MMPR Season 3 Episode 21: Changing of the Zords Part 3

Squatt Wears A Sombrero
Giant Ninja Man Shakes Bird Boys

Last week on Power Rangers, Kimberly laid dying in the Command Center while the other Rangers had to fight a big tooth goblin. As soon as Kim learned her new pal Katherine was in trouble, she left her hospice care to help out. Kim's powers gave out halfway into the fight, and she ended up kidnapped by Goldar in the most disconcerting scene ever put to film. Lord Zedd used his captive as a bargaining chip to enter the Command Center so he could piss inside of Zordon's tube, and also threaten the Power Rangers to become pilots/slaves for his ancient Zords. He gave the Ranger Teens a moment to decide if they wanted to become genocidal robot-piloting murderers, or continue their lives as genocidal robot-piloting murderers except a stuttering robot tells them what to kill.

This week's episode begins literally exactly where last week's left off, and Tommy immediately agrees to Zedd's conditions.

And right off the bat, I'm giving Power Rangers some kudos. There's no time wasted with the Rangers dwelling on whether or not to accept Zedd's conditions. The first line of dialogue is a follow-up to last week's cliffhanger, and I really appreciate it. It rewards viewers who are paying even a modicum of attention. Both of them! We already saw the Rangers talking amongst themselves about this, and for once this show doesn’t feel the need to repeat itself to pad for more time.

Shame it took til Part 3 to figure that out.

With the Rangers now under his thumb, Zedd tells them to report to him at dusk for their instructions. The emperor of space then places his intergalactic cheeks back on the throne and teleports himself back to the Moon. I've seen people question why Zedd would bother coming all the way down to Earth to communicate with the Rangers when he could have had one of his worthless toadies do it, or just talk to them on the Viewing Globe. Well, let me give you an answer.

Because that scene of him appearing in the Command Center was cool as shit. Deal with it, dorks.

Inside of Zedd's mystical cave, Kimberly continues to rotate on a big glass table like she's getting sold at a gas station. But her situation is far more devious than becoming a hot dog, as she's had her energy stolen by a hot Kat. Speaking of which, Katherine appears in a burst of energy to taunt the unconscious Pink Ranger for…no reason I can particularly gather. Kat says she wishes it didn't have to be this way, takes a beat, and then genuinely says "…I really do."

Sweetheart, you are a walking talking cat monster. The past four weeks you've been trying to shake Tommy's dong out of his pants like it was a big beefy scratching post. Who do you think you're trying to fool with this goody two shoes bullshit? Who do you think you are, a Power Ranger? Hit the bricks, Kitty Longstocking.

Back at the Command Center, Billy attempts to lock onto Kim's coordinates to bring her back home. Zordon promises that he and Alpha are desperately trying to find a way to detach her physical essence from her Power Coin, which might have been a good idea about four months ago. If Rocky leaves his coin at home and goes on vacation, is he going to be vomiting blood every hour? Why did you sign off on this Zordon, you absolute maniac?

About 6 seconds after Billy began looking for Kimberly, he alerts the rest of the group that he's found her. Where? "In one of Zedd's dark dimensions." A line that made me laugh, solely because it's clear that the writers were really goddamned sick of having to name a new dimension for Lord Zedd week after week.

When Aisha tells Billy to hurry up and bring Kim home, he tells her that it's not going to be that easy. Because nothing in this fucking show ever is. This dimension that Zedd is using happens to be conveniently out of the Rangers reach. Once Tommy hears this issue, he offers up some truly astounding logic.

"If we can't get in through the front door. There's always the back door."

Tommy, we're looking for ways to access Zedd's dimension, not things you say to Kimberly when you're feeling saucy.

Not to mention, this doesn't even sort of address what Billy just said. He said that you can't get access into the dimension. Not "well we can't get in the front door what with us being a bunch of teenage vampires."

But whatever, Billy thinks this is a stroke of pure genius. He can use his patented Portalcom device that he had used once when Tommy was stuck in one of Zedd's dimensions. I would go back and check if that actually happened in an episode before this, but when I tried searching my website for the word "Dimension," it returned 385 Gorillion hits.

The Ranger Teens, now in possession of the Portalcoms, head to the park to use them. We're "treated" to a really tepid gag of Bulk, Skull, and Lt. Stone snoozing in the park. Fuck outta here, I don't care.

It's a ham sandwich. 

Billy sets his gadgets up and enters the coordinates to whichever one of Zedd's godforsaken dimensions Kim is stuck in now. The other Rangers wish Tommy luck, as he refused to partake in this plan unless it somehow glorified him. Billy opens the portal, and Tommy is zapped into some dismal-looking cave set. Because that's what every dimension looks like in this universe.

Atop the Moon Palace, Zedd and his minions are all celebrating the enslavement of their former enemies. It's a pretty good visual gag, because it involves every single one of these space abominations dancing around like they're hammered at a wedding. Though there's definitely a moment where Zedd is dicking around on a child-sized guitar, and I can't for the life of me understand why.

