Gokaiger vs. Gavan (2011) Review

So, for Gokaiger Toei have changed things up a bit when it came to their Sentai movie schedule. Normally you have the summer “movie” paired up with the Kamen Rider of that time, then the “Vs.” movie, in which the current team joins up with the previous team, gets into a fight with each other, and then gets together to do the MASSIVE ROLL CALL followed by giant explosions and the kaiju killing, followed by light salad. If a Sentai show is successful enough, they even get a “Returns” direct-to-video flick. This time around however, Toei did the team up with Goseiger earlier in 2011 with the “199 Great Hero Battle”, which helped to mask the fact that it was a flick involving Goseiger. We did get the summer movie on time, but for the latter part of the year, we got Gokaiger vs. Gavan, allowing Toei to pay tribute to the Metal Heroes series. Never seen any of the Metal Heroes shows? Actually you did, when it was called VR Troopers:

A lot of the footage from that show was compiled from later eras of the Metal Heroes series back in Japan, of which Space Sheriff Gavan was the starting point. For those still wanting more info, just start here. With that all out of  the way, here’s my thought’s on the flick.

For one, I am thankful they kept the Gai-isms to a minimum except when it was time for comedy. As I stated before in my previous review of Gokaiger, Gai tended to drive me insane as a character to the point that he would become a major distraction from the narrative, so keeping him regulated to gushing over the 3 roles played by Kenji Ohba and kicking posterior as Gokai Silver was a much needed choice in order for this flick to actually be entertaining for me. What we do get is more focus on Captain Marvelous as it seems a portion of his own development as a pirate was influenced by his rescue as a child by Gavan, and his current need to save the Sheriff from the combined forces of Zangyack and the descendant of Don Horror, Ashurada. It goes a long way in establishing the personal stakes for the Gokaigers as to why they need to help out a guy who ended up kicking the crap out of them in the beginning of the movie.

Also, I like how they got the whole “Vs.” part out of the way by having Gavan kick the crap out of the Gokaigers and then reveal that he was using them as pawns the whole time to flush out the Zangyack forces. Most of the time when I watch these crossover flicks, it’s usually seeing the two teams battling it out over a misunderstanding and then coming to their senses over a common goal, which was really kind of odd for the 199 flick, as trusting others is just not the Gokaiger’s style, even by the end of the show.  Gokaiger vs. Gavan handled this better by keeping the initial fight and then teamup more in line with the tone established by the series in that they’re not teaming up with Gavan to save the world, they are simply letting Marvelous repay a debt to a man that he looked up to and they’re just along for the ride with their captain.

There is one part to the movie that bugged the crap out of me, and that was the Gobusters cameo. Okay, so we have Basco at full strength and form getting the crap handed to him by the same team that routinely gets their butts handed to them by Enter in their own show? Yeah, I was not feeling this part. I know Toei needs to make their new team look strong and able to match up to the Gokaigers, but doing a God-mode style scene will not work for ya. It’s the same thing that got them in trouble when All-Riders Vs. Dai-Shocker came out and they decided to have W smack the crap out of Shadowmoon. All stuff like that does is belittle your current Rider or Sentai team, at least the Gobusters did make things look back as W did to Decade.

Special mentions should go to the main comedy bits of the movie, the first involving the prison break-in, which I found to be hilarious as you got to see a lot of side characters from previous shows act absolutely ridiculous.  It was a nice tension breaker and we got to see more Jealoushitto. The other moment had to do with Kenji Ohba and his multiple personas. For those in the know, Ohba had already appeared in Gokaiger as two of his Sentai characters, Shiro (Battle Kenya), and Daigoro (Denzi Blue). I won’t give away too much, but let’s just say the movie has a funny way of acknowledging how the two Sentai look exactly the same as Gavan.

So at the end of the day, is this a flick to check out? Absolutely, the action is well-paced along with the drama and comedy, and it makes the Gobusters look more competent than they actually are. Plus one can use this show as a gateway into the wide world of the Metal Heroes series, of which many subs are out for those who know where to look. GOKAI CHANGE!