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Manga: Tentai Senshi Sunred

This is the story of the battle between good and evil which takes place in the city of Kawasaki.

Sunred, a masked hero of justice. Florsheim, an evil organization bent on taking over the city. Legions of monsters ready to fight.

That's how the story would be. Sunred is a bit of a jerk who wears his mask at all times. While mooching off of his girlfriend Kayoko, he deals with Florsheim on a daily basis, just not as you'd expect. He's on (grudgingly) friendly terms with the leader, General Vamp, and helps him move into a new house, clean his place, and occasionally meet to fight as heroes and villains do.

The support cast consists of several monsters from Florsheim and other evil organizations going about their daily lives.

Created by Makoto Kubota in 2005, Tentai Senshi Sunred (Astro Fighter Sunred) runs on Young GanGan, a Seinen magazine. Currently there are 12 Volumes published. In 2008 the manga got an Animated Adaptation running for 26 episodes, later in 2009 a 2nd Season was made, also with 26 episodes.

Tropes in Sunred include:

Adaptational Attractiveness — As noted in Fan Service Pack below for Kayoko's beauty evolution in the manga, the anime disregards her initial plain and chubby design, to stick with the later hot housewife from the very begining.
Affectionate Parody — Of the Sentai genre. Exactly what do Sentai heroes do when they hit middle age? It doesn't exactly look good on a resume, and it's not like they have retirement benefits.
Always Someone Better — One episode deals with Sunred's feelings of inadequacy when stacked up against Shachihokoider Great. It is subverted when Vamp reveals that Shachikoider is a lying liar: His nephew works in the evil organization Shachihokoider is supposed to be the Arch-Enemy of, and they've never heard of him.
Amusing Injuries — In the anime, Sunred's beatdowns usually result in this.
Antagonist In Mourning — Vamp goes through this on a more personal level. Sunred's not dead, he's just angry at them, ridding Vamp of the dynamic he's used to. Which is, oddly, him being angry and lecturing them.
Art Shift — A special chapter contained in the first Volume of the manga has a few instances with Sunred and Vamp drawn in high-detailed art; it is from a manga that one of Vamp's underlings, Duo, drew himself, and Sunred and Vamp are the ones reading it. In truth it was a joint work with Sunred's creator, Makoto Kubota, and Ji-Hyoung Song (DOUBLE-S) the artist of Until Death Do Us Part; DOUBLE-S is the one drawing the high-detailed bits of the chapter.
Audience Shift — The manga is explicitly seinen. The anime was made Lighter and Softer and ended up completely kid-friendly (without really losing much of the subversive humour of the original), and ran on the Japanese KIDS channel in an evening timeslot.
Bad Bad Acting — Florsheim's attempt at a 'hostage' taking, complete with delivering their demands to Sunred via video tape. "Mister X" (Vamp with a paper bag on his head) reads his lines incredibly flat, and the "hostage" (who is seen happily playing video games) has to be prompted to utter a very unconvincing "help, save me.".
Bait-and-Switch Credits — Sunred is never seen doing any of the heroic things he does near the end of the credits in the show itself, though he apparently did them at one point. The second season furthers this, including more power-up weapons and attacks that the audience will never actually see Sunred using.
- The first opening theme does show him selling his superbike and donning his civvies (plus mask), so it's not entirely bait-and-switch. Likewise, the second opening has him charging his gun from a wall socket.
Beware the Nice Ones — Weather Yellow is openly friendly towards Vamp and Florsheim and happily joins them for food and drink and wastes away the evening laughing about the good old days... But when two of the monsters ask him for a practice round, he goes all out and turns out to be a much more vicious fighter than Sunred.
BFG — The Corona Buster, an oversized gun whose blasts are visible from space, appears in the second season's opening.
Big Eater — Tiser, who eats near-constantly and with childlike enthusiasm.
Big Fun — Weather Yellow, who has what several characters describe as "a hell of a beer belly" and is a total blast to hang out with.
Boss Subtitles — For hero, monster and human alike.
Christmas Cake — Kayoko, who's near 30. She already has a boyfriend, so she's lucky in that regard.
