Engine Inspection presents a writer tears. This is MJ. I'm an author, I'm an artist, I'm an analyzer.
You can find all my work at MJMunoz.com. Join me as I talk about Combinator Gov episode 1.
So this episode is entitled A Snack Combinator or something to that effect.
It was kind of interesting. I wasn't really excited about Gov. It's been a while since I've...
I totally skipped over the chemi writer was at Gotshard. Totally skipped over that because I was doing other things
and I thought it wasn't going to be a good idea for me but I decided I'll come back with this.
I'm covering the newest Ultraman as it's coming out and I'm trying to get more into the Soka Satsuki game.
So I figure, here we go. Let's check this thing out and see how I like it.
I'll be honest, I thought it was stupid from the outset of it with the gummies and everything.
The gimmicks are, you know, kind of ridiculous and they get worse every year it seems to me.
But I gave the episode a fair chance and I honestly liked it.
So this originally is September 1st, 2024. It's September 3rd as I'm recording this and it will be released the same day.
The writer of it is Junko Komura and the director is Teruaki Sugihara.
Just for those people who don't know, Junko Komura, she was the main writer for Wizard actually.
And I actually, I'm sorry, she wasn't the main writer for Wizard but she wrote a lot of Wizard.
Sorry. She is credited as the head writer for Wizard. I guess that was the first time she was the head writer.
I think she worked on the previous Super Sentai as well.
But yeah, so she was the...oh, how funny. Huh. How interesting.
Apparently she's appeared in Wizard Drive and Gab.
But she was the head writer, credited as the head writer in obviously Gab...Gav? Gab? Gab? I don't know. Whatever.
Wizard and she was in...
I'm sorry. She was a head writer for Combinator Gab, writer for Combinator Wizard and Combinator Drive.
So that doesn't mean she was the head writer for those. Okay, got it. That's what I thought.
But I was second guessing myself. It's been a while since I've watched Wizard.
She even wrote the second episode of Wizard.
Wutsu Ishikida, who was the...I believe he was the main writer for Combinator Wizard.
Okay, yes. And he wrote the first half of Combinator Hibiki. Okay.
That's why I remember that name.
And Tera Kusugi Hara, he's worked on Bunch of Zero-One, Saber, Revice, Bunch of Geats.
Not everything, though. Like a handful about it. You know, anywhere from...
Well, increasingly more and more, so that's good.
Anyway, so I thought the...like I said from the outset, I thought that the premise was stupid.
And it looked really ridiculous. And I don't understand why it has to be gummies.
And it's...you know, this is a Japanese children's television show.
While I typically like that, it was very, very childish, very kiddy in the presentation of some of the things.
But at the same time, it is, you know, Combinator.
And it does have that different...I'm not going to say edge, because it's not edgy.
It has a different side to it.
Where you have this, you know, ridiculous premise, ridiculous setup.
It's very much unlike Ultraman, where, you know, Soma has, you know, his auburn hair.
And, you know, his bright outfit.
And he acts a little bit like a...well, okay. Ultras act like goofballs, too, in their civilian forms.
But, you know, he's a weird guy.
But it's explained because he's from another world.
Whether he's actually an alien, or if he's from another dimension, or what, it's unexplained.
But I gotta say, despite all of that, and despite the ridiculousness of the premise,
I decided to give it a shot.
And I was pleased with some things, because I, you know, I gave it, like I said, I gave it a fair shot.
And seeing Soma's heroism in a couple of different forms was really enjoyable for me.
And I really liked something deep within his character.
I liked something cool about his character.
He's starting with his kid, Hajime.
And they start talking.
And one of the things that Hajime says is about, he says it about his mother, basically.
And that kind of triggers something within Soma.
And he has memories of his own mother, and his mother warning him when he was a child to stay away from the family's confections, to not eat them.
And then his mother being taken away from him as, you know, he's an adult, he's 18, 19, whatever.
The actor turned 19 while filming the first episode, I think, is what I read.
So he's a fairly young guy.
But, you know, an adult still.
Hopefully, no, I mean, he acts like a man, he acts like an adult in this book, and I'll get to that, which is what really interested me, and really made me think, oh, okay, maybe there's someone here.
Before he even transforms, before he's a Kamen Rider, before he's a hero, we see he has, you know, amazing physical strength.
And he puts himself on the line to save Hajime from getting hit by a truck, which was very interestingly reminiscent of, but in a comedic way, Kamen Rider I, what he does.
I think the first time he exhibits his powers in the Hideyakana, the Toshikuyinoue, Kamen Rider I, there's the first, there's the next.
Anyway, he wrote that one.
And I don't remember who directed it.
Anyway, but it was a while ago, and it was the first, you know, adult reboot type thing of Kamen Rider, where he was Hopper, not, you know, Kamen Rider.
And then eventually, I guess he becomes Kamen Rider, but for sure he's Hopper in that.
