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| photo courtesy of powerrangers.wikia.com |
SPOILER-FREE REVIEW
Saban’s Power Rangers is the 2017’s film adaptation of the beloved kid’s
show. In a world of gigantic superhero franchises and spectacle-based
properties, it makes sense that the Power Rangers franchise would eventually
throw its own hat into the ring. Unfortunately, the effort is a downer on just
about every count.
Power Rangers follows five teenagers: Jason Scott (Dacre Montgomery), Kimberley
Hart (Naomi Scott), Billy Cranston (RJ Cyler), Trini (Becky G), and Zack (Ludi
Lin). A series of unlikely coincidences brings this group together to find an
underground spaceship, which houses friendly robot Alpha 5 (Bill Hader) and
Zordon (Bryan Cranston). With their help, these new Power Rangers must learn to
work as a team to defeat the evil Rita Repulsa (Elizabeth Banks) before it’s
too late.
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| photo courtesy of denofgeek.com |
For what it’s worth, Power Rangers is fine. Despite all its
high-budget trappings, it’s still a kid’s movie, so it’s hard to be too harsh
on something that’s designed for cheap action thrills and explosions. Yet even
so, the bar for kid’s movies these days are pretty high, with superior quality
animation studios and A-list action blockbusters. Compared to these, Power Rangers strikes out even as pure
escapism.
It’s an attempt to
modernize and ground the traditionally campy Power Rangers lore. Interestingly,
it also embraces the cheesy at several pivotal points, making the whole thing a
bit tonally frustrated—bouncing between unapologetic and ashamed of itself.
Longtime fans will enjoy the throwbacks and one-liners, for sure, but they may
find themselves a little bored by the rest—a lot of arguments in dark rooms and
training in dark rooms.
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| photo courtesy of technobuffalo.com |
Power Rangers goes to great pains to show you how cool and relevant it is,
emphasized by its super hip soundtrack. But even the beat-heavy soundtrack
can’t hide that everything here is borrowed from something better; the movie
feels like a weird stepchild of Man of
Steel, Transformers, and The Hunger Games. Seriously, interchange
the Power Rangers for Superman and it’s almost the exact same movie as Man of Steel, complete with battle-torn
cold open, angsty tone, and even a hidden spaceship that houses the mentor
figure.
The script is one of the
worst I’ve seen onscreen in recent memory. It makes no coherent sense at times,
has seemingly random and unexplained coincidences, and doesn’t let our action
heroes even suit up until far too late in the movie. To top it all off, Power Rangers has some absolutely
cringe-worthy dialogue. Seriously, it’s bad. Take out the high-budget effects,
and you’ve got a B-movie on your hands.
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| photo courtesy of screenrant.com |
To the movie’s credit,
I’ll concede that it includes some solid jokes and a few interesting
explorations of its source material (a pleasant surprise). But let’s be frank:
Power Rangers doesn’t (yet) have the kind of fanbase that Marvel, DC, or Star
Wars has, so it’ll be a long time before anyone gets really excited about
this-or-that obscure item from Power Rangers past.
FINAL VERDICT: Power
Rangers might please the hardcore fans, but if you’re looking for compelling
blockbusters or even high-quality mindless action, you’re better off looking
somewhere else.
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| photo courtesy of moviefone.com |
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