From left: Mouri (Saturn), Houjou (Mars), Tomoko, Takeda (Jupiter), Saionji (Mercury)
"Cyber Bit, stand by......"
Dennou Keisatsu Cybercop (lit. Computer Police Cybercop) is a Toku series produced by Toho in 1988, which chronicles the missions of the Zero-Section Armed Constable (ZAC), a special police unit assigned to assist the standard police force in a crime-infested Tokyo in 1999. Battling the criminal organization DeathTrap, a group of elite ZAC officers wears high-tech armors called Bit Suits, which confer them superhuman capabilities. They are soon joined by Shin'ya Takeda, a stranger from the 23rd Century who, strangely enough, has his own Bit Suit, and learn that their actions in the present can help reshape for better the apocalyptic future from which Takeda came.
The Cybercops:
- Shin'ya Takeda (Jupiter Unit): The Time-Travelling Hero. Quickly becomes The Ace due to his charisma and superior Bit Suit. Mars constantly calls him a rookie because of Takeda's habits about solving the things on his terms.
- Akira Houjou (Mars Unit): The Lancer and The Big Guy AND The Leader. Was The Hero before Takeda's arrival. Constantly butt heads with Takeda, but comes to respect him.
- Ryoichi Mouri (Saturn Unit): The Smart Guy. Fun Personified, as well as a Casanova Wannabe. His armor has built-in radar scanners.
- Osamu Saionji (Mercury Unit): A Martial Pacifist, Lightning Bruiser and
Iron Woobie. - Lucifer: Sixth Ranger after his Heel–Face Turn. Comes from the same timeline as Takeda.
The rest of the ZAC crew:
- Captain Hisagi Oda: The Mentor
- Lieutenant Shimazu Mizue: Mission Control
- Officer Tomoko Uesugi: Lone Female of the Five-Man Band. Was supposed to have her own Bit Suit, the Venus Unit, but due to lack of financial resources, it was never built.
The DeathTrap organization
- Baron Kageyama: The real Big Bad and Man Behind the Man to his subordinates, each of which leads an organization which is a branch of DeathTrap. Note, all of them are Mad Scientists.
- Professor Einstein: The Dragon to Kageyama. Leads the Ominous Gang, is an expert in Physics and, later, Cybernetics.
- Madam Darwin: A literal Cat Girl who leads the Harkoss Gang, made up of humanoid beasts of her creation.
- Dr. Arthur Ploid: Physically, he's The Brute. Makes machanical monsters, and specializes in Mind Screw.
- Führer: The supercomputer who leads DeathTrap. It, too, was brought from the future so it could rule the world in the past. Built by Kageyama, who fuses with him at the end.
Tropes:
- The Ace: Takeda, until Lucifer comes around.
- Applied Phlebotinum: If Jupiter's rage grows to a boiling point, he can power up his suit and summon his most powerful weapon, the Cyber Thunder Arm, from a portal that appears from nowhere (possibly from his original timeline).
- Avenging the Villain: In the last third of the series, Einstein's younger sister, Luna, joins DeathTrap in order to avenge her fallen brother.
- Bash Brothers: After change sides, Lucifer develops this dynamics with Takeda for the rest of the show. Most possibly because he's the only other person from the same timeline who isn't trying to ruin the past AND the future, what is Kageyama's goal.
- Briefcase Blaster: Almost all the weapons used by the Cybercops, except their personal standard firearms.
- Colour-Coded for Your Convenience: The Bit Suits, of course, not surprising as this series was initially intended to be a Super Sentai-like series. See
What Could Have Been below. - Dating Catwoman: Luna and Akira, towards the end of the series. He even cradles her as she's dying... Or deactivating, whatever the case.
- A Day in the Limelight: In rare occasions, the other cybercops have their chance to off one of the robot enemies instead Jupiter or Lucifer. Saturn in particular had his when he was able to defeat an Harkos unit by himself, with no help and while using a defective cyber bit!
- "Do It Yourself" Theme Tune: Mika Chiba (Tomoko) sings the ending theme.
- Four-Temperament Ensemble:
- Takeda: Sanguine
- Houjou: Choleric
- Mouri: Swings between phlegmatic and sanguine
- Saionji: Melancholic
- Hard Work Hardly Works: Played with, then subverted. Jupiter is generally their ace, but he's not infallible. After Lucifer, the battleship Cristalo and Luna comes to the fridge, the team start to work a lot with combination moves and team attacks to cover their weak points and defeat tougher enemies.
- Heel–Face Turn: Lucifer started out as an enemy of the Cybercops, especially Takeda, as they belong to the same timeline and he believed him to be the traitor to the forces resisting the Führer. Turns out Kageyama was The Mole in the resistance, who killed his and Jupiter's partners and threw them all into the past.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Akira pulls one to stop Kageyama once and for all in the series finale. While it does work, he survives.
- Ineffectual Loner: Except for Jupiter, Lucifer is generally distant from the other Cybercops, but comes to warm up to the other members, despite keep his distance. He's always giving advices when they're lost about what to do or appearing to help to solve the problem. Takeda does even take note that Lucifer can be very talkative when he appears.
- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: C'mon. DeathTrap. Led by a certain Führer. How can you not run away from these?
- Nice Guy: Osamu is the nicest member of the cast.
- The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Lucifer felt this way towards Jupiter before he learned the truth.
- The Psycho Rangers: The False Cybercops created by Einstein in Episode 22. They are capable of reading and countering the real ones' every move, sending the team straight into a collective Heroic BSoD. However, they have two factors which allow them to defeat their copies: teamwork and Tomoko.
- Real Life Writes the Plot: Very possibly the real reason why the Venus Bit was not made, since Toho did not allow too much budget for the series. This reflected on the fact that, in-series, ZAC's own budget wasn't enough for a fifth Bit Suit (considering that the Jupiter Bit wasn't even from their timeline to begin with). Here (on the left)
◊ is how it would look like. - Robotic Reveal: Every one of the DeathTrap leaders, save for Kageyama, who was the True Final Boss all along.
- Ship Tease: Quite a lot for a toku show. Takeda and Tomoko have the bulk of it, with some moments for some Oda x Shimazu and Houjou x Luna. Even Kageyama x Darwin get a hint in the second-to-last episode.
- Spanner in the Works / The Mole: Lucifer thinks Jupiter was the one who sold out the human resistance in the future. Turns out it was Kageyama.
- Team Mom: Tomoko and Shimazu to the team.
- Team Spirit: Becomes remarkable after Lucifer's debut. The team notices their overconfidence in Takeda to take care of the tougher opponents and start to work themselves to tackle this issue. While Jupiter and Lucifer are still the resident aces, Mars, Mercury and Saturn have their own wins through combination attacks and team formations. When even Jupiter fails, it's the team work what saves the Cybercops in critical moments.
- Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: Houjou towards Takeda at the beginning. Let's just say that he didn't really buy Takeda's Time Travel story.
- The Heart: Tomoko to the team.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: Jupiter and Mars in a nutshell.
- You Are Number 6: Takeda's and Kageyama's real names are Z-226 and Z-901.