Clothes Make the Superman — Averted. In a total break from the general Sentai and Tokusatsu medium, Sunred does not need his costume to keep his Super Strength, Nigh Invulnerability or any other powers. He does constantly keep his Cool Mask on (which does have some air filters and other abilities), and apparently has a costume that grants him a power-up (called "Firebird Form"), but the former appears to be a stylistic choice and the latter is kept stashed in Sunred's closet because he never needs it. The one time he ends up dressing up as some other sentai hero, it doesn't seem to change his power level at all.
Comically Invincible Hero — Sunred would be a Boring Invincible Hero if the show was at all about a standard Sentai dynamic, which it is not.
Commander Contrarian — Antkiller will generally gainsay (and subsequently abuse) his two mole sidekicks on general principle. See also Jerkass.
Contractual Genre Blindness — Florsheim. Despite being constantly curb-stomped and otherwise completely non-villainous they still follow genre conventions and fight Sunred on a weekly basis, because they're an Evil Organization and fighting heroes is what Evil Organizations do. Sunred is much less genre blind and finds the whole thing annoying, though apparently not annoying enough to actually try to stop it.
Cooking Show — General Vamp's Quick Recipes, a regular segment. Season 2 introduces Vamp & Kayoko's Quick Recipes.
Cool Mask — Sunred is never seen without his mask.
Cool Old Guy — Vamp. It's unknown exactly how old, but he seems to be in his fifties in the very least and a veteran in the sentai villains biz.
Couch Gag — The end of the opening has Sunred selling his bike for an increasingly lower price. Season 2's opening features the Sun Shoot slowly charging up after its use (except for the episode where Kayoko unplugged it so she could vacuum the apartment). The intensity of the blast of the Corona Buster (as seen from space) also changes in each episode.
- The S2 opening even has Antkiller wheeling Sunred's bike down the sidewalk.
Crossover — The Pudding Empire, which appears in the first half of season 2, are from Go! Go! Pudding Empire, creator Makoto Kubota's previous work.
Curb-Stomp Battle — Sunred vs. anyone. However, because the show isn't about the fight between good and evil, it doesn't really matter.
- The Absilin Brothers vs. anyone.
- Weather Three vs. anyone.
- Florsheim vs. Devil Eye Army
Cuteness Proximity — Almost anyone when they get near the Animal Soldiers. Special mention goes to Reiji, a stuffed dog who's the intersection of this and the Casanova as the best selling host of a club.
- Usacots gets the brunt of this. More than one of his attempts to kill Sunred have been interrupted by girls squee-ing over him.
Cut Lex Luthor a Check — "You oughta quit the world domination thing and open a restaraunt."
Cyborg — Parodied (of course) when Florsheim's scientist create a hideous Monster-Machine Fusion Cyborg by combining a horrible moth monster with... A piece of water pipe. Red is notably unimpressed.
Deathbringer the Adorable — Hellwolf, the newest member of the Animal Soldiers, who's as cute as Usa and the rest. Subverted in that he actually is terrifying under the full moon. But the moon has to be fully out. A cloudy night (which is when Vamp schedules the fight) renders him powerless.
Dirty Old Man — Hengel is a proud pervert.
Do-Anything Robot — Is there anything P-chan can't do?
Drunk on Milk — Vamp, on cola.
Emergency Impersonation — Sunred once receives the suit of Sakyun, a fellow toku hero, back from the laundromat. So he decides to put it on and impersonate his friend. Sunred-as-Sakyun then goes off to fight Florsheim for the hell of it. Curiously, this is the closest Sunred ever gets to acting like an actual toku hero, and he's not even in his own outfit.
Evil Old Folks — Vamp. For a certain level of 'evil'.
Evil Tastes Good — And they'll show you how to cook!
Excited Episode Title! — Most segments have titles that wouldn't be out of place in a henshin hero series.
Face Heel Turn — In Sunred fashion, even the Face Heel Turn is twisted. Junior superhero Night Man was mentored by Sunred. However, in his heart he felt he was not a hero but a villain. So even when he "defects" to Florsheim and becomes Night Owl, it only mildly annoys Sunred. Things are made even worse (for Sunred) when Night Owl's father and brother Night Father and Night Brother (two other heroes) come all the way from Yamaguchi to support Night Owl's new career path. This still doesn't stop Sunred from doing his usual Curb-Stomp Battle against a Florsheim minion.
