Plot: Genshi and the others head to 20th century Japan where they meet the superhero Space-Time Monster team, Redman! While they have the best of intentions in helping people, they cause a lot of havoc in the process.
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Title Change: The Hero is Redman is changed to The Cardians.
They add in two establishing shots after the theme song and before the shots of Redman.
Name Changes: Redman Red is changed to Blademan. Redman Yellow is changed to Thud. Redman Blue is changed to Arrowman. And Redman Pink is changed to Snapper.
Also, their team name was Redman. In the dub, they’re the Cardians, which I think is a cute way to change their team name based on their card suits while making a play on the word ‘guardians’.
So let me get this straight…..Red/Blademan is a blademaster. Yellow/Thud is super strong. Blue/Arrowman is an expert archer.
….And Pink/Snapper……AKA the only girl of the group……specializes in taking pictures. Not only that, but of course she gets the hearts suit.
Genshi is happy that the Redman come in so many colors. Flint guesses that they each have unique powers.
Originally, Rei said that the Redman have a strong sense of justice. Genshi then asks if justice is something you eat. In the dub, Jillian says they’re more interested in publicity than justice lately, and Flint asks if publicity is something you eat.
Saban actually adjusted their timeframe here. Originally, they were told that the Redman were in the year 1999, which is current day when the series is being aired (The series started in 1998, but it’s most likely 1999 by this point.) Saban, however, licensed and dubbed it in 2000, so they changed the target date to 2000.
Genshi stutters and mutters to himself about the word ‘justice’ before asking if it’s a juice. In the dub, Flint asks if it’s lunch time.
After Flint’s lunch comment, they add in Goodman hitting on Jillian again. I don’t know why they keep doing that. It’s not funny, and it just makes Goodman come off as a skeez who can’t take no for an answer.
Typical extension of the scenes in which they get their time card and head off.
Goodman: “Hey, guys, get me one of the Y2K preparation kits! That’d be good for a laugh or two!” Oh Saban, you topical bastards. That won’t get dated at all, promise.
Sarah: “Wow, we’re in a big city!”…Big cit–?…I just realized. They didn’t say that you guys were supposed to go to Tokyo. Since when is Saban less accurate in these details than the original? Don’t tell they’re 4Kidsing and desperately don’t want kids to know they live in Japan. I thought they established that before.
In the original, the woman and the guy were arguing because Yamato (1999 version) bumped into the guy. He tries to calm them both down, but they both snap at him, claiming he’s the cause of this mess. He backs down and laughs nervously, but the guy grabs him by the shirt telling him he has no place laughing when a girl is sticking up for him.
In the dub, the woman is accusing the guy of stealing from her purse, which he denies. Goodman tries to break it up, but they both tell him to butt out. He backs off and laughs nervously. The guy grabs him and asks what he’s laughing about.
In response to Yamato running away from the situation, Genshi points out that he ran. Sora and Tokio then say in unison “He’s the worst.” In the dub, Flint calls him a chicken and Sarah and Tony say in unison “Bawk bawk bawk.”
Name plate gone.
Subbed:
Dubbed:
What the hell? They kept in Yamato’s cigarette? It’s not lit, but what the hell? Even old shows tended to have any instances of smoking censored. They even draw attention to it in the dub. In the original, ‘99!Yamato goes on explaining how he didn’t actually run away. In the dub, the kids point out that he’s smoking and ‘00!Goodman says he is. He’s been meaning to quit, but he hasn’t had the time….? I don’t know how that makes sense, but whatever.
To their credit, they are definitely putting the smoking in a bad light. They make the kids yell at him to quit immediately, and even his girlfriend tells him he shouldn’t be joking about smoking. (In the original, the kids were exclaiming a repeat of his excuse for running in disbelief, and his girlfriend chastised him for not fighting the guy on his own.) But it’s still so weird to see this.
In really funny moment, ‘99!Yamato tries to explain himself to his girlfriend by saying “If I were injured, it would hurt.” Since the entire conversation was changed in the dub, ‘00!Goodman says “Sorry. How about I quit next year?”
When his girlfriend hits him, she walks off saying “You’re the worst.” In the dub, she says “Don’t call. Smokers are losers.”
