MMPR Season 2 Episode 10: Welcome to Venus Island

Magical Island Located By Observing Weather Patterns
Innocent Bystander Shot At, Was Rare in 1994

What's this? Are my eyes deceiving me? An episode with Trini in the central role? Okay Power Rangers you've burned me too many times before, what's the catch? Is there some annoying little kid hanging around the whole time? Is Tommy going to bust in and take the lion's share of this episode's focus? Is the episode going to waffle around for the first 10 minutes and essentially ignore Trini until the morphed fight starts?

Worry not everyone, this week Power Rangers is going for the hat trick.

Trini, Tommy, and Kimberly enjoy some nice R and R on the beach with Trini's neighbor Hallie, a character who exists only to be a MacGuffin in this episode. The four beach bums build a sand castle while Hallie tells the teens she'll be a sleeping princess and can wait for a handsome prince to come rescue her. Which is exactly what I want the first line of an episode to be. A nice healthy dose of female character dialogue right out of the 90's.

Trini tells her to make some nice tall castle walls so she can give the prince a challenge when he comes to save her. You see, not only do all women want a man to save them, they also want the man to bust his ass to come save them in the process, or else he wasn't worth their time. Beep Boop. Human Female Interaction Portrayed Successfully.

I'm not even a minute in and I already feel like turning this off.

Trini spots her episode-long flame Richie walking on the beach and starts visibly becoming moist over how handsome he is. The two exchange some PG rated fuck eyes while Kimberly brings the room down and starts talking about Hallie. Yeah Kim, she's Trini's neighbor whose parents let her hang out with strangers, can you please just let Trini enjoy the one piece of ass in this town who notices her?

But Richie isn't the only hunk on the beach. In fact there are two more hanging around ready to make their mark on history. Bulk and Skull have another plan guaranteed to fail in their attempt to discover the Rangers' identities. The two have dressed up as Putties in order to get the Rangers to show up. They proceed to dance around the beach while warbling like idiots, and for some reason the teens aren't convinced. I can't imagine why, their disguises are flawless.

The pie tin Z's are an inspired touch.

Lord Zedd is infuriated that someone is mocking his mentally handicapped death squad and sends the Z-Putties down to Earth to teach them a lesson. No that's actually his reasoning for dispatching the Putties today. Because Bulk and Skull pissed him off. I kind of love that to be honest with you. 

This is where things get really convoluted. Goldar begs to be involved in this plan because he's yet to do anything that matters this season. Zedd allows him to accompany the Putties to Earth, but only if he brings a bottle containing secret instructions with him. Because much like a genie in a bottle, you need to rub Zedd the right way. So instead of telling Goldar what he wants done, Zedd wrote down his directions and put them inside of a bottle that he has to take with him to Earth. Literally none of this plan makes sense, and only gets stupider the more you think about it.

Goldar just heard Zedd tell the Putties to kidnap Hallie (of course), so what more instruction does Goldar need? Make sure not to eat her while you're there? Bring back some sand in a bottle for Squatt? Who the fuck does Zedd need to keep his instructions secret from? You guys are on the goddamned Moon. Of course there's a perfectly dumb reason for this nonsense, so I'll just chalk this secret bottle garbage up to lazy writing so we can all move on with our lives.

Goldar appears somewhere on the edge of the beach with the Putties already in possession of Hallie. 

The evil aliens vanish just as Trini, Kimberly, and Tommy show up, and leave them terrified of what Zedd could have planned. Kimberly then picks up a bottle out of the sand and tries to inform her friends that Goldar dropped it. Unfortunately she has trouble telling them because Jason David Frank steps all over her line with one he had forgotten to say earlier. You would think it wouldn't take that much time to have your actors read three lines again, but when you have another 40 scripts to shoot in the day, you have to cut corners somewhere.

Kimberly opens the bottle before Tommy can interrupt her again, and a cheap looking energy swirl takes the form of Lord Zedd's face before burning a message into the sand. Power Rangers scholars among you may now add some more canon into your series grimoire, because judging from Lord Zedd's message, the evil emperor has the same grasp of reading and writing as Charlie Kelly.

Goldar would make a killer Nightman.

