This is one of the most unique inter-ranger rivalries in Super Sentai. Unlike many other inter-ranger rivalries, its not about one member of the team trying to surpass the red ranger or the leader. In Dekaranger, we have one of the most unlikely red rangers (Ban), and one person who would seem like a better fit to be the team leader (Hoji). In reality, there was no actual team leader in Dekaranger. The closest is Doggie who is more like their commander.Ban and Hoji throughout the series would fight for girls, semi-control over the team, and determine which one was the better "cop." Ban often called Hoji "aibou" which means partner, or buddy to Hoji's annoyance. Both were actually the same, competetive, sometimes arrogant, and stubborn.Ban is the chaotic character, with a hyper, fiery attitude that leads to some fans percieving Ban as a "jerk," which personally I don't see it. Sure he's rather chaotic and a hothead, but Ban's rather loyal to his teammates and has a chip on his shoulders after a kid who wanted to be in the Space Police died in his arms after an alienizer attack.Hoji is rather skilled (especially at gunmanship), professional, and generally a well like character. To me Hoji"s cool, but he's also the most overrated character in Dekaranger. Why? Sure he's skilled, he has two rather emotional moments (one having to defeat his best friend to save Doggie and the other is killing his girlfriend's brother who committed murder to save his girlfriend), and he's professional. His professionalism, however, is to an extent arrogance, and to me at the beginning of the series he's more of a jerk than Ban. Starting with Episode 1, where he attacks Ban after he disobeyed orders, was a bit too much. Then in Episode 2, after Ban saved a girl and asked her out on a date, Hoji accuses Ban of being "too forward" but does exactly the same thing, asking the girl out that starts a fight between the two. Then in episode 3 & 4 when Ban makes a small mistake during a practice session, Hoji scolds him for it and acts like he's "perfect" and without mistakes. Then when Hoji screws up on an assignment later in the episode (he didn't thoroughly check to see if a kidnapped princess was the real one), he pouts for almost the entire next episode about his one mistake. Thankfully, after this episode when he realizes he's not perfect himself, Hoji grows up a little. He grew out of his arrogance, showed some respect for Ban, and even started to fight more like Ban (such as fighting with more emotion and at times being just as reckless as Ban), although Hoji didn't fully acknowledge Ban.Near the end of the series these two show that they do actually care for each other. When a big meteor was threatening earth, Ban took control of the Dekawing Cannon, released Hoji from the mecha, and looked like he was going to sacrifice himself. Hoji gets emotional and even called Ban the "ultimate partner." Once its revealed that Ban didn't sacrifice himself, Hoji doesn't hesitate to denounce Ban for calling him "aibou." In the last episode, Hoji finally acknowledges Ban as his partner. Dekaranger vs Magiranger adds another twist to this rivalry when Ban refers to Kai as "aibou", which Hoji becomes jealous, and refers to Hoji as "moto aibou" or ex-partner in a rather cocky way.
I've decided that I'll make my own series of top 5 and top 10 lists for both Power Rangers and Super Sentai. I will make Power Rangers lists first since I've seen nearly every season of Power Rangers, so it might be a while before I make a Super Sentai list. Today I'll start with my top 10 Badass Power Rangers list (which is really a top 11 since #10 is a tie).
T10. Trini (MMPR Yellow) 
By far my favorite all-time yellow ranger. Trini was the third most skilled ranger in MMPR S1 and the first half of S2 behind Tommy and Jason. Unlike the other rangers, Trini was skilled in Kung Fu and not Karate. She was basically the team leader when Jason wasn't around and could whip anybodies ass that got in her way.
T10. Trent (Dino Thunder White) 
Why Trent? Trent is the second strongest among the Dino Rangers. Trent's highly underrated and like the other Dino Rangers, is overshadowed by Tommy. Trent is a lot like a young Tommy, although not nearly as skilled. He defeated the evil White Ranger clone and saved his father in the process.9. Cassie (Turbo/In Space Pink) 
Cassie is my favorite Pink Ranger and one of the most underrated rangers of all time. She's often overshadowed by other popular pink Rangers such as Kimberly and Jen, but she can fight. Cassie was tough as nails and could stand up for herself against both the other rangers and any monster. She even stood up for a monster that had a heart.
