Ahhh, after 10,000 years I’m free! It’s time to review movies!

What’s It About? After gaining superpowers from an ancient artifact, five misfit teenagers must learn to overcome their differences and become a team of warriors in time to defeat an alien invasion.

STRAIGHT UP: A confused mess, both narratively and visually. 1/5

What I Liked

Elizabeth Banks as Rita Repulsa – Rita gets far too little time onscreen to develop as a proper antagonist, but Banks makes the best of it with a hammy, throwback-style performance that fans of the original series will surely appreciate.

RJ Cyler as Billy – It’s Jason, the Red Ranger, who gets to be the team leader, but Billy, the Blue Ranger, is the standout character of the bunch this time around. He’s both likable and relatable in ways that none of his teammates are really allowed to be.

What I Disliked

Is it Morphin’ Time yet? – Despite this being a Power Rangers movie, where all the hype, merchandise, and marketing have been about the characters battling bad guys in their multi-colored costumes, nobody actually transforms into a Power Ranger until about 90 minutes into the movie. There are times and places for a slow-burn reveal, but this should not have been one of them.

Misguided priorities – I appreciate this film wanting to invest more in the Rangers’ character development, something that’s lacking even in the original work. The problem is that the focus on teen issues occurs separately from, and to the exclusion of, the other necessary world-building, to the point that this barely even qualifies as a superhero movie. Even worse is that said character development is generally pretty uneven in quality.

Cynical character writing – The original Power Rangers were kind of a model family – a group of friendly, high-achieving, community-minded kids under the guidance of their wise and fair mentor, Zordon. This movie gives us a Kimberly who’s a genuinely awful person, a Jason who’s basically a reckless idiot, and a Zordon who’s selfish and argumentative. Regardless of whether this sort of thing is more “realistic,” these changes don’t make any of these characters better.

Z-grade visuals – The design teams for this movie need to go back to school. The Dinozords are a bunch of shapeless metal lumps, and absolutely zero thought went into the Megazord design. The Goldar monster is just dreadful. As for the Rangers’ costumes themselves, I’m surprised there hasn’t been more outrage. The original MMPR costumes were simple and iconic – they didn’t need a dramatic redesign. Imagine if Batman or Superman got this kind of “update” – we’d never hear the end of it!

Washed-out colors – For a series that relies as much on color for its presentation as Power Rangers, the decision to go with a palette of muted browns and grays for this film was both puzzling and tragic.

Weird editing – There are a lot of scenes in this movie that just don’t flow well, which makes me wonder what happened in the editing room. There are two car-chase scenes in the first act when either one alone would have done the job. A scene where our heroes wake up at home after an accident is never explained. A few other significant plot developments are dropped without comment, too. There’s really no proper lead-in to the film’s climax, either – it just happens when it’s time.

Adult content – Parents should be warned, this movie isn’t as kid-friendly as it seems. Masturbation jokes, a revenge-porn subplot, and a scene where Jason spies on Kimberly in her underwear can all be found here.

Blatant product placement – Whatever Krispy Kreme paid for their sponsorship deal, they got their money’s worth.

CLOSING THOUGHT: I love Power Rangers, and I love its Japanese source material, Super Sentai. This isn’t despite the fact that these are TV shows for kids – it’s more because of that fact. They’re unapologetic and joyful and imaginative in ways that superhero media “for adults” rarely is. I think it’s a fundamental misunderstanding of this truth that produces wrongheaded remakes like this one. Appropriating something like Power Rangers for a “gritty” reboot results in a work that’s not satisfying to either the adults who thought they wanted it or the kids who might have found joy in a refreshed version of the original. It’s fine to like a kids’ show like Power Rangers, even as an adult – but acknowledge it for what it is, instead of pretending it’s something it isn’t.