SNS: History of the Power Rangers

I just want to go on record as saying that I’m not on Linkara’s payroll.

Granted I talk about his work quite a bit, and it wasn’t that long ago that his “Mechakara” story arc was spotlighted. However, he’s doing something that I failed to do, and better than I would have done it.

One of the things Lewis Lovhaug and I have in common is that we’re both fans of the Power Rangers franchise. I had thought about doing a series of articles giving my thoughts about the series, but never had the time to re-watch such a long series, and I was only able to get all the Time Force episodes. The last few series I wasn’t able to save at all, although I’ve watched the entire series, except for Mystic Force.

Lewis seems to have more free time than I do, which is why he has a web series to being with I guess. After the Mechakara finale, which featured a review of Marvel Comic’s take on the series, he became nostalgic for the show, and is starting a series of reviews of the various seasons of the series.

Looks strange in the “Dark Wood” theme I’m using as I write this, but clicking the “click to play” will start playing the video. I have received permission from Mr. Lovhaug to post this series here at the Spotlight, with my own thoughts added at the end. In other words, I’m letting him doing the hard part and adding my own stuff after the fact.

How appropriate.

To compliment Lewis’ comment about this being his opinion, my comments will also be my opinion, coming from a different angle. When Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers debuted I was still in high school and just enjoyed a good superhero story. I had seen a few episodes of Dynaman on USA Network’s “Night Flight” block, and thought this would be a similar show. (Both were produced by Saban, but while PR had American actors, Dynaman was a simple dub, comedied up to the point where I still hear that “gadget watches” line in my head from time to time.) We hadn’t seen any of the US footage at the time.

Another reason I was curious about it was that there hadn’t been any live-action adventure shows targeting older kids. Even PBS wasn’t doing too many. If you look back to maybe the 1950’s, there were plenty of shows targeting all age groups. Flash Gordon, the Lone Ranger, and others made the transition from radio to the moving picture box, and I’m sure Sky King launched many a piloting career. My generation saw shows like Shazam, The Secret of Isis, and Jason of Star Command. PBS had a few shows like Read All About It, a rather decent sci-fi show, and ohmygodit’sonYouTube! Potential new Showcase topic!

Yeah, in later years PBS had stuff like Ghostwriter and a show where a kid and his talking dog solved mysteries aided by a 3-foot clone of Sherlock Holmes (I’d say you can’t make this stuff up, but obviously someone did), but it was all detective shows with a gimmick. No sci-fi and no super heroes. Even Nickelodeon only had a few TV movies from England (it wasn’t until after MMPR that we had the remake of The Tomorrow People or Animorphs), but any adventure shows were animated.

Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers was something new, and I tuned in. They were fun shows combining superheroes and Godzilla (#3 on the list of my favoritest things), so it was a natural draw for me. I didn’t know anything about the Japanese origins until I read an issue of Antarctic Press’ “Sentai” magazine, learning more about it as I traversed the internet.

I don’t know how often Lewis will be releasing his videos. I’m assuming that Atop the Fourth Wall is his top priority as far as show producing. (His “Let’s Play” of the Star Trek: Voyager game had its shares of delays.) The first full episode is up now, and I’ll make a response of that in due time. My own postings will be when I have the time or need a filler. (I’ll have these sitting in my draft folder until I need it, so you may just want to follow on his blog instead of waiting for me.) My thanks to Lewis for letting me use his show to get out an article series I didn’t have time to do myself, and he’s more interesting to listen to. 😀