Power Rangers (Super) Samurai, Episode (13) 36 – The Master Returns

Jayden can’t stop thinking about Decker calling him weak and edgeless while he’s sparring with the other four Rangers. His takes his anger and frustration out on them and Mike doesn’t appreciate Jayden going all out on them. The Rangers head inside as Mentor takes Jayden out on a drive.

Meanwhile, Xandred is getting increasingly annoyed by the sootballs and their poor imitation of Dayu’s music. “This medicine’s not working,” he yells and the sootballs relay the update to Dayu’s sootball companion friend. She’s happy Xandred is miserable.

Mentor takes Jayden by the lake and knows he’s upset about Decker and wanting to prove something. It’s not like when it was just the two of us, Jayden says, that now he’s relying too much on the team.

Mentor tries to prop him up: “You bring honor to all the Red Rangers who have come before you.”

OOH-AH-OOH! Octoroo demands Serrator get Dayu’s harmonium back. And he demands to go along with him. In the forest, Dayu tells Decker she’s tired of waiting for Serrator to move, yet he says he can wait a little longer.

Insert a “Mia’s a horrible cook” joke here.

Mentor runs into Bulk and Spike at the supermarket and asks them why they haven’t come back to the “dojo.” His “drill sergeant” has been waiting to give them a real workout. They quickly refuse.

Serrator takes Octoroo by the sea and says Dayu’s harmonium is in this little crevice here. While Serrator works on it, Octoroo relates how she came to the Sanzu. Xandred was even crazier back then. Dayu’s music was the only thing that cured his headaches, the misery of her half-human side literally music to his ears. He searched for Dayu and then threatened her into becoming his mistre… minion. She accepted.

Serrator gets the harmonium out, but OOH-AH-OOH! He attacks Octoroo as he doesn’t want to keep up this charade any longer. He tells Octoroo how weak Xandred is and that he is going to use the harmonium for his own purposes.

“I knew you were a lyin’, cheatin’, fancy pants wearing snake!”

Octoroo slips into a nearby crevice back to the Sanzu triggering the alarm at Chez Shiba. Jayden apologizes again for having too much on his mind and lets them know he’s proud to be fighting with them. They head to the coastline. Dayu feels the harmonium and rushes to it.

Serrator gets ready to use the harmonium to open up a huge crevice when the Rangers arrive. They morph and fight off Moogers as Dayu arrives and demands Serrator give back her harmonium.

“You’ve been nothing but a pawn in my plan,” he tells her. That all he wanted was Decker and the harmonium.

“You’ve deceived me for the last time! Liar!!”
“And it only took you 200 years to figure that out.”

“Give it back, you two-bit con man!”

Serrator hurls explosions at her and she falls to the ground.

“Dayu, your frustration tastes like the sweetest candy on my tongue.”
“I can only hope that your wickedness will came back on you tenfold.”

Suddenly, Xandred’s anger explodes through the crevice after Octoroo tells him of Serrator’s backstabbing. He warns Xandred that if he leaves into the human world, he’ll immediately dry out.

But Xandred can’t take it anymore. Above ground, the sky becomes dark as rocks form a gateway for Xandred to emerge from the Sanzu. Light returns as the Rangers get their first look at him. Xandred begins to dry out, but still sends explosions their way. He tries to bind Serrator, knocking the harmonium out of his hands. Serrator jumps away and Jayden tries to attack Xandred.

Xandred takes a couple of swings at Jayden and eventually splits his sword and sends him back. The other five attack, but Xandred deflects it right back to them. Jayden stands up and grabs Emily’s sword, goes SUPER! and summons the bullzooka.

“I owe your family some payback and you’re the one that’s going to pay.”

Xandred deflects all the shots from the bullzooka as they take the fight into the air. He sends the final blows toward Jayden, he demorphs and becomes unconcious

Xandred picks up the harmonium. Octoroo pleads with Xandred to get back to the Sanzu, but he walks over to Dayu and tells her he’ll fix her harmonium as long as she pledges allegiance only to him. He rips off a piece of his armor and patches the harmonium up. Octoroo pushes Xandred back to the Sanzu.