Anyway, and you get, you get Rider I and Rider II within the first movie as well.
Yes, you do. Yes, you do. Anyway.
That's neither here nor there.
But he checked this truck to save somebody. I believe it's a kid as well, but it's not played for laughs at all, whereas this is played for laughs.
And it's funny, like I actually laughed at that, it was funny.
But also it was cool because he threw himself right in there in danger.
But then later on, he's protecting Hajime as best as he can, and he's getting trounced by this bad guy.
Like dog or wolf granite, granute, something like that, granute.
Let me see. Well, that stuff doesn't matter, but the bad guy, the monster of the week, he's getting trounced by him, and he's just taking, he's taking hit after hit after hit after hit.
And I started liking him when he talked about, like, like loving his mom and where he showed tenderness about his mom, and he showed like real emotional, like a real emotional reaction to something.
And he was sympathetic towards Hajime because Hajime was trying to get to his mom, and that kind of sort of cat on the other.
That like had, like that resonated with him, struck a chord with him, and it made him like want to help the kid a little bit even more.
And then Hajime's being, which by the way, that kid did great.
I hope he's going to be like a series regular because like I said, I think he did a fantastic job having the writer have a kid ally could be a lot of fun.
He's like kind of got attitude, and he keeps, he calls Shoma stranger danger at some point, and he calls the chocolate, not chocolate, the beastie, wolfhound, whatever, bad guy who follows him.
He calls him, he says, oh, stranger danger about this guy too, which is kind of funny.
But when the kids running from him, Shoma was just bringing him his little packet of snacks or whatever or something, all the seashells that he was taking his mom.
That's what it was. Kid was taking seashells to his mom, and Hajime had said something like, it's the least I can do.
She's my mom, you know, and like I'm a kid. I can't get anything with her really, but like this is something I can give to her.
And like it's ingratitude for everything that she's done for him.
And I thought that was like a really sweet emotional core. And that touched Shoma, that touched me as well.
And then when Shoma comes running in to give him the shells, he also says he's endangered from this monster.
And he tries to, he does, he does a school thing where he runs on the side of these shipping containers and he saves them.
And then he ends up telling him, you know, you go over there and stay away.
And then he gets beat and, you know, beat down a bunch and keeps getting back up and he keeps getting hit and getting hurt by this monster.
And then finally the gummy things in his pocket or that came out of his stomach because he is this alien with his weird stomach.
It's like a drive or build driver, which I guess the laziness of that design for that thing is like stupendous.
I cannot believe they just are recycling and kit bashing that friggin belt and they're not doing something better with it.
There were all those imagination belts that they made that they had like in the subway or in some place in Tokyo where they were displaying all these crazy,
like they had like a steampunk belt, which I think they cannibalized parts of that for like Comrade Blackstone's belt.
And they had a couple other belts that were like very inventive and imaginative that just like they made for whatever reason.
And instead of putting the effort into either steal something from those or pull something else in, they just use like the build belt.
And the fact, the idea that this guy has a mechanical stomach thing that's on the outside of him and it has a crank that it needs is kind of crazy to me.
Like I kind of got some Kiva vibes in here a little bit, but like Kiva, this robotic bat thing that Kiva has as his belt slash butler kind of guy.
Like it blows the whistles on its own. He has to put the whistles in its mouth and it blows them.
It latches on it, bites them for him to transform, flies around and he catches it and it bites him and stuff.
Like there's interaction with the belt, but the idea that your stomach part would...
I mean, I know you need to put food in your mouth in order for you to eat it, but the fact that he's going to put the gummies in there and crank them like this, it seems a little ridiculous.
Yeah, I don't know what else they could have done. They could have had...
I mean, I don't want to think about the mechanics of the belt right now on the fly, but it's like very silly and kind of dumb.
But I mean, here's the thing, I'm saying it's like a dumb, weird premise. It's super goofy.
But then like you have these hard things. You have this guy who loves his mom and who wants to protect this kid who loves his mom and is trying to get back to her.
And then the mom comes and she calls him a monster. She calls both him and the monster, the Weka monster.
And the monster is like, ah, you see, you're a monster.
And I'm just like, you should kill all humans because they think you're a monster. And he's like, no, she's right. I'm a monster. You're a monster.
But the difference between you and me is I'm going to be the one who's alive after this. He doesn't say it like that.
He's like, you're a monster who's bad. And he like starts the conversation and then they have a long, cool, super cool fight.
They're like in between, they're jammed in between these shipping containers and they're like slicing them open.
And you can see that it's big slicing it open, but they have an effect that works that it looks like they slice the thing open.
And you're seeing them through the frame by that.
And then Shoma's like holding himself upside down in between shipping containers and they're fighting.
He did this awesome where he slid off the end of the shipping container and the guy was coming after him.
He sliced him from underneath and that led to them being stuck in between the two fighting and he slashed them and it looks super cool.
And then they go to this weird shopping mall, courtyard field area type thing.
