It’s no secret I’ve been a huge Power Rangers/Super Sentai fan for virtually all my life. I grew up watching shows like Lost Galaxy, Lightspeed Rescue, Wild Force, and one of my favorites, Dino Thunder. But, when I was introduced to the internet and specifically YouTube, the door was opened for me to explore, what I thought, never before seen Rangers. Since then, I got to experience Tokusatsu the way I never thought possible, from Go Go Five to Gridman, happily supporting all it brings. But what really gets me going for each new Sentai or Rider series are, of course, the villains. Weather they are demons released from a millennia old seal, galaxy spanning empire, space pirates, interdimensional or futuristic gangsters, Tokusatsu brings to the table suits and costumes with intricate details, and they all come with their armies of lookalike foot soldiers.
Called Sento-in, literally translated as Combatmen, these identical troops are the henchmen of the Evil Forces, usually sent down to wear down the Rangers before the Monster of the day attacks or to create diversions. I guess foot soldiers, mooks, goons or whatever you want to call them are an everlasting stable of fiction as a whole. TV Tropes explains how they are used to give the hero an ever-present threat to face before they fight the big bad, on a constant basis, otherwise the show/movie/game would have less action and lose the attention of the audience. Probably the two most popular examples for these are like the realms of fantasy are the monstrous orcs, for genres like science fiction you’d have no trouble finding the likes of Stormtroopers serving the military of a fascist empire and crushing rebel scum.
For this case, like Power Rangers and Super Sentai, foot soldiers are a staple of the two franchises. They are some of my favorite monsters. Sometimes all I have to do when a new series comes out is check out the foot soldiers on whether or not I’m going to enjoy the Sentai more. If it’s still good and the foot soldiers look cool like for example the Nanashi Company who vary in appearance, types and sizes while looking almost Lovecraftian with the designs of the heads, or you have other examples like Batlings, Quantrons, Krybots, Mechaclones, the Zolohs. I can go on! But here’s the thing, in fiction we don’t get a particular question that’s asked all that often: what are the foot soldiers fighting for? Most of the time it’s explained away like they’re programmed, mindless drones, battle droids to simply follow orders or they’re simply born to be that way, bred to destroy the world of men. Others include deep lore of their indoctrination at a young age to be completely subservient and to do whatever it takes to win. Whatever the case, foot soldiers rarely have the agency to break the mold and strike out on their own.
But…What if that were the case? What if a foot soldier threw up his hands and said “enough of losing! Enough of being beaten up all the time!”? Well, you get the gem that is “Go! Go! Loser Ranger!”
Sentai Daishikkaku or if you go by its many translations Ranger Reject or, going by Google translate, Great Sentai Disqualification, or more commonly Go! Go! Loser Ranger (most likely a play on the lyrics of Go-Go Power Rangers) is a manga written and illustrated by Negi Haruba, the manga author of Quintessential Quintuplets. Quite the juxtaposition to what we’re looking at today! He apparently started working on this series right after Quintuplets finished in 2020, with Loser Ranger premiering its first chapter in February ‘21. At the time of this writing, there aren’t a whole lot of information on the author’s inspiration for the story and character but it’s plain to see. Super Sentai is wildly popular in Japan, so much so some Tokusatsu shows have gone so far as to either reference It in some form or another or outright parody. Heck, there’s an entire page on the Power Rangers wiki detailing all the references it had over the years, which goes to show its testament and longevity. On the surface, one could mistake Go! Go! Loser Ranger as a parody. If it’s parodying anything about Sentai, it’s only parodying in name.
So how does Loser Ranger hold up? Let’s dig into the first chapter of the manga.
Hold up, just the first chapter? Why not the whole series like I’ve done previously or at least the first volume For starters, reviews in which I previously took up the entire story were simple; it was a complete story in general. Ranger Reject is still ongoing (at the time of this writing), and it doesn’t make sense to me to cover the entire run. What’s more is I don’t really want to go all out with another mega review like I usually do. And lastly the anime just came out and I’m not in a heavy spoiler mood. I might cover the rest of the first volume, we’ll see.
