Saban's buy-back of Power Rangers has generated excitement among the fan base for a number of resons. To start off, the Disney era finally comes to a merciful end. It was during the first Saban era that Power Rangers was in its glory days. While there's excitement and anticipation of the new Power Rangers series coming up next year it won't be easy to bring back the glory days of the 1990's.
Saban must (and will) recognize that the fan base is much older today than it was in 1993. Power Rangers is and always will be a kids show. Old school fans such as myself recognize this, but one of the areas where Disney went wrong is they made the show "too kiddy." Saban has also been guilty of this during Turbo when they added a kid (Justin, played by Blake Foster) to the show to try to appeal more to kids. Saban quickly recognized this mistake and there hasn't been a kid on the show since.
Lessons can be learned starting with In Space. With the fan base by then getting a little older, the shows writers and producers recognized they needed to change. Better story writing and character development, as well as slightly more mature scenes (such as rangers actually getting hurt and/or dying) helped save the franchise from cancelation. I believe these elements will be needed for the new season to appeal to the older fan base. While Power Rangers can't have the maturity level, the violence, exc. thats in Super Sentai because American standards won't allow it, the show still has some room for maturity.
It also could help if Power Rangers could somehow reference the past. Among the ideas I've read from Sean Akizuki's blog would be to bring Zordon back or to have rangers from Eltar. Bringing Zordon back (or a ranger) for an entire season may be a bit too much. As I discussed on one of my earlier blogs, while Dino Thunder was praised by most PR fans for bringing Tommy back and reconnecting with the past, it also recieved its fair share of criticism for some of the Parody's it had with MMPR (which I also mention is not entirely the show's fault). However, having a former ranger guest star or rangers from Eltar could work. My idea would be the new rangers gained powers or Zords related through Zordon and they discover the connection through a former ranger like Tommy or Andros.
Shinkenger for me makes better Power Rangers than Goseiger ever will. In fact, it's room for new potentials like the first Asian red ranger.
ReplyDeleteWhen Saban had a kid ranger in Turbo, well some may get reminded of Kou in Dairanger. In fact, some MMPR fans call Kou as "Justin disgracing Tommy" provided they knew the adaptation prior to the original.
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