BW Media Spotlight

Let me start by saying I’m not angry. I’m just confused.

Somebody needs to explain what’s going on with this show. First it moves from Nickelodeon, which is still doing Hasbro’s current Transformers show, to Netflix, which apparently is going to lead to LESS new episodes for the Cosmic Fury season. They’re using Zord footage from one show and costume footage from a different show or their own costumes, I’m not sure which. Lord Zedd is back, even though he’s not the same guy who was Z-Waved into a normal human along with Rita Repulsa (and yet they still had a kid that makes Two-Face look more possible). That’s a long story we won’t get into here. Billy’s coming back, my favorite Blue Ranger, but with no sign of his alien wife, though I suspect they’re going to pull a Sulu and make him gay now because the actor is despite the character being shown as straight since early season one (Billy was the one who got the most chicks, not the hip hop dude who pursued one woman and the jock who we didn’t see in a romance until long after high school) and was still involved with Cestria as late as the recent team-up movie I really want to see, and with the tomboy’s girlfriend (because of course the tomboy’s a lesbian in modern US TV…it’s increasingly rare when they aren’t) now joining up for whatever reason. They’re also continuing a team longer, into multiple seasons and name changes not slapping a “Super” into it, like the original Mighty Morphin’. I know the Hasbro period has tied in the previous shows, but they used to build on Ranger lore, not go back to old stuff.

Now Simon Bennett, the executive producer, seems to think that the best way for Power Rangers to return to the mainstream is to get away from its roots. There has been rumors and theories like the franchise going the animated route and dropping the live actors altogether, but nothing official. Someone even wanted to do an adult Ranger show instead of just a Sentai type show for adults, like Bat In The Sun’s Dragon Ranger movie that featured Ranger actors until the passing of Jason David Frank. This is the last season that will be filmed in New Zealand according to the Ranger Wiki, but given the current strike situation isn’t affecting this show they may want to rethink that. However, according to comments collected by Bounding Into Comics it seems that Bennett believes sticking to the tokusatsu/sentai formula that the series is built around is what’s hurting the franchise. It’s like saying keeping Star Trek in outer space is killing the franchise. I mean, how much does he want to change?

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