Failure Is the Only Option — Obviously Florsheim are never going to be able to defeat Sunred: Even with all their monsters combined Sunred is way out of their league. The closest they've ever come is when Sunred is unwilling to fight Hellwolf because the situation has gotten too ridiculous, and Vamp wonders aloud if this counts as a "win" until one of the combat goons says it probably can't.
Fake Out Opening — Episode 26 opens on what the epic finale of an actual Sentai series would be like, complete with hordes of revived monsters, dramatic usage of Firebird Form, and a giant General Vamp. It's all in Vamp's head.
- The first episode of the second season opens on the theme song of the Weather Three, Sunred's old team. It's strangely reminiscent of Taiyou Sentai Sun Vulcan and, of course, nothing like the actual show.
Fan Service Pack — Kayoko's original design in the manga, in the earlier volumes she is a woman of average looks, quite short and chubby, even her hair is kind of curly. Later volumes simply changed her design to look like a beautiful housewife, packed with a body and looks fit of a bikini model; the later design is the Kayoko seen in the anime from the very begining, in which she is even more beautiful because the anime's artstyle is more polished than the manga's.
Fire, Ice, Lightning — The motif of the Weather Three. There's Sunred (fire), Blue (water) and Yellow (electricity). The power set is standard, but the way they use it is unusual. For example, Sunred considers using a lighter to be adequate enough for "fire" powers, Blue uses a water hose, and Yellow uses a stun gun.
Floating Advice Reminder
Friend to All Living Things — Gentle Giant Jargo the Berserker. He also speaks in Gratuitous English.
- About that "berserker" thing: it turns out his vicious reputation is actually due to confusion with a different monster called Jango.
Friendly Enemy — Vamp and Sunred are on very good terms with each other.
Go Karting with Bowser
Good Is Not Nice — Despite being a hero, Sunred is a bit of a jerk. The other heroes seen to have the same problem (one group from Hokkaido decided to wipe out their entire villain group on a drunken bender).
Harmless Villain — The entirety of Florsheim, with Vamp as the crowning example. Considering that Vamp has said they're lucky to have such an honest archenemy like Sunred, the odds of him actually being truly mean are very, very low.
- This is subverted half way through the first season when Sunred convinces the new villain Devil Eye that in order to become his new archenemy he has to kill his first archenemy: Vamp of Florsheim. When Kayoko learns of this, she is quick to think that Vamp and the rest of Florsheim are in danger until Sunred reveals that Florsheim isn't weak; he's just much too strong for them. Cue to Armor Tiger thoroughly kicking Devil Eye and his minions' asses while Vamp berates them about their manners.
Hero Antagonist — Sunred. For a certain level of 'hero'.
Hey, It's That Voice!: The only big names in the series are Kurumi Mamiya (Hamtaro) as Usacots, Hidekatsu Shibata (Führer King Bradley) as General Hengel, and Louis Yamada LIII and Higuchi-kun (a French-themed manzai duo called Hige Danshaku*
Baron Beard
) as General Vamp and Mook #1. Yamada is now the bungling professor in Tensou Sentai Goseiger.
Hook Hand: General Hengel has a variation, his left hand being a huge pair of scissors. The difficulty in performing a lot of everyday tasks is highlighted a couple times.
How Did That Get In There?? — P-chan, when trying to show a video of Hellwolf's powers, ends up showing a "Birds Gone Wild" video instead. Usa calls him out on this, and he quickly changes it.
The Idiot From Osaka — Weather Yellow. Supposedly. He, like his comrades, is not above dirty fighting.
I'll Kill You!
Image Song — "Tentai Senshi Sunred no Theme", sung by the monster(s?) in the ceiling. "We're really 'that'?"
In the Back — An independent monster during season 1 reminisces about how it delivered its One-Hit Kill attack to Sunred's back while he was obliviously fishing by the riverside. It only managed to tear Sunred's shirt and knock him into the river. This made Sunred very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move — The poor monster got PTSD from Sunred's retaliation.
