Continuing with the tradition of waiting 2 months to release a batch torrent when it could have been done earlier, is the V1 batch for Changerion! There’s nothing new here, just the original releases all put in one place. If you haven’t gotten it yet, download it at the Releases Page!

Speaking of downloads, though: I’ve been talking with KRDL, and they’ve agreed to host my releases on their site! Bycrosser and Strada 5 are up there now, with Changerion soon to follow!

We’re hard at work on Kyodyne, and I’m putting some previews on the Twitter account. See you again then!

And just like that, another show is complete. Changerion has been a fantastic ride from start to finish. Thanks to everyone for downloading the episodes, spreading the word, and enjoying the show. Head over the Releases Page to finish it!

So what happened to the show? The show was indeed planned to run for a full year, as the original proposal document indicates. However, an ending where the enemy was not defeated was planned before the order to shorten the show came down. Even Toei’s official website said that “The other way to end the show was impossible”. Had the show ran for a year, there was a plan for a sequel with either a powered-up Changerion or a Changerion #2 called “Gai Apollon”, designed by Shinohara Yusuke. The design can still be seen on his site. After the ending, the show had a sort of underground popularity as a cult classic in the Japanese tokusatsu community. In 2002, Kamen Rider Ryuki began airing, with Hagino Takashi as the dirt-eating psychopath Asakura. Hagino’s popularity caused people to start talking about Changerion again, and before long, the show was released on DVD. In 2003, the Fantastic Collection Changerion Bible was released, containing cast and staff interviews and concept art. Most recently, in a Kamen Rider Ex-Aid V-Cinema, Hagino reprised his role as Asakura, and took part in a direct reference to the “Not a Mackerel!” joke from the show.

What’s next for Big Nova? Well, the final 3 episodes of Strada 5 will be released soon. Once I’m done with that, I’ll do the Changerion batch torrent. I might do another Christmas special (or a Halloween special) one-off release later too.

I also have a message from the wonderful translator who worked with me on this show, Good Loser Greyrat:

“Hello guys, this is the second translator of Changerion speaking.

First, my thanks to Tokugami for his great great work as a translator and as an editor fixing my numerous mistakes and also for being a really great guy in general.

Thanks for sticking with us through these months, we hope you enjoyed watching Changerion as much as we enjoyed doing it.

I am one of those black sheeps in the world of Tokusatsu in the sense that I truly and genuinely enjoy Toshiki Inoue’s works. My first contact with him was through Kamen Rider Faiz and far from putting me away it made me research more about the author, that’s how I got to watch Jetman which was wonderfully crafted, Kamen Rider Agito which was also very good and his most hated work yet my favourite, Kamen Rider Kiva.

He has a lot of common tropes that you see repeating a lot of times (and the same can be said about the characters, really) but I always think he’s a marmite writer, either you love him or you hate him. I, personally am on the side that loves him and Changerion was not an exception. Suzumura Akira really grows as a character through the entire series even if he himself does not directly show it, leaving us viewers the hints through his actions (you know what they say, actions speak louder than words) and through his excellent actor (who the Rider fans that have watched Ryuki probably recognize by this point, snakes are very scary animals) but the best character overall was Hayami, his personality, how emotive and innocent he was, always willing to believe in Akira… was really touching to see. Their relationship and their good dynamic together is what makes Choukou Senshi Changerion a very rewarding and very good tokusatsu in general.
Once again, thanks for sticking with us and we hope to continue deliverign good shows to you!

(And yes, this is an announcement that I am sticking by Tokugami’s side until he finally decides to kick me out!)

Scintillate! And to the Future!

P.S. I also like NisiOisiN.”

Next year, we return to the works of Shotaro Ishinomori with the 1976 series, Uchuu Tetsujin Kyodyne!

See you then!

EDIT: I accidentally uploaded a version of Episode 37 with a work-in-progress script muxed in! It’s fixed now! Make sure your copy has a CRC of 7F028331 in the filename!

Back to Changerion! The translator’s back home now, so we’re working hard to get this done!

