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Preface
Well, we got a Power Rangers Unlimited issue last year for Drakkon. It figures to have one for Ranger Slayer now.
Although her character had been given the spotlight during her debut, Beyond the Grid, Necessary Evil, and the Drakkon New Dawn series, she still has not had quite as much screen time as Lord Drakkon. But, with the events of MMPR #116, Anti-Kim is now ultimately the main character from that world, a living reminder of everything that has happened in this series because of that universe.
But how will this factor in Darkest Hour? Well, let’s see!
The Cover
It’s a fantastic cover from how it’s structured with lighting breaking out of the darkness behind Ranger Slayer and the explosion of colors from it all blending in with the Emissaries. It’s gorgeous.
The Story
As we stated above, this immediately follows the ending of MMPR #116, where Drakkon is now officially dead. Before he goes, he ends up giving Anti-Kim his Power Coin, transporting her to another part of the Grid, and leaving her with the mission of finding the Morphin’ Masters to find a way to stop Dark Specter’s infection of the Morphin’ Grid. In a forest area, she ends up finding Xi. Well, a Xi was created long ago by the Morphin’ Masters. It doesn’t know where they went just that they ‘left for the light’. Before Anti-Kim could question it more, corrupted animal spirits begin to attack her. She flees for her life when suddenly, she’s guided by a mysterious voice to a small boat.
The voice belongs to the Pink Emissary, who plans on being Anti-Kim’s guide to the Morphin’ Grid. The Emissary explains the history of the Morphin’ Masters, how they were mortal beings before stumbling into the Morphin’ Grid and transcending beyond to escape Dark Specter. She takes Anti-Kim to the Morphin’ Masters civilization, where it is abandoned due to the corruption in the Grid.
So, she then takes Anti-Kim to the Fountains of Knowledge, where they find the Billy of Anti-Kim’s world. Billy tells them that everyone in this ancient city has dipped, going further into the Grid, except the Illumination, a group of the wisest six Morphin’ Masters. He then instructs Anti-Kim to hand over Drakkon’s coin containing the White Light, which should hopefully restore them. But, Anti-Kim figures out that Billy’s not who he says he is. Instead, ‘Billy’ turns out to be a corrupted version of the Blue Emissary, who immediately attacks her. Anti-Kim manages to defeat him, blasting her arrows behind him and dropping the nearby buildings on top of him.
Later on, as they’re riding their boat to their destination, Anti-Kim reflects on her past, how this wasn’t the life she wanted for herself, and how she keeps losing even when she has nothing. The Pink Emissary replies that the road she was on was hard, implying that the Morphin’ Masters were right for their actions in doing nothing. The Ranger Slayer tells off the Emissary, that anything she has done was through her hard work alone and that the Emissary shouldn’t believe in the Morphin’ Masters, but Anti-Kim instead.
Reaching the core of the Morphin’ Grid, both Pinks find the entrance to the Illumination before being ambushed by the corrupted Green and Black Emissaries. The Emissaries claim that Dark Specter gave them back their freedom from the Morphin’ Masters, but Anti-Kim argues that they’ve just found themselves a new master, one not willing to care for the innocent. The Ranger Slayer starts to get overwhelmed and the Pink Emissary finally joins the fight, protecting Anti-Kim from death. Both corrupted Emissaries are destroyed, but the Pink Emissary gets injured in the process.
Anti-Kim carries the Pink Emissary to the Illumination, but they soon discover that the Morphin’ Masters aren’t of much help now, focusing more on getting the early bird special. The Pink Emissary soon succumbs to her wounds, becoming corrupted and losing faith in the Morphin’ Masters. Before she can try and kill them, Anti-Kim gets in her way, and the two of them fight it out. The Ranger Slayer gets overwhelmed by the amount of Legendary weapons the Emissary uses, but Anti-Kim then finishes off the Pink Emissary with an energy arrow to the gut. The Pink Emissary then falls into Anti-Kim’s arms, thanking Anti-Kim for doing this before telling her that she believes the other Emissaries can still be saved.
And, so the issue ends with Anti-Kim coming to a realization. The Pink Emissary had told her before they let people fall so that they could grow stronger. All of the pain and suffering Anti-Kim had been through was to let her become strong enough to face whatever came her way. This is the start of her story as she walks away from the Morphin’ Masters, saying that it’s up to us to save ourselves.
She’s not going into the light. She’s jumping back into the darkness.
Ending Thoughts
I planned on reading a story about the Ranger Slayer… Wasn’t prepared to read a story about finding God, essentially.
For all of the Darkest Hour content we have gotten, this is the most concise perfect pacing of action and character development. Darkest Hour’s issues have been slow for a while and then with the more recent ones, struggle a lot more to balance the two without it feeling forced in some areas. This issue, without a doubt, delivers satisfying action sequences with the Ranger Slayer while exploring Anti-Kim’s character fully removed from Drakkon and the World of the Coinless.
