Thursday, March 23, 2017

Power Rangers - The 21st Century Reboot of Popular 1990s Kids TV series

My wife and I got to know that this movie would be playing in Indonesia in March 2017. However, we did not have a clue when it was supposed to play as the Indonesian cinema chains' social medias did not clearly indicate when it would premier. Then suddenly a tweet from Cinema 21 mentioned it would start playing on 22 March. Apparently the movie only played in this cinema chain. No wonder there was not a lot of news surrounding it. Anyway, we decided to watch this film first rather than another movie that also premiered on the same day (which I would see that one probably on Friday). So we will go straight to the movie, then.

Brief Story Line

Jason Scott (Dacre Montgomery) was a high school student with bright future ahead of him. But due to some incident related to a prank, he was punished to go to detention class for the rest of the year and no longer allowed to play football. This made his father (David Denman - 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi) very upset. During his detention period, he befriended with an autistic student named Billy (RJ Cyler - Me and Earl and the Dying Girl). There was also another girl in detention named Kimberly (Naomi Scott - The 33, Terra Nova TV series etc).

One night, when Jason and Billy went to an ex mine to scavenge, they met with Kimberly and a fellow Angel Grove high school student named Zack (Ludi Lin - Monster Hunt) who seemed to spent a lot of time there. They also met with another mysterious girl named Trini (the singer Becky G) who apparently also went to the same school but kept her profile very low.

When they found some mysterious different color coins, they immediately take them. From the moment these coins were in their hands, their lives suddenly changed. They tried to find out what these coins were all about and they realized that these were ancient coins which were supposed to be found by the worthy people who would be tasked with protecting an ancient Zeo crystal. This crystal if taken by the wrong people would lead to the destruction of earth.

With the help from a small android called Alpha 5 (voiced by Bill Hader - TrainwreckThe Angry Birds Movie etc) and their mentor Zordon (Bryan Cranston - Why Him?Get A Job etc), the five of these high school students must learn the hard way on how to guard the crystal and defend it from the grasp of a powerful witch named Rita Repulsa (Elizabeth Banks - The Hungers series, Pitch Perfect etc). 

So could these 5 teenagers learn to be the real Power Rangers and morphed into their famous suits? Could they find the Zeo crystal that had been hidden for 65 million years? Would they be able to set aside their petty differences and become one major force to fight the large armies and the very huge Goldar created by Rita? Find them all in this exciting new adventure movie.

End of Brief Story Line

My wife and I were pretty entertained with this movie. It was quite full of humor and fun all around. Watching the new Power Rangers suits were also pretty cool, especially if we compared against the suits from the original TV series back in the 1990s. Of course the special effects in this movie was pretty amazing. The CGI was done pretty nicely and neat. Loved the action sequence in the last part of the movie during the fight between the Rangers and Goldar. Sound effects were good, and maybe would be more amazing if you see in Dolby Atmos theaters.

After watching it for full 2 hours, the movie duration seemed to be just nice. It was not too rushed in the process of characters introduction and the time spent for the training to become the Power Rangers felt sufficient. It did not take too long or too short, and still have enough time for the big finale. Overall, the pace of the movie felt just perfect. The movie had brief moments of jokes that felt more appropriate for teenagers and not suitable for children. So I feel that the movie seemed to be aimed more for teenagers rather than for children, although the original series were actually shown in kids TV. This is also the reason why a lot of adults also watched this movie to reminiscent the good fun time when they watched the series (my wife was a great example of this audience).

In addition, the movie also had some cheesy moments and felt very light. There was no over-complication of plots, just a simple good old fashion pop corn movie to be enjoyed without over thinking. For this kind of movie, people should not expect a deep conversation and various twists. This is a movie that I feel would provide the fans of the original series satisfaction. Almost all the characters were there in the movie, with of course other characters that might join the sequels (if this movie was successful enough, fingers crossed). Though I had a feeling that the movie might be too light for general audience and did not wow the movie critics, so there is a possibility that the commercial success might be lesser than expected. Of course, I could be wrong and it became huge and popular that the sequels would keep on coming.

As I said above, this movie was based on the popular TV series titled Mighty Morphin Power Rangers for 3 seasons produced by Haim Saban, which spawned to 2 movies. So this is actually a 3rd movie in the so-called franchise. It was adapted from the Japanese superhero team series from Toei called Super Sentai. This movie also had some brief interesting scene during the mid end-credit part. But there was nothing at the very end. So there is no need to wait till the very last scene if you are in a rush to the restroom. 

So if you are looking for a fun light team of superheroes movie based on the popular 1990s TV series, then you would not be disappointed and you would be entertained by this. But if you are looking for a heavier super hero movies from popular comic books like Marvel comics or DC comics kind, then this might not be your thing. Especially if you are expecting a heavy drama full of logics kind of movie. The choice is yours.

Happy watching!

Mike's movie moments rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

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