The Chou Sei Shin Series (Ultra Star God Series) is a trilogy of tokusatsu shows aired from 2003-2006. Created by Toho (who famously produced the Godzilla movies) and Konami, it was their attempt to break into the Henshin Hero market that was — at the time — dominated by Toei and their two major franchises, Super Sentai and Kamen Rider, with Tsuburaya's Ultra Series for good measure. The shows revolve around the title Ultra Star Gods: Humongous Mecha that are used by the protagonists to protect the Earth from an extraterrestrial threat.
The first entry was Chou Sei Shin Gransazer, aired in 2003. The Earth was once a highly advanced civilization until it was attacked by the Alien Alliance. The Earth built giant mecha known as Ultra Star Gods to defend themselves, but even with their power the Earth was eventually defeated. Millions of years later, the Lost Technology of that ancient civilization is stirring, awakening the ancient DNA lying dormant in twelve chosen warriors that calls them to fight a new alien threat once more.
The twelve heroes- the Gransazer- were each named after a starsign and arranged into four elemental Tribes: Fire, Wind, Earth and Water. The main protagonists are the Fire Tribe, and the three other Tribes originally enter as antagonists to them, either directly or indirectly. When all three members of a Tribe gather, they can awaken and summon their respective Ultra Star Gods.
The second entry was Genseishin Justiriser, aired in 2004, which reduced the number of core heroes from twelve to three. Long ago, a champion of the Earth called Noulan defeated and sealed away the evil Kaiser Hades, and entrusted her power- JustiPower- to a future generation. In the present day, a scientist named Doctor Zora aims to free Kaiser Hades, and in response the JustiPower awakens three chosen humans as warriors known as the Justirisers. Each one can summon a mecha known as a Star God Beast, and when it combines with another mecha called RiseRoss they can create a Phantom Star God.
The third entry was Chousei Kantai Sazer-X, aired in 2005. In the year 3000, the Earth is consumed by darkness and conquered by Space Pirates. As humanity's last hope, they send three ships (and their pilots) back in time to Set Right What Once Went Wrong by preventing the Space Pirates' initial conquest of Earth. In the present day, Takuto Ando is recruited by the time travellers to become the third member of Sazer X, their elite fighting team. To save the Earth, they have to find twelve mysterious McGuffins called Cosmo Capsules which, when brought together, will grant one wish. Sadly, they do not summon a dragon to do this. Each member of Sazer X has their own ship and support team, and when a ship combines with a mecha known as a Core-Calibur, they transform into a Shooting Star God.
The three series were generally praised for the high quality of their giant mecha fights, which were fast and innovative, helped by the actual mecha costumes allowing for far more flexibility than the bulky suits that Super Sentai usually employs. Unfortunately, the Chou Sei Shin Series just wasn't popular enough to compete with Toei's established franchises, and the final installment would end with 38 episodes and a Bat Family Crossover movie, Chousei Kantai Sazer-X the Movie: Fight! Star Warriors. Though the franchise's legacy can be seen carried over into Konami's later media such as Sky Girls and Otomedius.
This series contains examples of:
- All Your Powers Combined: Each series has at least one moment where the heroes have to combine their powers.
- And Knowing Is Half the Battle: Each episode of Sazer X ends with An Aesop being delivered by Remy.
- Bittersweet Ending: Commander Shark being erased from time as a result of the heroes' success at the end of Sazer X.
- Continuity Cameo:
- Mika Shidou from Gransazers returns in Justirisers, executing the same reverse kick on Shouta that she did with Tenma when they first met. Akira and Naoto also make cameo appearances in Justiriser, the former to give Mio a check up after she visits the doctor's office and the latter to give Shouta a pep talk after he loses his In Loader.
- The only overt references to a past Chou Sei Shin series in Sazer X (besides the film) is the appearance of a Gadaru Seijin, the Gig Fighters and the Megarion mecha in the final arc.
- Cool vs. Awesome: The series could best be summed up as Sentai versus Kaiju.
- Crisis Crossover: Chousei Kantai Sazer-X the Movie: Fight! Star Warriors brings all three sets of heroes together to do battle against a newly unsealed Bosquito.
- Dancing Theme: The end credits for Sazer X have Takuto and Remy dancing (later joined by the other Sazers) to the outro music.
- Darkest Hour: In each series there comes a moment, usually right before or during the finale, where all hope seems lost and the villains look on the verge of victory.
- Defector from Decadence: Blaird's defection in Sazer-X comes partly because he can't stand Neo Descal or his fellow Shoguns.
- Diabolus ex Nihilo: Sazer X has a tendency to have a new complication for the heroes come out of nowhere whenever things seem to be going well.
