Post by Vits on Jul 1, 2017 10:33:23 GMT
Unlike some of the later seasons (where the quality improved a lot), MIGHTY MORPHIN POWER RANGERS remains a guilty pleasure. MIGHTY MORPHIN POWER RANGERS: THE MOVIE can't even be that. Paul Freeman knows how to chew scenery, but a lot of the new designs don't work. ZORDON (the mentor) looks creepy, the suits look like plastic (how is it possible that this was made the same year as BATMAN FOREVER?) and the CGI used for the ZORDS (the giant robots used to fight the evil monsters) makes me want to vomit (the miniatures from the show didn't look 100% realistic, but at least they made the viewer feel the impact of each battle). Say what you want about the over-the-top fights on the show, but at least the title characters didn't do back-flips every second for no other reason than to move from one spot to another. In a way, that's being lazy. When the POWER RANGERS become the NINJA RANGERS, they're told which spirit animal they will get (for some reason, their helmets will still be modeled after dinosaurs) based on their personality. I was like "What?! They have personalities?! I haven't seen any!"
4/10
In theory, TURBO: A POWER RANGERS MOVIE should be better than MIGHTY MORPHIN POWER RANGERS: THE MOVIE. It's canon to the show and it uses the same type of effects. Unfortunately, more than half of it is an adventure movie rather than an action movie, so the pacing is bad. The new theme song is as great as the one from the 1st season, but the other original songs are bad. LERIGOT (an alien the title characters have to help) is even creepier than the 1995 movie version of ZORDON. 3 things pissed me off a lot: A) The way the ZEO powers are tossed aside for no reason. B) The way LORD ZEDD (one of the antagonists from the MIGHTY MORPHIN season) continues his transition from "Serious villain in a campy franchise which can be threatening in the right circumstances" to "Goofy villain" by being shown snoring with an eye mask (it's all we see of him in this movie!). C) The unnecessary shot of KIMBERLY (the 1st PINK RANGER)'s ass while she's lying on a beach.
3/10
If a movie is based on an old TV show, it can be a non-canon re-interpretation. If the show is still on the air, the movie will have the same cast and crew and maybe will be canon. POWER RANGERS 2017 is the 1st ever non-canon re-interpretation of a show that's still on the air. I don't know if that's something negative, but it's definitely not something positive. The idea was to make a more mature version of the source material. It can be sensed even in the 1st minute... but then there's a gag involving a cow. Not only is lowbrow humour the opposite of mature; that gag isn't even funny. The title could've been shown right after that 1st minute in an epic way but, instead, it's shown after the 2nd scene in the most "Slice of life drama" way possible (grey font on the bottom right without any music). Also, a cartoon sound effect is used when ZORDON's helper ALPHA 5 (who now has a malnourished child body (was he based on MAC from MAC & ME?)) blinks. The whole movie looks dark but, during the big battle, the cinematography changes. The colors aren't saturated, but they aren't muted anymore. They even play the show's theme song for a few seconds. What was this movie trying to be?! It's not that hard to make a legitimately good movie from this franchise. Keep it light and colorful but not cheesy and make sure the production quality is good. While it doesn't work very well as a super-hero movie and it doesn't work at all as a tokusatsu movie, it works as a drama with characters that just happen to be super-heroes. JASON/THE RED RANGER, KIMBERLY/THE PINK RANGER and BILLY/THE BLUE RANGER were well-written, but ZACK/THE BLACK RANGER and TRINI/THE YELLOW RANGER don't even get a proper introduction. This version of ZORDON is colder and at first I thought it was his way to motivate the title characters (why was it so hard for them to realize what they had to do in order to morph?!)... but no. He just wasn't very interested in them. The movie ends without really clarifying what kind of relationship he will have with them if there's a sequel. In the show, GOLDAR (like a lot of villains) was a buffoon, but his design was pretty bad-ass. His new design isn't creative. Neither is the MEGAZORD's, whose assemblage isn't shown. That made me angrier than the shameless product placement of Krispy Kreme.
6/10
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You can read comments of other movies in my blog (in English, in Spanish or in Italian).
4/10
In theory, TURBO: A POWER RANGERS MOVIE should be better than MIGHTY MORPHIN POWER RANGERS: THE MOVIE. It's canon to the show and it uses the same type of effects. Unfortunately, more than half of it is an adventure movie rather than an action movie, so the pacing is bad. The new theme song is as great as the one from the 1st season, but the other original songs are bad. LERIGOT (an alien the title characters have to help) is even creepier than the 1995 movie version of ZORDON. 3 things pissed me off a lot: A) The way the ZEO powers are tossed aside for no reason. B) The way LORD ZEDD (one of the antagonists from the MIGHTY MORPHIN season) continues his transition from "Serious villain in a campy franchise which can be threatening in the right circumstances" to "Goofy villain" by being shown snoring with an eye mask (it's all we see of him in this movie!). C) The unnecessary shot of KIMBERLY (the 1st PINK RANGER)'s ass while she's lying on a beach.
3/10
If a movie is based on an old TV show, it can be a non-canon re-interpretation. If the show is still on the air, the movie will have the same cast and crew and maybe will be canon. POWER RANGERS 2017 is the 1st ever non-canon re-interpretation of a show that's still on the air. I don't know if that's something negative, but it's definitely not something positive. The idea was to make a more mature version of the source material. It can be sensed even in the 1st minute... but then there's a gag involving a cow. Not only is lowbrow humour the opposite of mature; that gag isn't even funny. The title could've been shown right after that 1st minute in an epic way but, instead, it's shown after the 2nd scene in the most "Slice of life drama" way possible (grey font on the bottom right without any music). Also, a cartoon sound effect is used when ZORDON's helper ALPHA 5 (who now has a malnourished child body (was he based on MAC from MAC & ME?)) blinks. The whole movie looks dark but, during the big battle, the cinematography changes. The colors aren't saturated, but they aren't muted anymore. They even play the show's theme song for a few seconds. What was this movie trying to be?! It's not that hard to make a legitimately good movie from this franchise. Keep it light and colorful but not cheesy and make sure the production quality is good. While it doesn't work very well as a super-hero movie and it doesn't work at all as a tokusatsu movie, it works as a drama with characters that just happen to be super-heroes. JASON/THE RED RANGER, KIMBERLY/THE PINK RANGER and BILLY/THE BLUE RANGER were well-written, but ZACK/THE BLACK RANGER and TRINI/THE YELLOW RANGER don't even get a proper introduction. This version of ZORDON is colder and at first I thought it was his way to motivate the title characters (why was it so hard for them to realize what they had to do in order to morph?!)... but no. He just wasn't very interested in them. The movie ends without really clarifying what kind of relationship he will have with them if there's a sequel. In the show, GOLDAR (like a lot of villains) was a buffoon, but his design was pretty bad-ass. His new design isn't creative. Neither is the MEGAZORD's, whose assemblage isn't shown. That made me angrier than the shameless product placement of Krispy Kreme.
6/10
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You can read comments of other movies in my blog (in English, in Spanish or in Italian).