1.38 A Bad Reflection on You

Episode 38, Season 1

A Bad Reflection on You

Writer: Peggy Nicoll

Director: Robert Hughes

Episode Summary:

Scorpina is tasked with a mission alongside The Twin Man – duplicate the Rangers and ruin their goody reputation.  These “evil” rangers wear sunglasses and chew gum and go on dates with Skull, so you know they’re bad news.  They’re so bad, they put laundry soap in the water fountain so Principal Caplan would get creamed in the face with a bunch of laundry soap.

That said, our teens get detention for the “evil” rangers crime!  In detention, we learn that Bulk is sadly illiterate.  Rather than pity him for spelling his own name incorrectly, the “good” Rangers laugh at him.  He pulls out a massive feast his mother packed him for detention and once again they laugh at his unfortunate battle with obesity.  Through Bulk’s television set he brought to detention, we learn that the “evil” Rangers are attacking ordinary citizens with lawn chairs – IT’S MADNESS!

 

Zack confuses Bulk and Skull with this concept of “counting” so they can morph of there and save their reputations.  The “good” Rangers battle the “evil” rangers –  “evil” pink tricks Trini into kicking “good” Kimberly - who turns out to be a putty in disguise.  We uncover the Big Bad – The Twin Man and beat him with the power weapons.

We transport back into detention and watch as Bulk and Skull are sentenced to another detention because the Rangers are big fat liars.

Facts:

-First on-screen – All

-First line – “Mr Caplan – can we give you a hand?” - Billy

-Focus – All

-Last Line – “Get a life.” - Zack

-Bulk spells his name “Buulk”

-The actual Rangers do not appear until 4:30 into the episode

-Sunglasses and gum = up to no good

Observations:

This is quite an enjoyable episode.  Obviously the same actors play both the evil and good Rangers, but all five of them differentiate their evil counterparts enough to make it believable that they actually are being framed.  We also learn that, yet again, evil Billy dresses much better than and is way cooler than real Billy.  I want to give credit to Trini for being the most believable of the five – everyone else performed caricatures of themselves where as her “bad” was much more subtle and evil in a way.

The unmorphed sequences show the actors have some decent acting chops, I don’t think a story-line like this could be pulled off with the same amount of believability by the cast of Samurai . . . but maybe Megaforce.  This episode brings the five rangers back to their roots before Tommy.  It’s a good standalone story that is just fun to watch.  We don’t progress the story any and we don’t earn any new weapons, but we don’t need to – the mid-season finale is about to come up (*spoiler alert*) in the next two episodes.

The thing is – this “evil” Rangers story line works so well in this episode I wouldn’t be surprised if we see it again . . . and maybe again . . . and possibly even again.  Obviously if something works well, do it over and over and over.

1.37 Clean-up Club

Episode 37, Season 1

Clean-up Club

Writer: Mark Hoffmeier

Director: Terence H. Winkless

Episode Summary:

Mrs Applebee is teaching another generic lesson plan which involves our students showing videos of their projects.  Bulk and Skull are filming a documentary while Trini shows off her editing skills in a video about Pollution Problems in Angel Grove (a VERY 1993 message).  Trini’s video essay is – in a word – perfect.  It brings Billy to talk about O-zone depletion and the effects pollution will have on the earth – silly Billy, there’s no such thing as global warming OR a hole in the O-zone layer!

Rita sends the Pollutacorn to tackle Trini’s clean-up efforts while Jason and Zack have a playful interaction karate chopping bottles and cans as founding members of the Clean Up Club.  Our teens dance and flip away the hours while cleaning up the trash in Angel Grove park proving that not only do they save the world by fighting monsters – they also do community service.  Putties mess up their groove while Pollutacorn dirties up Angel Grove again. But who’s really the monster?  Pollutacorn or the people who dirtied up Angel Grove to begin with?

Zordon calls his Rangers back so Billy can perform a situation analysis with Alpha – which I guess is what the kids are calling it these days?  We learn that to defeat Pollutacorn we must chop off his horn – which Jason does using his newly acquired Dragon Shield and Dragon Dagger – Tommy eat your heart out.  We call on Megazord, downtown Angel Grove is destroyed yet again but at least we got rid of all the pollution!  A newscast thanks the Rangers for saving the world yet again with no mention of who will pay to repair the damages.  Again.

Facts:

-First on-screen – Billy

-First line – “My video project is called “Pollution Problems in Angel Grove” - Trini

-Focus – Trini

-The Power Rangers are noticed by the public at large, but identities unknown

-Jason uses Dragon Shield in battle . . . again

-cleaning up dirty parks is cool!

Observations:

The episode itself isn’t heavy in moving the story for the season along – it’s yet another stand-alone episode (of which there are many in MMPR) but it’s entertaining to watch.  While the episode may seem PSA heavy, I don’t find this terribly out of character for a kids/teen show in 1993.  Just look at every episode of Saved by the Bell ever.  There is a subtlety to the message though, while they do beat you over the head with “pollution is bad” you discover this through a genuine interest on the teens part to help the world.  They’re super heroes who save the world every day – it’s not an unnatural thing for them to be interested in this.

I think there is an innocence in this episode that can go under-appreciated.   I could easily be annoyed with how preachy this episode is (and in fact, if an episode of the current Power Rangers Megaforce copied this story line I would find it incredibly annoying) – but I shouldn’t be.  They are teenagers in high school, these are the sorts of things teenagers do.  High schoolers learn about climate change and pollution and many of them have to fulfill customer service hours for graduation.  While the actors are obviously in their 20's in these scenes, you have to remember they’re portraying high school teenagers.

Looking at it in context, this episode and its story have held up.  I’m actually kind of impressed with that.  It’s not what I would consider a stand-out episode, but it reminds me of why I watched this every morning before school.

Also, re-watching I am really learning to appreciate Jason as a Red Ranger.  And I am loving the way the DragonShield looks on the red tyranno costume.