When Goldar returns to the palace, he boasts to Lord Zedd that he was able to kidnap a small child  with relatively few difficulties. Zedd asks Goldar what he did with the instructions, and Goldar completely bullshits Zedd and says he lost them "in the battle." By battle he of course means when he told the Putties to kidnap an 8 year old while he stood around and laughed. Certainly a harrowing experience, believe you me.

Thankfully Lord Zedd immediately calls him out on how goddamned stupid he is and responds to this claim with "A BATTLE?! With a little girl? Poor Goldar…it must have been fierce." Jesus Christ I love Lord Zedd so much. All of that stupidly convenient shit with Goldar dropping the secret bottle is almost made worthwhile just because of how bad Zedd takes him to task for losing it after the zero struggle Goldar encountered on the beach. In fact, Goldar's excuse is so pathetic it almost makes you think the episode is showing self-awareness. Then you remember what show you're watching.

Lord Zedd realizes if the Rangers know where he's keeping Hallie, he can use her as a bargaining chip to force them to surrender the rest of Tommy's power. Couldn't go one week without bringing up that old chestnut could we?

Inside of the Command Center, Billy scans a copy of Lord Zedd's illiterate message to Goldar. He soon decodes it, and finds that it contains orders for Goldar to bring Hallie to Venus Island where she will join them forever. Lord Zedd must be getting desperate to find new recruits if he's kidnapping little kids to become his army of War Boys. That or he's portrayed by Jeffrey Jones this week.

The Ranger Teens ask what this Venus Island place is all about, and Zordon starts making up a bunch of shit about how it only exists when Zedd calls it forth. An explanation which is meant to tell the viewers, "He could do this any time he wants to, but he's only going to do it this week and we'll never bring it up again."

I liked Venus Island better when it was the Island of Illusion.

Jason asks how they can possibly get to Venus Island, and if their magical teleporting skills may be of some use in accessing this locale. Unfortunately only Zedd knows where it's located and he isn't the kind of guy to rent condos out to tourists on his private island.

So for those of you keeping score, Zedd's plan is to lure the Rangers to Venus Island so he can rob Tommy of his powers. Unfortunately nobody actually knows how to get to Venus Island, so Zedd's attempt to salvage his original plan doesn't make any sense whatsoever. I'd be a lot more willing to overlook all these little details if I didn't know what was coming up next.

Because the writers arbitrarily decided the Ranger Teens can't just morph and show up on Venus Island, Zordon tells Billy he will need to figure out a way to follow the sunset trade winds to locate Zedd's compound. Yeah that's precisely what I wanted to happen in this episode. Billy analyzing the barometric pressure to figure out if Venus Island is due south or southwest of Gambia. Just the sort of pulse pounding action kids are tuning in for.

Don't worry though, this episode spares no expense in detailing all of the nonsense Billy goes through to make sure the weather balloon he created will work. It's almost appalling how tedious this segment is. It only lasts for a few minutes, but Power Rangers usually keeps things moving at a pretty steady pace. Why are we spending any time at all with Billy detailing this shit? What the fuck am I watching?

Someone pass me the remote I didn't realize we were watching National Geographic.

After Billy finishes his weather balloon, Jason and Trini accompany him out to the mountains where he gets ready to let it float as soon as sunset hits. Billy asks Zordon if his transmi-You know what? Billy's stupid thing works. Who cares?

The Ranger Teens regroup and plan to land on Venus Island as soon as Billy's fascinating garbage pile indicates its location. The primary five Rangers tell Tommy that he's got, at best, four fights left in him. Maybe it would beneficial to sit this week out. Tommy says not a chance, he'll come with them to Venus Island in case there's a problem, and if Zedd sends down a particularly deadly monster he can hightail it out of there. So then why is Tommy even going with them? Do you guys think Zedd isn't planning on sending some werewolf with four dicks after you guys the second you Dumbo Drop yourselves in there?

Billy's incredibly tedious weather balloon lands, and the Rangers teleport to Angel Grove Park with some shitty prop Venus Flytraps littered everywhere Venus Island. Zordon informs them that Hallie is unconscious somewhere on the island and will be overtaken by Zedd's evil magic if they don't find her soon. Does Zedd routinely hire 8 year old girls to work for him? It was weird enough when he was kidnapping her. I don't want to deal with Lord Zedd's views on child brides.