The events of Drakkon’s world indeed shaped her life more than anything, but she’s more than just her relationship with Drakkon. Anti-Kim has suffered more than anyone else. She lost her family, her friends, her life. She lost herself when she became Ranger Slayer, going against everything she stood for. She had to fight for so long even after being freed, participating in both ‘Beyond the Grid’ and ‘Necessary Evil’. She returned to her world, even getting a second chance to rebuild and start clean. And, then, even that was flat-out ruined. And, just recently, she recently lost Drakkon. Whether or not there are feelings between the two of them, it’s another reminder to Anti-Kim that she lost her sense of herself again by killing one more person from her life, leaving her more alone.
In the sense of this story, she has lost faith in God, in anyone coming to save the day and make everything better. She goes on this journey through this mystical landscape to find them with the Pink Emissary, someone who’s a stout believer in them. They both develop with each other. Anti-Kim shows the Pink Emissary that action must be taken to reach your goals. And, then, when the Pink Emissary loses her faith as well, Anti-Kim acknowledges that faith is just as important as action, giving her the strength to fight rather than give into despair. Anti-Kim will be on her own for the next part of Darkest Hour, but she now has the tools she needs to continue forward. I absolutely can’t praise the storytelling and the message enough. It is phenomenal. Morphinomenal.
Speaking of Darkest Hour, as something that is supposed to be part of this grand scale event for Power Rangers, it does an amazing job connecting to the lore that’s been building. It’s been inferred for a while who the Emissaries were, but its finally name dropped that the Emissaries are indeed the Squadron Rangers presented in the Power Rangers Universe mini-series. That also ties in a lot to how the Morphin’ Masters are presented here. And, this is actually the first time we get to see these guys in action as the Emissaries. The fight scenes with them, along with the complimenting environments, bring this intense energy to them and deliver some awesome moments like the Black Emissary slicing the Bow of Darkness with the Bison Axe.
Power Rangers Unlimited: the Morphin’ Masters is an intense yet emotional journey through the Morphin’ Grid, showing our Ranger Slayer at her absolute lowest and finding the strength and faith to save the universe in our Darkest Hour.
Random Thoughts from the Morphin’ Grid
- So, as of now, this is straight-up my favorite in terms of Power Rangers Unlimited one-shots. Hyperforce is #2, Heir to Darkness is #3, followed by Edge of Darkness, the Death Ranger, Countdown to Ruin, and Coinless.
- Also, let’s just get this out of the way now. Too much pink energy is dangerous.
- So… Lord Drakkon and the Ranger Slayer had Date Nights underwater?
- Those animal spirits that attacked Anti-Kim are presumably based on the spirits of Rangers like how the green dragon and white tiger had formed a long time ago with Lord Drakkon’s stuff. Gold mantis and orange scorpion are obviously based on Beast Morphers Gold and the Cosmic Fury Orange Zord. That rhino could be either based on Jungle Fury Rhino and the Wild Force Rhino judging from the coloring. With Red Lion, eh, there’s multiple options for that: Lost Galaxy, Wild Force, Samurai, Ninja Steel, Hyperforce, and Cosmic Fury. That Yellow Bear could be either the Ninja Zord from MMPR S3 or the RPM Bear Crawler, but I choose to believe it’s RPM just because it shows the range of the multiverse currently. There’s only one Red Gorilla Zord from Jungle Fury, but there’s also an option from Super Sentai that could tease them.
- Ok, so, the Illumination symbols shown here don’t resemble the symbols for the Morphin’ Masters here, but they represent the symbols for the Morphin’ Masters shown in the actual TV show, more specifically Dino Fury. But, the only difference is that the TV show had Gold, but this has yellow. But then again, they could be interchangeable based on shading…
- Kim’s favorite color is turquoise, a mix of blue and green. Yeah, I can see why that would be one of her favorites…
- Blue Emissary: “And your head was prettier when it was long!” Ranger Slayer: “Liar!” I found this exchange pretty funny, but honestly, Kim’s hair has never been that long. She always tied it up in a ponytail, so it’s not that jarring to see different versions of her. Though, she looks prettier here than her appearance in Necessary Evil.
- So, yeah, there’s a Dino Thunder Pink somewhere? Look I can accept color mistakes on my variant covers, I’ve seen it before, but to put it in an actual story moment, it immediately makes me question everything.
- Zayto, when you come here and eventually become senile like these guys, could you at least offer your guests imaginary cake instead?
- Hey, remember when we found out that if an Emissary dies, they end up turning into an Empyreal bent on destroying the universe? Is that ever going to be addressed for the Pink Emissary…? I know we have enough problems now, but still!
- Regarding the Morphin’ Masters, I will say it’s my one disappointment with the comic. Ignoring that the show’s version shown here is different from this comic’s version, I just hate their depiction here. Yes, I agree with the overall decision at the end for Anti-Kim and the Rangers to handle this mess on their own. But, I didn’t want to see the Morphin’ Masters as people that essentially belong in a retirement home. I wanted them to show what they’ve learned from all of their years in the Grid, and show their attitude to the whole thing rather than act senile. Show that there’s more to growing up and meeting your end than just acting like they were. If you needed a reason for them to not help, you had one. The initial reason they ran in here was because they wanted to escape Dark Specter. Well, make use of that. Say that they created all of these Rangers or artifacts throughout history, but won’t act themselves because they are deathly afraid of him even after centuries.