Also I'm not clear on why Baboo is holding a giant taco.

Zedd stops his impromptu jam session to check in on the Power Rangers. As soon as he learns that the Rangers are trying to rescue Kimberly, he summons the Tengas to…stop them? I'm not sure what he thinks the Tengas will accomplish, since the Ranger Teens already sent Tommy into Zedd's cave. Is Zedd not at all suspicious that only 4 of the Ranger Teens are out in the park?

Oh right, we need to have a Tenga fight to chew through a few minutes. Silly me.

The Blue, Yellow, Red, and Black Ranger Teens ninja morph against the Tengas, and I…I seriously don't know how to elaborate on what I just saw.

So Billy kicks one, Rocky dicks around, but then Aisha stops a group of Tengas in place and starts leading them in a choreographed dance. It's the most baffling motherfucking thing and I seriously don't know how it's real. How is that a ninja thing? Why is this happening in the middle of a fight? I'm writing this section of the review at 2 in the morning and when this scene happened I thought I'd fallen asleep and I was having a fever dream. Aisha told a group of foot soldiers to "shake their tail feathers," and I felt like snapping this DVD in half. I don't know if I'm more confused or angry.

I'd imagine several of you would expect me to make a .gif of this moment, due to how goddamned kooky and unnecessary it is. I'm not going to. Because if I had to sit through this moment and wonder if it was really happening and look around to make sure reality wasn't folding in on itself, then you get to do it too. Try not to swallow your own tongue!

But I can't say this Tenga fight is bad, because it has something far better than a brain-melting dance sequence. Two of the Tengas leap at Adam, and he folds his hands into a ninja seal. The Tengas land on the ground, which appears to have become black. They then look up to see one of the best goddamned ninja tricks this season has thrown at us yet.

Season 3 learned how to use forced perspective and goddamnit we're going to use it!

Instead of crushing the Tengas like ants, Giant Adam picks the birds up, shakes them around, and chucks them into the distance. Because we can't have slapstick ninja fights if the Rangers are actively murdering these birds, now can we?

While the Ninja Rangers are at work beating on the Tengas, Tommy arrives in one of Zedd's nameless dimensions. He's immediately met with Kimberly's spiraling corpse as he ponders how to get her free. That's when a growly voice bellows at him. Tommy turns around and finds himself face to face with an enemy. Not Goldar, not Rito, but someone else.

Lord Zedd himself.

The big cheese himself has finally gotten off of his throne and come down to personally handle matters. After a season and a half of doing nothing but bitching at his cohorts to do all the work, Zedd has taken an issue into his own hands. Now it's time for something that would cause our little 7 year old hearts to stop. Lord Zedd Vs. the White Ranger.

Ho-lee Shit.

Saban finally produced the scripts I sent them!

Tommy spouts off some of his Karate Noises™ and Zedd asks if all that grunting is really necessary. He follows suit by doing some exaggerated grunts of his own to mock Tommy before the fight even begins.

I fucking love Lord Zedd.

The White Ranger tries to get an upper hand on Zedd, but the overlord's magic completely overwhelms Tommy. Zedd blasts the White Ranger repeatedly with bolts of electricity from his staff, and Tommy pukes out a real groaner of a hero speech. Some malarkey about how even if he and Kimberly don’t make it out of there, Zedd will never be allowed to win. Yeah that's right, even if you kill my girlfriend and me, we're still gonna kick your butt, Zedd! You might end up enslaving my pals with space magic and chain them into giant death machines to murder the general populous, but you're never going to win! Our entire planet will be under your servitude but if we keep moving the goalposts on what constitutes "winning," that'll learn ya!

Back on Earth, the Tengas take notice of Billy's Portalcom and knock it over. Two of the Tengas gently kick at the prop, so as not to damage it in case we need to do reshoots, and teleport away as they mock the Rangers. Rocky and Adam ask Billy if he'd be able to fix the "broken" device, what with it having been gingerly tipped over by birds and all. Billy says he'll need to survey the damage on the device before they can bring Tommy back home. Or they could call it a wash and get a leader who doesn’t force them into ludicrous cheerleader poses to make himself look badass.

Rita watches the Rangers fumble around as she complains that she wants in on the action. Finster sweeps up the palace as he asks what she has in mind, and Rita suggests sending a new monster down to take care of the Rangers. New monster? Why not send down that Incisorator guy from last week? He didn't get killed or anything, so maybe you could use him instead. No? We're going with something new? Alright, but it better be one badass monster.

What happened to you, Hiei?

While Billy looks over the malfunctioning Portalcom, Adam asks if it's possible to reprogram Zedd's ancient Zords. Billy confirms that this could plausibly be done, but not if Tommy is unable to rescue Kimberly and escape Zedd's dimension. Without her power back in hand, they won't even be in control of themselves. Which means we could see even more unbearable scenes of Aisha forcing a bunch of bird monsters to dance for her pleasure. Personally, I'd rather die.