As the Ranger Teens wander around the island, Lord Zedd springs his trap. He spews a bolt of energy from his staff to create the Invenusable Flytrap. Credit where credit is due, that's a pretty good name.

That monster looks more realistic than those props.

Invenusable Flytrap appears in front of the Ranger Teens, prompting them to morph. The monster introduces itself as the master of Venus Island, in case someone out there didn't make the correlation. She actually has a really intimidating presence about her for a creature made out of novelty plants. It's mostly in her shrill screeching delivery and how she sounds like a legit monster. Not just some buff rhino who plays football in his off-time.

Flytrap engages the Rangers in battle and bashes all six of them with her spiky appendages. Trini and Tommy try busting out their respective dagger weapons, but Invenusable deflects them without breaking a sweat. With her foes on the ropes, Flytrap opens up two panels on her chest and absorbs all of the Rangers besides Trini and Tommy into her stomach. She rubs her tummy and says how delicious her new treats are, because this show is fucking weird. Better watch out Terror Toad, someone's looking to steal your spot among vore fetishists.

With 2/3rds of their team resting inside a plant creature's stomach, Trini and Tommy decide it might be time to rethink their strategy. Before they escape completely, Flytrap promises that she'll let the other Rangers out as soon as Tommy joins the forces of Lord Zedd. Zordon tells Tommy to get his happy green ass back to the Command Center this instant, and also he can bring his friend in yellow if he so obliges.

As Trini and Tommy teleport into the Command Center, Tommy nearly keels over as his powers fail him yet again. Zordon reminds everyone who hasn't been paying attention that Hallie will soon be in Zedd's clutches if they can't rescue her before the island sinks. Tommy then offers to make the ultimate sacrifice. He will give himself up to Lord Zedd in place of Hallie. If only all of us could be as perfect and flawless as Tommy "Jesus" Oliver.

Trini says she can't let that happen, and tells Tommy that she'll fight the monster alone. Tommy refuses this proposal because he's a glory hog and if he ain't going down swinging then he ain't going down at all. Tommy rebuffs Trini's attempt at having a defining moment and then reasserts his dominance by saying he'll go sacrifice himself. He offers Trini a lukewarm hug while presumably whispering in her ear "Sorry sweetheart, this show's mine now."

Tommy tells his only remaining friends that he'll try to resist Zedd but if he ever tries to attack them, he wants the others to know he's sorry. Honestly even if this moment robs Trini of her little remaining credibility, it's a pretty heavy scene. Tommy is about to submit the little strength he has left to service Zedd because he feels like there's no other option. Jason David Frank's not an amazing actor, but he does sell this scene as though it were a friend's final farewell. Shame this feels like the only communication he's had with Trini before. Oh wait no scratch that I think Tommy and Trini interacted once previously.

I'll miss your abusive beatings most of all Tommy.

Just as Tommy prepares to teleport into Zedd's clutches, Alpha tells him to slow his roll because the computer has discovered something. The Invenusable Flytrap may look unstoppable, but she has a glaring weakness. Her body is unable to handle extreme heat. Which explains why she resides on a tropical island somewhere near Africa, an area known for its brisk chilly temperatures. Trini says Tommy can stop whining about how his suicide is a necessary tactical advantage now that they can give this monster some hot flashes.

Green and Yellow morph back to the battle and start threatening the monster with heat related puns. Then out of goddamned nowhere, we cut to inside the Invenusable Flytrap's stomach where the other four Rangers sit in yoga poses while apparently hearing Tommy and Trini's advice. The Red Ranger bobs his head while…he says nothing. It looks incredibly stilted and awkward, but there's a bit of a story about all that I can get into later.

As the Red Ranger jilts around without saying anything, Billy speaks the lion's share of the dialogue and says "It appears that Tommy is trying to inform us that heat is what we will need to beat the monster. We should combine our Power Coins." Then Jason silently nods in response. Glad I tuned into this riveting episode of Speed Racer.

The four Rangers put their fists together, which causes a rainbow colored energy wisp to emerge around their hands. Each of the Rangers punch at the insides of Flytrap's stomach lining. The monster stops charging at Trini and Tommy and begins to clutch her abdomen in agony. Yellow and Green produce the same rainbow colored energy from their fists, which they say is a little heat of their own. Just in case any of you scientists out there are watching and wanted to know that all your research is bullshit. Heat is actually just rainbows that live inside people.