“Colossal Mooger Cannon Company advance!”

Kevin tells Emily to take care of Jayden, takes the black box to go SUPER and calls on the zords.

Antonio summons the bullzord and the other three call on their own cannon as Kevin goes into Shogun mode to finish off the Moogers.

The Rangers drag Jayden home as Emily cries.

On the Sanzu, Octoroo sends Xandred into the water to soak for a long time. Serrator sees this as his opening to fully enact his plan to rule the Earth.

Episode Thoughts
Wow! That was a great episode. A truly great episode. The Bulk and Spike scene was unnecessary (of course), but the rest of the episode moved at just the right pace. There was plenty of action and drama and Dayu, Serrator and even Octoroo had probably some of the best written lines Samurai has had in all the 35 episodes previous. Also kudos to the voice actors for Serrator and Dayu, Derek Judge and Kate Elliott. They did some great work in this episode.

This is probably my new favorite Samurai episode and you can definitely feel they are gearing up for the finale (and some twists that are still on their way).

How Much Better Was Sentai Than Power Rangers?
Corresponding Shinkenger Episodes: Act 40 – The General Goes Into Battle

The Shinkenger episode had its own random Genta moment at the start, but the rest of the episode played out just as it was in Samurai. Of course, Takeru is a much more emo and mellow guy than Jayden, but both shows did a good job of showing the Red Rangers’ doubts in themselves.

Maybe what Shinkenger did better was Dayuu’s backstory, which as we’ve already seen, is completely different than what Samurai chose to do with Dayu, which is okay because so far it has worked out well. But Dayuu’s tragic and far darker descent as a Gedoushu is much more compelling. Not appropriate for young American audiences, sure, but it made for some great scenes in this episode as well as in the future.

Samurai‘s treatment of Octoroo’s character, turning him into some old kook, has been iffy, but him going at it with Serrator was great. It was the first time we’ve really seen Octoroo do something of use since that toy kidnapping episode. In Shinkenger, the villains’ dialogue has of course always been less on the slapstick, but in this episode for Samurai, they really did a great job making Serrator, Dayu and Octoroo sound normal instead of cartoonish. The episode also highlighted how great Dayu has been developed overall actually. It also highlighted how much of a sonuvabitch Serrator is.

So while Shinkenger was much heavier, as it always is, Samurai was able to take the episode and make it their own. Which, hey, is all I ever asked for from Samurai. Great, great episode.


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0 thoughts on “Power Rangers (Super) Samurai, Episode (13) 36 – The Master Returns

  1. pretty good review although you should also mention how Serrator made Dayu look like a complete idiot with his comment of how it only took her 200 years to realise he wasn’t trustworthy. i know the review stated she had been developed very well but imo she honestly comes off as one of the STUPIDEST villains in the show for trusting him in the first place.

    1. That’s great to point out. Thanks, I forgot about that line. I’ll add it in.

      As for being developed pretty well, her tragic love story is much more fleshed out than anything we’ve seen from any of the Rangers that’s for sure lol Stupid to trust Serrator, sure, but I guess you can say it’s part of her story and character. She made the mistake and that’s why she’s been living as a Nighlok all these years, miserable and and merely a puppet. If only Samurai were a little deeper, hehe.

    1. Yeah, that was random. I actually don’t remember if Kotoha in Shinkenger cried when they bring Takeru back home. And in Shinkenger, Kotoha looked up to Takeru/had a crush on him sorta. Probably a case of Google translate again. lol

  2. “You bring honor to all the Red Rangers who have come before you”

    Me and my brother were having fun with this statement.

    Was mentor Jii talking about the last 17 Samurai Red Rangers (since Jayden’s the 18th), or the last 17 Red Power Rangers from Mighty-Morphin to RPM (since Jayden the 18th)? we thought that to goes both ways!

  3. I really liked this episode! But i don´t undertand why Emily cried? Does she is in love with Jayden? I thought that she and mike could have a case or somethin, but… anyway, i wanna see the next episode, but is just in august… This is too bad!

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