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Sekai Ninja Sen Jiraiya ("Jiraiya: War of the World Ninjas"), also known as Ninja Olympiad, was the seventh Metal Heroes series.
Rather than being a Ridiculously Human Robot or a man in a Power Armor, Jiraiya (real name:Tōha Yamaji) is an elite ninja warrior from the Togakure style of Ninpō. His mentor and foster father Tetsuzan Yamaji, the 34th Grandmaster of the Togakure School, has trained him for the day the ancient Yōma Clan will return. Sure enough, the clan, led by Oninin Dokusai, arise with their army of evildoers in order to seize Pako, a mysterious treasure which came from outer space over 2000 years ago which is said to have power equiparable to the Sun. With the help of his family, and an army of international ninja heroes, Jiraiya must stand tall against the evil ones.
This show features examples of:[]
- Action Girl: Emiha, Reiha and Yumeha, who even form a Power Trio in episode 32. Benikiba is a Dark Action Girl.
- Americans Are Cowboys: Rainin Wild
- Badass Biker: Mafūba.
- Captain Ethnic: Some of the various World Ninjas (at least, the ones who are McNinjas).
- Cool Car: Jiraiya's main vehicle, the Black Saber, is a black Z31-model Nissan 300ZX
- Clothes Make the Superman: Played around in an episode where a rival warrior named Yajiro Iyo (played by Kenji Oba) takes the Jiraiya suit away from Toha after defeating him. Toha is forced to fight Iyo without his suit to get it back.
- Deceptive Disciple: Kuroi Ibara in Episode 30 betrayed his master's teaching in order to become a criminal.
- Defeat Means Friendship: Many of the World Ninjas when they first fight Jiraiya.
- Department of Redundancy Department: The title of Episode 6 is Nazo no Nazo wa Nazonazo?!, which roughly translates to "The Mysterious Mystery is Mysteriously Mysterious?!"
- Distaff Counterpart: Tōha's foster sister, Kei, has her own heroic alter-ego under the guise of Himenin Emiha.
- Fake Nationality: The actors playing the World Ninjas. Notice how they're always in costume — and how their costumes cover their entire bodies. However, they did manage to get an American to play Rocket Man in a Vietnam flashback though, while Rainin Wild's suit actor was originally a black man before he was switched with a tanned Japanese stuntman.
- Fake Shemp: Junichi Haruta was unavailable after his only episode in the series. As a result, all of Kazenin Mafūba's later appearances were played by a costumed stuntman dubbed by Atsuo Mori (who was also the voice of Baron Owl).
- Gratuitous English: Jōnin Baron Owl, Bakunin Rocket Man and Rainin Wild. Practically any character who is supposed to be American or English.
- Hey, It's That Guy!: Quite a few Tokusatsu alumni starred or guest-starred in this show
- Manabu Yamaji is Takumi Hashimoto, who later went on to play Boi/Tiger Ranger in Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger.
- Ryū Asuka was played by Issei Hirota, who previously played Akira/Blue Mask in Hikari Sentai Maskman.
- Tetsuzan Yamaji is played by real-life martial arts master Dr. Masaaki Hatsumi.
- Junichi Haruta (Goggle Black and Dyna Black) plays the Wind Ninja Mafūba, but only in Mafūba's debut episode (see Fake Shemp).
- Machiko Soga plays Yōnin Kumo-Gozen (Witch Ninja Madam Spider), who joins Dokusai's gang in the latter half of the series.
- Janin Kuroi Ibara (Wicked Ninja Black Thorn) was played by Kazuoki Takahashi (Sho Hayate/Change Griffon and Hakko Kita).
- Metal Heroes veteran Kenji Oba (Space Sheriff Gavan) plays Yajiro Iyo, a pretender to the Jiraiya identity.
- Highly-Visible Ninja: Even without accounting Jiraiya's bright red armor, Dokusai's son and Dragon Retsukiba wears a quite unbelievable striped, magenta-and-black ninja suit.
- Human Alien: Toha and Reiha are descendants of the original Jiraya, an alien warrior who arrived on Earth thousands of years ago.
- Humongous Mecha: Jiraishin, which makes its debut in Episode 34-35.
- Improbable Aiming Skills: Wild's bullets can make curves in the air.
- In the Name of the Moon: Togakure-ryū Seitō, Jiraiya! ("Disciple of the Togakure school, Jiraiya!")
- Kick the Dog: Chan Kung-Fu the Fire Ninja does this literally in Episode 4.
- Legacy Character: Chan Kung-Fu, Makumba, Gyuma and Gamesh are all replaced by identically-dressed successors. Chan's and Makumba's successors in particular are their son and older brother respectively.
- Lighter and Softer: Compared to its immediate predecessor Choujinki Metalder.
- McNinja: Most of the World Ninjas.
- Monster of the Week: The World Ninjas start off like this, but quite a few of them end up becoming recurring characters and not all of them are villains.
- Names to Know In Anime: Shozo Iizuka is Dokusai.
- Ninja
- Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Demost is an alien ninja. It is eventually revealed that Toha and Rei also descend from the aliens that brought Pako to Earth.
- Also, there's Gamesh, a cyborg ninja.
- Put on a Bus: Toppa leaves Japan after Episode 24 for an overseas assignment.
- Spiritual Successor: Loosely based on Kamen no Ninja Akakage, but set in modern times.
- Theme Music Power-Up: Pretty frequent.
- This Is Unforgivable!: Basically, this is Jiraiya's Catch Phrase.
- Transformation Sequence: Mostly averted. If Toha has to don the armor during the fight, the scene will do a quick cut between him and Jiraiya (one particularly funny case is in episode 30, when Benikiba is fighting Toha; she first pushes him offscreen, and he comes back onscreen less than a second later in the Jiraiya armor). In cases it is shown, it's only a brief sequence.