Thursday 2 September 2021

Toybox REVIEW: Power Rangers Lightning Collection Zeo Green Ranger

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Release Date: March 2021
RRP: $19.99/£19.99

The Power Rangers Lightning Collection draws one step closer to completing another team as the eighth wave in the main line of releases brings us the Lightning Collection Zeo Green Ranger. Following the destruction of both his power coin and the Command Centre, Adam Park calls on the power of the Zeo Crystal to become "stronger than before" and defend the planet from the new threat of the Machine Empire. Although Adam first debuted in Mighty Morphin Power Rangers season two and stayed all the way through until the cast changeover in Power Rangers Turbo, Hasbro have chosen his appearance in Power Rangers Zeo for their first release of this fan favourite character.

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As another entry in the main line of Lightning Collection releases, the Zeo Green Ranger comes in the standard white background box featuring the ever fantastic artwork from Tom Whalen. Of course in typical Hasbro fashion the CG render on the box doesn't quite match up to the figure inside, this time around sporting a couple of extra paint apps that I'll discuss further down in the review. On one spine of the box you'll find a repeat of that front artwork, whilst the other has the same piece continuing from the front together with the Power Rangers Zeo logo. Open it up and you'll find the figure, along with accessories, neatly laid out on a moulded plastic tray.

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The fourth and final male Zeo Ranger to be released, the Zeo Green Ranger rounds the boys out with nothing we haven't already seen before. It's worth noting that, much like the Red Ranger, Zeo Green lacks the gold bands around the gloves that were filled in on the Blue Ranger. Based on the promotional pictures for the two figures, it looks as though the forthcoming Pink and Yellow Zeo Rangers will actually have these paint apps - so while it's nice Rocky won't be the odd one out (in that respect at least) it is a little frustrating that the paint apps can't remain consistent throughout the entire team. It's a shame because everything else on this figure looks great - the shade of green used is perfect and all the other bits of tech-like detailing (as well as the belt buckle sporting all of the Zeo Ranger shapes) are perfect. The helmet sculpt is great too, keeping the rectangular visor relatively flat as it should be whilst correctly carving out the sections just above it. The simplicity of the Zeo suits is what makes them work so well, and likewise that simplicity makes them very hard to get wrong. Two tiny rings of gold paint aside, it's a great looking toy.

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The Lighting Collection male body is a tried and tested success by this point and having worked well on all the Power Rangers Zeo releases so far, you can bet that it works brilliantly here as well. Altogether the Zeo Green Ranger features;
- Ball jointed head, torso and hips 
- Single hinge neck and ab crunch
- Swivel hinge shoulders, wrists and ankles
- Butterfly joint shoulders/pecs
- Double hinge elbows and knees
- Bicep, thigh and boot swivels
It really is hard to think about how Hasbro could improve upon the body they have now, other than maybe tweaking those butt plates a bit so that the legs could move backward as well as they do forwards. Offering extremely close bends on both the elbows and knees, shoulders reinforced by butterfly movement to bring them inwards/outwards and those fantastic swivel hinge ankles to keep the figure flat-footed, the Zeo Green Ranger is another absolute joy from the line when it comes to posing. At a push you could also probably improve the body further by using a ball jointed neck as well as head (like Hasbro have started doing with their Star Wars Black Series figures), but with the helmet covering the neck for the most part it really isn't necessary. Overall it's just a really fun figure to mess around with and pose, perfectly showing off exactly what the Lightning Collection is capable of.

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Zeo Green continues Hasbro's course correction when it comes to the accessory count, once again making Blue feel like an incomplete release that we don't know how or when it is going to be rectified. Altogether the figure comes with an additional pair of hands (giving him one pair of weapon holding hands and one pair of closed fists overall), an extended Zeo Power Pod Sword, Zeo Laser Pistol, a translucent green blast part for the pistol and finally his twin Zeo IV Power Axes. As is to be expected by this point, only the extended version of the Power Pod Sword is included so it looks pretty silly (not to mention inaccurate) when holstered. It's disappointing, but after being the case for the previous two releases it isn't likely to change for the rest of the team. After all, even if Hasbro did fix it unless additional collapsed versions were packaged with someone else the inconsistency would be just as frustrating. The Power Pod Sword and Laser Pistol are completely identical to the ones included with the Blue and Red Rangers - nicely detailed but easily prone to paint rubbing when held in those pristine white hands. Another slightly questionable inclusion with the figure is the laser blast effect part, which is just a recolour of the one packaged with the Red Ranger (where it was light blue instead of green). While of course Hasbro are going to reuse and recolour effect parts, it's disappointing that two rangers from the same series come with exactly the same part. What certainly isn't disappointing however are those Zeo IV Power Axes, which have been gorgeously moulded with detailed paint apps. Best of all the handles aren't painted either so there won't be any paint rub for once. These are possibly the best accessories that have come out of the Zeo team yet, which makes it all the more irritating that we don't have Blue's Zeo III Power Tonfas to go with them.

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Rounding off the accessories is of course an alternate Adam Park head, based on how the character appeared in Power Rangers Zeo. Any future Adam releases, such as the forthcoming metallic armour Black Ranger or any inevitable Mighty Morphin or Turbo figures, will feature different heads. Given how wildly the likeness of these alternate heads can vary all things considered Hasbro have done a pretty great job in getting this one to look like Johnny Yong Bosch. Even if you didn't consider this to be a perfect likeness, there's enough familiarity there for you to identify exactly who it's supposed to be. Which is more than can be said for poor old Rocky, who's really gotten the short end of the stick when it comes to his Zeo figure.

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The Lightning Collection Zeo Green Ranger is probably the best of the core Power Rangers team (so that's not counting the Gold Ranger) released so far, but is still slightly brought down by those little inconsistencies and annoyances that seem to be plaguing this season in particular. The missing paint apps on the gloves wouldn't be such an issue if one figure out of the three (and the first one to be released no less) didn't have them, and a repeat of an effect part within the same team when Hasbro have so many different ones on offer strikes as a bit of an afterthought. Those gripes aside though, the Zeo figures in general continue to be pretty great releases - nicely detailed sculpts and fantastic poseability. When they come with all the right accessories and a good head sculpt too, you can really see what Hasbro is capable of with this toy line. That's four down and with the final two in sight, I for one can't wait to finish off my Power Rangers Zeo line up.

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