Dynazenon Training Arc

I believe that episode 2 is the first time we’ve actually seen the SSSS.Dynazenon opening. At least, I don’t remember seeing it in episode 1. I think in episode 1 we just got the opening song but not the visuals to go with it.

As far as openings go, I thought this was a pretty good one. I wouldn’t say that the song is really anything special, but it’s the same band that did the SSSS.Gridman opening, so that’s neat. The visuals were pretty nice though. Pretty colors make my brain think things are cool.

Aside from the opening, I wasn’t too big of a fan of the start of this episode. I didn’t really feel like we needed that mini recap of the kaiju fight from the previous episode. But, I guess the scene directly after it with Gauma giving everyone else a piece of Dynazenon was important.

One thing I’m a bit unsure about still is Chise’s role in all of this. Didn’t Gauma give Chise the “legs” of Dynazenon? I guess those are the submarine when separate from the main body. But Chise’s still not one of the four pilots. So what was the point of giving her a piece?

Anyway, the first half of this episode is primarily focused on the characters, except Yomogi, training with their various parts of Dynazenon. I’m a bit disappointed that they don’t all look like dinosaurs. But vehicles are cool too, I guess.

Oh, and of course, the most important part of the first half of the episode is the scene of Yume in the bath. If they just extended that scene for a few more minutes, it would have been perfect.

A New Kaiju Appears

The kaiju from this episode was a lot more interesting than that from the previous episode. For starters, I really liked the colors of this one — as did the Kaiju Eugenicists, apparently. Pink, purple, and teal are just a good combination, what can I say?

Beyond its appearance, I also liked this kaiju‘s warping ability. I thought it made the battle a lot more interesting because it was more than just two giant mechs slamming into each other. Once warping is introduced into a fight, strategy becomes much more important.

Building on that, it was nice to see that there were actually some rules at play during this fight. I mean, super robot series fights don’t really follow many rules in general. Usually, anything goes, which often results in random beams being fired.

However, it was noticed that the kaiju spread its wings before it warped each time. And once our heroes had this information, they could form a plan to take advantage of that weakness. If they can restrict the kaiju‘s wings, they can stop it from warping around.

The Kaiju Eugenicists are an interesting inclusion in the series even if we don’t know anything about them. I think the fact that they control the kaiju is a good dynamic for the series to have because it allows for the kaiju to be more than mindless monsters.

And, while we don’t actually know what their goals and purpose are, we can make some assumptions. Based on their group name and the fact that one of them said “kaiju shall steer the world,” we can assume they believe kaiju to be the life forms deserving of ruling over the planet.

Dyna Soldier Wing Combine!

Already, I’m trying to think about where this series is going to go in the future. Based on the events of SSSS.Gridman, I can’t believe that this is going to remain a standard super robot series throughout its entire run. There has to be some twist later on.

So far, I can think of three areas in which that twist could manifest. First, there are the kaiju users. Gauma claims to be a kaiju user himself, and yet he’s not with the other kaiju users. So there must be something more to their relationship.

Also, if Gauma is a kaiju user and also a good guy, doesn’t that imply that kaiju aren’t inherently bad? After all, the kaiju in this episode was minding its own business until the Kaiju Eugenicists showed up and began controlling it.

The second form the twist could take is in relation to Yume’s older sister. How did she die? Did it have anything to do with kaiju? And is there more behind the scenes of Yume’s situation at home that we’re not seeing? It seems like her parents don’t really care about her, but cared a lot about her sister.

Finally, there’s the combining nature of Dynazenon. I don’t really know how this could be worked into a twist later on. But maybe it has something to do with kaiju combining as well? And then it turns out Dynazenon is actually a kaiju itself? I don’t know.

I feel like there has to be something more to the combining nature of Dynazenon, though. The T-Rex form it took last week was kind of similar to a kaiju in appearance. And since even Gauma doesn’t know what Dynazenon really is, there’s always a possibility.

Conclusion

What do you think of SSSS.Dynazenon Episode 2? Was it any better than the first episode? I think it was. Which individual part of Dynazenon is your favorite? Personally, I like the car the most. And what’s your early prediction for the twist that’s sure to come later on?

If you enjoyed this review, remember to click the like button ❤️ down below. Also, follow me over on Twitter @DoubleSama so you don’t miss out on any future content. And come join our Discord server if you’re interested in discussing anime with other members of the community.

Finally, I’d like to thank Roman for supporting DoubleSama.com at the Heika tier this month. To learn more about how you too can become a supporter of this blog, check out Patreon.com/DoubleSama.

My review of Episode 3 is available.

