I have to say that I have not been more impressed with a Power Rangers premiere in quite a while and Super Megaforce delivered, taking pretty much everything I loved from Gokaiger and creating its own slight twist to the story and characters. This is my first review where I will no longer be summarizing the episode, so instead I felt it would be a better idea to walk you through some of my favorite things and some not-so favorite things about the episode. See if you can count the times Gokaiger is mentioned, ready? GO!
The Beginning Sequence, OK I understand that in order to get the story moving we needed moments with the original Megaforce Rangers but I have to tell you that I found this sequence pretty boring. I only wanted them to get to the point, however it seemed that they rushed it as much as they could anyways.
I will say the beautiful lighting used in the footage, shown above, was fantastic and the dark inside of the shopping center where Ernie’s Brain Freeze is located looked amazing.
I was a little puzzled by Noah’s remarks, he is attempting to inspire the students but there is no mention of what they need to do? Are they civilians fighting the X-Borgs? Who knows/ I’m just not sure I bought that line of dialogue.
I did find it strange that Emma went straight for the ice cream machine to turn it off. It must be habit from baking pies there.
The New Powers Introduction, was very well done. Gosei explains their new powers, the keys and morphers. Sadly, he does not explain where the powers came from, why they have them and of course why is Jake’s Ranger Key Green now?
I thought that the fact that Gosei wasn’t able to explain to Jake why his color has changed was simply hilarious! I hope they touch on that somehow in the upcoming episodes when he changes back to more Black Ranger roles.
I am madly in love with the powers draining from the keys in the Command Center into the Keys in the Rangers’ hands! That was perfect and I couldn’t have asked for anything better. I just want to know why have all the other Power Rangers lost their powers? If the Super Megaforce Rangers are using the Ninja Storm powers, is Tori suddenly struck with nausea? What happened? I hope we get to hear the story behind this as we had in Gokaiger.
The Morphing Sequence, come on. Let’s get real here. The morph is identical to Gokaiger and I loved the producers for this! The Gokaiger transformation sequence is amazing. Simple yet beautiful and I did notice that some things have changed. For example, we now have two X’s behind the Rangers instead of the XXXV for Gokaiger! THANK YOU, for changing this! It looks amazing!
In this episode, I really wish that they had changed their role call “Super Megaforce, Ready!” I wish they had utilized their colors and said, “Super Megaforce, Pink!” But, what can ya do. :/
Super Mega Rangers in Action, as we all know, this is Sentai footage of the Rangers battling their new enemies, the X-Borgs and Bruisers.
However, this footage used from Gokaiger is amazing and I fell in love with it a few years ago and here I am again loving it. I mean, look at the acrobatics and sword and gun fights! Not to mention the epic switching of the weapons giving Gia a little more #MilfyRealness PLUS she used the Saber Whips which was even more amazing to see in Power Rangers at long last.
I must admit as well, some of us were worried if Jake’s mannerisms would match up with Don from Gokaiger. I say, mission accomplished.
The Ranger Changes, were so amazing I can’t even tell you how much I squealed when this footage was shown.
In this episode we got a change into not only the Samurai, SPD, Mystic Force and Ninja Storm teams (with their skirt gender swaps!!!!!) but we were also treated to the all Legendary Red change. I had thought earlier to myself how they were going to handle GoseiRed being apart of the change in the original footage. GoseiRed was now changed to Operation Overdrive Red (for some ungodly reason) but I can appreciate how the footage was edited and changed to accommodate this change.
I could not love the Mystic Force change anymore when the Rangers actually used their Morpin Call! I cannot wait for more of this from this series, it tingles at my Fan Feelz! I do wish that they had used the SPD & Ninja Storm morphin calls for their changes as well, but I can understand with the swiftness of the footage that it may not be possible to do that. I just hope that this is a trend throughout the series.
The Villains, I was rather impressed with the villains and their respective voice actors! I was glad to see that the Barizorg character was kept, now named Argus! I am very interested in seeing what is done with his backstory.
Levira’s voice is very intriguing and it reminds me of an actress that I cannot name. Something from the olden days perhaps? Either way I absolutely am loving Rebecca Parr’s work so far!
Prince Vekar is another of those voices that am loving. I am very excited to see Walz-Gil taken in another direction. In the Power Rangers version it seems that Vekar is slightly less flamboyant. This is welcome, however in his first outing he didn’t prove the Armada to be an all mighty force in the universe.
Monsters of the Day, Headridge and Tentacus, running off a point I was trying to prove in the previous paragraph, the monsters in the first episode were rather weak and defeated quickly by the Rangers’ new powers! Headridge was shown to be particularly weak in this episode. He was simply destroyed by a Final Strike. Since Super Megaforce is squeezing two Gokaiger episodes together, there is a zord fight and other monster to contend with. So, enter Tentacus who was defeated by the new Megazord in the latter half of the episode. What can I say about these two? They were weak casualties of the first episode.
The Zord Footage, like I said earlier, there were two episodes crammed together into this premiere. It was all a little rushed and perhaps a two-parter would have better suited the story-line and characters. However we did get an epic Megazord battle against Tentacus. The Megazord showed off its amazing acrobatics and its powerful cannon! Again, no mention of why the Rangers have the Zords they have or any such thing. However, the footage is still beautiful but I have to say that I found it rather strange when the Rangers collectively said, “FULL SPEED AHEAD!” I mean, is that a Pirate reference or something? Another thing that won’t be explained.
BECAUSE PIRATES!
Troy’s obsession with RoboKnight, this is something I am not a huge fan of. I understand they were comrades and I am sure they never want to leave a Ranger behind, but come on. I much preferred the Gokaiger explanation whereas RoboKnight would’ve lost his powers and reverted to a Zord. But, so far all we see is that RoboKnight is missing, sadly I hope he stays gone for quite a while. Mad love RoboKnight, but stop the rapping.
The Ending, was probably the most disappointing thing to me in the entire episode. Don’t get me wrong, I love Mr. Burley but I was just confused by the sentiment. With the amount of disaster that is supposed to happening around the world, it appears that only 1 teacher remains and he is the most beloved. This scene just felt strange to me and rather forced and yet no mention as to why Troy gets to skip class!?
This scene would have been much better if Mr. Burley had been hurt, or done something heroic during the battle. However, he just gets a round of applause because of reasons.
Final Thoughts
While Super Megaforce had a very strong Premiere, I have to say that it would have benefited from a two-parter. I wish the powers of the Legendary Rangers had been better explained, HOW/WHY DID THEY LOSE THEIR POWERS?
This episode took fantastic advantage of all that the Sentai footage has to offer and even improved on several things. Of course we all have our tiny nitpicks here and there but all together this was a fantastic premiere for season 21 of Power Rangers.
Once again Ciara Hanna and Azim Rizk shined above all the others in their season. Jake is still as funny and goofy as ever and Gia is still ravishingly beautiful and tough as nails. I cannot get over how she is growing into the Sentai footage of Luka.
I am very happy with the first episode of Super Megaforce and I cannot wait to see the remaining episodes until FINALLY we get to see this SUPER MEGA LEGENDARY BATTLE.
Story: 9/10
Action: 10/10
Monsters: 7 /10
All Together: 8.5/10
