11, 2014

Hibiki became a gorilla once, but so did everyone else. A good time was had by all.

Twelve by Pies
May 4, 2012

Again a very likpatous story
Also I'm glad they finally explained (well, didn't really explain, more like implied) Siren is living with Otokichi. Since I was kind of wondering that for a few episodes.

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

So lately I’ve decided to finally check out the three existing Precure dubs. Smile’s was....ok? The tacked on dream at the beginning was weird (they also kind of spoil a powerup from a bit later in the season) and nobody ever shuts up (even during transformations).

But on the other hand, Akane is still great in any language (I think her and Nao may be my favorite actors of the bunch so far), the voice acting was less cringeworthy than I expected and it more or less seems to follow the spirit of the Japanese script (somewhat anyway), I also kind of liked the ending song. Not sure how I feel about Wolfrun’s voice though (it works well enough for the episode but I’m not sure how well it fits the sillier side of his character).

I’ve only seen like an episode or two of each so far but if I had to rank the dubs from best to worst it would probably go:

Futari: Mostly untouched aside from changing some character names and cultural references, some of the supporting cast leave something to be desired but Nagisa, Honoka and the Fairies are decent enough)

DokiDoki: They seem to have dialed things back a little from Smile (though the talking during the transformation aspect is still there) and they left in a lot more than I was expecting them to. Some of the name changes are kind of weird too (what was wrong with just calling her Alice?) and it’s odd that most of them still retain their Japanese last names from the original. The dub also cut 19 whole episodes from the original run (or in some cases just grafted scenes from said episodes onto others)

Smile: See first paragraph. They cut a lot less from this one at any rate though (the dub only lost 8 episodes).

Out of curiosity, did the Cure Gorilla and Cure Sebastian episodes make it into their respective dubs?

Edit: Checking the wiki, it seems the first one (the one with the comedians) got cut for some reason but Cure Sebastian/Cutie Madam did indeed make it into Glitter Force.

Larryb fucked around with this message at 01:38 on Apr 13, 2019

Twelve by Pies
May 4, 2012

Again a very likpatous story


It doesn't happen a lot, but I always enjoy when the show remembers that Siren is a cat currently trapped in a human body.

Very excited to see how the hell the old man not only knows the Crescendo Tone exists but is also friends with it, but I need to torrent more episodes first.

Captain Invictus
Apr 5, 2005

Try reading some manga!


Clever Betty
thought y'all might enjoy this silly twittermanga, Grandma in the Magical Girl, in which a terrible-at-his-job sidekick recruits a grandmother in a last ditch effort to get a magical girl for his quota

it's cute(aside from some questionable translation choices)

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

Out of curiosity, do we have a release date for that Madoka Magica spinoff anime somebody mentioned a little while ago yet (I forget the name of it but apparently it's an adaption of a game set in the same universe)?

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

Also it's been mentioned before but I would really love a DokiDoki sequel series/movie. It just seems out of all the seasons so far the ending leaves a lot of things that could be explored further.

For example:

-The Trump Kingdom now has a direct link with Japan and has been modernized thanks to the Yotsuba family. They also seem to have abolished the monarchy and the former king now resides in Mana's hometown.

-With their identities now public knowledge the Precure are apparently now directly employed by the government to deal with various threats (which makes sense honestly).

-Though post-series All Stars movies seem to ignore this Regina now appears to be an official part of the DokiDoki team. To that end, while she can't transform (though her normal outfit does kind of bare a resemblance to that of the main team if you look at it closely) it might be cool if she started referring to herself as a Cure while in battle (like I've said before, Cure Joker has a nice ring to it and would be a good match with her "sister")

-The Selfish Trio is still around (also, I forget but was it ever explained where those three came from in the first place? I know they were there during the initial invasion of the Trump Kingdom).

Larryb fucked around with this message at 01:17 on Apr 14, 2019

Nodosaur
Dec 23, 2014

obvious pretool
I imagine the Selfish trio are embodiments of a certain emotion/deadly sin like their master, so they just manifest alongside him. Bel for Sloth, Marmo for Gluttony, Ira for wrath, etc. One of the ones we never saw in the series is straight up called Lust, so it fits.