Speedrunning Cast Introductions

SSSS.Dynazenon is a spin-off of the SSSS.Gridman series from 2018. Since I reviewed that weekly, and also since there weren’t many anime airing this season that I actually wanted to write about weekly, here we are.

If you watched Gridman, something you may have remembered is that the first few episodes weren’t very good. I don’t think it was until episode 3 or 4 that I bumped my rating of the series up out of “bad” territory. Luckily, this first episode of Dynazenon was better than that.

However, I still wouldn’t call this episode good. I have it at a 5/10 right now. So, what’s wrong with the series so far?

The first issue I have with the series is how it decided to introduce us to the various characters. A common trope in series like this is for a bunch of unrelated characters to all be thrown together to form the main cast. Dynazenon follows it to a T.

While there are plenty of tropes that I think are good, or that I don’t mind, this isn’t one of them. I’m just not a fan of series that bounce around between a bunch of disconnected characters and situations as a way to introduce us to all of them at once.

I think my main problem with this type of character introduction is that I’m always left feeling like I wasn’t actually introduced to the characters. For example, we know that Yume had an older sister who died and that she likes to ditch boys she asks out.

That’s some oddly specific information we’re given about her, and I could make inferences from it. But at the end of the day, I don’t really know anything about her character.

Slow Start, As Expected

While the character introductions were sped through, the actual plot of this series seems like it’s going to be slow — just as it was with Gridman. I don’t think I became really interested and invested in Gridman until the final third of the series. And I could see that being the case here as well.

Some people might say that this wasn’t a slow episode because we got action at the end. A kaiju appeared, Dynazenon was summoned, and a battle ensued. Sure, but did that battle mean anything? Not really. It was just a way to bring all the characters together.

By the end of the episode, we know some of the main character’s names (I don’t think we even know all of them), and that’s it. The characters haven’t really even been introduced to each other aside from the few who already had some connections.

Based on what we know of the characters so far, the only one I’m actually interested in is Chise. Sure, the primary reason I’m interested in her is her character design. But she’s also the only character so far who seems to have a real personality.

And the messed up part about that is she’s the only apparent main character to be left out of Dynazenon. As we’re told, it requires four people to pilot. And those four pilots are Gauma, Yomogi, Yume, and Koyomi (I don’t think he was named).

Gridman did eventually become interesting and good. I expect the same to happen with Dynazenon, but at the same time, I’m not really looking forward to waiting 8 or so episodes to get to that point. Hopefully, Dynazenon will begin to flesh out its characters and introduce complex plot points earlier on.

Dynazenon’s Dyna Rex

This might seem odd considering I’m planning to review this series weekly and did the same for Gridman, but I don’t actually care about super robot mecha series. Of course, there are some good ones that I like. But the subgenre as a whole doesn’t interest me all that much.

Though, I will say that I don’t really understand people who’ve decided that they just hate all mecha anime. Usually, people who say things like that tend not to have actually watched any mecha anime, or they only watched one and assumed the entire genre is the same.

Now, why am I bringing all of this up? Because despite how Dynazenon does seem to be extremely similar to Gridman in a lot of ways, it has its own quirks that are already apparent. If you’re thinking that this series is going to just be a Gridman clone, I would caution against that assumption.

The part of the series I’m most interested in having explored is this whole “Dyna Rex” thing. I think Dynazenon is a pre-existing series like Gridman was. But regardless, I know absolutely nothing about it. So I’m looking forward to seeing what that’s all about.

Obviously, we saw the standard Dynazenon mech transform into Dyna Rex. So is that its only transformation? Are we going to see it transform into other mecha dinosaurs? Will there be additional mechs that transform into other dinosaurs?

Modern super robot series like this already hit on nostalgia for a lot of people. But mechs and dinosaurs, now that’s what I’m talking about. I can’t put into words how disappointed I’m going to be if it turns out there are no other dinosaur mechs in this series.

I do think it’s unlikely that there will be additional mechs considering there are 5 main characters and 4 are required to pilot Dynazenon. But I’m holding out hope that it has additional transformations.

Conclusion

What do you think of SSSS.Dynazenon Episode 1? If you watched Gridman as well, how do you think this episode compares to the first episode of that series? And, who’s your favorite character so far? If it’s not Chise, you’re wrong.

If you enjoyed this review, remember to click the like button ❤️ down below. Also, follow me over on Twitter @DoubleSama so you don’t miss out on any future content. And come join our Discord server if you’re interested in discussing anime with other members of the community.

Finally, I’d like to thank Roman for supporting DoubleSama.com at the Heika tier this month. To learn more about how you too can become a supporter of this blog, check out Patreon.com/DoubleSama.

My review of Episode 2 is available.