Ineffectual Death Threat — "Omae-tachi! Kolo-chu!" ("Kolo-chu" is an extremely cutesy-sounding mispronunciation of the word "korosu", which means "to kill")
Interspecies Romance — A relationship between a Florsheim frog monster and a human girl. Not only is it possible, it seems to be a very intimate, if weird, relationship.
- Geddon, a monster who retired from Florsheim to raise strawberries, eventually married the daughter of the strawberry farmer he worked for.
Irony — This show's bread and butter, given that the Evil Organization is much more 'heroic' than the "Ally of Justice" who's supposed to save the world from them. One episode showcases this: Florsheim are having a riverside picnic when a boy upstream falls into the river and their Shark monster immediately leaps into the river and saves the boy. Sunred and Kayoko note how this is not terribly 'evil' of them. Sunred, feeling somewhat envious of Florsheim getting press coverage for this, ends up in the middle of a bank robbery. However, he gets too distracted trying to think of when it would be the most dramatic time to intervene, and a Heroic Bystander ends up saving everyone instead (Sunred did covertly disarm the robber and save the day, but nobody notices it). Vamp and Kayoko note how this is not terribly 'heroic' of him.
Jerk with a Heart of Gold — Sunred is a bit of a jerk as noted many times, but he genuinely cares about his girlfriend Kayoko and is much nicer to the General Vamp than the hero should be (at least compared to his senpai heroes, who make Captain Hammer look like a nice guy).
Jerkass — Sunred, back in the day. A flashback shows him chasing down a Florsheim monster who hides in a tree to escape him. Sunred starts kicking and shaking the tree to coax it to come down, before producing a lighter and threatening to burn the tree down. Then the monster comes down. Then Sunred beats the hell out of it.
- Antkiller is also a noted dick.
Killer Robot — In one episode, a deathbot is shipped to Vamp in the form of a model kit. He has no idea how to construct the thing, and goes to Sunred for help. After initially refusing to help his "enemy", Sunred ends up completing it. Then it explodes because one of Vamp's minions is too dumb to realize that he has one of the robot's crucial parts.
Sunred: I'm not going to stop until I've defeated a robot I built myself!
Kill Sat — According to the opening, one of these assists Sunred in activating Firebird Form. Since he keeps said form in a box in his closet, it's likely that's just another bit of tokusatsu hyperbole that Sunred has since abandoned.
Lighter and Softer: Sex jokes and the fact that Sunred is always pestering Kayoko for sex are downplayed in the anime, to downright non-existant. Also even with slapstick humor, Sunred often deals some brutal beatings against Florsheim's lackeys in the manga, with them coming out bloody disfigured, in the anime the beatings aren't that severe.
Mundane Fantastic — Nobody sees the presence of evil organizations, monsters or masked heroes of justice as being too out of the ordinary.
Minion with an F in Evil — Not many of the monsters are actually evil. They're just trying to make a living. Some of them are even perfectly happy in non-Take Over the World fields of work.
Mooks — Florsheim does have two Combat Goons who are regular characters. They appear to be regular guys doing their jobs, and, despite being Mooks, generally suffer less damage than the monsters.
My Name Is Not Durwood — The first time Sunred and Hengel meet, Hengel steadfastly refuses to get Sunred's name right, calling him "Red Moon", "Red Mask" and "Star Red", among others.
Mysterious Past — Sunred doesn't know much about himself, aside from his parents are dead and that he is 27 years old, in fact he only knows how old he is because he keeps counting the passage of years, he doesn't know his own birth date.
Name's the Same — Weather Yellow is Takuya Kimura, which is also the name of a famous actor/singer in Japan.
Nigh Invulnerable — Sunred. In the few occasions where a monster does get a hit in (usually by sneak attacks), the attacks do nothing apart from making Sunred angry.
No Accounting for Taste: Sunred to Kayoko in the first 3 manga Volumes before she started to get inexplicably hotter; even when she was average (at best) in looks, Sunred was constantly trying to get in her pants like she was the hottest chick in town.
Not So Harmless — Florsheim is made to look weak until a rival villain group steps on their territory. They are strong, just weaker than Sunred.
