May 4, 2024
Loser Ranger is a story with no clear villain but not in any sort of way that would make the story deeper or more engaging.
To summarize a synopsis you've probably already read: Invaders (probably from space, or maybe they're manmade idk the comic does a lot of yapping) come down to earth in a floating fortress and set upon the planet with the goal of total world domination. To combat the invader overlords and their army of minions (the comic calls the overlords "executives" but I'm going to keep calling them overlords because that communicates the concept much better) a team of rangers is formed,
...
wielding the power of the mcguffin weapons that would allow them to defeat the overlords and take back earth for humanity.
13 years later and all the overlords have been killed, their remaining minions being secretly forced by the rangers to continuously stage mock invasions only to then allow themselves to be publicly defeated by the rangers in a mix between a false flag operation, propaganda, and televised bloodsport.
One of the minions - Footsoldier D (Yes, they really named the protagonist that), realizing that he's sick of playing the part of a fake enemy and being constantly beaten and humiliated decides to defect, forges himself a new identity (although he later steals someone else's identity and instead lives as them) and vows to join the rangers with the goal of destroying them from within.
One of the first problems that pops its head up is that the overlords are still alive, and they truly are the cruel, machiavellian gods that they're hyped up to be. It undercuts the gut-punch and narrative purpose of the rangers perpetuating their own existence by artificially creating a problem that they then solve when you add in an actual, tangible, credible threat that only they alone can solve; and it makes the rangers seem less like bad guys when you add in worse guys.
Making the conflict even more muddied is that the rangers, at least some of them, aren't actually bad people. Blue is a tough guy with a heart of gold and a found family, Pink suffered legitimate trauma and has a brother that means the world to her, Green is more goofy/aloof, but he still looks after his subordinates and has his own wife and kid. None of these people feel like they would go along with the pretend invasions, tolerate any of the vile shit that the rangers have done, or especially just sit by and watch while red murders one of his own subordinates in front of them and then just appear slightly annoyed afterwards like red just passed a really bad fart. By forcing decent people to share a faction with complete amoral psychopaths, especially when they're actively participating in something so clearly fucked-up like the mock invasions, it doesn't make the conflict feel more nuanced it just makes those characters seem dumb for being good people in a clearly evil faction or it looks incongruous when their motivations conflict with their actions; and it increases the amount of prerequisite yapping we have to listen to as they all exposit their tragic backstories.
and worse still is that as D infiltrates and makes his way through the ranks of the rangers, he still has to endure a lot of the trappings of a typical shonen battle manga, a training arc, an imprisonment arc, a battle arc, the rival. These things on their own aren't a problem, but in the context of subversive media it's kind of bizarre to watch them be played straight.
There was potential for a pretty decent, punchy story about a lowly henchman fighting his way through a series of colorful, ranger-themed bosses that all embody some form of corruption or delusion.
There was also potential for a story about a henchman, who aligns themselves with "evil" with all the gung-ho and glee of a saturday morning cartoon villain; infiltrating the rangers faction, learning about heroism and comradery, and seeing the true face of evil from the other side.
Instead it tries to both at the same time, tied together with some vague theme of going your own way, and accomplishes neither.
I got to about chapter 100 before I dropped it, kind of in the middle of the big battle arc. It's a group of humans that worship the overlords as gods, and some overlords VS the rangers. D mulls over who he wants to side with in the battle and ultimately comes to the conclusion that both factions suck and that he's just going to attack everyone indiscriminately, and that was it for me. "Fuck it, if the protagonist themselves doesn't want to keep track of what's going on, neither do I."
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
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