Welcome to the Fantasy Zone
This Zone is dedicated to the lesser known elements of anime hosted by the cast of Victory Script.
What weapon is the best?
Who will win in this Death Battle?
Is this costume practical?
You name it, it's all covered here in the Fantasy Zone!
Haim Saban and Shuki Levy are names associated with bringing the Super Sentai genre over to the west rebranded as Power Rangers, with action scenes taken from the original source and dubbed over while civilian themes are filmed and added, during this reign, many of it's original line up became house hold names with Amy Jo Johnson, the original Pink Ranger introducing a behind the scenes look at Saban's latest attempt, Princess Tenko and the Guardians of Magic.
The idea was to promote an idol singer from Japan in the western market, while it was common practice in anime to promote an idol with their own show, Saban hoped the idea would click with Western audiences while they rode a high with Power Rangers.
They went with Mariko Itakura, an idol magician dubbed Princess Tenko, the premise was to make Tenko a Guardian of sacred gems that get scattered all over the world due to a dispute with jealous rivals, the gems give Tenko magical transformations into various forms that grant power, likely a test run to see if a magical girl show would click with audiences with Sailor Moon up for localization around the same time, that's a long story in itself, don't ask.
After each episode, the actual Mariko Itakura will teach you one of her magic tricks.
The show was rough in terms of presentation and about as cheesy as you can get, I admire Tenko for being one of the early pioneers of female led action shows, but compared to the decade earlier She-Ra, lacks the charm that made that cartoon such a success.
As for Princess Tenko, she gained notoriety for her status as a favourite performing artist of former North Korean leader Kim Jong Il; as far as I know she's still active as a magician.
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