And he tells them something like it comes down to choice and you choose to do X with your power and I'm choosing to do Y.
And that's why I'm made to beat you. And then he does this ridiculous gummy writer thing where his foot gets this giant gummy boot thing on it.
And he had already done super cool writer kicks I think that I'd never seen before where the guy's flying through the air.
I think the monster's flying through the air and he runs up to the edge of a building and he stops at the end of the building,
stops on a diamond and kicks the guy as he's flying through the air and he flies off. It's amazing.
So they have really cool ideas and really cool things that they're doing.
And really cool awesome stuff that they're doing.
And then they're packaging it with all this weird gummy stuff that I don't really get and don't really like.
And then when he beats the guy there's an explosion of gummies around him.
And I know these CGI elements, the guy turns into a hound and he has to chase them and he's on this ATV gummy wheel thing with bullets coming out of it and whatever.
It's super hyper ridiculous. And I just don't get why. This level of twerkness is really silly.
I don't really get it, especially because the old stuff sold with just a cool design and there's monsters every fight and there's the bike and there's the mask and the belt.
And I don't understand why you can't make a belt cool without having a ridiculous gimmick to it every single time.
I would think you'd be able to make the belt pretty cool by having stuff that you've put in there.
But I was thinking about it like, who does it? Well like Yu-Gi-Oh for example, it's a card game only right?
But you've been able to have, and it's a very successful card game but apparently it's like a one piece card game or whatever.
I'm just thinking like there's other ways to sell these shows.
Like you could have a combinator show and you could have an interesting design for each guy, a very unique design for each guy.
You could have the belts and you could have other accessory weapon type things.
But I would think you'd be able to just sell the roleplay toys but you would not sell the roleplay toys.
You can give them all card belts and then you can have the cards be like the cards in the trading card game for example.
And I think that's a lot cheaper to produce in a lot of ways than all these toys.
Maybe the ROI is smaller, I'm not sure but it seems like, it seems kind of crazy and ridiculous.
I'm like, I was thinking like I'd be so embarrassed if someone would watch me watch this because like it's ridiculous.
And I'm slightly embarrassed of it myself.
But I can see past some of the ridiculous stuff to see like okay there's something like, there's a story here, there's something cool here going on.
There's something interesting going on with these characters and with this world.
And I don't quite know what the conflict is, I don't really care at this point.
I don't know how long I'm going to stick with Gav or Gav or whatever.
But you know there's something good.
I like this episode, it was actually pretty cool.
And I think there's something there.
So anyway, a couple things I wanted to say.
So Hidizaku Chinin is the actor who played Shoma.
And I like him, I think he did a really good job.
I think there's definitely something there.
And I appreciate him and his performance, which I think I've talked about adequately.
I just wanted to put his name out there and say what I had to say.
Apparently Teruaki Sugihara told him to watch...
This is information from the wiki.
Sugihara told him to watch Zero-One.
To prepare for the role, knowing that Arato Hidin Choma is a very bright personality.
Chinin also took heavy inspiration from Miyotaka Hashi's portrayal of the character in both the physical action scene and behind the booth ADR sessions.
Very interesting.
So he did at the very end of the episode when he was about to get on his motorcycle, he had a very Arato feel.
And that makes a lot of sense.
So if he copied him, I could see that.
Teruaki drew inspiration from that performance.
I can see that.
So I think that's really interesting.
And again, I think he did a great job even in his civilian fight when he was getting beat up and stuff.
And then he also does this really cool kick where he jumps and does a two-foot kick against the monster.
Super cool.
So I really like Shoma.
He's a pretty cool guy.
And I think Hidizaku Chinin does a really good job portraying him.
And then I wanted to note that the suit actor, which I mean the suit acting was fantastic as well.
I mean, I talked about the box and the kicking at the edge of the roof and all this stuff.
And I want to know, like, they were on a wire, is it a fake roof?
Is there like a CGI blue ledge that they painted out or whatever?
I don't know.
But whatever they did, it was fantastic.
It was magical.
I was like, I stopped and looked at that again because that's amazing.
But that's Yuya Nawata who acted as the suit actor in Zero One.
He was Combinator Revi in whatever that next show was.
He was Buffa who was sort of like secondary antagonist writer from Geats.
And then now he's Gapp.
So I think Revi was from the previous pink and purple weird dinosaur children's bar bizarre adventure Combinator type thing.
So anyway, yeah, I was wanting to give note to those guys because there's something to appreciate there.
There's something to say.
So anyway, with that, that's going to end my conclusion.
That's going to end my conclusion.
That's going to end my conclusion of talking about Combinator Gapp Episode 1.
Overall, I liked it.
I liked it more than I thought I would.
And I was surprised by it pleasantly.
So that's cool.
And I'll check out a few more and we'll see where we go from here.
So until next time, folks, take care and be well.
And I hope you enjoyed that.
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This is MJ signing out.
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