Friday, March 24, 2017

A Mighty Morphin Legacy

These past couple of years have brought back a lot of nostalgic feelings for myself and others and 2017 has proven to be running with the same pattern. With a new Pokemon game, Pokemon GO and it's 20th anniversary, Digimon Adventure Tri with the return of the original kids, Star Wars Rogue One, and Nintendo releasing the Nintendo Switch and Zelda Breath of the Wild the nostalgic feelings are running through our veins. I feel like I've taken a time warp back to the 90s. I grew up during the late 90s and 2000s and as I've discussed before Power Rangers was one of those shows that morphed it's way into my life and was a huge part of my Saturday mornings and action figure collection.


Rebirthing those feelings is the brand new Power Ranger movie which releases today in features! It's an action packed reboot of the original Mighty Morphin Power Rangers with a similar storyline. This is basically MMPR but with a big budget, which allows Saban to take this franchise to new heights. Aesthetically a lot has changed, the Ranger suits are more like actual armor, though with a more shiny alien sleek. (How they were able to fight and take heavy blows while in spandex I have no idea.) The names of the teenagers are the same but the characters looks are a bit different. I've not seen the movie myself just yet so I'm not aware of the differences between the show and the movie. I talk more about this movie in an earlier blog GO GO Knitting Rangers.

My Power Ranger Life (Can't say Morphin Life, Jason David Frank would probably sue me.) started off with the original Mighty Morphin Power Ranger movie.


This movie released in 1995 and starred the second team of Rangers. By second team I mean Jason (Austin St. John), Zack (Walter Jones) and Trini (Played by the late Thuy Thang) the original Red, Black and Yellow Rangers had moved on and given their powers to Rocky, Adam and Aisha. Oh yeah and Tommy the former Green Ranger was given the sweet White Ranger powers. The suits in this movie were also more of metallic armor then the show's original spandex suits. I always loved these suits more then the originals (Not saying I didn't love the spandex, of course I do.) so the new movie taking a more armor approach is okay by me, they look awesome regardless while still having similar parts from the original suits.


In the beginning of this movie our Ranger heroes, Rocky (Steve Cardenas), Adam (Ichigo Kurosaki... I MEAN Johnny Yong Bosch.), Aisha (Karan Ashley), Kimberly (Amy Jo Johnson), Billy (David Yost and their leader Tommy (Jason David Frank) are participating, alongside Bulk (Paul Schrier) and Skull (Jason Narvy) (The goofballs of the series,) who aren't good skydivers by any means, in a charity skydive for Angel Grove. Meanwhile in Angel Grove a group of construction workers unearth an ancient egg holding a mighty powerful villain, the main enemy of this movie, Ivan Ooze. (Played by Paul Freeman) Of course Ivan Ooze would still be trapped in his egg if it wasn't for Rita Repulsa (Julie Cortez voiced by Barbara Goodson), Lord Zedd (Voiced by Robert Axelrod), Goldar (Voiced by Kerrigan Mahan) and... Mordant (Voiced by Martin G. Metcalf) who also star in this movie. Mordant is a pig like monster who actually isn't featured in anything outside of this movie, which often confused me as a kid.

Anyone notice how Ooze seems to have his own power coin on his outfit? Odd. Maybe he was the Purple Ranger, ha.

Of course Zordon (Played by Nicholas Bell and voiced by Robert L. Manahan), the Rangers mentor, and Alpha 5 (Zordon's Robot Assistant voiced by Richard Steven Horvitz.) send the Rangers off to deal with Ivan Ooze after interrupting them during a sweet skateboarding/rollerblading scene, Red Hot Chilli Pepper and Dan music included. Actually this movie had some really good music in it.

Mighty Morphin Power Ranger has a couple of pretty big action scenes in them and Ivan Ooze proves to be one of the Ranger's most devious foes... Oh yeah he and his minions are kind of gross as well but we'll look past that. (I think Kimberly had a hard time looking past that too.) The story of this movie is actually not connected to the show at all similar to the new movie, making this movie completely separate from the show's canon.

I absolutely love this movie (Especially the part with the frog... You know... Adam.) but actually originally my parents bought it for themselves funny enough on VHS. I got into it eventually and from then on I've been a big fan of the multi colored spandex heroes. Of course some people knock this movie because of its cheesy humor but hey that made Power Rangers for me and it seems the new movie is keeping that sense of humor while also keeping a more mature tone. Actually the MMPR movie was pretty mature compared to the original series. I never grew up watching the original series so I didn't know Jason, Zack and Trini even were a thing or even that Tommy was once a green ranger until a couple of years later through re-runs on Jetix. (Remember Jetix?) Yeah I have to admit I always thought they Rangers in the movie were the originals.


The oldest series I can remember watching was Turbo and In Space but I wouldn't really watch the show every week until Time Force... Which can take up a whole blog on its own as it's one of my favorite seasons. I know it wasn't one of the most popular seasons but damn I really loved Ninja Storm back then. Anyway Power Rangers has been here fighting monsters and saving the Galaxy for almost 25 years now. Power Rangers have definitely come back into the limelight, with the new movie, the awesome BOOM! Studios comics (Which I talk about on an earlier blog.) and even the new Ninja Steel season. I've not watched Power Rangers since Super Megaforce but I'm willing to give Ninja Steel a go as it seems pretty cool.

Along side this new movie comes Power Rangers Legacy War, a new iOS and Android game in a similar style of Marvel: Contest of Champions if it was mixed with the DC Injustice iOS game (In the sense of using a cards system and having a power meter limiting how many cards you play at once) making this more of a strategic fighting game. I haven't dove into this game much at all but you unlock you can Rangers to play and upgrade them. The Rangers currently available are the original Mighty Morphin team, the new Power Rangers reboot team and a couple of Rangers from other teams such as Zeo, In Space, Wild Force and Dino Charge. (No Disney Era ones to my understanding sadly.)


As well as the Rangers there are villains you can play as too! Such as Rita Repulsa from the new movie, Snide from Dino Charge... and Goldar. Yes you heard me right, you can play as the original Goldar from MMPR which is incredible. Sadly there isn't much of an offline part of this game, you have to have your internet on while playing and it's for the most part PVP against others online. I believe there is a training room but it'll still be using your internet/data. This game regardless has some incredible graphics. I've never seen a Power Ranger game with the characters being so highly detailed it's incredible. I really think they should get this game out on the consoles/PC with a more traditional fighter genre control system. Hey it would sell like hot cakes, I would buy that game instantly.

So we're wrapping for the day everyone. If you have tickets for the new Power Ranger movie, go see it! It's seeming like an awesome reboot and apparently Haim Saban has already talked about 5 more movies, as well as introducing the green ranger in the next movie. Power Rangers Ninja Steel airs Saturday's on Nickelodeon as well. Just because the movie has released doesn't mean I plan on stopping Power Ranger blogs, no I feel like I could go more in depth on my memories with each season so we'll see how that goes. Until next time though may the power be with you....

It's Morphin Time!

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