Answered Question: About Ryuseitai’s Different Forms of Justice
After learning about Chiaki and Tetora, im curious to know how you would qualify Midori’s and Kanata’s perception of justice according to what we’ve seen in Tropical and Stella Maris ?
And with Shinobu’s potential center looming over the horizon, any theory about his vision of justice ?
Sent and answered in August 2024. tweet link of the answer
sure!! i talked about this before in an ask but it was just after stella maris ended so i was still digesting a lot of my thoughts at the time… so here’s a version that’s a little more complete! i’ll also mention tetora’s to complete the picture. time for a rundown of reborn ryuseitai, my favorite topic in the whole world!!!!
RB (tetora)
story is supervillain. came to life by fighting against an actual evil in reality that was causing harm to people. a lot of it is because tetora wanted to be worth something, and to actually put in effort in something all the way. he also wanted to save his juniors and get them out of such a dangerous organization. the theme is "evil is justice too"
RB has a lot to do with paving a new pathway of justice in something that isn’t typically regarded as such (in this case, evil). and by doing so, tetora proves that justice can be achieved in all kinds of forms! he validates ALL forms of justice. it doesn’t have to be in the traditional ideal hero way at all.
what i love about RB as well is that it supports ryuseitai’s principles. take for example ryusei hanabi’s "if you pray for the peace of the world, then even yesterday’s enemies are members" line. i feel like RB perfectly represents that concept and proves it to be true, since they are "heroes who were dyed in evil"!! and i specifically mean ryuseitai rather than tokusatsu principles, since !! era ryuseitai is a lot about breaking free from the chains of tradition but still remaining as who they are and what they believe in. it really suits tetora, the person who has always taken ryuseitai’s mottos to heart (he constantly says how much he believes in the "all for one and one for all" phrase)…
there’s a chance RB will take on new forms and shapes the next time we see it, since it spontaneously came to life at the time, but for now! this is the gist of what makes it so good.
RG (midori)
story is tropical. there are no such thing as enemies here. it’s all about being yourself and loving what you love. midori focuses a lot on creating a space where everyone, including ryuseitai, can relax (after all, there are no enemies to fight in the first place). performed specifically for the sake of saving his beloved mascots who comforted him for many years, BUT… he hesitated at first to bring his ryuseitai to life because he had a lot of anxiety that he may not be good enough as a leader, and that he may end up harming ryuseitai’s image with his own likes (with his individuality)… but the support he gets from ryuseitai and anzu, and finding out he has a chance to save his beloved mascots, gives him enough courage to try and form his own ryuseitai and show what he’s capable of.
yuruseitai is unconventionally heroic. it’s heroic in its essence (believing in something and standing your ground for what you believe in) but not in its shape (there are no enemies to fight, no justice vs evil). it perfectly fits midori and how he doesn’t care at all for tokusatsu’s hero values and other traditionally hero things. midori as a person tends to be pretty pessimistically pragmatic, yet his ideal "hero" vision is a world where nobody struggles at all and can just be themselves… it’s so precious?? and since the song focuses so much on being yourself, untied by any conventions or expectations, it’s the perfect answer and sequel to !! era ryuseitai’s arc 🥺 reading tropical after watching relax paradise gives the impression that midori specifically wants this to be a relaxing place for his precious comrades the most above all… not to mention its strong focus on being so goofy and silly and embracing that!!
the theme is "it’s okay to be you". i think there’s an even better way to word the theme of his unit, but it’s not coming to me right now… but!! definitely about being true to yourself! even at the end of the story, he reminds chiaki (who was trying way too hard to be "soft" like a yuruchara) that yuruseitai isn’t about literally being a yuruchara, it’s just about relaxing and taking it easy!!
RC (kanata)
story is stella maris. after kanata rejected being a leader many times, his ryuseitai finally came to be due to his wish to repay everyone around him, since it’s thanks to them that he’s here. focuses on saving a boy who looked exactly like his young self, along with the island he’s from (hoshijima). he wanted to make others experience the happiness he received from everyone. the theme is "a cycle of happiness"
fish ryuseitai encourages an endless cycle of love and kindness. repaying kindness with kindness, love with love, until it spreads across the whole world and now everyone is smiling together… and that’s how people’s fears and anxieties about life, their future, their situation etc fade away. it fits perfectly to kanata’s backstory (the "evil things" that can negatively influence people, and can only be purified by someone like kanata). it’s taking everything about kanata thus far and reshaping it into his ideal form of justice… it’s so 🥺🥺🥺 especially with abyss in mind, knowing that from day 1 kanata has only ever wanted to dispel "evil", whether as an ally of justice or god.
one other thing about fish ryuseitai is that kanata’s plan/intention had a lot to do with guidance and leading the way for the hoshijima people, rather than being someone above them, ordering them around or granting things for them. he gives people the space to explore themselves and validates their way of finding their "form of justice". he gently nudges people towards the direction of what they want… and that’s exactly what kanata had been doing for ryuseitai in !! era (even ! era). he heard their wishes and desires and gently guided them down a path that will fulfill those desires. what’s more! that’s exactly what chiaki told him what dreams are back in meteor impact! it’s such a beautiful convo so i’ll put the important part here:
Kanata: mm~? i don’t understand this anymore! i really can’t help but see Wishes and Dreams as the same! i cannot tell the Difference!
it is Not a dream if all of it is Bestowed on you by someone, right? then, i will make a Compromise with you!
chiaki! please tell me your Wish!
and once you’ve Worked hard for a bit, i will make it possible to Grant it!
…is that wrong, too?
Chiaki: No, not at all. I really appreciate it. I’m happy to hear that you want to support and help me achieve my dream.
