Last edited:
Hasbro's Power Rangers era and General Tokusatsu discussion
- Thread starter Samurai8472
- Start date
Last weekend, I decided to do something that I've only previously done with Doctor Who and started a self-contained rewatch of a PR series from the 'Zordon Era', namely Power Rangers in Space (plus Chase into Space Parts 1 & 2), and those two episodes plus the start of PRiS really stand apart as something special and mark a turning point from PR being a niche American Sentai composite kids show to a more 'mainstream' kids'TV program.
First trailer for the MMPR 30th anniversary reunion
They actually went ahead and killed Trini. That took guts
They actually went ahead and killed Trini. That took guts
Wow. That was unexpected. I'm not comfortable with "grittier" revivals of fluffy, upbeat kids' shows, but building the story around the impact of the real-life death of a cast member is rather moving, in a Wakanda Forever kind of way.
That trailer is great. Thats how you add stakes and make the show a bit more intense then it usually is, without becoming grimdark junk. Death is a part of life, and I've never really thought that kids shows avoiding it so much in the 90s, at least action/adventure type stuff, was a good idea. But, to be fair, even Power Rangers eventually killed off a Ranger in a season. Sure, Kendrix came back to life at the end of Lost Galaxy, but her death was still fairly intense and drawn outr, although not gory or anything like that. The fact that they even say the word "kill" several times is good, it would really take away from things if they had tried to say that Rita had "destroyed" Trini or used another similar goofy replacement term for killing.
They're obviously taking into account that people that loved MMPR as kids (or kept up the PR love into adulthood) are going to be watching this, either alone or with their kids, so we seem to be getting something that gets to be more complex / general audience focused then we've gotten since RPM or maybe Dino Charge Season 1. I'm really excited for it, it can't come too soon for me.
Super Sentai does kill off Sentai Senshi or Rangers as you would like to call them, it's just rare & infrequent.
But it does happen on occaision.
That looks pretty cool, I might check it out when I go back to Netflix.
Yeah, I was mostly talking about US kids shows. I've seen the kinds of stuff that Japanese kids TV can get up to, early Ultraman is especially memorable for all the blood and violent decapitations / limb removals of kaiju
Do we have any idea how long they've been planning this?
I half-way had an idea that it was originally Tommy that they were planning on killing off (to deal with the potential impact of JDFs death on the franchise) but perhaps his family vetoed it, so they retooled to use Trini who doesn't have the same impact for the franchise as a whole or even MMPR itself?
That said, the "Trini version" seems pretty good including the casting of her daughter, so I'm not complaining about their choices there.
No way. According to RangerWiki, David Yost pitched the special back in 2021, and it was officially announced in September 2022. The inclusion of Trini's daughter was announced in October 2022, a month before Jason Frank died.
Ah, ok. Just a thought as JDFs death is something that the franchise will have to address at some point given his in-universe profile but it's nice that they're committed to exploring other options even in "nostaligia bait" situations.
I find it particularly interesting that it was Yost who pitched the idea in the first place given his long time negativity towards the franchise or at least his experiences in it (justifiably so based on his accounts), but it does explain him finally coming back for this.
I find it particularly interesting that it was Yost who pitched the idea in the first place given his long time negativity towards the franchise or at least his experiences in it (justifiably so based on his accounts), but it does explain him finally coming back for this.
My local comic shop got a few Kamen Rider Zero-One comics! So excited!
I wouldn't be surprised if David Yost finally grew past it.
"Grew past" being subjected to homophobic harassment??? No. The burden wasn't on him to change. The franchise grew past it, with Dino Fury giving us the first openly gay Ranger and portraying her romantic plotline so well that it won a GLAAD award for representation.
So you think that's the reason he came back?
I wouldn't presume to speak for him. I'm just saying he's not the one who needed to grow.
So everybody around him grew. Since he is coming back, I would presume that it's good enough to get him to return to the role?
RangerWiki says Frank was unable to participate in the special. However, it claims the Green Ranger will appear in some capacity. https://powerrangers.fandom.com/wiki/Mighty_Morphin_Power_Rangers:_Once_&_Always