Ibukuron? Like, ibukuro, as in Japanese word for stomach? O.K. Give me a moment to get over the title, please.

(gasp)...O.K. I'm going to be all right...I think...(gasp)

The episode opens with a sugar cane field, and it just occurred to me that 1972, the year the SNT series was born, was the year Okinawa was returned to Japan from the US, bringing back memories of the WWII era to many Japanese. One of the things people will still talk about when they speak of WWII is shortages, how food was rationed, matches were rationed, soap was rationed, EVERYTHING was rationed. Because the general population suffered so much from shortages and air raids and loved ones killed in battle, there is still a victim mentality about WWII, and it is like OURS IS THE COUNTRY THAT STARTED THE WAR, O.K.? Anyway, this episode about evil forces causing sugar shortages makes me suspect a meta-reference to the US as an evil power that kept sugar from Japanese children half a century ago and is keeping bases on foreign soil...but perhaps I am overanalyzing...and I would just like to see someone present a reasonable, realistic alternative to the US forces being here...but I am overregressing too.

Suddenly out of nowhere (in true Galactor mech tradition) appears a mech that looks like...a cockroach? And the Roach attacks the sugarcane field, and eats all the raw sugarcane.

Cut to Ryu lying in his hammock in his boathouse. The radio is giving a report on how the world's sugar supply is running out. Ryu freaks and runs out of the boathouse.

Cut to street in shopping district. Jun and Jinpei are carrying armloads of boxes. Ryu runs into them and the boxes go flying. Jun and Jinpei are upset that the cake and candy they stood in line for eight hours to get are all ruined...and I am trying to remember if the oil crisis was before or after 1972, when some brilliant mind started a rumor in Japan that there was going to be a shortage of toilet paper, and so everyone went at stocked up on toilet paper, and so there was no toilet paper in the stores and people stood in line to buy toilet paper, never mind that there is precious little connection with toilet paper and oil reserves. And the toilet paper panic led to the cooking oil panic that led to the dishwashing detergent panic, and so on and so forth until someone finally realized that this was CRAZY.

Anyway, Ryu sees all the cake and candy and says that there is no sense in letting it go to waste, and I suppose he is taking into account the three-second rule about fallen food. But just as he's getting started on a piece of cake his wrist communicator goes off. Dr. Nambu wants to launch the Godpheonix because the Roach has appeared again, and Ryu is like "Now?" and Dr. Nambu is rightly upset and yells "YES NOW!!" and Ryu and Jinpei and Jun leave the boxes just lying there, and soon there are a bunch of kids around the candy and cake on the ground about to help themselves, so I suppose 1) no one poisons Trick-or-Treat candy in Utoland and 2) none of the children's parents told them, "don't touch that candy, you don't know where it's been!"

The team has assembled on the Godpheonix, and Dr. Nambu is on the monitor telling them that the Roach is taking all the sugarcane and sugar beet crop and that it is nuclear powered, and that Galactor has taken the sugar to make the children of the world suffer, and Jun says "how awful!" and I am thinking that if there were no sugar I would have no fuel to run on in the mid-mornings. I need my caffeine and sugar from my regular Coke or else I can't function, so there would be others besides the children who would feel the loss of sugar (like my co-workers and the unfortunate people who show up in my department). Dr. Nambu tells them that their mission is to persue the Roach unnoticed and locate its base, (but we all know that they'll do that and more).

(BTW, all Dr. Nambu said was that Galactor was taking the sugar to make children suffer, and he did not, unlike our good friend Dr. Brighthead of the G-Force incarnation of Gatch, say that Galactor's plan was to make the children turn on the grownups because children, if their parents couldn't give them sweets, would think highly of someone who could, and all Jun said that it was awful, and she did not, unlike our good friend Aggie, also of the G-Force incarnation, say that that had to be the most diabolical plan ever. Thank you Jason M-sama for the info about the G-force translations, and yes, I agree with you, Aggie obviously doesn't seem to get out much.)

And they find the Roach, and a powerful magnetic field sucks them in and Ryu is freaking, and I am thinking about the time I forgot and wore metal barettes on a day that I was going to be doing MRI and I went in and started the IV for contrast but all the time my head was being pulled by the 1.5T magnet and it can wreak havoc on your aim when something is pulling your head like that...poor patient.

Jun says "but we're still flying!" and her flirty voice is annoying the heck out of me again, and it is like, yes, falling from a tall building doesn't hurt much until you hit the ground. Ken says that they will pretend that they are going to be sucked in, and he and Joe and Ryu will sneak into the Roach. So they go up to that little bubble contraption on the top of the Godpheonix (what is it called? Someone help?) and glide toward the mouth of the Giant Roach, and Jun who is now in the pilot's seat in the Godpheonix bends the stick in two and manages to maneuver it out of the magnetic field, so either a) Jun is a better pilot than Ryu b)Jun has more upper body strength than Ryu c) the McGuyver effect (the hero will always get out of a tight spot with minimal resources simply because he is the hero) is being applied, or d) all of the above.

