JAKQ Dengekitai

"Warera J.A.K.Q. Dengekitai!"

JAKQ Dengekitai (Jacker Blitzkrieg Corps) is the second Super Sentai series (although, like its predecessor Himitsu Sentai Goranger, it wasn't counted as part of the Super Sentai series until years later), aired in 1977. It lasted only 35 episodes (the shortest run of all Sentai shows) and a later crossover movie involving Goranger. It was the last one to involve the creative influence of Shotaro Ishinomori.

The evil organization, CRIME, sets out to become the greatest criminal organization in the world. Only ISSIS (International Science Special Investigation Squad), a sector of INTERPOL, has the resources to stop the threat. They recruit four people to become playing card-themed cyborg warriors, the JAKQ Dengekitai, in order to take down CRIME.

Starring:
 * Gorō Sakurai / Spade Ace: The Hero. Controls Atomic Energy.
 * Ryū Higashi / Dia Jack: The Lancer. Controls Electrical Energy.
 * Karen Mizuki / Heart Queen: The Chick. Controls Magnetic Energy.
 * Bunta Daichi/ Clover King: The Big Guy. Back from the Dead. Controls Gravity.
 * Sōkichi Banba / Big One: The Fifth Jacker, The Strategist and The Dandy. He takes over the field leadership spot from Gorō.

The Headmasters of Crime are:
 * Shine: The Big Bad.
 * Iron Claw: The Diabolical Mastermind initially thought to be the Big Bad, but is really The Dragon.
 * Crime Big Four: The Quirky Miniboss Squad.

Recurring Super Sentai tropes:

 * All Your Colors Combined: The JAKQ Covack, where the heroes overload the enemy with their energies and kick it away.
 * All Your Powers Combined: Big One can control the same energies as the other four.
 * Calling Your Attacks:
 * Cool Airship: The Sky Ace
 * Cool Car: The J.A.K.Q. Machines, individual vehicles for each of the original four: the Spade Machine (based on a Fiat X1/9), the Mach Dia (a Formula 1 race car),the Heart Buggy (based on a Mini Moke) and the sole motorcycle of the group, the Auto Clover (a Kawasaki Triple).
 * Color Coded for Your Convenience: Although they don't use color-based codenames (instead using a different playing card suit as the head word and a rank as the tail), the original four members of J.A.K.Q. wear the same colors as their predecessors in Goranger, minus yellow since they're one member short (although their commander Joker does wear a yellow military jacket and hat). Big One on the other hand wears primarily white and is even nicknamed the "white birdman", but he's really more of a Rainbow Ranger, both literally (due to the four-color symbol on his helmet and chest) and figuratively (he is powered by the same four energies that each of the other members possess individually).
 * Crossover: J.A.K.Q. vs. Goranger. This was 19 years before the Super Sentai Versus Series was officially started with Ohranger vs. Kakuranger.
 * Eyecatch: Similar to Goranger's, it features illustrations of the JAKQ team with Joker, and also has a similar sting.
 * Finishing Move: The team later gets a cannon (each member has one piece of it) that can leave its mark on the villain.
 * Five-Man Band:
 * The Hero: Gorō
 * The Lancer: Ryū
 * The Chick: Karen
 * The Big Guy: Bunta
 * The Smart Fifth Ranger: Sōkichi
 * Home Base
 * Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: All episodes contained two sentences, the first ending with an exclamation point (or two). For the first twelve episodes, the first sentence consisted of "[Number] [Noun]!!".
 * In the Name of the Moon: "We are JAKQ Dengekitai!"
 * Law of Chromatic Superiority: Subverted. Spade Ace starts out as the team's leader, but loses this position once Big One arrives.
 * Suit design-wise, Spade Ace stands out among the pre-Big One team. While the other three's helmets are white, with their colors being represented on their visors (though Dia Jack's is more purple than blue, and Heart Queen is cherry red). Like Aka Ranger of the previous Sentai, Spade Ace's visor is blue, which is probably why Dia Jack's is purple.
 * Mecha-Mooks: Crimers
 * Monster of the Week: The Machine Monsters (Kikai Kaibutsu, also known as Devil Robots), who are replaced with the Invader Robots from Episode 23 and onward. The early episodes also had human crime bosses that were the ones who employed the Machine Monsters.
 * The Movie: Two. The first was a theatrical edition of Episode 7; the second was not only the Series Finale, but serves as a Crossover with the previous Sentai team (although, only Peggy Matsuyama appears out of costume, the rest never leave their suits).
 * "On the Next Episode of..." Catchphrase:
 * Regular Caller:
 * The Smurfette Principle: Heart Queen, notable for being the first Sentai heroine to wear a skirt on her suit (Momo Ranger did not wear one).
 * Supervillain Lair:
 * Tank Goodness: The Jack Tank
 * Theme Music Power-Up:
 * Transformation Trinket: Instead of anything like the later wrist-worn or hand-held small transforming devices, JAKQ had the Strengthening Capsules (resembling giant batteries), which the heroes must enter to change - there's a set of four in their base, and another in the Sky Ace.
 * Bamba on the other hand has a rose, which he sniffs and tosses into the air before jumping and then landing as Big One.
 * Weapon of Choice
 * Gorō: Spade Arts Power Bow
 * Ryū: Dia Sword
 * Karen: Heart Cute
 * Daichi: Club Megaton
 * Sōkichi: Big Baton

