7 Thoughts About Uchuu Sentai Kyuuranger Episode 6: "Take Flight! Dancing Star"

1.) The episode starts out with the team discussing a plan of attack on another member of Jark Matter when Lucky's enthusiasm apparently upsets Hammy so much that it causes her to break a Sentai rule: never ask to be made the leader.  It pretty much always leads to you being instantly disqualified.

As a result, the rest of the episode centers around which member of the team should lead them, even though Garu basically comes up with the right answer from the very beginning: the leader is obviously Lucky.

Later in the episode, we learn that Hammy's frustration with Lucky is largely due to her belief that his good luck shouldn't allow him to lead the team when she put so much hard work into training to be a shinobi and now as a Kyuuranger.  It's a fair point, only Hammy's ignoring both the sheer ridiculousness of Lucky's good fortune and the fact that when it comes down to it he just has excellent instincts...instincts that literally JUST saved their lives last week.

2.) I have...questions about this scene: is this all happening in Xiao's head, or is he actually doing it in front of the rest of the team?  And why aren't they reacting to this insanity and abrupt, impossible change of scenery if its the latter?

Also, you can tell that even though Toei is trying to change the way they approach Sentai that they're not quite sure how much they want to change, as this is exactly the sort of thing that you would've seen in the past three or so years that I would have thought they were trying to get away from.  I know it's apparently "important" they choose which five members are going to be involved for the episode, but doing it in a more straight-forward fashion...or just having a computer choose the "optimal" members for the mission...would have been much cooler, I think.   Ah well.

Still, there is something to be said that the Kyuuranger are dealing with an enemy so powerful it's apparently subjected the entire universe...and they're leaving their missions up to chance each time.  This team is clearly stupid OP.

3.) Of all the things I could have expected, a talking upgrade actually was not one of them.  The Pegasus Kyu Globe is apparently inhabited by...either an actual Pegasus, the living embodiment of the Pegasus star system..or both?   I'm not really sure, Xiao's Art Show wasn't quite clear enough.

Either way, Pegasus-san didn't distract from the episode too much--he was attached to Lucky, who's already a goofball so as far as antics go it's not like Lucky can really get that much worse in the first place.  I do think there was a lost opportunity on adding a new body to KyuRenOh that could fly, but I guess the Pegasus globe is like the Ninja Falconzord, so it's fine?

4.) This is one of those episodes, where the heroes get outdone by something impossibly mundane despite normally being capable of superhuman feats.  Sometimes its by brainwashed kids, this time the Kyuranger are waylaid by...a group of enslaved humans doing an advanced exercise routine to confuse the team.

My running theory is that the actual power any Sentai character has is variable on a number of factors including stress level, inner-harmony as well as harmony with the actual team, Hot-Bloodness™, and lastly actual experience with the powers.  If harmony levels are down, their weapons and suits become about as effective as they are in real life.   

Not to worry though, because the team practices a dance routine to the tune of the Kyuuranger ED to save the day!

5.) Stinger Update: While the idiots spend the episode practicing the Cha-Cha with D.R.A.M. and a Dominican that resembles Taina, Stinger runs across what I'm almost certain will be a major threat for the team in the future, a pair of squid monster assassins who keep making ink related puns.  The fact that Stinger could hold them off without dying tells me he legitimately is better than the rest of the group, but also that these two either won't last very long or were seriously holding back.

6.) Admittedly, I hated the dancing, but the way Balance continued to bust a move after the gimmick of the week had stopped was adorable.  After Stinger he might legit be my favorite character right now, hitting just the right spot on the spectrum between being funny and being a buffoon.   He's just out in space battling evil and trying to have as much fun as possible while he does it, and it's hard to get mad at something so earnest.

7.) Next week?  An Ex-Aid crossover!  I'd say I'm excited as I once vastly preferred Kamen Rider to Super Sentai, but the Ex-Aid costume design is fucking space cancer, so I'm just hoping the characters are all good enough to pull this episode through.