Hello! Welcome to my first review of the 25th season of Power Rangers, Super Ninja Steel! I will have to say that this season is actually off to a good start with the return of some of my favorite old foes, Madame Odius has taken her seat on the throne and there’s even an a new addition of a pretty cool Female villain! However, you always know there’s the salty with the sweet but we’ll leave that for the end! Let’s take a look back at some of my favorite moments from the first episode “Echoes of Evil”!
Sledge’s Crew Returns: I for sure wasn’t really expecting Sledge’s crew to return in the premiere but I was sooo happy to see them! I was even happier to see that Poisandra was included in the return! For some reason, I had the fear that she would be left behind and that we would only see Sledge and Wrench. But, just to see the crew again from Dino Charge made me feel so good and it was such a breath of fresh air to have them in this series! Of course there is still that little inkling in the back of mind that is confused about the whole wormhole plot line, but it hurts my brain too much to even begin to make sense of it so I’ll just go along with it, haha.
I am so curious about how the crew is going to be used going forward!
Oh how I missed Poisandra so much, but where is Curio!?
Madame Odius & Sledge: With the return of Sledge and his crew that meant that we were treated to the team heading into the badly damaged Galaxy Warriors stage! Now that was a sight to see! But, what I really enjoyed was seeing Madame Odius and Sledge interact and at first attempt to show each other who was more powerful.
My favorite part of this interaction was how Sledge tries to trick Madame Odius into getting the asteroid explaining to her that his wife Poisandra just simply loves rocks! Loves ’em! A real geologist!
Strange though that several of the prisoners he took along with him didn’t talk or weren’t mentioned by name. We know that two of them were from ToQger, but what function do they serve? I hope we get to find out in the future!
Which is it?: Ninja Super Steel or Super Ninja Steel? It seems at some times they seem to follow the title of the show and sometimes they follow it backwards. Then we are further confused by the toys which change it as well. I suppose you can call it whatever you please then?
Badonna: I am already in love with Badonna! From her name, to the suit (which I liked in Ninninger, except for that creepy hairlip), to the crazy accent which translates to that lisp sound and to her nasty double-cross against Sledge. I found it pretty great of her to make a deal with Madame Odius and extract the Ninja Super Steel from the asteroid without Sledge noticing!
Even though I am despising the fart jokes, at least she made a good comeback claiming that if she did fart hers would smell like perfume. That at least made me chuckle a little.
Badonna is a welcome addition to the villains and I am glad that there is another Female villain!
Madame Odius in Charge!: Can you believe that there hasn’t been a head Female Villain in charge since Queen Bansheera from Lightspeed Rescue? Yeah, it’s been that long! I was delighted to see that Odius sat upon Galvanax’s throne and was completely in charge because I was afraid that somehow a male villain was going to take charge somehow. I am loving that she is the one in charge and to be honest her first plan was pretty great! I mean, she stole Ninja Super Steel and almost turned the Ninja Nexus Prism evil to create her own Ninja Power Stars! Whether or not that it failed, it was a good plan!
I am interested in whether or not that Sledge will team up with her again! Werk that throne Odius!
Preston’s Magic: This is a strange opinion that I have so bear with me. I loved how Preston was hiding with his dapper hat and trench-coat and used his magic, that was so cute! I am also loving how much that Preston is actually actively using his magic! However, is it just me or are the strange wordings of the spells turning anyone else off?
It was a little different for me in Mystic Force, but for some reason when the words are spoken in Ninja Steel it just seems off to me and I almost kind of don’t want him to speak at all when magic is used. Strange opinion, I know!
Smellephant: Interesting design for a monster for sure and I will give kudos for the usage of this monster to make short work of the Monster Repellant! He sucked that right up and then we moved on!
The Return of the Rangers’ Powers: So, we were moving right along with Madame Odius’ plan to make the Ninja Nexus Prism evil and make her own stars, she’s cackling, almost finished with her evil plan! Then suddenly, she gets knocked off her plan and then a sudden appearance of ALL of the Rangers’ Ninja Power Stars they had lost during the finale episode. Wow, that was waaaaaay too easy. I mean they fought with Badonna and Smellephant for like 4 minutes before the Prism returned their Power Stars and that was it; they’re back. That was a pretty weak return and then when they did we got a decent “It’s Morphin’ Time” but it felt like it fell a little flat to me. This episode was FANTASTIC for the return of the Villains, but the Rangers not so much.
Victor & Monty: I simply cannot repeat myself in my reviews and bore you so let’s keep this brief.
Somehow it was very predictable that these two were going to sell Monty’s farts after the finale because they are just those kind of people. Somehow, without much proof, the citizens around town bought into it that the bottled farts made the monsters go away during the summer break and that somehow made the guys a lot of money and made them famous!
While it was very nice of them to donate a million dollars to the school it was a back-handed donation to get a golden statue of Victor on school property. Guh…
Happily, Smellephant to the rescue! He was able to bring the truth about that their bottled farts didn’t repel monsters after all and suddenly all of those people wanted their money back. Victor and Monty were left in shambles and penniless begging to be let back in school. This episode would’ve been a high “A” without this lame segment wasting our time.
With the opening episode being pretty decent I am attempting to keep my hopes up that the 25th Anniversary season of Power Rangers can keep the momentum up! At least, that’s what I am going to keep telling myself because I love this franchise!
This episode focused on the villains more so than on the Rangers which I absolutely loved, but there seems like there needs to be a balance. The Rangers don’t need to take a back seat to the Villains, but I think this happened because we are wasting time on the incredibly awful comic relief. There have been times in Power Rangers history when the comic relief characters have been amazing and welcome to the plot, even adding to it. However, these two seasons don’t seem to be one of them.
I could be wrong, maybe in the coming episodes Victor and Monty could do something amazing to change everyone’s opinions; doubtful. If only their time was reduced and we fleshed out the Rangers more with a great balance with the Villains! If that happens I think certain issues people have with this season could be resolved.
Next week’s episode seems to be an interesting filler so, Until Next Week!