At last the world is afforded the Kishidan + Megadeth + Kamen Rider crossover it has long cried out for.

The opening is fairly engaging, telling the story prior to the Goukaiger series. In fact, it’s only as the Goukaiger appear that things begin to slow down. I never thought I’d say this, but the appearance of the Goseiger cast soon changes this.

Again, the Goukaiger team seem guest stars in their own story. This seems to be a running theme for the series, although I’m fairly sure this wasn’t always the way. Perhaps I’ve simply become more cynical as the story has unfolded.

For a while there, at the beginning of the year, I was pretty engaging by both the characters and the settings… and then the worst thing possible for the show happened: they had a Hurricanger two-parter. If anything was needed to highlight how uninteresting the events of their own series have been, then it was episodes #25 – 26.

Obviously it’s well documented that Hurricanger has long since been one of my favourite shows. These episodes simply reminded me why.

After #26, I just felt that, more than anything, what I wanted was a Hurricanger sequel.

But all of this is besides the point as we’re talking about 199 Heroes.

So, what did I like about the film? Surprisingly, the Goseiger characters. I never watched this series, or had much interest in it, but they seemed a lot more well-rounded than the cast of this year’s sentai. Like Boukenger and Shinkenger, it also felt like the events of Goseiger continued beyond what we saw in the series – like we only saw but a glimpse of the wider world in which these events took place.

Speaking of Boukenger, it was also nice to see a cameo from Takahashi Mitsuomi, again reprising his role as Akashi Satoru/BoukenRed. Likewise I was pleased to see the original actors reprise the roles of the Big One and AkaRanger.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a vs. Super Sentai film were it not for the random selection of ‘favourites’ reprising their roles. I’m not going to complain about Aizawa Rina being in the film but I do have to wonder if she was really that popular to warrant an appearance here and also in the standalone Goukaiger movie. Regardless, she is an improvement on GingaBlue.

When placed side-by-side with Toei’s other big crossover of the year (OOO, Den-O, All Riders: Let’s Go Kamen Riders), 199 Heroes is an infinitely better offering and a story that does its source material infinitely more credit. It’s still not as good as All Riders vs. Dai-Shocker – in fact it could even be said to rely too heavily on the tropes of the previous Rider crossover, but it is a lot of fun and worth checking out for that reason alone.

So far it’s not a patch on All Riders vs. Dai-Shocker.

I suppose I should award points for the fact that General Shadow from Stronger appears… but seeing as I’d completely forgotten who he was as he’s such a last-minute-head-villain, I don’t think I really can.

Not only is their latest song, Z Densetsu ~Owarinaki Kakumei~ a collaboration with tokusatsu songmaster, Mizuki Ichiro, but the PV itself is one big tokusatsu homage.

You can check out Z Densetsu, and take your first steps into the wider world of idol fandom, on tokyohive.

Thank you.

Goukaiger doesn’t look like it is as unique as DCD. The gimmick has already been proven and tested, we know the DCD format was popular hence its return here and the continued presence of DCD-related spin off features. So whilst not unique, what Goukaiger is, is actually a lot of fun.

The same AU premise as DCD seems to be employed in order to prevent the show from being too hampered by continuity (I can almost hear softpixels weeping as I say that) and we are treated to, on average, the return of at least three different former teams (if only for henshin and combat sequences) per episode, not including the Boukenger style Pokérap detailing a different chunk of previous shows at the end of each episode.

The use of former powers by the core Goukaiger team is also unique in that gender is not an issue – in episode #2, we see a female HarikenYellow, a female GekiRed, a male HarikenBlue and several other paradigm shifts in terms of the interpretation of established power sets.

So, having said all that, you would be vastly mistaken if you thought that I wasn’t about to write about to write Ahim de Famille as girl!KuwagaRaiger x Nono Nanami is seriously mistaken.

Hell, you might even get a new Sentai School piece out of me yet.

Stay tuned.