Nuke 'Em — P-chan, one of the adorably evil Animal Soldiers, has a nuclear missile in his body for some reason.
Our Werewolves Are Different — Sunred even calls Hellwolf out on how oddly nonstandard he is.
"What kind of wolf needs to look at a full moon to turn into another wolf?"
Parental Abandonment — Sunred's parents are dead, and he has no recollection of when; in thruth he has no remembrance of his childhood at all or his origins, he knows he is 27 years old but not his birthday, Sunred just counts the years.
Poke the Poodle — The Animal Soldiers once come up with a great plan — to steal all of Sunred's water. It doesn't work very well.
- This describes most of the "evil" works done by the Florsheim in general.
Pose of Supplication — Vamp and Florsheim tend to do this whenever Sunred defeats them in battle, sitting still and listening to him lecture them.
Power Trio — The animal soldiers ("power" part optional). Devilcat is the superego, Usacots is the ego, and P-Chan is the id.
Progressively Prettier: Kayoko's beauty evolution in the manga also coincides with her character and importance growth within the series; in the begining her role wasn't clearly defined, only that Sunred lived off her was, but other characteristics such as working at an insurance firm, being on friendly terms with Vamp, getting more recurring appearances, all of this only came when Kayoko was stabilished as Sunred's pretty and independant girlfriend.
Punch Clock Hero — Sunred.
Punch Clock Villain — Florsheim.
Real Place Background — While the art style the show uses isn't normally associated with this trope, everything in the opening, and almost everything in the show itself, is a real location in the Mizonokuchi area where the show takes place. The ED of episode 34, in fact, is "lip synched" by various real life people from the Takatsu, Kawasaki, Ward Office and other Kawasaki locations.
Real Song Theme Tune — Twice, for a Special Edition Title, a real song has been used. The first season had a polyphonic ringtone version of the incredibly popular (at the time) song "Shuchishin", by the idol group of the same name, when Vamp had it as his ringtone. The second season used the Kawasaki city anthem "Suki desu, Kawasaki, Ai no Machi" in an episode where the song was annoying one of Florsheim's monsters.
Red Oni, Blue Oni — Florsheim has an actual Blue Oni on payroll. As suitable for his colour he has a calm and community-minded temperament, and volunteers to let people throw soybeans at him during Setsubun.
Ridiculously Cute Critter — All of the Animal Soldiers
Sanity Ball — Sunred and Kayoko compete about it. Sunred is the straight man in sketches involving himself and Florsheim, while Kayoko is the straight man in sketches involving herself and Sunred (whether or not Vamp and Florsheim are involved).
Sdrawkcab Name: A play on it, "Red-san" as many characters adress to Sunred, his name is spelled in japanese as Sanreddo or Sanred; just separate San and Red, place it in reverse order, and you have Redsan, the Red-san. The characters are being polite by adding the honofric and spelling his name backwards at the same time.
Seinfeldian Conversation — One of the major sources of humor in the series. Of note are the Godom and Sodorrah segments, where one of the pair is constantly trying to start one of these, which the other refuses to participate in.
- Furthermore there's Gaima's ambition, a running gag of short segments on how Gaima plans to get a dog. At the end of the first season he realizes his apartment doesn't permit pets and gets a battery driven toy dog instead.
Sentai — Largely a parody of this type of genre. Sunred himself was part of a Sentai team at one point, the Weather Three.
Shout Out — Tama from Bamboo Blade appears riding past, and Antkiller does Red Braver's finishing move, Atomic Fire Blade, in episode 24. In episode 23, Sunred is seen walking by a Spider-Man poster.
Shrinking Violet — Florsheim turtle monster Games/Durtle, who is always trying to avoid social contact
Sitcom Arch Nemesis — Sunred and Florsheim.
Smoking Is Cool — Well, Sunred smokes. Whether he is 'cool' or not is another matter entirely. As a Sentai hero he's presumably immune to the side-effects.
Spirited Competitor — Say what you want about Florsheim's competence, but nobody can claim they're not good sports. Sunred occasionally gets fired up if Florsheim appears to have brought something that can actually challenge him, and tends to get meaner the less 'serious' the fight is.