8. Adam (MMPR Black, Zeo/Turbo Green) 
Among the new cast members during MMPR S2, Adam was the most skilled and the coolest. Adam was tough physically and mentally. During In Space, he helped Carlos to get tougher and faught a monster even though he knew that using his old powers could destroy him.
7. Leo (Lost Galaxy Red) 
Leo sneaked into Terra Venture without a ticket, but I'm sure the Galaxy Rangers were glad he did. He took his brother's Quasar Saber after it looked like his brother had died. Motivated by his brother's apparent death, Leo faught valiently to make his brother proud. At the series end, Leo saved the space colony with one last shot from his battlizer.
6. Andros (In Space Red) 
Andros wanted to fight against the forces of evil and find Zordon without the other rangers help, but eventually accepted the helping hand. Andros, however, was more than capable of fighting on his own. He was also an excellent leader. Andros was motivated by his missing sister which turned out to be Astronema in the end.
5. Dillon (RPM Black) 
Dillon is literally a cyborg, equiped with Venjix hardware in his body. He is easily the toughest among the RPM rangers. Before becoming a ranger, he evaded a Venjix attack to reach Corinth, then helped the rangers and saved Summer's (RPM Yellow) life. After becoming a ranger, he single handily defeated 100 Grinders.
4. Jen (Time Force Pink)
As tough as Yuuri from Timeranger is, even she is small fry compared to her PR counterpart, Jen. Jen is the one chick who it would be smart to avoid when she's in a bad mood. Jen is by far the toughest Heorine ever in Power Rangers history, and was motivated by the death of her fiance and also by her team's failure to transport Ransik to prison.
3. Magna Defender (Lost Galaxy) 
Some people might not consider the Magna Defender a ranger, but since him and the Galaxy Rangers were fighting a common enemy I will consider him a ranger. The Magna Defender was motivated by hatred against Scorpius and wanted revenge for the death of his son. The Magna Defender often single handily defeated monsters while refusing help from the Galaxy rangers. Eventually, he sacrificed himself and released Leo's brother Mike to save Terra Venture from destruction.
2. Jason (MMPR Red, Zeo Gold)
Jason is arguably the most skilled power ranger of all time, and is possibly the best true leader as well. Jason taught his own karate class and helped to transform Billy from a brainiac with no fighting skills to a very skilled fighter. If his actor Austin St. John never left the set, Jason might be talked about as the best power ranger of all time instead of Tommy.
1. Tommy (MMPR Green/White, Zeo/Turbo Red, Dino Thunder Black).
Like Jason, Tommy is arguably the most skilled ranger of all time. For the record, I'll put him infront of Jason for two reasons. The first because in Tommy's first appearance he had a 2 point lead on Jason in a Karate match before the match ended in a tie and the second, well its hard for me to remember anyone single handily, monster or human, coming as close to defeating the power rangers. The In Space rangers came close to defeat against the Psycho Rangers and on Countdown to Destruction, but it was a group effort. While initially Tommy wasn't nearly as good of a leader as Jason was, he became a great mentor/leader by the time Dino Thunder rolled around. His actor, Jason David Frank, is even a badass (6 degree black belt and undefeated in MMA matches).
I remember recently the Henshin Grid had a pole on why Disney failed with Power Rangers. Most people, along with myself, voted for incompetence. There were a number of things that Disney screwed up on with power rangers, such as the kiddy special effects, and having Bruce Kalish as the main story writer from SPD to Jungle Fury. However, not mentioned in the poll and what I would point to as the main reason would be laziness. Disney is a multi-billion dollar company and is the largest entertainment corporation in the world. They've created many classic movies and cartoon characters. If Disney really wanted Power Rangers to succeed they could have done it. We saw it when Disney originally took over the series. Some of Disney's earlier PR incarnations were actually pretty good (Ninja Storm and Dino Thunder were both good series, while SPD was ok). RPM was pretty good as well, even though the tv ratings were low. But by the time RPM came around, Disney was just looking for an excuse to get out of doing Power Rangers. TOEI and the PR fandom had highly objected to an animated series, and Disney didn't want to spend the money it needed to on Power Rangers.
