Some
fads never go away. While sentai team shows in the U.S. haven't been as
hot in recent years as was Mighty Morphin Power Rangers in the 1990's,
those shows are still on American television. The sentai tradition in
Japan goes back to 1979, and there's been a new series every year
without interruption. The look of those shows comes from the costume
and giant robot designs, and two of the designers responsible for that
look were at Anime Reactor. Kobayashi Daisuke, on the left, was the
U.S. convention newcomer; he specializes in the design of those wild
uniforms. Tetsuya Aoki, on the right, is the mecha designer who has
branched into manga in the last couple of years. Together, they've
worked on the three-artist teams who draw up the uniforms for each
year's new sentai team and make the robots used by the heroes and
villains.
Sentai
shows always have teams of five or six fighters, who are color-coded.
The artists said those colors have special meanings to Japanese
audiences, which is why they've not changed in a quarter-century of
series. Red always belongs to the heroic leader, black is worn by the
rebellious second-in-command, and pink always goes on the female
character. "Who wants to see a guy in pink?" asked Aoki. While
purple is considered to be a royal color in the West, in Japan it's not
seen as a heroic color and won't be worn by the good guys in sentai
series. When Aoki was creating the robots in the series known as the
Transformers in the U.S., he exclusively used purple as the color as
the leader of the evil bad-guy robots. "If we were to take brown or
purple into this, you'd confuse the hero for the evil villain," added
Aoki.
While
colors and the basic premise of the sentai series never change, the
theme of each year's show is different. The series that was turned into
Power Rangers was a dinosaur-themed show, but other series have been
based on alien power sources, animals, and even teachers (?). Weapons
typically are limited to swords and the occasional gun, and that's not
because of any U.S.-style standards and practices limits, according to
the artists. They say that the costumed fighters just look better in
sword fights than if they used other weapons. Aoki said "The image of
taking a swing with a sword is cooler than firing a gun," and Kobayashi
added that "Guns only look cool if there's some distance between you
and the target. With these robots we film them in a small area, so it
has to be hand-to-hand combat."
Some
fads never go away. While sentai team shows in the U.S. haven't been as
hot in recent years as was Mighty Morphin Power Rangers in the 1990's,
those shows are still on American television. The sentai tradition in
Japan goes back to 1979, and there's been a new series every year
without interruption. The look of those shows comes from the costume
and giant robot designs, and two of the designers responsible for that
look were at Anime Reactor. Kobayashi Daisuke, on the left, was the
U.S. convention newcomer; he specializes in the design of those wild
uniforms. Tetsuya Aoki, on the right, is the mecha designer who has
branched into manga in the last couple of years. Together, they've
worked on the three-artist teams who draw up the uniforms for each
year's new sentai team and make the robots used by the heroes and
villains.
Sentai
shows always have teams of five or six fighters, who are color-coded.
The artists said those colors have special meanings to Japanese
audiences, which is why they've not changed in a quarter-century of
series. Red always belongs to the heroic leader, black is worn by the
rebellious second-in-command, and pink always goes on the female
character. "Who wants to see a guy in pink?" asked Aoki. While
purple is considered to be a royal color in the West, in Japan it's not
seen as a heroic color and won't be worn by the good guys in sentai
series. When Aoki was creating the robots in the series known as the
Transformers in the U.S., he exclusively used purple as the color as
the leader of the evil bad-guy robots. "If we were to take brown or
purple into this, you'd confuse the hero for the evil villain," added
Aoki.
While
colors and the basic premise of the sentai series never change, the
theme of each year's show is different. The series that was turned into
Power Rangers was a dinosaur-themed show, but other series have been
based on alien power sources, animals, and even teachers (?). Weapons
typically are limited to swords and the occasional gun, and that's not
because of any U.S.-style standards and practices limits, according to
the artists. They say that the costumed fighters just look better in
sword fights than if they used other weapons. Aoki said "The image of
taking a swing with a sword is cooler than firing a gun," and Kobayashi
added that "Guns only look cool if there's some distance between you
and the target. With these robots we film them in a small area, so it
has to be hand-to-hand combat."