After Jason gives another vacant head-bob, the attacks inside Invenusable Flytrap launch the four trapped Rangers out of her guts and back onto Venus Island. The monster angrily charges with what is the most pathetic attempt at defense I've seen from one of Zedd's creatures.

Venus why are you doing the Monster Mash?

The Rangers collectively slash at the monster using their Power Weapons and leave her critically wounded. With Flytrap on the ropes, our rainbow colored heroes bring their weapons together to Power Blast the monster. Then Zedd uses his Growth Bomb to revive the monster just like he did last week and…what's that? The Flytrap is actually dead and won't be coming back? All that stuff about the Growth Bomb being a potion was nothing but bullshit? Oh right on, nevermind. Don't get excited to see those new toys we're selling you kids, we didn't feel like including them this week.

Zedd becomes testy that another one of the monsters he bought from Japan failed and decides to go for broke by sinking Venus Island into the sea. The Rangers are left unable to celebrate their abrupt victory against the monster as the cameraman gently shakes the camera to indicate that Venus Island is in structural danger. Maybe you should have built us a balloon that would have gotten us out of this one too Billy.

Using some other stupid gadget nobody cares about, Billy locates Hallie deep inside of a cave on Venus Island. They find the young girl coated in a red energy forcefield, but none of them are able to get close enough to rescue her. Thankfully Zack appears to have a solution; he grabs Billy by the shoulder and nods his head up and down without saying anything. He must have been getting jealous of Jason's ventriloquism skills and decided to show off some of his own. Having run out of time and options, Trini knows the safest and most trustworthy way to save a child's life.

The 2nd Amendment.gif

After wildly firing a gun near an unconscious child, Trini manages to save Hallie from Zedd's evil clutches. Oh my mistake, it's Tommy who rescues her once she wakes up. Shocker. Hallie sees Green and dully calls him, "A prince." Yeah, great read Hallie, that sounded natural. Let's finish this up and go find the monster that stole Zack and Jason's voices.

Later at the Youth Center, Hallie gets needled by Bulk and Skull for information about those mysterious Rangers that rescued her. Hallie, either intentionally deceiving them or having the memory of a goldfish, informs Bulk and Skull that there were ten Rangers. Psh. 10 Rangers? How bad do you think we need to sell toys? What's next? One of em was a bird and another was Bruce Lee? Fuck outta here.

While most of this episode has been total trash, Bulk and Skull interrogating a little girl for information as though she were a hardened criminal is at least worth some chuckles. Bulk demands to know what the Rangers looked like and Hallie gives an authentic description of Tommy's physical appearance. Did those dumbass Rangers actually take off their costumes in front of her? If not then where is she pulling this from?

Bulk tells some French stereotype to draw out the details Hallie is describing. What the piss is this yahoo doing here? Probably because the writers had two "Bulk and Skull looking for the Rangers' identities" gags and they couldn't decide between one or the other. Hallie gives the idiots some more clues to the Ranger Teens identities while the Frenchman Pierre (of course) finishes his artist's rendering. The Ranger Teens look at each other nervously, is it possible that this could be the moment their secret is revealed? Pierre shows off what he's drawn to the crowd of onlookers.

….Only it turns out he's drawn a renaissance looking portrait that has nothing Power Ranger related in it. Haha how silly! Now all Bulk and Skull have to go off of are incredibly accurate descriptions of two of the six Ranger Teens that a little girl could inexplicably provide them. Instead of utilizing that information in a way that makes the tiniest goddamn lick of sense, they get comically angry and give up on the closest thing to a lead they've ever gotten.

Maybe I should have just turned this one off.

Your Weekly 90's Nostalgia: Rainbow Colored Heat

Personal Thoughts

Man oh man oh man. I honestly remembered liking this episode. Well maybe my tastes have changed a bit with age because this episode fucking blows. I get baited into an episode about Trini and then realize she's only there to fill out Sentai footage. Goldar dropping a bottle of instructions is some of the dumbest most convoluted shit there is. Instead of wasting my time with Billy consulting weather charts, why don't you have Goldar drop a map to Venus Island? Something he would actually need to carry with him and not some instructions Zedd decided to write out for Goldar like it was a homework assignment.