During the mid-late 1990's, Haim Saban attempted to capitalize on the success of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers by making other Tokusatsu-like tv shows. 
The first was VR Troopers. This show was originally named "Cybertron" with Jason David Frank (Tommy in MMPR) in it, and originally was intended to be a one man show. A pilot episode was filmed with Jason David Frank. However, because of his immense popularity in Power Rangers, Frank was pulled off the show and put back on the set of MMPR. Furthermore, the Cybertron theme song was remixed and became the Green Ranger theme song in MMPR (Go Green Ranger Go). The show would also be renamed VR Troopers because of some copyright issues with the show Transformers. VR Troopers was transformed into a three man team and used footage from TOEI's Metal Hero Series. It spliced footage from three different Meteal Hero seasons, Super Machine Man Metalder, Dimensional Warrior Spielban, and Space Sheriff Shaider. To capitalize on the success of MMPR, Saban made it a point to try to portray VR Troopers as Power Rangers-like, putting VR Trooper trailors in MMPR VHS cassette tapes. Contrary to what some people believe, VR Troopers was not a failure, it had respectable ratings. Some elements of VR Troopers were actually better than MMPR, particularly the last half of S2 and S3 of MMPR. VR Troopers had a much darker plot than MMPR, (The villains were less comedy driven, particularly Grimlord, Ryan Steele's father was missing, exc), and VR Troopers had a little bit better action than MMPR. However, VR Troopers did have its own plot issues. Too much attention was focused on Ryan Steele (partly because of the story's background and the fact that Saban tried adapting 2 Metal Hero series at once), as well as how poorly the show edited the Japanese stock footage. VR Troopers could not surpass MMPR in popularity, not even in S3 when MMPR had a dip in its ratings. The show ended after two seasons (from 1994 to 1996) when all of its stock footage ran out. Personally, I think this is a show that if Frank had stayed on the set and kept the show as a "one hero" show instead of making it a team show with the majority of the focus on one guy, it could have been successful and surpass Power Rangers. Tommy fans may have switched to Cybertron, and Power Rangers may not have went on to be the successful franchise it is now. But that is a whole lot of what if's.
Also adapted from the Metal Hero Series (Juukou-B Fighter and B-Fighter Kabuto) was Big Bad Beetleborgs and Beetleborg Metallix. Also like VR Troopers, lasted two years and did respectable among the ratings. In fact Big Bad Beetleborgs breifly surpassed Power Rangers in the ratings, albiet in the middle of a horrible PR season (Power Rangers Turbo). The show was more kid oriented than either Power Rangers and VR Troopers, with kids playing as heroes and comic book strips used in the show. The show was also a little better organized than VR Troopers because of how it used the stock footage from its Japanese counterparts. However, like VR Troopers it couldn't completely live up to the popularity that Power Rangers once was, and ended when all of its stock footage ran out.
While VR Troopers and MMPR S3 were airing (1995-97), Masked Rider debuted. Masked Rider was based off another TOEI-created Tokusatsu series, Kamen Rider. Masked Rider used footage from Kamen Rider Black RX, which was one of the most popular Kamen Rider seasons. Like VR Troopers, Saban tried to pitch Masked Rider to Power Ranger fans by introducing it at the beginning of MMPR S3 in "A Friend in Need." The series lasted two seasons, but they were rather short seasons with only 20 episodes a piece. This series, however, failed due to competing with the more popular VR Troopers and MMPR, and also because it had a poorly executed plot and even worst editing of the Japanese footage than VR Troopers had. 
