Series REVIEW: Power Rangers Turbo

Since it began back in 1993, the Power Rangers franchise had been enjoying success after success. However it was not going to last forever, ratings were beginning to drop during Power Rangers Zeo and Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie was a box office flop. The next series was already starting on rocky ground, but it was about to get much worse. Power Rangers Turbo aired in 1997 and ran for a total of 45 episodes.

Out with the old cast, in with the new: Cassie, Carlos, TJ, Ashley, Justin & Alpha 6

Following on from the events of Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie, Divatox and her band of space pirates set their sights on Earth to take revenge on the Turbo rangers for ruining her plans on Muranthius. The rangers, with the exception of Justin, have graduated from Angel Grove High and begun life as adults. In addition to this, Zordon and Alpha 6 announce that they are to return to Eltar, leaving them in the care of new mentor Dimitria and the wise-cracking Alpha 6.

Tommy, Kat, Adam and Tanya continue their battle against Divatox, but as they start to pursue new careers their time as rangers draws to a close. Their powers are passed on to T.J., Cassie, Carlos and Ashley, who join Justin as the new Turbo rangers. Together with the Blue Senturion, a robotic law enforcer from the future, and the mysterious Phantom Ranger, the Turbo rangers continue the battle against Divatox and the forces of evil.

Dimitria: Not Zordon

While Divatox's sudden appearance in Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie was understandable, her taking over as the lead villain here makes less sense when taking the end of Zeo into consideration. The Machine Empire were by no means defeated (though a little...scattered perhaps), and Rita and Zedd had proudly proclaimed that they were back. All of a sudden both parties have lost interest in the Earth, and we're left with Divatox and her motley crew of pirates. When you take the following season into consideration possible reasons for this are a little more plausible, but right now it doesn't fit well at all with previous events. The sudden change from Zordon and Alpha 5 to Dimitria and Alpha 6 also comes out of nowhere, with two integral characters now replaced by frustrating copies. As an alien from the planet Inquiris, Dimitria has the habit of talking only in questions, much to the frustration of both the rangers and anyone watching Turbo.

No sixth ranger this season, but the Blue Senturion pretty much fills the role

Usually I try not to compare and contrast Power Rangers seasons to their Super Sentai equivalent, but when it comes to Turbo its necessary just to understand some of the reasons for how bad it is. Gekisou Sentai Carranger is primarily a parody series, full of ridiculous plots and slapstick comedy. In adapting these plots to be used for Power Rangers, what was never meant to be taken seriously is suddenly thrust into being a (semi) serious plot line and it just doesn't work. For example, the first zord sequence involves the rangers messing up the transformation sequence (even though they already did it in the movie) and Tommy resorting to the instruction manual mid-fight to learn how to drive it. It's ironic how while a (now-debunked) rumour suggested Carranger saved Super Sentai, Turbo almost killed Power Rangers.

The Turbo and Rescue Megazords, once again one of the few good things.

With some many new characters to have to suddenly get used to, its even more frustrating to see some of the core cast acting completely out of character (as is the norm when a character is about to leave Power Rangers). Tommy is suddenly so obsessed with stockcar racing that he doesn't even attend his own graduation (or much else before he leaves), and Adam, Kat and Tanya are noticeably reduced to give the ever-annoying Justin more focus. Usually the action makes up for these things, but the first 20 episodes follow the same dull plot formula. Divatox has no scale as a villain at all, with all of her schemes involving planting a detonator with a tiny blast radius somewhere and then sending a monster simply to distract while the timer ticks down. Rangers beat monster, rangers find bomb, day is saved etc etc. Granted every Power Rangers episode essentially follow the same formula, this iteration of the Power Rangers often feel little more than glorified bomb squad.

Pirate or pathetic?

Thankfully things pick up a little bit with the introduction of the new cast. Despite barely any introduction to the characters at all (Carlos and Ashley pop up a few episodes before, but T.J. and Cassie debut the same two-parter they become rangers), the new actors settle into their roles well and the series moves a bit closer to the status quo. Justin gets less focus, Dimitria stops talking in questions and Divatox's schemes don't just involve blowing things up. The Carranger footage till means that plots are far more light-hearted and comedic then seasons past (the infamous pizza episode being a prime example) but Turbo is now a tolerably bad series other than downright unwatchable one. The remaining episodes range from bad to average, with the only must-see episodes being the two part finale "Chase into Space", which is one of the biggest cliffhangers in the franchise and a great set up to the next season (which would be the final of this 'era').

Yes. this happened.

With many other aspects of Power Rangers moving backwards rather than forwards, it's no surprise that we also see a regression in Bulk and Skull. As if them suddenly being on the police force wasn't enough., it begins with them first being turned into monkeys (during this time the actors were in talks for a potential spin off series starring the pair), then temporarily being invisible before returning to normal. From then each episode sees them taking different jobs and finding new ways to mess them up. There's less things being spilt on them in Turbo, but they are very much the bumblers they were in the early episodes of Mighty Morphin'.