Let’s get started!
We open with the evil fortress loading overhead of Milky Way City. I guess Angel Grove and Tokyo aren’t good enough invasion spots anymore. Thirteen years ago, an invading villain army had tried to conquer the world because that’s pretty much what alien invasion forces do these days. Sorry E.T., coming in peace means killing little green men with fire. We get introduced to two members of the Ranger Battalions, the kind Yumeko Suzukiri and the ever excitable and cheery Hibiki Sakurama, trying to recruit this guy in the white T-shirt to join. The Battalions are stationed around a stadium where crowds of people gather to watch the Sunday fight, serving under each of the five Rangers themselves with their own color coordination, too. The pair give their speech on how the area will be dangerous, but the guy mentions there hasn’t been a casualty in years. He also comments on his youth that they look for being members of a paramilitary force, but Hibiki says the guy in white can be a Ranger too, giving him a recruitment slip.
Suzukiri goes on to say joining as a Ranger is easy but actually becoming one takes years. Sure, hope the money’s good. We step outside and the fortress is literally hanging over our heads in the shot. It’s actually a pretty impressive base for the Villainous Army, I like the stalagmites and the chains connecting the city with the citadel, basically anchoring it.
Over at the stadium, the crowds are gathering around vendors, getting masks for the kids. It looks like something of a Japanese New Years eve festival or Summer festival plus gorgeous ring girls holding up signs. Meanwhile the ever-reliable Leader of the Squadron arrives in bright red to happily sign autographs to adoring fans. However, this is not a story of a bunch of adults with attitude but a foot soldier with attitude.
We cut ten hours before inside the fortress that reflects its rocky exterior resembling somewhat of a cave. Inside we meet our gang of foot soldiers, the Dusters. I love the simplicity of their costume designs, from their bandanas to the faces resembling demon or Oni with how the horns and fangs are angled. Their name and black and white tights may have come from Dinniman’s foot soldiers, the Dustlers, who may have been inspiration. The Dusters are freaking out and panicking because they’ve run out of ideas on how to fight the heroes. 13 years is a very long time to be spending on coming up with weekly plans to eliminate your enemies. The well is so dry at this point they have no idea what to do.
They scramble to think up new monsters as the pre-show broadcast starts on their little radio they have. The Dusters don’t have traditional names like you or I, to compensate they go by single letter names instead. For example, the one laying down, Foot Soldier A, rejects the ideas of G and L, the former drawing up an impressive muscle-bound creature and the latter a cutesier kitty cat with a dress. Eventually one foot soldier suggests using a tiger as the monster of the day, reasoning the Asian philosophy of the rivalry between dragon and tiger, a sort of yin and yang duality. Much like the relationship between the Rangers and the Invaders.
And by the way, they’re not putting on this show because they want to. They were forced to do this by the Rangers as a sort of one-sided agreement. In fact, the last 13 years have been nothing, but a sham created by the Ranger, who killed the last of their leaders, or Executives, in just a year. And there’s one scrappy Duster who can’t stand it anymore.
This is Foot Soldier D and, believe it or not, he is our main protagonist. He’s sick of losing every week, so much so he tries to rally his fellow Dusters to remember why they were made in the first place. To, of course, conquer the world! However, his fellow foot soldiers are so browbeaten at this point they laugh at him and shrug him off. D goes to fight them but is quickly beaten up for his reckless ambition. He does have one friend among the evil forces, F, (who has a different body type than his friend as do each of the other Dusters) who tries to cheer him up by saying they only lost about 998 times and tells him it could always be a lot worse.
There is a reason why the Rangers didn’t kill all the Footsoldiers though. They have incredible regenerative and shape-shifting abilities. After using an animal encyclopedia, one of the bigger Dusters transforms into a giant tiger monster, a fake Executive. As the others start adding a truck motif to the monster, D and F hang back with D commenting how he would have done a better reconstruction job but then says it’s a loser role. F comments on how D’s been going out a lot recently. He then talks about this one moment when a kid was cheering him on. It could have been that the little dude was cheering on the Ranger who was fighting him, but the implication was he was cheering F on.