Among all attempted Tokusatsu-like series that were made by Saban, The Mystic Knights of Tir Na Nog (1998-99) was the only one that was an attempted original not to use Japanese stock footage. This series contrasted differently from other Saban series in that it had a historical setting instead of a present-day setting. It was based loosely on Irish Mythology. However, this show lasted only one season and is perhaps the worst out of all of Saban's Tokusatsu-like series.
Next year will be Super Sentai's 35th anniversary. The previous two major anniversary seasons (Gaoranger and Boukenger) have had team-up specials with a number of different heroes from the past. A month and a half ago the Henshin Grid discussed this topic. Here's what my team would be.
Now the 19th head of the Shiba clan and the only Shinkenger that didn't leave at the end of the season, Takeru would be my pick to represent both Shinkengers and red rangers. 
From Gekiranger, I would pick Gou. Why? Because he's the badass of the group. Gou was the most skilled fighting wise among the Gekirangers, at least initially.
This would break away from the Boukenger vs Super Sentai theme where warriors from the previous five seasons only were in the team-up special, but I feel Jasmine would be more than deserving. I actually felt she should have been the Dekaranger in the Boukenger vs Super Sentai team-up instead of Tetsu. 
This would break away further from the previous five seasons. Sakura would be my top choice for Boukenger, and for Pink rangers. Also, to me, a Jasmine-Sakura combo would be a dream come true.
After some careful thought I've decided to change to Gosei Blue, Hyde. I don't know much about Goseiger and since blue, along with Red and Yellow are the three constant colors that blue shouldn't be left out.
Instead of having a 5 or 6 member team, why not 7? We can't leave Go-Onger out, and to me the best possible fit would be a brother-sister combo, Miu and Hiroto. There were 7 rangers in Go-Onger afterall (and Dekaranger). Some people would probably ask, "why not Retsu since he's Gou's brother?" For me, 8 would be where I draw the line as too many, and I would like a brother-sister combo better. Also, these two would be a perfect trio with Gou (since they're all Jyuken users) and Jasmine (since they're all Espers).
A lot of Sentai fans I've notice rank Gekiranger as the best Sentai of the 2000's. To me, it's not even close. Dekaranger, Shinkenger, and Boukenger all easily beat Gekiranger, and while I haven't seen Timeranger in its entirity yet, I think most agree that Timeranger beats Gekiranger. Don't get me wrong, Gekiranger isn't a bad series. It has a rather touching story about its two main villains that were mislead and become good in the end, and its ending is one of the best ever, but the first 20 episodes or so aren't that good to me. This series is commonly overrated by Sentai and Power Ranger fans because its PR counterpart, Jungle Fury was terrible, and because many people shun Gekiranger's proceeding series, Go-Onger.
Although clever, I think Master Shafu is a rather corny mentor/commander, much like Mr. Voice from Boukenger.
The first 20 episodes or so, Jan is an annoying character. I guess I kinda got use to him as the series went on. But still, for all the red ranger focus that Shinkenger recieves, there is way too much red ranger focus in this series. Especially since Jan isn't even the team's leader.
Ran, I felt, was a cute, funny girl. She was named team captain in Episode 23. Because of that, I think she did not get enough attention or episodes written about her. Furmore, on most of the episodes after she's named team captain, she doesn't look like she's actually leading the team, with a few exceptions like when they were trapped back in time during the Edo era.Gekiranger does have a great plot, but its cast to me is fairly average at best. And like I mentioned above, there's some flaws in it with too much red ranger focus and not enough team leader focus.
Although it's quite rare in Super Sentai (I can only think of Doggie Kruger, Swan-San, and Mari Gold in Dekaranger), aliens playing as rangers are quite common in Power Rangers. Here's a list of all aliens that have played as rangers in Power Rangers
The first were the Alien Rangers of Aquitar, who came to earth when it had been turned back in time by Master Vile in MMPR S3. The Power Rangers were turned into kids who were way too young to fight, so Zordon and Alpha summoned the Alien Rangers (or Aquitar Rangers) to basically be substitute rangers. The Aquiar rangers wore the same suits that were worn in Kakuranger. The big problem with the whole Alien Ranger arc was that none of these characters got proper character development.
