by John Tillyard, Contributing Writer
Ahh, after 30 years, Power Rangers is back, and it’s time to conquer Netflix with this one-off special, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Once and Always. After Rita Repulsa (Barbara Goodson) kills Yellow Ranger Trini, the Power Rangers must stop her once again, and it’s up to Blue Ranger Billy (David Yost) and Black Ranger Zack (Walter Jones) to work with the rest of the Rangers to defeat Rita.
I should start by saying that I loved Mighty Morphin Power Rangers the show growing up. When it first aired in this country, it was all anyone talked about at school, and played in the playground. I begged my parents to get me the Megazord for Christmas. I even remember one kid that could play the communicator tone of the recorder. I lost interest around the end of the second season, and rewatching it now, I can see it is kind of stupid. The dialogue is cringeworthy, and the fight scenes are cheesy. I still can’t help but love it though.
This special has many of the same elements of cheesiness in both the dialogue and the action, which helps to capture the same tone as an episode of the show. In a similar style to shows like Cobra Kai, the story takes place 30 years after the show’s events, with the same cast reprising their roles. Frustratingly, there’s little to no explanation for what’s happened in the last 30 years. As someone that who saw the first two seasons of Mighty Morphin, I was hoping for some prologue to fill us in on the events of the various Power Rangers shows. However, we only get the most bare-boned background on who the Power Rangers are, followed by a scene of 40-year-old Billy fighting alone. Things pick up considerably once the rest of the team shows up to fight, and I got a reminder of why I enjoyed this show growing up: the fight scenes. Like always, fight choreography looks incredibly fake and childish, adding to my enjoyment. This one ends in tragedy, with Trini’s death setting the plot in motion. It hits all the right nostalgic notes and is an excellent quick way to draw you in.
The original plan for the story was to kill off Trini, due to actress Thuy Trang having passed away more than 20 years ago, and write the plot around the other five original Rangers and Trini’s daughter, Minh (Charlie Kersh). That plan had to be tweaked to focus mainly on Billy and Zack, as they were the only two original Rangers whose actors returned.
Interestingly, the characters of Red Ranger Jason, Green Ranger Tommy, and Pink Ranger Kimberly are still in this, in Ranger form only. I’ve never liked having characters appear when the actor isn’t available. It always comes across as a bit awkward. I honestly think they’d be better off writing them out. This decision seems especially odd since Steve Cardenas and Catherine Sutherland reprise their roles as Red Ranger Rocky and Pink Ranger Kat, respectively. So if they had actors available to play the Red and Pink Rangers, why not just have them in those roles for the entire special?
Odd rewriting decisions aside, this story feels like a typical show episode. It has the same basic structure where there’s a contemporary problem for the Rangers, Rita gets involved, there are fights with the monster of the week, and the Rangers use their experience to fix their problem. The look and tone of the story, however, feel much more modern, and the cheap aesthetic of the effects and costumes is much more noticeable here than it ever was in the original show. Also, I was not too fond of how they shot some of the putty fights; the camera is much lower down, and there is too much in the foreground. Sometimes a putty steps in front of the camera, and you can’t see anything.
The main character arc here is Minh learning what it means to be the Yellow Ranger. Several dramatic scenes involving Minh and Zack feel like an attempt to modernize the story. Zack assumes a surrogate father role, which I like as an idea. I never understood why we rarely saw the Ranger’s parents in the original show. The problem is the main conflicts between them come across as a bit cliché. The acting and dialogue are decent, and they feel like a believable father and daughter. Still, ultimately the central conflict is just a child wanting to do something, and the parent not letting them. On top of that, the way Zack and Billy try to discourage her from getting involved because she is a teenager is so dumb, given that the whole idea of the Power Rangers is they are “teenagers with attitude.” Though I did like the world building here, with an explanation of when the power coins would allow someone to morph.
As a love letter to fans of the original show, this special pays tribute to what kids enjoyed about it. Angel Grove Juice Bar, Alpha in all his “aye aye aye” glory, the morphing, and the Megazord, now in CGI form, are all here with a more modern look. The CGI isn’t the best, but it does enable them to do more with the Megazord when it is fighting. There are also a decent number of Easter eggs and references for more hardcore fans to dig their teeth into. The corny nature of the story adds an excellent nostalgic appeal to the whole experience. Some will argue that the story is trite, and that nostalgia for the original show is the only reason anyone will like it, and that is true. If you weren’t a fan of the original show, you wouldn’t enjoy this.
The campy acting is another thing that somebody would generally criticize, but since it’s similar to the acting in the original show, I’m okay with it. Goodson’s line delivery is just as amateurish as ever, and I wouldn’t want it any other way. The only time the acting bothered me was in the more dramatic scenes, which distracted me from the scene’s emotion.
A new version of the theme song is at the end, which isn’t as good. The “go go Power Rangers” line doesn’t have the same oomph behind it. But otherwise, they did a good job recreating the show’s intro. There’s also an excellent tribute to Trang and Tommy’s actor Jason David Frank, who sadly passed away only last year.
Overall Once and Always takes a bit of time to get going due to the writing out of certain characters, but once it does, it hits all the nostalgia beats you would want it to. The story and acting are nothing to write home about, but they arent in the original show, so you shouldn’t expect anything more. This special isn’t a continuation of the story, but a one-off tribute for those who remember it. More hardcore fans will likely take more from this. As I said, I only watched the first two seasons of Mighty Morphin, so there were probably a lot of references and continuity nods that went over my head. As a homage to the show, the biggest shortcoming is all the characters not in this special. Though there are many references to other characters, there’s no real explanation for why we don’t see them. The dramatic moments don’t feel out of place, and the silliness remains. It’s not for kids because kids won’t remember a 30-year-old show. It’s for the inner kid of adults that remember Mighty Morphin Power Rangers.
Score: 6/10
Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Once & Always is currently streaming on Netflix
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