Featured Blu-ray and DVD Review: Power Rangers

June 25, 2017

Power Rangers - Buy from Amazon: DVD, Blu-ray Combo Pack, or 4K Ultra HD Combo Pack
 Video on Demand

Power Rangers

Power Rangers, the TV show, has been around for more than 20 years and it is still going strong. Power Rangers, the movie, was supposed to setup a six-part franchise, but its box office numbers probably killed any chance of that happening. Were moviegoers spared five more of these? Or was there enough here that fans would have been looking forward to more?

The Movie

The film begins with a prank gone wrong. I think any prank that involves livestock and ends in a police chase and crashing your car counts as a prank gone wrong. The prankster in question is Jason Scott, the star football player at his high school, or at least he was before the prank. Now he’s kicked off the team, is on house arrest, and has to go to school every Saturday just to graduate on time. Other residents of Saturday school include Billy Cranston, who is autistic and a target for bullies, and Kimberly Hart, who used to be a cheerleader, but she got blamed for spreading a picture of one of her friends, so all of that’s over. Because Jason defended Billy, Billy offers to disable Jason’s ankle bracelet, in exchange for helping Billy get somewhere.

That somewhere is the local abandoned mine. Billy and his father used to go there to look for old stuff and he wants to go back there. Jason isn’t interested in sticking around, but when he’s about to leave, he hears some music playing and goes to investigate. What he finds is Kimberly diving into the lake. (We also briefly see Zack sitting on a train caboose and Trini doing yoga poses.) Jason and Kimberly talk about leaving town and going somewhere better when they hear an explosion. The two of them, as well as Zack and Trini, rush to where Billy was. He’s okay, but soon the entire wall of the cliff collapses and reveals what looks like glass. Inside the glass are strange gems and after breaking them out, each person takes one before fleeing from security. They get into a car chase that ends when, well, let’s just say it ends.

The next day, all five teens wake up at home with no memories how they got there. They’ve also changed. The injury Jason sustained during the prank is healed. Both Kimberly and Billy exhibit great strength. All three of them realize something is wrong and they need to go back to that mine. When they get there, Zack and Trini are already there. While exploring, they find a crashed spaceship. While exploring the ship, it powers up and they meet Alpha 5, and shortly after that, Zardon, the giant talking head. He tells them since the gems, the power crystals, choose them, they are the Power Rangers and it is their job to protect the Zeo Crystal and the Earth. Rita Repulsa is trying to get the Zeo Crystal and when she does, she will have the power to destroy worlds.

And with that, their training, and the plot, finally kicks off.

Power Rangers feels like a pilot episode of a TV series, and the pilot episode is usually merely average. There are too many characters to introduce, too many plot details that have to be disclosed, too much world-building that needs to be accomplished in too little time. Because so much happens so fast, the opening two-thirds of the film seem rushed. Conversely, because we haven’t yet been given a reason to care about these characters, it’s a slog to get through. Some of the characters are engaging from the start, like Billy. It is rare to have someone on the autism spectrum as the lead in a movie and this character is well done. He doesn’t come off as a caricature and I really appreciate the filmmakers doing this. On the other hand, he’s the only character that starts with any personality, as the others are too generic for far too long. A good script would have found faster ways to do this.

Because the characters are not enough to draw you into the movie, the movie really needed more action beats, especially earlier in its two-hour running time. It literally takes 90 minutes before the Power Rangers finally morph into their armor as a team and by that time it is too late. Once the action finally starts, it really does feel like an episode of Power Rangers. It has the energy and the goofy charm that is the main appeal of the show, it’s just too little, too late. (Also, some of the special effects are a little dodgy, which wouldn’t have been an issue, if the rest of the movie was able to draw me in right away.)

The Extras

Extras begin with an audio commentary track with the writer, John Gatins, and the director, Dean Israelite. The Power of the Present is a nine-part, feature-length making of documentary. It is literally longer than the movie itself going over practically every aspect of the movie, from looking at the original TV shows to creating the new Zords. Up next are 18 deleted scenes with a total running time of 34 minutes. This could explain why the movie doesn’t work, as these deleted scenes are a quarter of the length of the final movie. The editor clearly had to create the movie in the editing room. Finally, there are four minutes of outtakes.

The Verdict

Power Rangers is a frustrating movie to watch, because in the end, there’s a lot of potential shown here, but it starts too slow to draw audiences in. If you did like the movie, then the DVD, Blu-ray Combo Pack, or 4K Ultra HD Combo Pack have more than enough extras to be worth picking up. If you haven’t seen the movie, but like the TV show, then wait till you can rent it on Video on Demand.

Filed under: Video Review, Power Rangers, Elizabeth Banks, Bryan Cranston, John Gatins, Bill Hader, Dean Israelite, RJ Cyler, Naomi Scott, Dacre Montgomery, Becky G, Ludi Lin