Geats Extra: Punk Jack

[takenoko]

Wiki

Wow drinking on my kid's show. Feels like a story about being 30-40 depressed about giving up your youth, but with a guy who's like in his 20s lol

Always fun to see Girori around

I'm loling at the behind the scenes stuff for the DGP. There's your Rider mad scientists erasing people's memories, something I had assumed up to this point just happened magically and didn't really need an explanation for. LOL at the people working the factories to pack the ID Core boxes

Does Tooru always break apart with those lights?

LOL Buffa got men in blacked. There's a DGP cleanup crew too? This is like Skullface showing up in MGS 5 and going "Snake, I've been cleaning up your mistakes all this time."

A blank ID Core?

I like that the blank Riders have mind control helmets already installed

the blank riders are kind of cool, why don't they show up in the actual show

Are the Jamato alwys this colorful? They look extra good here. Maybe its' been a while since I've seen the base ones. Anyway, this is kind of lazy storytelling. Why are the Jamato there, did the staff order them to show up to deal with the fugitive or is it just a coincidence. If the player can just give up, why did he run, just let him go?

15 min in and I feel like I really haven't learned anything new about Win

That's how the ID Core works? So weird

Tsumuri talking more than in the show. I wish Tsumuri were more of a character

Are we going to see Men in Black captain i the show too? Feels like he needs to show up now

Oooh, wait, Beat makes much more sense as the buckle for Punk Jack...

Now that's how you swing an axe

I wish the men in black captain had a special helmet at least

LOL, I appreciate the closeups to explain how the toy guitar works, but at the same time, it makes it super apparent that he's just banging against a plastic prop that doesn't do anything XD

Man that was a real thirsty look from Win at Ace

Really enjoyed that special, not because the story was particularly good, but we got a lot of weird, unnecessary world building, plus the action was really good and fun. A little longer than it needed to be, but good times all around for the most part

Kind of dumb of Win to go "I won't be the staff's pawn" and then just going ahead and obeying them. Sure I guess??? Also it's silly that he didn't die, but was just in a coma. I would have been fine if they just used DGP magic to bring him back to life??

Edit:
Oh, the captain was GoseiBlue. I thought that skinny dude looked familiar lol. Glad to see a Goseiger still working

Also, for a Sakamoto direction, I didn't see any thighs. Maybe he was feeling off during shooting or something

[Gokider]

I like that the blank Riders have mind control helmets already installed

the blank riders are kind of cool, why don't they show up in the actual show

Just adds to the question of why they had Punk Jack join in that pair up round with his helmet, which causes Ace to be suspicious later when they could've just had him in one of those. Though I'm sure the show didn't have those helmets yet and they likely wanted to get Punk Jack's look in there sooner rather than later as he does seem to be the 5th Rider of the series (what with the additional personalization to his "ID" that only he and the main 4 have).

Oooh, wait, Beat makes much more sense as the buckle for Punk Jack...

Yeah, 2 musically inclined Riders doesn't help with solo themes (no pun intended). This does kind of make it a shame the 2 Geats Extras don't come together (that we know of) or Kamer Rider Shinobi at least gets the Beat Axe at some point and references StarNinger somehow.

Considering his helmet's appearance, the puns of his name and Rider name, and his debut without his helmet was the day before his pun namesake, I wouldn't have been surprised if they had him use the Zombie Buckle for a one-off goofy Halloween special or even just a joke in the series itself.

That being said, the Beat Form hasn't been used by many Riders other than Nago. Geats briefly used it the episode after its debut (because he has to use every large buckle apparently), Buffa got it from Feverslot the episode after, but didn't do anything with it, and Ben and John used it at the same time offscreen recently.

[Connie_Edogawa]

I like how the blank black ID core for the guards really completes the look for the desire driver to turn it into this icon, like I picked up on back in episode 14:

[takenoko]

No visual. Audio only

[Connie_Edogawa]

I made my comment earlier in this thread based on a clip I'd seen, I've yet to watch. might still be a while, as the torrent I'm using has 0 seeds, surprisingly.

[takenoko]

Urr.. lemme check something

Edit try now!

[Connie_Edogawa]

just got done downloading, I'll watch it later. 1:15 am isn't the worst time to enjoy toku, but maybe not on a Wednesday night.

EDIT: forgot to say, thanks. :3

[ViRGE]

This was a perfectly perfunctory special. But if I'm being honest, it wasn't anything special.

Alluding to something I said when Punk Jack returned to Geats a few episodes ago, he's a very basic character. He started out as a faceless, silent role and ended as a faceless, silent role. There are reasons for this, but at the end of the day he didn't do much during his initial run. He was mostly a plot device that went out like a chump (showcasing Giori's barbarism meant that he had to kill someone).

I suppose, in a sense, this special was an attempt to make up for that. But it wasn't particularly effective, in part because, as Takenoko noted, we never did learn anything new about Punk Jack. This special gave him some friends, but his character as a whole remains unchanged. That's sort of the challenge when doing a special like this: you don't really want to make it mandatory viewing to understand what's going on with the main show. But since that makes it a superfluous special, you're left without much reason to care, either.

The fact that the DGP even has a staff of mook riders wearing armbands (really?) is an odd choice. Like Takenoko, I thought this was all magic - or at least, technology indistinguishable from it. After all, we see people disintegrate (teleport) right off the field when they're dropped. Not to mention how people are getting to the DGP's hammer space. Having a team of people collecting participants in order to do traumatic memory wipes is basically just mild torture porn as far as the story goes.

On the plus side, the action was solid. I figured this was a Sakamoto work from the brief untransformed fight with Punk Jack. Other than leg shots, that's Sakamoto's other staple. I was also tickled pink that they made gratuitous use of physical explosive squib packs for the Punk Jack fight. Toei has been shying away from those for the most part, so it's good to see those used to full effect here. Nothing quite matches the way a physical pack will light up the room (and the guy setting it off, if he's not too careful!).

the blank riders are kind of cool, why don't they show up in the actual show

They went through entirely too much effort not to use them. So I guess we'll see what happens, but I expect they'll show up at some point.

If the player can just give up, why did he run, just let him go?

I guess they need to formally drop out? Otherwise they'll hang around and try to mooch a win in the end?

Tsumuri talking more than in the show. I wish Tsumuri were more of a character

Hear, hear! Now there's a character with a still very unclear backstory.

Kind of dumb of Win to go "I won't be the staff's pawn" and then just going ahead and obeying them. Sure I guess??? Also it's silly that he didn't die, but was just in a coma. I would have been fine if they just used DGP magic to bring him back to life??

Let's be clear here: he blew up. He blew up spectacularly. In no rational, realistic universe could he be revived with contemporary medical technology.

[takenoko]

Maybe Punk Jack's actor is a Toei's execs grandson in real life and this special was a favor to him. They even let him sing his own song, like Yodonna did for her third special. Punk is life! Yaaay!

[ViRGE]

Maybe Punk Jack's actor is a Toei's execs grandson in real life and this special was a favor to him. They even let him sing his own song, like Yodonna did for her third special. Punk is life! Yaaay!

He's certainly a solid actor, and I wouldn't mind seeing him in more. Though I'm afraid the Punk Jack role is just high profile enough that Toei may be disinclined towards casting him as a main character in anything else Toku-related.

As an aside, since I didn't get this in my initial notes, I appreciate that this special came out during Geats and not after. This makes it more relevant viewing, and it means they can shoot on Geats' standing sets. It makes the special actually feel like a part of the Geats' world, rather than tacked-on.