In Zeo, Trey of Triforia was the Gold Ranger. He came to earth to help the power rangers and kept his identity secret until he crash landed on aquitar, when the Aquatians revealed his identity to the Power Rangers. He was then sent to earth and nearly drowned. As a result, he split into three different personalities and had to pass his powers to Jason until he could reunite as a single person. Once reunited as a single person, he took his powers back and left earth.
The Phantom Ranger in Turbo/In Space came from Zordon's home world, Eltar. He initially helped the rangers battle Divatox and later, search for Zordon. His identity was never revealed. The writing staff had planned to reveal his identity, but they were unable to do so because of budget reasons. Cassie had a crush on the phantom ranger.This is debatable as to weather or not Andros is an alien since he's human, but since he was born and raised on KO-35, I'll call him an alien. Andros, who appeared in "In Space," is the first alien to be a full-time ranger during an entire season. 4 of the 5 Turbo Rangers (Cassie, Ashley, T.J., and Carlos) found Andros on a distant planet. Initially he didn't want to fight with them, but changed his mind and gave the Turbo Rangers the astro-morphers. His sister, Karone, was the main villain of In Space, Astronema (which I'll talk about later in this post).
Zhane, like Andros, is from the planet KO-35. He was Andros' best friend and original teammate. Two years before the events of In Space during the battle of KO-35, he was injured and nearly killed. He was frozen and put into suspended animation to keep his body alive. When he woke up, he fought alongside Andros and the other rangers.
Karone, Andros's sister, was also originally from KO-35. When Andros and Karone were kids, she was kidnapped, and raised by Ecliptor to become Astronema. After the events of Countdown to Destruction, all evil was washed away from her and she became a normal human again. After the death of Kendrix, she was given the Galaxy morpher to become the Pink Galaxy ranger. Karone wanted to make up for all the wrong doing she did as Astronema. Originally, this role was planned to be given to Cassie, but the deal with Patricia Ja Lee (the actress that played Cassie), never fell through. Thus, Karone became the Pink Galaxy Ranger instead.
Trip from Time Force, was from the planet Xybria. He was residing on Earth during the year 3000 and along with the other Time Force rangers, he went back in time to 2001 to try to stop Rensik. Trip had the ability to read a person's mind through the jewel on his forehead. 
Doggie Cruger (not to be confused with Doggie Kruger from Dekaranger) is from the planet Surius. He became the chief of the earth branch of Space Patrol Delta. Midway through the series, he would become the Shadow Ranger. He was also the first ranger to be married, (his wife's name is Isinia). Cruger would defeat Emperor Grumm in the last episode of SPD.
Although Kat only morphed once, I decided to count her as a ranger. She is an alien from an unknown planet. She's the rangers' technician, and was offered a job by Space Patro Delta away from the earth base, but choose to stay on earth instead.
A-squad blue was an alien from an unknown world. Though he has no official name, he is commonly called Beever. Along with the other A-Squad rangers, he turned evil to "be on the winning team." The A-squad rangers were ultimately defeated by the B-squad rangers.
First, I want to say sorry for not posting in nearly two weeks. It was the end of the school year, which is also the bussiest (I had 2 research papers and 3 finals to do). Now I'll have a little more time to dedicate to this blog, as well as create some new blogs.It is well known that Power Rangers is based on the Japanese series Super Sentai. Sean Akizuki has even posted about Power Rangers' influence on Super Sentai, as well as Chinese influence on Super Sentai. Today, I want to talk about the other American influences on Super Sentai.English Language
The use of the English language has been incorporated into Super Sentai as well as many other Japanese programing (anime, jdoramas, exc.). Conversational english is rarely used, however, english phrases and english catchphrases are quite common. English phrases have been used more in receent Sentai series than they were in earlier installments. Above are two Sentai characters, Gaku (Gaoyellow) and Hoji (Dekablue), who frequently used english phrases.Sports Figures
Some American sports figures, or characters based off of American Sports figures have been used in Super Sentai. Above is the character Pachy Bonds, who was in Episode 19 of Abaranger (this episode is parodied in the Dino Thunder episode Lost and Found in Translation). Pachy Bonds is a baseball player who is clearly based off of former San Francisco Giants slugger, Barry Bonds. Like Barry, Pachy is African American and supposedly the "home run king," like Barry Bonds was during his career. Fortunately, unlike Barry Bonds, Pachy Bonds does not take steroids :)American TV Shows
Above is Miss America, from the 1979 Sentai series Battle Fever J. During this time, Super Sentai's owner, TOEI, had a partnership with the American company, Marvel Comics. This allowed TOEI and Marvel Comics to bring Spiderman to Japan. The Battle Fever J series, and in particular the Miss America character, was based off of the Marvel Comics character, Captain America.