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

Nodosaur posted:

I imagine the Selfish trio are embodiments of a certain emotion/deadly sin like their master, so they just manifest alongside him. Bel for Sloth, Marmo for Gluttony, Ira for wrath, etc. One of the ones we never saw in the series is straight up called Lust, so it fits.

That makes sense. I think Regina was also supposed to represent Lust (and Proto Selfish was Original Sin). Hell, the final battle of the series was essentially God vs Satan (Parthenon Mode was a reference to a Greek temple dedicated to Athena).

Off the subject, Star Twinkle 11: This was an interesting episode. The team was able to recover Taurus, but Aiwan still has one Pen in her possession. Also, she turned the three generals into a Notrigger with the combined power of all three of them, necessitating the usual Precure magical wand weapon. The power of the Southern Cross manifested in a new attack that's pretty flashy, but not final upgrade level flashy.

If anyone was wondering, apparently the ship can be compacted into a small red ball about the size of Lala’s antennas so that’s how they managed to evade the alien hunters.

I'm really looking forward to next week. Moviemaking episodes are always fun.

Larryb fucked around with this message at 01:19 on Apr 14, 2019

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

Subs are out, lots of stuff happens this time around:

-The girls avoid detection thanks to Lala being able to shrink the ship down into a small orb she can carry around with her

-The Taurus pen is recovered (though Iwan still has the other one she picked up last episode)

-Mr. Ryo discovers the team’s identities (or at least that Lala is an alien)

-We learn a bit more about the NotRaiders and their goals. Also their leader is named Lord Darknest and has begun to awaken (and Cat Butler appears to be way stronger than he lets on)

-We get our first team finisher

- Madoka’s dad seems to be starting to suspect that something’s up with his daughter and her friends

Next time: Lala becomes a movie star (also ninjas)

Larryb fucked around with this message at 15:15 on Apr 15, 2019

Twelve by Pies
May 4, 2012

Again a very likpatous story
It looks like to me at least that Mr. Ryo only learned that Lala was an alien, and not that they were Precure specifically. Hikaru kind of hinted about the bad stuff that went down last episode but she didn't get into any detail, and just having space joyrides with friends doesn't really hint at "We're also transforming superheroes."

It'd be really awesome if Hikaru's power awakening Lord Darknest was a ToQ #1/Zed situation but I don't think I'll get my hopes up.

Gonna go ahead and state the obvious and say that the mystery figure is Mr. Ryo posing as a movie producer and saying that all this was special effects and that the girls are starring in a movie to throw suspicion off them (for now).

SatoshiMiwa
May 6, 2007


Nah the next episode preview showed it as a new character so it looks like it's a honest to goodness movie producers

Anyway a bit I caught in the subs is Looks like Kappard had his planet destroyed so I suspect we'll have the generals turn at some point or have more of back story than just being evil. Also don't trust the Butler at all

SatoshiMiwa fucked around with this message at 04:04 on Apr 15, 2019

Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

The butler is definitely holding something back (he declines to be part of the Notrigger because his power would imbalance the others and then later is shown opening up a portal and lifting his companions seemingly via telepathy), I’m interested in seeing what he can do/what his deal is.

The next two episodes appear to be Lala focused which could be interesting. Based on the title, the one after next week’s seems to feature her attending school with Hikaru and the others so that might be fun to see.

I think at this point we’ve now seen everything from the OP except for our mysterious blue haired girl (who I suspect should be popping up before too long now).

MonsterEnvy
Feb 4, 2012

Shocked I tell you

Larryb posted:

(and Dog Butler appears to be way stronger than he lets on)


Cat Butler. Name Bakenyan based off the Bakeneko yokai.

MonsterEnvy fucked around with this message at 15:07 on Apr 15, 2019

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Larryb
Oct 5, 2010

MonsterEnvy posted:

Cat Butler. Name Bakenyan based off the Bakeneko yokai.

Ah right corrected, forgot his name for a moment and he looked kind of like a wolf to me. Either way, this episode makes him seem like he’s going to be way more important than I originally assumed.

While we’ve seen everyone from the opening now except our mystery girl I wouldn’t be surprised if we get introduced to at least one more general later down the road (it’s happened before after all).

Larryb fucked around with this message at 15:20 on Apr 15, 2019

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