Yesterday's episode of PR Samurai, Day Off, was the first episode that we truly got dialog from all the main characters and got to see their acting abilities. The episode was based off of Shinkenger's episode 5. For me, it was an ok episode. It was better than the premiere but not as good as last week's episode. The dialog was a bit better, mostly because we got a fair amount of lines from everyone. But once again we got a MOTW that had plenty of cheesy lines, though not as much as the first episode. However, I did think the MOTW's southern accent was pretty cool. I was also waiting for them to shout out "big bad beetlezord" when the Beetlezord was introduced.
Still, the acting just isn't up to par, even by Power Rangers standards. Hector David (Mike) so far seems like the only truly competent actor so far. Alex Heartman (Jayden) and Erika Fong (Mia) are as wooden as a statue and seem to only be reading their lines instead of acting them out. There are many people complaining about Najee De-Tiege's (Kevin) acting, but I actually prefer his acting over Jayden's and Mia's actors. Unlike those two, Najee is actually trying to act. He may be overacting at times, but contrary to what others have said, I think sometimes overacting is better than underacting. At least when someone overacts you get a sense that they are trying to display emotion, where as with underacting characters like Jayden, you just get a blank face. From what I saw of Brittany Pirtle (Emily), I didn't think her acting was bad at all. She was sufficient for the role she got in this episode, though to be honest her lines didn't require a lot of acting talent either. Next week will be her character focus episode, so we'll see how Britanny's acting turns out. Mentor Ji's acting was pretty solid.
The other issue is how to use Bulk and Spike. First I want to say that some of the hatred for Spike on rangerboard is a bit over the top. I don't find him annoying or a "Skull ripoff." He's suppose to be Skull's son and he's acts just like Skull, including all of Skull's quirks such as his laughs. Really, I think if Spike's that annoying, than Skull should be considered likewise. As for Bulk and Spike's parts in this week's episode, it was a flashback to the MMPR opening credits with them eating cotton candy at a fair. A nice little wink at the nostalgic fans. But the problem so far is that unlike MMPR-In Space, there's no real sense of connection to the main plot or interaction with the rangers. It seems like they're just there as fan service. Perhaps this was because Paul Schrier was casted really late to reprise his role as Bulk, so hopefully we'll actually see them interact with the main characters eventually.
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