- Disc-One Final Boss: An example in Justiriser — The heroes kill Big Bad Kaiser Hades at the end of the second act of the series, and then his brother appears from nowhere to pick up where he left off.
- Earth Is the Center of the Universe: Earth in the Chouseishin universe is...
- The home of an ancient advanced civilization which developed their own Humongous Mecha and were capable of communing with an Energy Being representing the will of the universe (Gransazer).
- The place where an intergalactic Evil Overlord was sealed in a can (Justirisers).
- A "sibling world" to Planet Riser and one of two planets bearing powers that threatened the above Evil Overlord's galactic conquest (also Justirisers).
- The hiding place of the wish-granting Cosmo-Capsules (Sazer-X).
- The capital planet of a galactic empire that threatened the whole universe in the future (also Sazer-X).
- Elemental Powers: The four Gransazer tribes each embody a different element — Fire, Wind, Earth and Water. This motif pops up again in Sazer-X, except with Earth swapped out for Lightning.
- Evil Counterpart: Each series has one
- The Impactors and Bosquito to the Gransazers in Gransazer. The former are a team of robotic aliens who resemble dark Gransazers]], the latter is an alien which can copy and use powers from all the Gransazers.
- Demon Knight in Justiriser, who transforms using similar powers to the Justirisers and acts as their rival on the Hades Army side. And later Majin Daruga after stealing Demon Knight's powers and using them to become Kurogane, a dark version of Riser Glen's Super Mode.
- Jackall in Sazer X is basically an evil Sazer, using similar powers to them to transform and piloting his own Ryuuseishin mecha. In the finale, a dark variant of Lio-Sazer appears called Black-Lio.
- The Four Gods: Used as the motif for the Star God Beasts in Justiriser, although interestingly enough the White Tiger-themed Ranga and Azure Dragon-themed Ryuto have their colors switched.
- Finishing Move: Unlike in Super Sentai, each hero usually has their own finisher attack.
- Galactic Superpower: The Chouseishin galaxy has several big players.
- Warp Monarch in Chouseishin Gransazer are a "cosmic alliance" of various alien races formed to enforce peace throughout the universe.
- The Daruga Imperial Army in Genseishin Justiriser are an interplanetary empire that seeks to conquer the entire universe. The Big Bad and his army are just one subsection of their much larger military.
- The Descal Fleet become this after conquering the Earth. Their descendants formed the Neo Descal, an intergalactic empire that conquered and ravaged dozens of planets, to the point where other alien races in the universe formed an alliance to oppose them.
- Gold-Colored Superiority: Interestingly, this trope shows up mostly in the villains instead of the heroes. All three Big Bads (Belzeus, Majin Daruga and King Neo Descal) have gold as a dominant color in their palette.
- Gotta Catch 'Em All
- The Steller Plates in Justiriser which need to be destroyed to unseal Kaiser Hades.
- The Cosmo Capsules in Sazer X. The Descal Space Pirates want to collect them to take over Earth, Sazer-X wants to collect them to stop Descal.
- Greater-Scope Villain: Present in all three series.
- Chouseishin Gransazer has the Bosquito, an ancient and destructive evil that the Warp Monarch sought to eradicate by wiping all life off of Earth. Belzeus later unseals one as part of his plan to get the Warp Monarch to attack the Earth.
- Majin Daruga, Kaiser Hades' older brother, for the first half of Justiriser. While his younger brother's Hades Army are a sect of his Daruga Imperial Army, he and his forces remain distant from the story until receiving word of Hades' death.
- The ancient Biyodo aliens in Sazer-X, who drove Earth's original inhabitants off of it long ago, leading them to form the Descal and try to retake the planet millions of years later.
- Kaiju: The Space Beasts in Justirisers and Terror Beasts in Sazer-X, both of which are giant monsters used to facilitate the mecha battles.
- Lighter and Softer: Sazer X had less serious villains and more comedic moments than its predecessors, at least at first. Justiriser also has relatively more lighthearted tone compared to Gransazer.
- Make My Monster Grow: Averted for the most part, as the villains would usually send down an already giant kaiju rather than enlarge a defeated one. Although this trope does get played straight a few times.
- The Akelon and Omega both assumed giant kaiju forms to facilitate their mecha battles in Gransazer. Impactors Radia and Lucia could also grow themselves larger in order to fight the Gransazers in their Chouseishin.
- Several of Doctor Zora's Cyber Knights in Justirisers could transform into kaiju forms for battle against the Ryuuseishin, as could Kaiser Hades and his big brother. The finale also had the heroes pulling this by merging into a giant version of Shirogane.