Much like me, there are people who side with villains, often sympathizing with their struggles and trials. You almost want to root for the Dusters because they are a downtrodden group who were strong-armed by the Rangers, forcing them to perform like circus animals for the entertainment of the masses. And F, even though he and D are forced to do this weekly fight, says he’d still do his best for the folks who don’t know it’s an act. No one wants to watch a one-sided match. I really like F; I wish he stuck around longer to serve as D’s confidant.
The time has come. The Dusters and their newest monster arrive in the battle arena in force, the executive towering above them and looks pretty quicker like what the suit makers would do for an actual monster for Super Sentai or Kamen Rider. The crowd is less than thrilled to see them, booing, and throwing crap at them. Tough audience am I right? But of course, it’s time to meet the true heroes with attitude. Because they’ve got a power and a force that you’ve never seen before. They’ve got the ability to morph and to even out the score. No one will ever take them down. The power lies on their side. Go Go Divine Dragon Squadron Dragon Keepers.
The crowd immediately changes their tune, especially when they do the pose that explodes the background. Let’s talk about the Dragon Keepers (who I’ve been simply calling the Rangers as a blanket term, when really it’s an organization split into two halves the actual Ranger Battalions and the Keepers themselves as an attempt to be dramatic). Design wise with the helmets exposing their mouths (save for Green Keeper who has a toothy mask) and the white billowing capes may come across as parodies to Tokusatsu but honestly their more homage to past Tokusatsu series. The capes could have been inspired by Gorenger and J.A.K.Q. who both wore capes before they dropped them for practical reasons. The color schemes themselves could have come from Goranger, too, as they were the first sentai team to use red, blue, green, yellow, and pink suit colors. The helmets with the lack of mouth pieces or just straight full-face covering helmets may have taken inspiration from Riderman, the fourth Kamen Rider of the Showa era. Even the suits look bad ass.
Only problem, if you could call it that, is the black and white manga does nothing to help distinguishing which Keeper is which. The devil is in the very detail, and some are easier to tell, like Blue’s facial scars or Green’s mouth guard and the different patterns on their helmets. I know it’s a minor thing to complain about but still.
After they do the explosion pose, the Fake Executive monster spouts an evil speech. How he’s the resents captive tigers and will give all the animals tiger stripes that will undoubtedly send the world into chaos. I’ve heard of stupider plans. If you really want to get revenge for tiger captivity, you can always beat up Joe Exotic and Carole Baskin, I’m pretty sure one of them is still in prison. Anyway, the Dusters launch an attack, some of them going after civilians before Suzukiri and Sakurama fight them. The fight goes as planned, the monster gets his second wind and transforms into a truck, and runs the Dragon Keepers down. It seems the villains are about to win when a kid cheering for the Rangers inspires the crowd to join in suit. As the Dragon Keepers get right back up in an inspiring display of bravery, teamwork, the Heart of the Cards etc. Foot Soldier A sees and realizes their bringing out their Divine Tool or Artifact (basically their super weapon) and rallies the surviving Dusters to the monsters.
As they contemplate their final words before getting blown to smithereens, they also notice Foot Soldier D is standing right beside them when he’s not supposed to be fighting today. As the Rangers bring out their big Dragon Blaster, D starts to walk in front of them just as the final blast vaporizes them, turning into particles. All except for D. He complains that even though they are technically immortal and can reconstitute their bodies from nothing he still feels pain. He still being here after the final blast is a bit of a shock to everyone, chief among them the Dragon Keepers who react in different ways like Blue Keeper being stoic and quiet while Yellow Keeper chides D for not wanting his opinion. Foot Soldier D charges in, hoping to change the outcome of the match at long last. The audience is pretty shocked before Red Keeper steps in and controls the situation with a façade of the heroic leader he’s always been. In a surprising turn of events the crowd actually starts cheering for D, either genuinely hoping to win or, in the most likely event, in mockery of his moxie.