The problem of making a show that has a continuous plot season after season is that the show needs to grow up with its audience. Power Rangers Turbo fails miserably at this and thus is the first real misstep the franchise makes (and perhaps because of this the most memorable). Its regression into juvenile plots and slapstick moments bring the original cast so far down the show is only refreshing when they leave. Aside from some decent looking zords (which are still completely outclassed by all the previous ones) and an excellent finale there's not a whole lot to love about Turbo. Yet the fact that it is a somewhat integral series and still more memorable than other seasons makes it that special kind of awful.

Movie REVIEW: Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie

With Power Rangers Zeo ending on a rather high note (the return of Lord Zedd and Rita), the next instalment in the Power Rangers franchise seemed to promise to be a good one. Amping up the scale, Power Rangers took to cinema screens for a second time, only this time around the film was in continuity with the television series. Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie was originally released in 1997 and bridged the gap between Power Rangers Zeo and the next series Power Rangers Turbo. It served as an introduction to the turbo powers, as well as new blue ranger Justin and new villain Divatox.

I already miss the Zeo suits.

On a distant planet, a wizard named Larigot is hunted by the space pirate Divatox, who seeks his golden key in order to travel to another dimension to marry an demon known as Maligore. Larigot transports himself to Earth in search of Zordon and Alpha for help, but despite finding them is taken by Divatox when she threatens the life of his wife and child. To make matters worse, Divatox has also kidnapped Bulk, Skull, Jason and Kimberly, planning to use the latter two as sacrifices to awaken Maligore.

With Rocky hospitalised due to a back injury, the four remaining rangers take on new turbo powers and zords in order to cross the dimensional barrier on a mysterious ship named the Ghost Galleon. When they reach the ship, they are joined by a new blue ranger - Justin, a child who attends the Angel Grove Youth Shelter (which the teens are trying to raise money to save) and accidentally stumbled upon the rangers' identities. Armed with new powers and zords, the turbo rangers travel across the Nemesis Triangle in order to stop Divatox and put an end to Maligore.

Space pirate Divatox

So the most important question raised in this film is, what happened to the Zeo powers? Well, that isn't exactly explained very well. It's established that the keys to the turbo morphers work like Larigot's golden key (allowing them to pass into the other dimension), but why an entirely new set of powers is needed to do so (especially when the Zeo powers were forever growing in strength) is a mystery. Of course the real reason is because the show was moving on to use footage from the Super Sentai series Gekisou Sentai Carranger, but a proper in-show reason would have been welcome. After season after season of dinosaurs and mystical beasts, cars just seem a bit bland.

Get used to this face, you're about to start seeing it a whole lot more.

Although he would make a short appearance at the beginning of the Power Rangers Turbo series, this is where we say goodbye to Rocky and hello to Justin. Justin is considered by some fans to be one of, if not the worst characters to serve as a Power Ranger, and in this film its immediately clear why. Other than the fact he discovers who the rangers are, we barely know him as a character before he's chosen to take Rocky's place and has shown no redeeming qualifications worthy of even being considered. From spouting terrible jokes ("Good thing you don't need a license to drive a zord!") to hopping around and proclaiming how much fun this life-or-death situation is, Justin is not only a terrible character but completely overshadows the more serious (and better) veteran rangers. Making a kid a ranger might have seemed like a good idea on paper on how to get children to relate better, but any child watching this would probably have a much better demeanour toward to role than Justin.

Maligore looks awesome.

Then we have Divatox and her minions Elgar, Rygog and the Piranhatrons (who look like their armour is too small for them here), who we'd be seeing much more of in Power Rangers Turbo. The absence of Rita and Zedd (although the two make a small cameo) and the Machine Empire isn't too bad here, as Divatox doesn't show any desire in conquering the Earth and is simply after Maligore. She isn't a bad villain, but thinly balances on the line between competent and comical. Plus she doesn't really do very much physically, since the action and zord battle are shifted towards the excellent looking Maligore.

Larigot escapes David Bowie's Labyrinth and comes in search of Zordon.

One of the biggest problems with Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie was the lack of morphed footage, and that problem is even worse in Turbo. A significant chunk of the beginning of the film is dedicated to Tommy and Kat running around a jungle looking for Lerigot, and then the action shifts to them sailing around on a boat before morphing to simply running around a jungle and fight some piranhatrons. They fail to do anything against Maligore, so the action shifts almost right away to a zord battle. This film needed to be a platform to showcase the new powers and fails miserably at it. But one thing that works in the film's favour is the location footage. There's barely any part of it that takes places in the city, and its refreshing to see a zord battle surrounded by moutains, trees and volcanoes as opposed to roads and buildings.

The Megazord fight is the only real highlight of the film.

Just to further add to the mysteries raised by Turbo, Bulk, Skull and Lt. Stone are suddenly back on the police force, despite being fired in Zeo and then Bulk and Skull walking away to take a detective case in Paris at the very end. It isn't properly explains, and completely regresses all three characters. Not that there's much relevance to Bulk and Skull's appearance in the film anyway, since they're mostly used for spouting poor jokes in funny accents.

Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie is a very poor start to Power Rangers Turbo. The appearance of veteran rangers and interesting locations don't save the film from its extremely dull plot, lack of action/consistency with the previous season and introducing a character which would be key in the darkest hour the franchise had faced yet. It just goes to show that just because a film is in-continuity, it doesn't make it better.