- Almost entirely absent from Sazer-X apart from episode 12 where Blaird gets grown into a giant monster using the Cosmo Capsules and the finale, which exaggerates this trope by having an already huge kaiju get grown even bigger to the point where it towers over the Ryuuseishin.
- Militaries Are Useless: Averted in the first two series, both of which have the heroes being backed up by the JSDF.
- Mirror Match — Takuto's fight against Black-Lio in the finale of Sazer X has the two able to counter each others attacks.
- Monster of the Week:
- Gransazer subverts this at first, featuring the Gransazers first having to fight each other in a Ryuki-style melee and then doing battle against a set of Arc Villains. It isn't until the third quarter that single-episode aliens of the week start to appear.
- Justirisers plays this straighter, alternating between Cyber Knight of the week and Kaiju of the week plots.
- Sazer-X also plays this mostly straight, although the monsters of the week in that series usually aren't the focus of their episodes, which are instead all about collecting the Cosmo Capsules.
- Mook Carryover: The Gig Fighters used by Warp Monarch in Chouseishin Gransazer appear again in Sazer X as the Mooks of the Space Pirate Fleet Descal. Megarion from Justiriser also pops up in Sazer-X as mass-produced Giant Mooks for Neo Descal. Descal also make use of a Bulgario from the same series in The Movie.
- People in Rubber Suits: As with most Toku series, the monsters are all rubber-suited, albeit ones designed to look incredibly realistic and grounded in the setting.
- Power Trio:
- The four tribes in Gransazer are each comprised of three people.
- The Justirisers are also a trio of heroes.
- Same with Sazer-X, at least until Shark-Sazer joins the team.. They technically have seven members at the start of the series, but only three are Henshin Heroes.
- Quirky Miniboss Squad — The Three Shogun of Sazer X. Quite possibly the most plot-integral Quirky Miniboss Squad ever.
- Robeast:
- Omega in Gransazer is a Robot Soldier who grows himself by transforming into a more organic looking kaiju form.
- The Genseishin in Justirisers are heroic variants, each being a mecha themed after one of The Four Gods.
- Sealed Evil in a Can:
- The Bosquito in Gransazer. And there's more of it.
- Kaiser Hades is sealed in a metal prison for the first quarter of Justiriser.
- Shared Universe: All three Chouseishin installments take place in the same universe, as confirmed by various Continuity Cameos in each series and The Movie bringing all three sets of heroes together.
- Sixth Ranger:
- The Water Tribe in Gransazer are the last of the four tribes to be assembled and join the Gransazers.
- Demon Knight in Justiriser, who after pretending to be one joins the Justirisers for real after regaining his memories.
- Shark-Sazer in Sazer X. He's technically with the team at the beginning, but he gets separated from them when they go through time and doesn't rejoin them until later.
- Sorting Algorithm of Evil: Each series has the heroes having to fight stronger and stronger villains as it goes on, with each arc usually culminating in a Climax Boss whom the heroes have to unlock a new power to defeat.
- Strictly Formula: Averted. Chouseishin likes to play with the standard Sentai formula a lot. An episode may only consist of mecha battles or feature none at all and only be focused on battles against human-sized monsters.
- Story Arc: Each series is usually divided into three to four arcs consisting of 12-16 episodes.
- Super Mode: Riser Shirogane in Justiriser is the result of Riser Glen being charged with Justi Power by Mio.
- Take a Third Option — A rare villainous example in Sazer X: The Man Behind the Man King Neo Descal appears from the future to ensure that the Earth is conquered. Instead of adhering to history and conquering the Earth by capturing all twelve Cosmo Capsules (which his minions have thus far tried and failed at) he decides to build a Doomsday Device on the moon that will essentially conquer Earth for him.
- The Man Behind the Man: Used in all three series to some degree.
- The Warp Monarch turn out to have been manipulated by Belzeus in Chouseishin Gransazer into attacking Earth, so he can use it as a foothold as part of his plan to become a Galactic Conqueror.
- In Genseishin Justiriser, the Hades Army turns out to be a section of the Daruga Imperial Army.
- King Neo Descal turns out to have been behind both of the Descal fleets in Chousei Kantai Sazer-X.
- Time Travel: Forms the crux of the plot in Sazer X.
- Transforming Mecha: All the Sei Shin can shift from vehicle modes to fighting modes.
- Wire Fu: Particularly in Gransazer, where the ways in which the heroes performed attacks and were knocked backward were accomplished through wirework.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Subverted in Sazer X, where the Neo Descal have to keep the useless Three Shoguns around since they're their ancestors and they need to stay alive for the future to stay as is.