Ototan says that she has an admirable fighting spirit. In the dub, he says even cavemen know smoking’s bad. Pretty sure the only smoking cavemen know about is the “me make fire” kind.
There’s an establishing shot of the park via a shot of a faucet for some reason before we cut to the kids talking to the Redman. In the dub, it’s removed.
Oh my god. There is no way Red didn’t slice the driver of this car in half.
Sora says they have to take the Redman back home. In the dub, she tells Flint that he can’t join the Cardians because his costume doesn’t match theirs.
When Genshi and the other Redman (I’m not using the plural incorrectly – that seems to be the way they address themselves in a plural manner.) run off, Sora asks where they’re going. In the dub, she tells him she wasn’t making fun of Flint’s clothes.
Saban adds in a closeup shot of Petra’s face twitching right before they get to the kitten. She explains that she plans on getting all of the Cardians now.
Nitpicking, but the group clearly say “Guardians” when they catch the kitten, not “Cardians.”
The person playing the bully is completely unfit for that role in the dub. He’s like six but he sounds like he’s 30.
In the original, everyone keeps saying “Redman are so cool!” Toki-G says it and goes “Oh now I’m doing it too.” In the dub, since they don’t retain the original line, they have Old Timer say “Those Cardians really float my boat! Oh no. Now I’m starting to do it too.” Doing what? Just…liking them?
TP Lady also parrots the “Redman are so cool!” line. In the dub, she says “Those Cardians are so dreamy!” Dreamy?…..Are you….attracted to the foot-tall muppet-esque Super-Sentai creatures?
TP Lady says it would be boring to be good. In the dub, she says she’d have to get a whole new wardrobe if she turned good.
Now that I think about it, it’s pretty trippy to hear Petra talk about wanting to be the leader of this Super Sentai-based team. She’s voiced by Barbara Goodson, who voiced Rita Repulsa in Power Rangers – which is also a Saban production. Power Rangers was retooled from old clips of Super Sentai (and continues to be to this day, I believe) combined with reshot footage for American/Canadian audiences.
It’s even funnier considering the name she comes up with for her proposed new team with the Redman/Cardians is the TP Rangers/The Four Fabulous Fighting Card Rangers.
They repeat the same closer shot of Dino talking to mockingly says “I bet you think the Cardians are going to appear.”
TP Lady, Dyna and Mite are being very funny today, but the dub keeps ruining it. In the original, Dyna and Mite fake evil laugh, pause and laugh again several times before conversing with each other about waiting for the Redman because they’re bored. In the dub, they do repeat the laugh gag, but it’s ruined because they have Dino says the laughing is hard work….
They insert the “BAGON!” screen right after the Cardians arrive, which makes no sense because they’re acting like they hit Dino and Mite, when they clearly hadn’t yet. Also, they keep the “BAGON!” card after they do hit them, making this even more confusing.
I figured this would get cut. In the original, they show Dyna and Mite beaten up and thrown in the garbage. Mite’s butt is on full display. Instead of finding some way to censor that, they just cut the shot altogether.
Both TP Lady and Petra thank the Redman/Cardians for saving her, but in the original all Red says is “Red” because that’s all he can say, like any other Space-Time Monster. In the dub, he asks her what’s wrong, which doesn’t make any sense. All she did was thank them, and they already saved her from the danger.
In the original, TP Lady explains what her TP stamp does while acting all dizzy and disoriented because she was spinning around a lot to stamp their heads. In the dub, they make off like she’s mocking them. Despite the fact that she’s clearly acting very dizzy, there are even spirals in her eyes, they just have her say “Neener neener neener” over and over. Saban, dizziness exists in the west too…
TP Lady corrects Genshi in her name by saying she’s TP Red-dy now….which sounds really dumb. In the dub, she just says she doesn’t take orders from him.
Ototan laments on TP Lady having another evil scheme. In the dub, he says “Remind me never to eat at your restaurant.” It actually took me a minute to get this joke…..Haha….she doesn’t take ORDERS from him….hahah….Ha.
Name Plate removed.
Subbed:
Dubbed:
Name Change: Akuman is changed to Cardian-kon.
