MOVIE REVIEW - POWER RANGERS

It’s morphin time. The ultra popular Power Rangers has an updated look that the producer’s hope will launch a new cinematic franchise to rival its comic book superhero competitors. But does it succeed? Warning, spoilers ahead…

Power Rangers seemed more suited for The CW than on the big screen. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. As I said, the Rangers have a very loyal fan base that spans a couple of decades. This film goes a long way in giving them what they crave. The drawback is that if you’re a newbie, there are things and inside jokes that will go over your head and escape you. The movie like the series it’s based on, is campy fun and even though the teenage heroes play it seriously, it’s hard to take it seriously. It takes a while, nearly two-thirds of the film, before they quintet morph into Power Rangers. When they do, the film takes off and the action is very entertaining with slightly above average CGI.

Other than a CGI Bryan Cranston as the team’s mentor Zordon and a hardly recognizable Elizabeth Banks as the villainous Rita Repulsa, the main cast is composed of relative newcomers. Think The Breakfast Club as team is made up of a group of high-school kids sentenced to endless Saturday detention. We have Jason (Dacre Montgomery), the football jock, Kimberly (Naomi Scott), the “mean” girl, Billy (RJ Cyler), the nerd, Trini (Becky G) as the silent introvert and Zack (Ludi Lin) as the rebel with no real cause. When an experiment at a forbidden construction site by Billy goes wrong, they discover a spectrum of colored coins (conveniently one each of them), that infuses all of them with unique superpowers. This leads them to Zordon, who tells them that they’re the chosen ones to take up the mantle of Power Rangers. He later trains them along with his robot Alpha 5 (voiced by Bill Hader) to harness their new abilities to save the world from Rita Repulsa.

This is ultimately a kid inspired superhero film. That’s the appeal of this franchise. It’s easy to relate to this kids. If you didn’t grow up watching it, you may not appreciate it as much as someone who has. However there is enough to take in and enjoy. They’re hardly the Avengers but the filmmakers knew who their target audience was and in the end, delivered and clearly had fun in the process.