But please, don’t use your worshippers just to help me with my dream!
If you’ll help me by yourself — if you’ll lend me a hand ordinarily, then I don’t mind!
That’s how all the people in the whole world make their dreams come true, without ever using the help of some God!
I can’t cheat my way toward it! So please, cheer me on as a friend!
also linking this thread (which i made before the story for stella maris came out, but it’s still really relevant) for more thoughts if you’re curious
one last note is that kanata’s backstory with all the "evil things" (can also be translated as "bad things") is a different type of "evil" than what tetora’s RB represents. it’s related to people’s anxieties and fears typically being the root cause to "bad" or "evil" acts (for example, in their eyes, they’re defending themselves against something dangerous), and peace and understanding can only come by dispelling those fears. this is also explored in stella maris through the people of hoshijima.
with this in mind, so far we can say that the ryuseitai’s contain these elements:
some kind of inner, selfish wish
an ideal vision that’s grounded in reality
there’s some kind of specific, tangible target for it (whether to fight against or to save)
and this is what leads it to be a unique ryuseitai of its own. the contrasts between the ryuseitais are fascinating and so interesting to look into and i could talk about it forever…
although i discussed chiaki’s form of justice in some tweets… after supervillain, even chiaki’s form of justice has been starting to take a new form slowly but surely. so we’ve yet to truly know RR (chiaki) and RY (shinobu).
RY is a given, but RR will also definitely happen despite chiaki having been a leader for a long time already. this time around, his reborn ryuseitai should reflect who he truly is deep inside, rather than what he believed he had to embody to become a hero (since chiaki’s arc has a lot to do with how heroes never existed in reality, so he had to find a way to make it a reality once and for all, even if it cost him a lot of mental and physical energy).
THAT BEING SAID! we at least do know that chiaki’s ryuseitai still includes hero shows and typical tokusatsu concepts like it always has. this is shown in parallel world (a story set after supervillain, where chiaki gets to be the leader because they have to perform a hero show. HIS WHOLE SPECIALTY!). theoretically this time around what will be different is it 1: reflects and represents who he really is deep down, 2: is not constrained to traditional values just because "that’s how it’s done in tokusatsu", aaand probably some other things too
as for RY… i’ll be combining other answers i posted in the past for this part, but! akira has been telling us a lot about unmasked shinobu (i.e. doesn’t use ninja speech, uses "boku" instead of "sessha" for first-person pronoun) in various stories and reminding us that ninja is not the only part that makes shinobu… and in terms of his center, they can’t do Yet Another Ninja Song for him, soo… lots of new territory for shinobu!!
also, akira has been indirectly building up an arc for shinobu where he goes through a LOT of trials related to trust (mostly from yuuta, but it was shown in ryuseitai stories like supervillain too where chiaki says he KNOWS shinobu would never betray ryuseitai), and he’s sort of sombered and matured because of these events (this is shown in stella maris), so i wonder how this would be reflected in the storywriting…
even if his center isn’t written by akira, i’m still expecting SOMETHING SUPER NEW FOR SHINOBU TO SHOW HIS RYUSEITAI!! his fs2 moved away from his ninja theme, and i imagine his center will also do something similar.
as for his vision of justice, that’s a bit tricky for me to pin down hmm. here are some points about shinobu that i’ve been keeping in mind for his potential:
shinobu has a relentless spirit where he never wants to leave his friends alone, and he wants to be capable of assisting them no matter what. he also wants to show he's grown and become reliable
as mentioned in dokisuta: "Extremely attentive and capable of calming the atmosphere; he is the Cheerful balancer", which i think is so relevant to this very day… he also isn't really a big fan (and arguably even sensitive to it) of seeing anyone in ryuseitai argue with each other, even if they're arguing for good reason.
he’s always been about sharing his love with others, and wanting people to know the joy of sharing your interests, that you don’t have to be alone
he tends to be seen as someone to protect or someone who should remain as he is (usually when discussing his "small and cute" self), when in reality shinobu is actually very capable of protecting others and has an extremely relentless mental mind. for example, i can say for SURE that nobody in ryuseitai could’ve done for their close friend what shinobu did for yuuta, which is stay by his side no matter how many times yuuta pushed him away. that’s a unique strength only shinobu has. for example tetora has drowned in his feeling of inadequacy when trying to face his friend (midori), and midori mentally collapses when a close person is mentally not doing well… these are things that shinobu managed to still stand his ground and persist through!
so i assume his ryuseitai will have these sorts of elements, but in a new shape…? but i’m really not sure what to expect at all, it’s all the more why i’m really excited for his center!!! I WANT TO KNOW SO BAD!!!!
lastly, for something i personally find very interesting… midori mentioned all the way back in SS finals (story set in the new year of !! era) that shinobu "is much more qualified as the leader (of ryuseitai)". THIS WAS WAY BEFORE THEY EVEN DID THE WHOLE ALL-LEADER SYSTEM LOL. another interesting point is that chiaki trusts shinobu with tasks WAAAAY too much, to the point he’s said that "as long as sengoku takes care of it, there’ll be no problems!" (this was in stella maris), whereas shinobu replies that he’d rather not be relied on so much, he’s feeble and could collapse by it. so it seems like there’s this general vibe around shinobu where he’s seen as someone Extremely Capable as a leader and someone to rely on, but at the same time that being something that could potentially put too much burden on him…? how, i don’t know yet… maybe i’m reading into it wrong, but it’s always on my mind, and makes me sooo excited to find out the full story.
all in all, these are just my personal interpretations and thoughts. i love what we're learning about ryuseitai, i love how there's so much to dig into and explore. i love i just love so much… so thank you for asking!!