“Yesterday’s” Comic> Power Rangers Turbo Vs. Beetleborgs Metallix

I actually got to this review before Linkara. Sadly, I also beat him to Liefeld’s Galactica so I had to review that mess.

Saban Presents Power Rangers Turbo VS. Beetleborgs Metallix

Acclaim Books (1997)

While scanning for new monsters, Divatox and Nukus make contact and decide to team up (and of course later betray each other). Nukus creates a shapeshifting monster which Divatox duplicates in her monster copier and sends the monsters against the Turbo Rangers and Beetleborgs disguised as the other group, hoping to trick them into battling each other in another dimension so the villains can collect their heroic fighting energy. When the Rangers and Borgs realize they were tricked, the shapeshifters become weird combo versions of the group and attack. Beaten back by the heroes, the monsters merge, so the heroes merge the Turbo Zords and Beetle Attack Vehicles into a super MegaZord and destroy the monster, the explosion expelling the captured energies and opening a portal to send the two teams home.

What they got right: This was an example of a good team up. While the old “heroes fight each other before realizing who the real enemy is” cliché is here in full force, the action was pretty good and they put their misunderstandings aside because they actually listen to each other and realize they weren’t the ones who attacked the other team while trying to complete their transformations (a nice nod to Japanese/Saban cliché morphing).

What they got wrong: While I enjoy the comic there are some minor missteps. The Zord/AV combo robot really doesn’t look like the two battle vehicle types merged into one robot, and while other Ranger teams have managed to merge tech with theirs before that they shouldn’t have been able to was nothing new even by this point this seems even more farfetched considering where the Metallix gear came from. The subplot with Jo worried about the spelling bee seems forced in and barely matters outside of Justin getting to snap her out of her fear. Also, I can’t tell if the Beetleborgs and Rangers are supposed to be in the same dimension or two separate ones and the comic doesn’t seem to, either.

Recommendation: As crossovers go this was a fairly decent one. Fans of both shows should check it out if they can.

And so we’re done with Saban comics until I can catch up with the Papercutz graphic novels. Between this and Power Rangers Super Samurai there were no Power Ranger comics and this was the last appearance of the Beetleborgs in comics form. At least they got off better than the VR Troopers did. 😦