I actually don’t understand this evil form. Is the evil jester + centipede thing a Super Sentai reference I don’t know of? I get that maybe this is the Joker of the suits, but that’s the best I can gather. Everything else is confusing me.
After the commercial break, they show TP Lady yelling at Akuman to attack Genshi. In the dub, they remove this and insert the shot of Flint wielding Rocky that was meant to come after Cardian-kon started attacking.
Oh my god, in the crowd…it’s that voice actor who can’t help but do a bad imitation of John Wayne in every Saban dub he’s ever in.….
I love how they have never once had to cover up a Space-Time Monster’s existence or explain away a battle to anyone nearby before, but now they suddenly feel the need to so for absolutely no reason.
Originally, Tokio explained that the reason this battle looked so amazing was because it was American special effects for a movie being shot. In the dub, he just marvels that they’re filming a monster movie in their town.
Again with Genshi making additional conflict just because he’s hungry. Why don’t they have a rule to feed this kid before they go off on an adventure? It’s not like they don’t have the time – they literally have a time machine.
Instead of showing Genshi smashing through the window, they cut away to a repeat of that comic “BANG – BAGON” screen.
Petra: “Now do the same to those meddling kids! Make them dance the Macarena!” First of all, Cardian-kon didn’t make Flint dance, so I don’t know what you’re on about. Second, yeah, Saban, make that macarena reference…..again. Date this show so hard you leave bruises.
I don’t know why, but Saban makes the old lady so much meaner in her speech than she is in the original. It was originally a very sweet speech about how kind Redman was, and how, in a world where people tend to just watch things happen instead of taking action, Redman leaped in to help them and they were happier for it, even if they caused some trouble. In the dub, she does say this more or less, but she also goes on to say ‘Well, I guess you’ve decided to take the easy way out. Listen up! I’d whack you with my cane if I could reach you!” And then Cardian-kon and the music react like it’s such a sweet gesture. What the hell is this? Why would you change her sweet speech into her being so harsh for no reason?
Originally, TP Lady, Dyna and Mite laugh about how stinky her speech was, and TP Lady says it was almost as stinky as Dyna and Mite’s socks, which makes them go all wiggly and fall down…..I get the joke, but it’s just awful. In the dub, Petra says the awful speech is killing them, which makes them go all wiggly and fall down. It’s still a lame joke, but I actually prefer the dubbed version this time.
Slight white flash added when Petra whips Cardian-kon in the face.
Oh wow. So….now de-transformed, TP Lady calls on Redman to fight more. Red jumps up and we get an INSANELY overly long sequence where he’s trying to spell out “o maeto ore to ittai ichi de shoubu da?!” which means “I challenge you to a one-on-one duel.”
He does this by charades because he can’t talk.
O (behind) is mimed with him smacking his butt at them.
Maeto is shown by dragging Mite out.
Next, Red comes out dressed as a matador to convey ‘ole’ because l and r are interchangeable in Japanese. (ore)
He brings out a door (to.)
He acts like he’s in pain (itai.)
He throws a ball into the air to signify ‘one’ (ichi.)
He holds up his hand (de.)
He brings out a soy sauce (shouyu) and points out the label (fuda.)
Then he repeats the sequence again, but faster, for them to get the entire sentence together.
This would have been so much better as a joke if they found some shorter way to convey this, because, as it stands, it was very annoying to sit through.
Now, there are two huge problems with translating this scene. First, the Time Shifters of the dub can talk, so there’s absolutely no reason for Red to start playing charades to convey his words.
Second, there are obviously a lot of complications in trying to make these charades work with English words. They barely work with Japanese words. Like, how would this sequence translate to a native English speaker? A bullfighter’s butt might come through your door and hurt your hand so put soy sauce on it?
I have to actually commend Saban for even attempting this, because this looked so impossible I was convinced they would probably just have Red challenge him straight out and cut the charades, but nope. Saban left in this whole sequence and made something fairly workable. So, what was it?
*deep breath*
Flint: “To the rear with friends, this is a challenge, and he who goes out crying leaves one with the upper hand.”
Flint and Petra: “A DUEL!?”
FLINT.