D thinks they’re all looking down at him promising them he’ll show them how much of a bad guy he really is. If only Red didn’t put him in his place, telling him it’s not his kind’s stage and know his place, before cutting him in half with a sword and blowing him up like all the rest.
Back at the Sky Fortress, The Dusters gather and, even though they lost, all pat each other on the back in a congratulatory way. However, F notices that D’s missing from the crowd and figures he’s just vanished, resigning to his fate. Meanwhile, D is on a rooftop regenerating himself and disguising himself as the guy with the white T-shirt from earlier. Just then Suzukiri walks onto the roof too, recognizing him from that morning, who gives the excuse that he likes the viewpoint from up there. She asks him what he thought of the Sunday battle, remarking how the Dragon Keepers were overwhelmingly strong and how he’s decided to join the Rangers, enlisting for the entrance exams. Suzukiri smiles at this impressive display of determination.
And so, our chapter ends with Foot Soldier D standing on the rooftop’s ledge, vowing to bring down the Dragon Keepers from the inside as a Ranger himself. Hopefully, there’s no written exam.
Go! Go! Loser Ranger is a hidden gem of a manga, both in the way it tells its story and presents its characters. The premise of the Anti-villain is nothing new, but it’s the way it tells it is what’s interesting. Foot Soldier D as this downtrodden grunt presents a lot of interest in how he’s going to bring down the Dragon Keepers. While not the smartest in the beginning, and rather headstrong and stubborn, he’s able to adapt to the situation and learn from his past experiences. He’s not a one trick pony like how most Shonen characters are depicted. Though he wants world domination, he’s at least willing to bide his time. On a side note, I hope we get to see a Ranger form for D, it would complete his journey. As for the other characters, we don’t get a lot of time with characters like Sakurama and Suzukiri, but as the series progresses we’ll be seeing their motivations for joining the Rangers as well as ulterior motives that could help D achieve his goal.
Same as the Dragon Keepers. I’ve heard this manga be described as if the Power Rangers were in the universe of the Boys, and it’s not an unfair comparison. The Rangers, while not as horrific as the Supes are in that show, they are no saints either. Red Keeper specifically is a glory hound, addicted to the fame and attention the battles bring and can become brutal and violent on a dime. The other Rangers I can’t really say because I’m still in the early phases of the manga to tell.
Linkara once said he did the History of Power Rangers because he saw underlying themes and patterns and began analyzing the entire series. It’s why we now consider Bulk and Skull to being the true heroes of the franchise. For Mighty Morphin in specific, he saw the underlying theme of magic vs technology and how as the years progressed the balance began to shift. If I had to find my own underlying theme with Ranger Reject it would definitely be the conflict of restoring balance. As cliche as it may sound, there will always be the eternal struggle of good and evil, light, and dark, yin and yang, or in this case the tiger and the dragon. If one side is more prominent and tips the scales so to speak unevenly it could cause an imbalance. And that’s not to say it’s only darkness that could cause imbalance, though most commonly used in fiction, light is just as capable.
The Dragon Keepers by forcing the Dusters to play these mock battles for over a decade have caused this imbalance. Intentionally or not, D’s quest to bring down the Rangers is ultimately a quest to restore balance. But maybe, like Linkara had said, I could be overanalyzing a simple Japanese comic book about a Tokusatsu foot soldier wanting to defeat the team of multicolored superheroes in tights.
What I do know, is that I love Go! Go! Loser Ranger. I honestly do. Like I said at the start, this was a story I’ve subconsciously wanted to read for a very long time. I’m only a few chapters into reading the manga right now, and I’m invested. I’m excited to see what comes up and how D is going to defeat the Dragon Keepers. If you’re a manga reader and you’re looking for an exciting series featuring a monster’s rise to greatness from the ashes of defeat, then Ranger Reject, or however you call it, is the book for you.
To cap off this review, I’m gonna quote a saying from a group of foot soldiers from my youth: for the future of the Dark Axis, Zako soldiers fight! Yeah!
See you space cowboy.