Super Mode — Firebird Form!
- And in season 2, Prominence Form.
Super Senses — The manga states that Sunred can detect any sound within a 10 Km ratius. He also has razor-sharp eyesight, and his mask renders him immune to inhaled allergens and toxins (probably justifying how he can smoke so much with no bad effects).
Super Speed — Sunred can run as fast as a high-speed train; the anime actually spoofs this by making hin run alongside a high-speed train in one OP.
Super Strength — The only superpower that Sunred displays on a regular basis apart from his Nigh Invulnerability. He can stomp craters in concrete without much trouble.
Supporting Protagonist — Sunred is this, even though the series carries his name, the story is mostly about Florsheim Members' lives and how it interacts with the titular hero; case in point is how many named and recurring characters Florsheim has in comparison to Sunred's friends, there's a great contrast in it. The manga is not subtle about it, all Volumes published so far had Vamp, his lackeys or any variation potraying the Florsheim organization in the cover, while Sunred himself does not appear in the covers, only in inside color arts.
Take Over the World — Florsheim's ultimate goal. Vamp considers the first step towards achieving it to be eliminating Sunred.
Talking to Himself — In the anime. Sunred, Kayoko, Vamp and Hengel are the only ones who have unique voice actors, with the remaining Florsheim monsters and background characters sharing a handful of voice actors. This trope naturally ensues.
Team Mom — Vamp is an not so evil version of this.
Ted Baxter — Peeled Shrimp thinks he can beat Sunred five times out of ten, but he's one of the only Florsheim monsters that Vamp doesn't even consider sending after Sunred.
Those Two Guys — Vamp's "Combat Goons", #1 and #2, Florsheim's only Mooks. Also Khamenman and Medallion, two Florsheim monsters almost never seen apart, and Godom and Sodorrah.
Trademark Favorite Food — Medallion loves cup noodles.
Trying to Catch Me Fighting Dirty — Weather Yellow, even by the standards of his fellow Sentai colleagues. He's a lot nicer when he's not fighting, but Red usually doesn't bring foreign objects or stun guns to fights. Nowadays, anyway.
Tsundere — Sunred, towards his girlfriend Kayoko. And somewhat against Florsheim too, given that he's rude and abrasive against them on one hand and on the other shows up to help clean an unwanted monster out of their attic.
- When she hears about a Florsheim shark monster saving a kid from drowning, Kayoko explicitly compares it to "that 'tsundere' thing".
Trading Card Lame — Some eyecatches include images of "Heroes Attack" cards featuring Sunred and Vamp. The cards are actually a Captain Ersatz version of the real-world Super Sentai trading card game, Rangers Strike.
Villain Protagonists — Florsheim's members are the viewpoint characters for the most part.
Villains Out Shopping — Whether Florsheim is evil or not, a lot of time is spent on them doing the most mundane of activities. One episode details a frog monster who, the narration says, can kill an elephant with the venom he shoots. All of his screentime is spent cruising ramen restaurants and writing on his blog.
- This eventually turns into a Crowning Moment of Funny when he brings Vamp and the Mooks to one of his favorite ramen restaurants and after the others say that they don't like how the ramen tastes, one of the Mooks points out that this restaurant was given high points by the blogger and that everyone on the Internet thinks he has horrible taste in ramen.
Villain with Good Publicity — While the "villain" part is doubtful, Florsheim have enough good publicity on their own, despite frequently talking of world domination. The town regards them as overall better citizens than Sunred.
Well, Excuse Me, Princess! — Kayoko towards Sunred. She's the household's breadwinner, owns their apartment, and is in no way afraid of Sunred or outright criticising him.
What Do You Mean, It's Not Awesome?? — General Hengel, a leader of a branch of Florsheim, takes even the most mundane tasks on with an incredible seriousness.
What Do You Mean, It\'s Not Heinous?? — A recurring segment in the second season is "The Rules of Florsheim", where General Vamp berates his minions...on what food and home cleaning products they buy for HQ.
- On two occasions, Sunred has gotten very upset when Florsheim attacked him on New Year's Day — with a monster who represents the previous year in the Chinese zodiac.