POWER RANGERS (2017)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *cosmological, psychological*

I appreciated, more than liked, the multitudinous POWER RANGERS serials. They took the bizarre weapons, wacky monsters and wild fight-scenes from the Japanese SUPER SENTAI shows and spliced in American footage. Each American show used a diverse group of "clean teens" from one era or another as the true identities of the armor-clad heroes. It was a good if repetitive juvenile action-series, but I often found the squeaky-clean heroes less than impressive. One could hardly tell that any of them had gone through so much as a single adolescent mood-swing.

I know nothing about the genesis of the POWER RANGERS reboot, though I've noticed that four writers contributed to the script and a fifth wrote the screenplay, while director Dean Israelite had never before worked on a movie with such a large budget. Undoubtedly, given the big money behind the reboot, I'm sure Israelite got plenty of support from more experienced hands, though that experience didn't keep RANGERS from bombing at the box office.

I frankly cannot see why RANGERS wasn't at least as popular as the so-so TRANSFORMERS movies. It's possible, as Israelite suggested in one interview, that the PG-13 rating kept some kids from buying tickets. But the basic rationale of the reboot was to court a wider audience than kids, in that the script gives more psychological heft to superheroes who were originally very one-dimensional, roughly the way Tim Burton upgraded the image of Batman for many viewing-ages. 

The five teens-- Zack, Jason, Billy, Kimberly and Trini-- are only loosely based upon the protagonists of the initial MIGHTY MORPHIN POWER RANGERS teleseries. Instead of being a bunch of brightly smiling kids constantly concerned with recycling, these adolescents are good-hearted but confused by their burgeoning emotions. All five are either loners or on the outs with their peer groups, and they're capable of taking rash, ill-considered actions just because they don't realize they can die. The writers bring the five of them together in reasonably inventive ways, with a standout touch being the reworking of original MORPHIN character Billy, a routine nerd-type, into a high-functioning autistic who's both amusing and sympathetic.

After the five young people have taken one another's measure, without quite becoming friends, they're caught up in the long-range schemes of former Power Ranger Zordon (Bryan Cranston) and his robotic servant Alpha-5 (Jon Hader). While exploring a cave, beneath which Zordon's disembodied consciousness dwells in an underground facility, the teens find five Power Coins and take them home. In an impressive variation on the original serial's origin-tale, the youths flee the authorities in a van and get hit by a train, only to find their lives preserved and their abilities enhanced by the coins. 

Inevitably, the quintet returns to the cave, encounters Zordon and Alpha, and get drafted to fight in a cosmic war against Rita Repulsa (Elizabeth Banks). This alien fiend seeks to acquire a mystic crystal on Earth, after which she will destroy the planet. Quite logically, the teens refuse to be drafted-- at first. But other incidents persuade them that the threat of Rita is real, and they agree to let the alien Ranger and his robot train them against artificial opponents (the "Putties" of the original show). The kids aren't able to master the skill of morphing-- that is, each one manifesting his or her own color-coded armor-- except when Billy does it once, by accident. In addition, Jason discovers that their tutor has an ulterior motive: if they can all morph at the same time, they can open the Grid and make it possible for Zordon to form a new physical body. This gives the former Ranger a little extra self-interest, and the concept pays off later with respect to using the Grid for a more altruistic purpose.

Rita finds out about the new Rangers and tracks down Trini, taking her prisoner with touches of horror-themed violence not present in any of the TV shows. Soon the villainess masters all five heroes, and uses Billy to locate the Mystic Crystal. While she's occupied bringing to life a gigantic kaiju, based upon the villain "Goldar" from the old show, the New Rangers finally master their power to morph and take control of their dinosaur-vehicles, the Zords. This leads to the expected Big Battle, in which the heroes do their Voltron-thing and merge their Zords into a humanoid robot capable of defeating Goldar and his evil mistress.

The first half of RANGERS is stronger than the second, given its emphasis on character building, though I must admit that Elizabeth Banks brings an insidious, focused malice to her evildoer that I rarely find in most nasty female overlords. All five of the young performers RJ Cyler, Becky G, Ludi Lin, Dacre Montgomery, and Naomi Scott-- acquit themselves well, and surprisingly, the script even gives a few good moments to the parents who can't remember their own confused juvenile years. ("Pee in this cup" provides the standout funny line.) The only minor failing I found is that the fight-scenes aren't as lively as those of the TV-serials, but then, the TV-shows really didn't offer much of anything else. And there's enough verbal humor to compensate for not having monsters who look like giant toads or chickens or water-faucets.