Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Chief Differences between Power Rangers and Super Sentai

While six months ago, I had highlighted Why You Should Watch Super Sentai, with concepts that are exclusively present in Super Sentai and are not present in Power Rangers. These concepts (Guns, perversity, writing, blood and death) are differences between Super Sentai and Power Rangers, but I also want to mention things they both share but slight differences within them.

Powers
In Power Rangers, they obviously have 'powers.' Having a morpher, in most cases they are bound by DNA or locked into the morpher, so they need something to transfer the 'powers.' And you could loose 'powers.' While in Super Sentai, the henshin device (morpher) is just a tool to don the uniforms. They can switch the devices if someone leaves or dies. The 'powers' as they are, can never be 'taken away' like they are in Power Rangers. Unless, of course if the Sentai henshin device is broken, but in most cases they are fixed OR recently with Gokaiger, that every team before them did loose their powers. The reason I bring this up, is because there is always a discussion in teamups "Forever Red" and "Once A Ranger" about regaining their powers, since in the veteran Ranger's respective finale, they lost their 'powers.' But in Super Sentai teamups, there is never a question on how they got their 'power' back.

Monsters having two lives
In the majority of episodes of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, monsters were either destroyed by the Power Blaster or Megazord. If they became big, they weren't destroyed firstly by the Power Blaster, in most cases. In Super Sentai, they must be defeated in adult size by the team's cannon and then they grow big and must be destroyed by the robot. Of course, this has been adapted in later on seasons and is now common in Power Rangers. And this concept can divert in both Power Rangers and Super Sentai, in different forms. Also, in earlier seasons of Power Rangers, it was common for monsters to re-appear with no explanation, many times after the monster's destruction. In Super Sentai, a reason is given to the resurrection to a fallen monster.

Villain Groups have names
In the majority of Super Sentai villains have names for their collective groups. Goranger had the Black Cross Army, Dairanger had the Gorma, Kakuranger had the Youkai, and Ohranger had the Baraonia Empire. Ohranger's adaptation Power Rangers Zeo, did have a name for their villain group and it was the Machine Empire, but it was the only one. Carranger had Bowzock, Megaranger had the Nejiregia, Gingaman had the Barban, GoGo Five had the Pysma Family, Timeranger had the Londarz Family, Gaoranger had the Orgs---Wild Force did too, Hurricanger had Jakanja (their logo above), Abaranger had the Evorian, Dekaranger had the Alienizer, Magiranger had the Infreshia, Boukenger had the Negative Syndicate, Gekiranger had the RinJyuDen, Go-Onger had the Gaiarc and the Shinkenger have the Gedoushu. While most of the Power Ranger villain groups were just refer to by their lead villain's name, much like Bandora's gang in Zyuranger.

Monsters have different classes
In most recent series of Super Sentai, monsters have different classes. For example in Magiranger, there are Dark Beasts, Super Dark Beasts, Beastmen, and Beastmen Kings. But in Power Rangers Mystic Force, their counterpart, the monsters were just monsters. In GoGo Five, each general had a different class of monsters, each elemental. But in Lightspeed Rescue, no such thing. Same with Go-Onger, each general was in charge of different class of monster (Bankijyu), if it was water, sky, or land. But in RPM, that is thrown out the window. All monsters have names in Super Sentai, but nowadays, we are lucky if a Power Ranger monster has a name.

Swimsuit Distraction
This hasn't been done lately, even though some Rangers have swimsuits (Abaranger movie and the Boukenger movie), but back from the 70's to 90's, female warriors have donned swimsuits to distract the footsoldiers. In fact, Miku of Megaranger showed Sae of Gaoranger how to do this in Gaoranger vs. Super Sentai. By the way, above is Momo of Ohranger.

Teleportation
Earlier in Power Rangers, teleportation was common. In Super Sentai, teleportation is rarel used. From the 80's and 90's, they did teleport from their robos, like in Zyuranger, Dairanger and Ohranger. The reason I believe Rangers don't teleport in Super Sentai is in order to run, for heightened drama. Yes, the heroes run, in the majority of every season, there is a dramatic scene where they all run to the spot to meet the villain.

Canon
While Power Rangers fans are sticklers for continuity between season and season and want them to exist in their same universe, but in Super Sentai, it was assumed each series existed in their own universe. You can start fresh with each season, each series had their own rules and history. In teamups, they do exist in the same world. But that is only the teamups. Rarely does anything from the past seasons are mentioned on the actual series. In the teamups (Abaranger vs. Hurricanger, Dekaranger vs. Abaranger, and Gekiranger vs. Boukenger), they go to the Abaranger curry shop, but it is never mentioned, for example in Gekiranger.

Related Topic: Greener on the Other Side: Why You Should Watch Super Sentai

2 comments:

Duckhams said...

Re: Swimsuit Distraction.
Now I want to know what episode in Boukenger has it ^^

Kakuranger VS Ohranger did show some Swimsuit Distraction too.

henshin0 said...

The boukenger swimsuits were in the movie, as far as I can remember. But in ep39 the male members wore coconut bras (don't ask why), maybe the girls did too, but I'm not sure. In 44, yellow was having a bubble bath with moboroshi no gekkou