Episode 27 features the return of Akemi, played by Hayashi Mie. She originally left the show in episode 14 because she wanted to keep focusing on her high school studies. She has a few more appearances after this, but it’s good to see her back.

Episodes 28 and 29 are more episodes with Kuroiwa, and more of his sorta contrived romance with Eri. Interestingly, 28 was originally going to be called “Eri’s First Love”, which is accurate, but boring. So the real title just references some jokes from the episode.

Episode 30 is an interesting one. It’s one of two episodes of this show that weren’t written by Inoue (The other being 31). This one was written by a guy named Kinoshita Ken. Turns out that that’s a pseudonym for Arakawa Naruhisa, main writer of Kamen Rider Kuuga and Akibaranger! He’s a professed Tokusatsu nerd, so this episode serves as a giant love letter to 70’s and 80’s heroes!

TRIVIA:

Zandar is voiced by Otomo Ryuzaburo. He’s a voice actor well-known for his intimidating villain roles. He sadly hasn’t voiced many other main villains in Toku, but he has a few notable minor roles, like the Mishima the cyborg in Winspector episode 22, and Gori Yen in Gekiranger.

The Changerion Train’s back on track, baby! One filler and one plot this time.

Episode 25 is kind of a standard goofy detective drama with superhero antics in it. I remember hearing someone remark that Changerion has very kissable lips. Yeah, uh…

Episode 26 is a plot episode (Basically any episode with Kuroiwa is a plot episode) with the one thing that Changerion needed (?): Politics! Interestingly enough, Tokyo did not have a gubernatorial election in 1996!

TRIVIA:

Hayami is played by Aizawa Kazunari, a current member of the Actrain Club group. Apparently, he took the audition for Changerion after being rejected when he auditioned for a role in Carranger. His other Tokusatsu roles include a minor role in Ultraman Dyna, as well as playing the human form of the Tarantula Undead in Kamen Rider Blade! He’s still acting, so if Toei wants to do some sort of Changerion revival (wink wink), I doubt he’d reject it.

Download the episodes at the Releases Page!

Hey, it’s Changerion time! The translator was having trouble with the internet, but we should be back on track now!

Episode 21’s sort of similar to episode 6, but it has plenty of great moments, like Akira’s spit-take here:

Episodes 22, 23, and 24 all link into each other. Episode 22 is a treasure hunt episode, with quite a few Japanese puns. We tried our best to localize those. Episode 23 is up there with some of the best episodes in the series, since it’s basically Ace Attorney about 5 years earlier! And episode 24 introduces a new recurring villain! So head over to the Releases Page to download the episodes!

TRIVIA:

Mordos (the tree-guy) is voiced and suit-acted by Takahashi Toshimichi, a member of the Japan Action Club. His first suit-acting role was Zabitan in Akumaizer 3. After that, he gained the record for guest appearances in the Metal Hero series, appearing in twelve shows. Additionally, he was the voice and suit actor for Baraom in Kamen Rider Black.

We’re at the exact halfway point! Just 19 episodes to go.

These episodes introduce Akira’s new assistant, Rui. She is played by Matsui Yuka, who is relatively unknown to the Tokusatsu scene. Her only Toku role is this. After this, she went on to do some variety shows and gravure shoots. She was also a race queen on the Formula Nippon Le Mans team, but she hasn’t done much otherwise.

Episodes 17 and 18 are a 2-parter. They herald the return of Kuroiwa, and the introduction of another disguised Darkzeid monster. Strangely, episode 17 was the lowest-rated episode of this show, with 2.1% viewership!

Episode 19 is an episode that covers some backstory on Rui, and it’s pretty decent.

Episode 20 is the season-requisite clipshow. It’s pretty standard and entirely skippable, but it does have the best worst English opening theme.

TRIVIA:

Katagiri Kazuki is played by Tokusatsu veteran Hirose Yutaka, whose roles encompass Sentai, Rider, and Metal Hero. He is best known for his roles in Super Sentai, most notably as Ley in Flashman, Doctor Kemp in Liveman, Emperor Tranza in Jetman, and Demon Boxer Jin in Dairanger. He is another favorite actor of Inoue’s.