Tropes specific to JAKQ Dengekitai:

 * Acting for Two: Subverted in JAKQ vs. Goranger. Although Hiroshi Miyauchi voices both, Big One and Ao Ranger, only Sokichi Bamba appears out of costume. None of the Gorangers appear in their civilian identities (except Peggy), so the scenes that have Ao Ranger and Big One together are actually stuntmen in costume with Miyauchi providing the voices.
 * Badass Cape: The main four; most prominently seen on Big One.
 * But Not Too Foreign: Karen.
 * Cancellation: Why the show didn't even last a full year.
 * Card-Carrying Villain: The villains are called CRIME, what more do you want?
 * Catch Phrase: Karen has one: Do you want another?
 * Darker and Edgier: JAKQ tried to be this to distinguish itself from Goranger, until Executive Meddling ordered the show to lighten up.
 * Early Installment Weirdness: No giant robot yet and the initial roster consists of four members instead of the usual five (or three for that matter). When Big One joins, he takes over the team's leadership from Spade Ace, subverting the franchise's tradition of having the red ranger as the lead character. Additionally, instead of using transformation devices, the team must enter the "Strengthening Capsule" booths to have their transformations applied.
 * Elemental Powers: The four energies used by the team are based on the four fundamental forces: gravity, electromagnetism (in this case split into electricity and magnetism), and the weak/strong nuclear forces are loosely represented by atomic energy.
 * Four-Temperament Ensemble
 * Its Pronounced Tropay: The team's name is pronounced "Jacker" (a play on "Joker", which is the codename of their original commanding officer Kujirai), despite the fact that the official spelling is J.A.K.Q., although "Jacker" is sometimes used as an alternate title.
 * Kiai: The Crimers have a distinctive "kwee" sound.
 * And JAKQ vs. Goranger has them teaming up with Goranger's mooks, the hoi-ing Zolders.
 * Product Placement: The playing cards used by the heroes were produced by Nintendo (long before they become known for their video games) and the Nintendo logo is clearly visible on the Spade Ace card (fans of Super Mario Bros 3 will recognize it from the N-Spade minigame).
 * Retirony: Karen's dad had just retired when he was taken out.
 * Retool: Episode 23, where the team are not only joined by Big One, the show becomes a bit more light-hearted and the monsters of the week are completely different.
 * Scary Black Man: Big Saturn, a competitor in an underground fighting tournament in Episode 9.
 * Screwed by the Network: The reason it was canceled.
 * Something About a Rose: Sōkichi is never seen without one: he even takes a sniff of it before morphing into Big One.
 * The Psycho Rangers: Sort of. In #22, four mooks dress up as JAKQ, but don't fight the real team. Instead, they are used as training for a group of cyborgs led by the monster of the week.
 * The Verse: The JAKQ vs. Goranger movie shows that not only does Goranger exist in the same world as JAKQ, but so do Kamen Rider V 3, Kamen Rider Amazon and Kikaider.
 * Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger puts all 35 Super Sentai shows into a single verse.
 * Kamen Rider and Super Sentai are set to cross over again in Gokaiger, and Let's Go, Kamen Riders reinforces Kikaider being in the same verse as Kamen Rider, and there's not even a Kamen Rider Decade-style dimension jump to say that they're normally separate. The connections are definitely, unambiguously established now.
 * They Fight Crime: Yeah.
 * Transformation Is a Free Action: JAKQ has what is possibly the longest individual transformation in Sentai history. It's amazing that Tokyo isn't destroyed by the time they're finished.
 * Very Special Episode: Of sorts, one episode had a drug-addicted character played by the then-unknown Kenji Ōba and his sister as part of it's plot.
 * You Killed My Father: Karen lost her father to Crime minions.
 * You Have Failed Me...: The fate of most of the Crime Bosses who fail to meet Iron Claw's expectations.