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Preface
The Power Rangers franchise is in a bit of limbo right now.
Don’t get me wrong. 2021 overall was a busy year for Power Rangers. There are so many Lightning Collection pre-orders announced it’s hard to keep track. Battle for the Grid just hit their fourth season of character packs. There are tons of other companies getting licensed PR merch to release soon. Dino Fury, not only, is a great season for the young audience but is getting good advertising and marketing (something I didn’t see from Beast Morphers).
In terms of the future, however… we have no idea what’s happening.
We got tons of MMPR content coming (they just announced a Godzilla crossover a few weeks back). But, besides knowing that Dino Fury Season 2 will premiere exclusively on Netflix, we don’t know if there’s any non-MMPR content coming except for this.
But still. A limited series that plans to delve more into Power Rangers lore? That’s always going to get me excited.
The Cover
Actually a really great cover here. Love the energy swirling around this new hero debuting in this series and the whole red aesthetic with various Red Rangers from the franchise. It presents itself as a cool anthology series and I’m all for it.
(And, what’s cool is that all of the Red Rangers here do have some franchise significance. MMPR Red and Omega Red because they’re the current Red Rangers for the comics, TJ because he’s the first African American Red Ranger, Lauren because she’s the first female (good) Red Ranger, and Hyperforce Red because he was the first American-exclusive Red Ranger.)
The Story
Flashback Land takes place far, far, far in the past where a white figure known as the Morphinaut is about to enter a dimensional space that contains the Morphin’ Grid. As the Morphinaut steps inside and looks around, he realizes he’s not alone as a dark presence attacks. The Morphinaut can’t stop the dark presence on his own so he destroys the portal, trapping him inside and leaving his lab partner and his wife, Chendil, alone in the real world.
Exactly 584 years later, Ori, another scientist, is using the Morphinaut’s lab as a clubhouse of sorts, attempting to power up the Proto-Arch, the portal the Morphinaut used to enter the Morphin’ Grid before. Meanwhile, Rhian, a Morphin’ Master/teenager with attitude, overhears a conversation where two other Masterforges (cities with an Arch aka portals to the Morphin’ Grid) went offline and their Masterforge is the only one left. Officials in their city, including Vivali, Rhian’s mother, are rushing to evacuate everyone through their portal.
Realizing that something’s going on, Rhian contacts her friends Telosi and Phiro and tells them about a video that shows what happened at one of the other forges. Telosi, in particular, is concerned that their friend Xev, who was at one of the attacked forges, hasn’t been in contact with anyone.
The three of them meet Ori at their super-secret hideout, along with another one of their friends, Aleia. With Ori’s help, they hack into the computers labeled top-secret and see a video of a dark entity attacking an Arch and the Arch being shut down before everyone could get inside. As everyone ponders over the events of the video, Ori notices some bright lights in the sky, the same lights that were seen in the video.
The five Morphin’ Masters run back to the Arch in the city, but before they go through, someone is shot out of the Arch. Kartok, Ori’s brother, urges them to come through the Arch, but Ori and the others do not want to abandon someone possibly in trouble and so they run to the person’s location. The person, in question, is the Morphinaut. The Morphinaut tries to warn the five of them that someone is coming but is in constant pain from the Grid energy surrounding them.
Ori then figures out why everyone is being rushed to ascend to the Morphin’ Grid. It’s not just to protect their own lives. It’s to stop something from getting out…
Ending Thoughts
Power Rangers Universe #1 is daunting, to say the least.
We have a brand new writer for the PR franchise, Nicole Andelfinger. Nicole has worked on fantasy graphic novels as well as novels based on existing properties like Regular Show and Steven Universe. And, in a way, this issue showcases her experience in a way, taking these fantasy elements of these demonic entities coming and combining them with the PR sci-fi elements established by the comics so far with the Arches and the Morphin’ Masters. Nicole did a great job of creating this foundation for an engaging world and grounded characters with a lot of potential to create more lore for Power Rangers.
But, here’s the thing. Establishing a brand new setting and a whole cast of characters is a big task to accomplish. There was so much lore to set up that this issue has a lot of dialogue in it. A lot. As much as I am interested in seeing where this story will go, I did need a reread or two to keep track of who all the characters were and their relationships with each other. So, I can understand if there are readers out there who aren’t into this yet or feel lost.
Art-wise, we have Simone Ragazzoni, the same artist from Drakkon New Dawn and the previous Power Rangers Unlimited one-shots. And, just like in those stories, we get environments that are just filled with so much detail to them. Every character design is distinct and so if you’re not able to remember each character’s name, you remember who they are based on their fabulous outfit. All of this in a style that’s sharp and angular that highlights the characters and the important details. Mattia Iacono is in charge of the coloring. You might know him from Radiant Black and the bright and radiant colors from that series is perfect for this new sci-fi setting.
Power Rangers Universe #1 juggles a lot of Morphin’ Grid mumbo jumbo and a brand new cast of characters but lays a solid foundation for the beginning of these Morphin’ Masters and what mysteries the Morphin’ Grid can hold.
Random Thoughts from the Morphin’ Grid
- Honestly, I don’t know what I want to see from this series other than some glimpse for the Dino Fury Rangers. As of now, they’re the only team we haven’t seen at all in comic book form. Even Beast Morphers got in before their series debuted. I would like to see something for Dino Fury. Even if it’s just a variant cover.
- I do want to know the backstory behind this “surprise party” that got Aleia all scared.
- Didn’t mention it before, but I honestly really do like the concept of the Morphin’ Hearts being expanded on more. We never got that much of an explanation on what it was back during Shattered Grid so it’s cool to see it here. (That said, now I gotta keep reading to find out if there’s any explanation as to how Drakkon getting that gave him the power to rewrite reality.)
- One thing for sure to keep in mind with this series is that our closest comparison to this is going to be Beyond the Grid. A brand new cast of Rangers that many readers aren’t familiar with in a sci-fi setting in a story that is focusing on the Morphin’ Grid and attempting to add something to the big scope of PR history. There are a good chunk of readers that weren’t that satisfied with Beyond the Grid so this is a second chance for the comics to see if we can have a Power Rangers story without the main MMPR cast behind it.