FIGURED.
THAT.
OUT.
Leaving the fact that Flint is so stupid he used to think friends were a food aside, how in the name of Zordon did ANYONE get anything coherent from that jumbled jigsaw puzzle of a charade?
…..Even though….ya know….it’s kinda generous to call that coherent. Saban, I give you all the credit in the world for even attempting this, bravo, standing ovation, I’ll buy you a bouquet of flowers later, but that is some crazy-ass word salad. The second half of the sentence is workable, but what was that starting portion? I keep thinking I’m hearing it wrong, but I have the volume on max and I can’t hear anything else but “To the rear with friends.”
ALSO, don’t think my eagle eyes missed the fact that you totally cut out the part with the soy sauce bottle because you just couldn’t think of any way to work that in, and you never gave a reason as to why Blademan was even doing charades to begin with when he can talk. Flint does say “Why didn’t you just say so?” but Blademan never answers.
So why are they acting like it’s only fair if Blademan uses his sword but Genshi has to fight without Ototan?
Sarah: “Go get ‘em, Flint! Show ‘em who wears the loin cloth around here!”
Tony: “Uhhh…….All right!”
Sarah, sweetie, that didn’t make sense.
Tony, sweetie, I get that you’re a slave to lip flaps, but that was awkward for everyone. Please never do that again.
The stare down was originally silent barring background music. In the dub, Blademan thinks “I bet he’s thinking what his next move should be.” and Flint thinks “A cheeseburger would taste really good right now.” You just ate! Why is food your only shtick?
Tony thinks “Wow, what if Flint loses?” What if you had faith in your friend to beat a foot-tall cosplayer with a fencing sabre that has a rubber tip on it?
Sarah thinks “Maybe they’ll call the show Sarah Time Detective.” First of all, are you responding to Tony’s thoughts? Because that’s weird. Second, WOW, you think your friend might die and your first reaction is taking over the show? Third, nice way to break the fourth wall, Saban. Finally, Sarah, you’re not a Time Detective, technically, so that wouldn’t happen.
Old Lady: “I’m too old for this stuff.”
Kid: “I’m too young for this stuff.”
*snort* Alright, that was pretty funny.
Cat: “I need a catbox.” Aaaaaaand you ruined it.
After that, the scene remains silent, because it’s supposed to be a tense buildup to the duel, but the dub suddenly adds narration over a PA system from some unknown person, even telling us not to touch that remote before the commercial comes on. Can you please shut up, Saban? Also, you’re using up your fourth-wall break allowance pretty quickly today.
They cut out a shot of Genshi facing Red, probably due to the incredibly awkward angle where we can see Genshi’s butt cheeks for some reason.
For some reason, they cut out Dyna and Mite responding to TP Lady claiming she was never going to replace them by saying that’s a bunch of baloney.
The dub doesn’t include the detail that TP Lady was born on October 12th, making her a Libra.
The original just said her horoscope said to be wary of something gigantic. The dub says to beware of giant robots.
Name Plate Removed:
Subbed:
Dubbed:
Name Change: Super Redman is changed to Cardian Master……Kinda wish they used this opportunity to make a Megazord reference.
Pterry: “It’s like a monster movie!” You mean it’s like a giant robot movie…..because there are no monsters, only giant robots.
They censored out the cat robot getting punched in the face…..because now we apparently can’t even show violence towards robots?
This music in the original sounds remarkably similar to the battle music of Pokemon….Space-Time Detective Genshi-Kun did first air in 1998…..Hm…
The cat robot’s Super Deluxe Brilliant Gold Mechanical Cat Punch is changed to Super Deluxe 9 Megawatt Gas-Filled Tuck and Roll with Extra Cheese Power Punch. Were you guys competing with yourselves to see who could make the most nonsensical word salad or something?
I don’t know how TP Lady/Petra Fina keeps reading anything in this horoscope book. There are no words in either version – just simple drawings of the images that correlate to each astrological sign.
Also, I missed this the first time, but there’s an illegible word written underneath “Butterfly” in the magazine in the original, but it’s painted away in the dub. I have no clue why.
Subbed:
Dubbed:
They removed that random word, but they couldn’t be arsed to fix “Scorrio” to “Scorpio”?