Above is Jan (Gekired). To me, Jan seems to be a character that is at least partially based on the American cartoon, George of the Jungle. Before becoming Gekired, Jan lived and grew up in the forest.American moviesAmerican movie influences are quite numerous in several Super Sentai episodes.Timeranger- I can't find a picture for it, but there is one scene where the timerangers are riding bicycles in the night sky with the moon in the background. That scene resembles the Steven Spielburg movie, ET.Dekaranger- Dekaranger has several episodes with storylines similar to American movies
Above is a picture from Episode 20, which has a similar storyline to the movie Die Hard with A Vengence, which was the third installment of the Die Hard series. In this episode, the alienizer Germa Seijin Baiz Gore planted a bomb powerful enough to blow up the earth, and he made the Dekarangers play a game by sending one player running all over town to find the next hint. If he didn't make the deadline, the bomb would explode. In Die Hard with A Vengence, a criminal who calls himself Simon threatened to set off bombs around New York City if Bruce Willis's character, John McLane didn't find the next location and hints within the time limit.
Episode 26 is similar to the Rocky Balboa series. Rocky Balboa, played by Silvester Stalone, is boxing's ultimate underdog that usually starts out getting his ass kick before winning the match. In episode 26, Hoji fights the undefeated champ, Jiva, in an illegal match. The first match Jiva beats Hoji easily, but then Hoji trains for a rematch, which Hoji, the underdog, won by knockout. Above is Hoji after he won the match.
Episode 38 is similar to the movie Speed. In Speed, a bomb is planted on a bus in Los Angeles. Once the speed of the bus reaches 50 miles per hour (roughly 80 kilometers for those who are not familiar with the English measure system), the bus cannot travel under that speed or it will explode. In Episode 38, Ban and Yaako (the piglet in the bike), ride a bicycle given to them by an alienizer (unkown at the time) when Yaako becomes car sick. After Ban reaches the speed of 25 kilometers per hour (about 16 miles per hour), a bomb on the bicycle activates. If Ban's speed goes under the 25 kmh speed, the bomb will explode.
Episodes 42 and 43 are very similar to Armageddon. In episode 42 and 43, a meteor full of planet eating browgouls is headed straight for the Earth. In a pinch, similar to the Armageddon ending, Ban sacrifices himself to stop the meteor, and sends Hoji back to the earth, to make sure Hoji doesn't sacrifice himself and to make sure he's at his sister's wedding. In the Armageddon movie, A.J. (played by Ben Affleck), was suppose to sacrifice himself to destroy an asteroid heading for earth. At the last minute, Harry (played by Bruce Willis), sends A.J. back to the ship, and thus back to earth, and sacrifices himself so A.J. could marry his daughter. The only difference is unlike Armaggedon, Ban didn't die.
Magiranger- Magiranger had a magic motif. At the time, TOEI and Super Sentai were trying to capitalize on the success of magic themed American made movies, The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter, which in turn were based off of British books. 
Boukenger- Boukenger had an adventure motif, similar to the Indiana Jones series. The Boukengers looked for treasures called "precous" to keep them away from evil villans. This is also similar to Indiana Jones which tried to keep certain "treasures" away from certain agencies or governments, such as Nazi Germany.