I’d also like to make a special shout-out to the Flurbdini Church of Toku for their article about the first 5 episodes of Changerion.

Download the episodes at the Releases Page!

UPDATE 4/22/17: FortMax informed me of an issue in episodes 18-20 where fonts were not muxed with the video files, causing the title sequence to appear wrong. The original files have been removed from the Mega folder, and the torrent has been replaced with a new one with the fixed files. If you would like to seed it, get the updated episodes from Mega and seed using those. Additionally, I have a patch you can use if you have the original files. To use it, unzip the archive, then drag-and-drop the original video files onto the included .bat file.

EXCUSES TIME:

Yeah, it’s been over a month since the last release. Keep in mind that both the translator and I are in college. We do this out of our own free time, and we both had exams to deal with. But we’ll be bringing you more Changerion very soon! So for now, enjoy these 4 episodes.

TRIVIA:

This show is credited with two designers. Character design was done by Shinohara Tamotsu, and the Super-Light Knights are credited to Submarine. Shinohara is known for a lot of creature design in the Metal Hero series from Metalder onward and the Super Sentai series from Turboranger onward. Additionally, he designed the Tactical Suits in Tekkoki Mikazuki, and most recently, some mechanical design for Mobile Suit Gundam Iron-Blooded Orphans. He made a website featuring all of his original drawings and designs for Changerion a few years back, which can be seen here. Submarine can be mainly credited with mechanical design for Space Runaway Ideon and the 1979 Cyborg 009 series.

Head over to the Releases Page to download the episodes!

Didn’t expect this, did you? Honestly, the story behind this is that the translator wanted to break the record of episodes released at once.

Episodes 7 and 8 are pretty standard stock plots, “A character has to become an idol” and “A parent visits and wants to get a character married.” Pretty average.

Episode 9 is special, because it has Hayami become Changerion like he always wanted! It may foreshadow something in the future, too…

Episode 10 is neat, because it guest stars Thane Camus as one of the interpreters!

Episodes 11 and 12 join into each other. They feature the introduction of Inoue’s possibly most favorite character type: the suave, pretentious, well-dressed prick who knows everything. Episode 11 is also really heartwarming.

Some notes:

• Konjac is an Asian vegetable, commonly used in shirataki and oden.
• “Daruma-san ga Koronda” is a childrens’ game in Japan. It’s very similar to Red Light Green Light.

TRIVIA: Kuroiwa Shogo is played by Ogawa Atsushi. After working on this show, he became friends with Shirakura, Nagaishi, and Inoue; and subsequently has several appearances in the Heisei Era Kamen Rider series, such as Sawaki Tetsuya in Kamen Rider Agito, and Minami Masahiko in Kamen Rider 555.

Get the episodes at the Releases Page!

These episodes are pretty good. It takes a few episodes to notice certain gimmicks characters have, along with subtle acting (in this show?). Hayami will often say “What the hell?” and “I’m furiously devoted!”.

Episode 5 is a solid whodunit. The kid’s not bad, and the other guest actors are solid too.

Episode 6 is just… heavy. Not dark, but heavy. Inoue shows his writing range here, along with really good acting by Hagino and Ota Yumi, who plays Jiro. Also, I suspect there were some scenes cut from this episode, as some can be seen in the teaser in 5, as well as the clipshow episode later on.

TRIVIA: Akira drives a real beat-up Citroen 2CV. The car the crew had was a real junker. Since they couldn’t get replacement parts easily, it had to be transported on a trailer between scenes.

Episodes are at the Releases Page!

Somehow, this makes less sense in the episode.

I’ll just let the picture explain itself. Download the episodes over at the Releases Page.

TRIVIA: SAIDOC’s CG Pen is a Tiger Electronics Talkboy FX Plus Pen. By Sega’s request, Toei put it in the show. Honestly, it’s way cooler in the show than the actual item is.