Then we get some decent-ish fighting with Flytrap. Unfortunately so much of her footage is cut we don't get much of a view of what she's capable of. She feels incredibly secondary to all of the other plot happening around her and ends up seeming like a massive waste of potential. Then she gets unceremoniously Power Blasted before we end on a gag which only works if you assume the Ranger Teens are cosmically ignorant.

This episode is the first to be written by a fella by the name of Judd Lynn. For as much as I really didn't like his initial foray into the series, Lynn has gone on to do excellent things for this franchise. He's currently executive producer and one of the writers on Power Rangers Dino Charge and doing a damn fine job at that in my humble opinion. Essentially what I'm getting at is I hope Judd Lynn isn't mad at me if he ever reads this. Also please cast me as Bulk's son in whatever Power Rangers series comes next. Thanks in advance.

So all that stuff with Jason and Zack bobbing their heads and not saying anything? That's only an issue for us folks watching the episodes on DVD. When "Welcome to Venus Island" originally aired, Red Ranger and Black Ranger both had lines at the points where they're dead quiet on the DVD. Why is that? Possibly because Jason and Zack's lines were either recycled lines from earlier in the series, or new lines done by really terrible sounding stand-ins.

So why did that happen? Well that's going to get interesting, but just know this certainly won't be the only time it happens. If you want to see a quick comparison for how these scenes differ then please refer to this handy video a kind Youtuber has compiled.

That brings us to the Invenusable Flytrap. A monster that has quite a lot to discuss. Not that you would know that by watching the episode considering how much of a non-entity she was. Let's take a look at the Zyu2 block containing her footage and see what else she had going on. Thanks again to Jeff Pruitt for releasing the footage that had eluded fans for so long. You can take a look at it here.

When did Invenusable Flytrap put on 80 pounds?

The first thing we lose is a really strange inclusion by the Zyu2 producers. We see one shot of the Power Rangers flipping onto the scene, and it's followed up by another scene of them flipping in shot from a different angle. Of all the Zyu2 footage that's been released, no other blocks have this weird duplicate scene thing going on. Maybe whoever was filming wanted to try shooting this flip twice just to see how it looked and ended up sending both for the US editors to decide which they preferred.

We also lost a scene of the Rangers landing in front of Flytrap and posing. Not because of anything objectionable in the footage, but because the Rangers are very obviously standing in front of a park bench and a street lamp. Since this episode is supposed to take place on a mystical otherworldly island, the editors didn't want to include shots that clearly indicated the Rangers weren't anywhere special. Granted if you're watching carefully there are plenty of scenes where you can see the buildings and benches and shit in the background.

We would also lose a bit of the fight with Flytrap and all six Rangers because of the visibility of civilization in the background. While this usually wouldn't matter much, it did mean we had to cut one of the best utilizations of a monster's body in quite some time.

Heads up

After devouring the four Rangers, we lose a pretty lengthy scene of the captured Rangers reacting as they find themselves inside Invenusable's stomach. By cutting this it makes the later scene of the four Rangers chilling inside Flytrap's stomach baffling. We also see the four trapped Rangers get into the yoga poses to channel their energy here after a brief discussion which explains why they were sitting like that when we saw them in the episode proper.

So why was this scene cut? I'd say the most likely reason was because they didn't have Jason or Zack's actors to voice over these lines. It's easy to recycle dialogue for situations like "punch an enemy and grunt while expressing confidence." It isn't quite as easy to recycle dialogue for a situation like "I am trapped inside a Venus Flytrap's stomach and am being digested. I need to channel my aura into energy to help escape this creature." I'd also imagine even the producers knew how awful the stand-ins for Zack and Jason sounded, so they made an effort to reduce their presence as much as possible.

Speaking of that rainbow aura stuff, I'm not entirely sure what the purpose of that was. It certainly didn't seem like heat, and more resembled the energy that characters would use in Dairanger. Was this trying to bridge the gaps between Zyu2 and Dairanger? Or was it simply a reuse of preexisting special effects? Knowing Toei, I'd say the latter is significantly more likely.