Ken, Joe and Ryu are gliding toward the mouth of the roach when they see the turning gears which I suppose crush the sugarcane when the Roach eats the stuff, and they escape being turned into pulp because Ken throws is Birdrang and it wedges between the teeth of the gears and the gears stop. Ryu finds the switch to make the teeth/ gears come apart, and the three of them enter the Roach.

The inside of the Roach is a sugar refinery.

The Roach starts moving. Jun and Jinpei follow the Roach, jamming the Roach radar as they do so as to not be seen, but the Roach captain realizes that they are being jammed, and then we see Katze on the monitor of the Roach cockpit and he is like you morons, didn't you notice that Gatchaman was inside, and the captain is all apologetic to Katze, and soon he is tracking them on the monitor, and I am thinking I sure as heck wouldn't want the Roach captain working under me. I mean, HELLO? You have the equipment to track them and you weren't using it??? Got two words for you, dude. WHAT-EVER. Got two words for Katze. FIRE HIM.

Ken, Joe and Ryu are on a conveyer belt. They fall into a pit/ room/ canister, and the ceiling begins to move toward them. As Ryu tries to hold the ceiling up, Ken says "there has to be a way out!", but how can he be so sure that there is (unless the audience are not the only ones aware of the McGuyver Effect)? They begin to knock on the walls for a hollow sounding spot, and after a few knocks Joe gets resonance. They remove the wall panel and Joe goes in first, then Ryu tries but his backside gets in the way, and Ken shoves him through, then Ken slips in nanoseconds before the floor meets the ceiling.

Back on the Godpheonix, Jun and Jinpei are worried that they haven't heard from the other three in a while, and Jun says "oh, I see, Ken left us behind as backup in case they got caught!" and gets chiding about her crush on Ken from Jinpei. And instead of giving Jinpei a non-geographical location to go, she just says that this is not the time for jokes and they have to find a way to save the other three, so she must REALLY have a crush on Ken. To which I would like to ask, WHAT DOES SHE SEE IN THAT GUY??

Ken and Joe and Ryu are making their way through a duct of some kind. AT the end of the duct brings them over a giant tank/ vat of a boiling substance, and since Ken mentioned that the inside of Ibukuron*

Okay, let me stop laughing at the name*.

Sorry about that. Since Ken mentioned that the inside of Ibukuron was a sugar refinery, I suppose that this must be where they are boiling the sugarcane sap (is that what it's called? Help me someone?). Joe says that if they fall in they will turn into soup, and I am thinking more likely they will turn into the syrupy-sweet Eagle Riders. (Hi Ali-sama!) Then from the duct behind them comes a flood of the same boiling substance, so they jump out of the duct and Joe and Ken are hanging by their fingernails on one hand from the walls of the vat/ tank and they are each holding one of Ryu's hands in the other. Ryu is like "don't drop me" (of course) and the Ibukuron captain...

Sorry, give me another moment...

Okay, the Ibukron captain is very pleased with himself for having the three of them in so tight a spot, and Katze says that Sosai is pleased too. The Great Purple Chicken cautions Katze to not underestimate the SNT, so I guess that The GPC is more familiar with the McGuyver Effect than other villans are (^-^).

Jun and Jinpei have followed Ibukuron...(I'm all right)..into an icy crevasse, where its home base is hidden. Jinpei says, "Please God, let them be alive," and I am wondering which god he is praying to as I capitalize that word, because if he was brought up Japanese he would be praying to either a Shinto god (in which case I should not have capitalized) or Bhudda (in which case he should not have said "kami-sama" but "Hotoke-sama"), and if he were brought up in a Christian environment he would be praying to the Christian God (in which case I would be correct in capitialization), but for convenience's sake I shall assume that he and Jun were brought up in a Christian missionary Children's home. (I realize there are other faiths, but those are the most common in Japan, though I am not sure that Gatch takes place in Japan sometimes, and there are quite a few Christian Missionary Homes in Japan.)

Jun says, "Don't be silly, of course they are alive" and I guess Jun knows about the McGuyver Effect too (^-^)

Cut to Ken and Joe hanging by fingernails and Ryu hanging on Ken and Joe. Ken says, "if we don't do something soon we'll all turn into soup" and I am thinking, "no, you'll just turn into Hunter Harris and Ryu into Ollie Keeawaanii."