Okay…so…you’re not allowed to show the robot getting punched in the face, but you can show the giant sword go clean through its body, its eyes roll back in its head, split in two and then blow up?
TP Lady says she wishes she had read the magazine before now. Dyna and Mite say they read it every month. (They read the horoscopes every month? Isn’t that a daily or weekly thing?) In contrast, Petra says “Horoscope schmoroscope! Anybody could have seen that coming! RATS!”
They switched the shot of Toki-G to a closeup of him for some reason.
New ending theme for the original. It’s a good song, but the visuals are strange. It’s just an onslaught of shots of Sora….sitting there and looking at the camera. There’s a shot of her looking at a floating, rotating black pyramid in the sky, another of her looking at the sky while standing on green water? She keeps looking at a flower and tries to hold the sun in her hands. I don’t get it.
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All in all, this episode’s a huge mess. It’s so sloppy, I’m actually kinda flabbergasted. There’s nothing inherently wrong with the premise – team of ‘heroes’ is all for justice and saving people, but end up unwittingly causing trouble – but everything else is so weird. First of all, I get why this episode is taking place in the 90s, to seemingly capitalize on Super Sentai, but there’s no important ‘historical’ figure to focus on.
We got to see Dr. Yamato’s distant relative, who for some reason looks exactly like him, but he didn’t impact the plot in the slightest. He’s a big coward and….that’s it. After his girlfriend dumped him, he disappeared entirely. We never even get a glimpse of him after that, and he’s never mentioned again. What was the point of showing him here? If it was to set up the Redman saving people, there are much better ways of achieving that. Just show that woman getting attacked by the thug and getting saved by the Redman. The end.
I thought with the emphasis on heroism and Yamato being a coward that they’d help him be braver and maybe be the hero in the end so he could get back with his girlfriend. After all, she even said directly how he was supposed to be her hero. But nope. Pointless.
In the dub, Jillian said they were more preoccupied with publicity than justice, but we never saw anything like that. They just took pictures after every save, so that was misdirect.
There’s a sudden random shift to an anti-smoking PSA in the middle of the dub too.
The stuff about them causing trouble also didn’t do much. They didn’t care, and no one around them yelled at them or ostracized them. They didn’t apologize, either. Pointless.
Why was there a one-on-one western or samurai-esque duel added? Is that a thing they do in Super Sentai? Because it just seemed like an excuse for more padding since most of it was just all of the characters standing completely still for over a minute. The old lady, kid and cat pleading with him to change back should have been what made him change back – not winning a duel with Genshi.
Admittedly, the episode was salvaged a tiny bit by also having the Redman’s super transformation be in this episode as well, and TP Lady, Dyna and Mite got some hilarious moments, but other than that it was so disjointed and didn’t even feel like it had an actual story. I’m especially disappointed that Saban didn’t take this opportunity to just have a blast making Power Ranger jokes. Even if that meant changing the original script quite a bit, it would have been welcome because the original was already a disaster. You have the rights to the show, you have Barbara Goodson, you have a Super Sentai parody episode sitting in front of you – what more do you need?
But no.
Even the original barely did anything with this premise.
I had my hopes up pretty high for this episode too. 
Next time, we’ll be heading to 16th century Italy to hang out with the Space-Time Monster, Monarisu, who is basically the opposite of Horurun in that she turns people into art.
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The Anime Madhouse 
I remember this episode. Even then I wondered how intentional the Power Rangers/Super Sentai parallels were since that was still going on then, but I didn’t even know Petra was Rita herself! Wow, this is some serious actor allusion right there especially since Saban has worked on both. I didn’t realize the episode was that messy or with some of the censored scenes like the guy in the car. Yeah, that insurance bill is going to cost an arm and a leg for him [rimshot]. I didn’t realize how dated the references were with the dialogue. If I’m going to watch some Power Rangers parodies, I’ll stick with Shinesman which is still funny to this day and one of the best dubs in my humble opinion.
Keep up the good work with these reviews! I do feel a weight lifted after taking on my Alternate Disney August project. Hope things are well with you.
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Mite do be kinda thicc tho…
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