Then we lose a really goofy moment with Flytrap laying around in the park as she mimes contentment over her recent meal. She pats her stomach, kicks her legs around, and then gets up and stretches in a comically exaggerated way. She looks like she just gorged herself on Thanksgiving dinner and had to unbutton her pants. I wouldn't say it fits the character that Power Rangers is trying to portray Flytrap as, so I can understand their reasoning behind trimming it. Doesn't make it any less funny though.

Jeez Venus would you shut your trap?

Then Yellow and Green show up to antagonize the monster. Right after she finished a meal? Low blow guys. As soon as they show up, Flytrap summons a batch of Putties to attack the two Rangers. This was cut of course because Season 1 Putties were no longer being used, but I'm curious why this wasn't replaced with a Z-Putty battle. Maybe because we wasted so much time on that weather balloon bullshit.

As it turns out, there is a promotional image of Flytrap alongside a pair of Z-Putties that was used for a Viewmaster toy. I certainly can't cite this as proof that Invenusable was supposed to have a Z-Putty fight filmed with Tommy and Trini, but it certainly seems likely. Why would they drag out a monster costume and photograph it with stuntmen in Putty suits for a unique shot as opposed to using one of the several scenes of monsters surrounded by Z-Putties you already have available?

Image captured in 1080p

After the Putties are defeated and the Rangers are freed, Flytrap is finished off by the Power Blaster as usual. However it turns out we lost one last important bit of footage with the Invenusable Flytrap.

That is one upsetting flytrap vagina.

Yep! It's another lost Zord fight. I wouldn't say it's as good as the Bloom of Doom's Zord battle, but it's still wonderful to see footage that was hidden away for two decades finally come to light. No matter how mundane the scene may be, it's really interesting to watch just to see a missing piece of the puzzle from so long ago. That's what makes Zyu2 so intriguing to me anyway.

This Zord battle was also hinted at by a Viewmaster slide. There's an unused image of the Invenusable Flytrap holding up a Growth Bomb that I remembered seeing once when I was a kid looking through Power Rangers slides on my toy. At some point I thought I had just imagined it or dreamed it, but lo and behold this image does exist, indicating that perhaps Invenusable Fly Trap was going to have a Thunderzord splice fight after all.

Pictured: 93% of my childhood memories

After Flytrap grows, she suddenly busts out a sword from absolutely fucking nowhere. She never had one during her ground fight, so I don't know why they decided to give her a weapon after she grew. The sword is actually pretty generic looking and doesn't seem like it fits her design at all. The reason for that would be that it's a recycled prop from Dairanger. It was used by one of the main villains, Shadam, during the latter half of the season.

You may also notice that the Invenusable Flytrap had quite a weakness for whenever its gut was being pounded on. This led me to believe that if Flytrap had a Zord fight, maybe she was defeated by the Dragonzord in Battle Mode's drill staff. After all, it was an attack that drilled through enemies midsections. While Zyu2 never gave us any scenes with the Megadragonzord or the Dragonzord in Battle Mode, maybe those scenes were only in the Season 2 Zord fights we didn't get to see!

I justified this theory by assuming if the monster got drilled in the gut, there would be no way that this could be edited into a Thunder Megazord fight. Thus explaining why the Zord battle had been cut. I certainly don't think I'm the only person who theorized the Dragonzord in Battle Mode would be included, but I know I personally held onto that theory for quite a while.

During all my Zyu2 speculation I would argue that Dragonzord in Battle Mode would totally be used to finish off the Flytrap. It's just so perfect! This monster looked like it was built solely to be finished off by a drill in the stomach. I eventually became convinced that's what was going to happen because I imagined it, so that meant it had to be true right?

Of course not.

One final note on Zyu2 I wanted to make was that, unless my math is wrong, Invenusable Flytrap has the least amount of her footage used out of any of the Zyu2 monsters. Flytrap had a grand total of 2 minutes and 47 seconds used out of the 6 minutes and 41 seconds of footage they had available. The only way any monster will have less footage than that is if Saliguana gets released and has a bunch of material we never saw.

I only bring those numbers up because 1) Zyuranger already did the math for me, and 2) It helps to explain why Invenusable Flytrap felt like such a total dud of a monster. Let me know what you guys think though. Maybe this episode is one of your favorites and you now have a blood oath against me. That's okay too! Just please end my life quickly, I can't handle being eaten alive by a flytrap monster.