Joe tells Ken to hold Ryu by himself for just a short while, and while Ken is holding his and Ryu's weight by one hand (which I am sure is more than 170 kg altogether), Joe fires the cable gun (pushing the trigger, not pulling it...did you see that, Galactor Green People? Probably not ^-^) and the hook wraps itself around a ceiling beam. Ryu slips from Ken's grip at just that moment, but Joe catches Ryu between his legs, and I am wondering if the fanfic people had fun with this one.

Katze is upset.

O.K., someone is going to have to help me with this one, because sugar refineries are not my specialty. I do NOT recall any part of the sugar refining process that requires a CENRIFUGE, but here the three are, wandering into one of the sections of a centrifuge, and it starte spinning and they can't get out.

Jun and Jinpei have found their way to the generator room and take out the engineers in about two seconds flat, and just as the Ibukuron Captain orders "full power on the centrifuge", Jun tells Jinpei to take out the generator, and Jinpei says "Leave it to me! I'm good at breaking things" which is really, really cute. As he pulls on one of the wires, it shorts, and leaves him burnt black, and Jun asks him it he is all right.

In the control room the Ibukuron Captain realizes that the generator is out and tells the engineers to notify Ibukuron...

...give me a moment again please...

Sorry about that. The engineers are ordered to notify Ibukuron. The centrifuge stops, and Ken and Joe and Ryu fall into a huge mountain of sugar. The next instant they are surrounded by Galactor Green People, and the Ibukuron Captain tells them that this mound of sugar will be their graves. Ken says "Just try. This is where Gatchaman shows his true power. The White Shadow... to which Joe adds "that slips in unseen"... to which Ryu adds "We are called the Science Ninja Team Gatchaman! G-5, Horned Owl Ryu!" While they were introducing themselves they have gotten into position for the Whirlwind Fighter, so Ryu is on the bottom. So we move up one and Joe says "Likewise, G-2 Condor Joe!" and we move up one again, and Ken says "G-1, Eagle Ken, also known as Gatchaman! Science Ninja Power Whirlwind Fighter!"

And if the Green People were not going to do anything to stop them and going to let them say all that and get into position to do Whirlwind Fighter, well, let's just say that my diagnosis for them is "too stupid to live...

Ken hurls the Birdrang for added effect. Ryu says that he is going to destroy the nuclear reactor and runs off. The Captain yells at Ken and Joe to stop or he will kill the two and we see Jun and Jinpei have been captured, like inconsistency much, I suppose that in the '70's even Jun had to be a Damsel in Distress. The captain says that they snuck into the generator room and disabled the generator, and Ken goes "so that's how the centrifuge stopped and we were saved" and Jun gives a gorgeous smile and nods and if a smile like that doesn't sway Ken I think he must really have a thing for Joe. Ken says that in that case he has no choice but to give up and throws down his Birdrang, and then we see a little light on the Birdrang flash, and it flies on its own toward Jun and Jinpei, slicing the ropes that held them. Jun and Jinpei take out the Green People that held them captive in two seconds flat (again, inconsistency much? If they can do that, how did they get caught in the first place?).

Ken and Jun find Ryu hitting the nuclear reactor with a mallet, and Ken points out that radiation deserves a little more respect. Jun says that you use your head, and presses a few buttons and pulls a few wires. They run.

Cut to Joe waiting impatiently in the Godpheonix, and I am thinking it is about time that someone else took the All Important Job of Waiting other than Ryu.

Ryu is stuffing sugar into a large sack. Ken and Jun are yelling at him to hurry up. They board the Godpheonix and Joe tells Jinpei "Full Power Engines!"

Katze is unhappy.

The team is high-fiveing each other, but there is an explosion (compliments of Chief Engineer Jun) and the Godpheonix rattles. Apparently the (thermonuclear, I am led to assume) explosion has created an avalanche. Ken says that there is no way out other than the Kagaku Ninpo Hinotori.

The rest of the team wears looks that all say, "Oh, waste products."

And they fasten their seat belts...I suppose it is a Tatsunoko Public Service Message...but in spite of it all, lots of people in Japan don't fasten seat belts...and Japanese parents still don't use infant seats...and one of these days, goodness help me, I am going to go up to one of those mothers with the little cars with the little yellow signs that say "baby on board" and drive with (I kid you not) their babies STRAPPED TO THE FRONT OF THEIR BODIES, and say to them "oh, nice soft adorable AIRBAG you got there!"

The Hinotori melted the avalanche snow around them, I guess, because they are saved. Ken asks everyone if they're all right, and Ryu says he can't die until he gets the sugar to the kids. Jinpei says that Ryu is all talk and that he only wanted it for himself. Ryu says no, but, maybe a little, and takes a lick.

The episode ends with the Team in Birdstyle passing out sweets to the little children, and the narrator saying that the sweetness of sugar after a victorious battle must have been the true taste of peace. And I am wondering if this is another WWII reference.

 (^-^)/))