During this discussion, Rita's new monster arrives on Earth to taunt our heroes. The creature, known as See Monster (ugh), greets the Rangers with an enthusiastic "AHOY MATEYS!" Which…I mean this guy isn't themed off of a pirate is he? Why is he talking like this? He's a pasty-faced freak with an eyeball dick, and he's trying to talk like he's about to set sail? Get the fuck out of here.

The Ninja Rangers refuse to be threatened by a pervert with a lumpy face, and they morph into their Ranger forms. See Monster bombards them with blasts of energy released from the eyes all over his skin. But I hear some of you eagle-eyed readers stopping for a moment. "Isn't this monster's flesh all made out of a big trench coat?" Why of course it is, but when he pulls the trench coat pieces apart, his flesh is all coated in assorted eyes that blast red energy wisps at them.

So basically, he attacks people by flashing them. I've got to admit, that's a pretty funny design choice.

The Rangers are left dizzy and dazed from the monster's attack, but Rocky forces the attack away from himself. How? I don't know. He says something about how he visualized pushing the waves away. Hey. Sure. Whatever. I don't care. The Rangers just saw some pirate eyeball boy's dingus, it only makes sense they could defeat him by forcing themselves to push that memory out of their head.

So, one minute after he was summoned to Earth, See Monster is getting absolutely clowned. Rita pisses and moans about how horrible this new monster is, and makes an executive decision of her own. She's summoning the Shogunzords to force the Rangers into her bidding. The massive Shogunzords appear on Earth and interrupt the fight between the Rangers and See Monster, which prompts the monster to bug out as he says "COR BLIMEY, O'ILL WALK THE PLANK OI WILL BEFORE TANGLIN WITH THESE SCURVEY RAPSCALLIONS."

Probably. I wasn't paying attention.

The four Rangers look up at these new Zords that are ostensibly supposed to belong to them, and they offer a forlorn sigh that they're going to have to use these new toys to destroy the city. Since Tommy hasn't made it back yet, the other Rangers assume this means that Zedd has rescinded their initial time limit, and forced them into an early servitude. Forever stuck inside of their giant ninja animal robots.

Kim? We've got some bad news for you.

As the Rangers fret, an image of Rita appears in the sky to taunt them. She commands the Rangers to board the Zords and destroy the city so that everyone will detest the Rangers for the rest of time. If they refuse, then Kimberly will be thrown into the nearest space volcano or whatever. 

The four Rangers are livid at the position they've been put into, but Adam suggests that they give their Power Coins to Billy to have him transfer control of the Zords to the Rangers. Once they do, the Rangers leap into the Shogunzord cockpits. For whatever reason, Rita doesn't make a fuss that the Rangers are idly standing by in her new death machines. She just commanded them to go destroy the city, but the Rangers are playing a game of grab ass inside of their Zords? This is when you take matters into your own hands and put Ninjor inside of a guillotine, because clearly these kids aren't taking you seriously.

Back inside Zedd's Thousandth Dimension, Tommy writhes on the ground after getting beaten around. The White Ranger unsheathes Saba and chucks it at Zedd. The evil master blocks the flying sword with his staff, which…turns it into a snake? So wait a goddamn minute here. Is Zedd's staff always secretly a snake? I know when he first arrived, he had a snake covering him that transformed into his staff, but is he always using some kind of space demon magic to keep that snake turned into a staff? I appreciate the continuity, but why the fuck did his attack not just break the damn thing? Power Rangers is forcing me to invent a whole lot of nonsensical headcanon.

With his staff destroyed, Zedd chickens out and flees from the fight. Christ almighty are you kidding me? The absolute embodiment of all evil gets hit one, single, solitary time and immediately turns tail? I guess I shouldn't be too surprised. That costume is hanging on by a literal thread, and if Tommy tried spinkicking him it would explode into a cloud of red dust.

Tommy ponders how he's supposed to free Kimberly from her peril, and he notices a huge wall of switches and gears. He asks aloud what he should do to free her, and his response is "Well, might as well try 'em all." Which might just be the most Tommy K. Oliver solution to an issue that has ever been put to film. Can't wait for him to hit the button that tears Kimberly apart with Hellraiser hooks.

To the surprise of nobody, Tommy manages to shut the machine off by violently punching the wall, and Kimberly's body stops spinning atop a plate of plexiglass. Tommy picks up the Pink Ranger and teleports back to the park with her. As soon as they arrive, Tommy grunts and says they "just made it." What are you on about now, Oliver? Zedd had disappeared, the machine had gently shut off, and nobody was even thinking about trying to stop you? Stop trying to add drama when there is none you karate doofus.

Tommy sets Kimberly onto the ground and has Zordon teleport her back into the Command Center. Once she's back in safe hands, Tommy joins the other four Rangers and leaps into the cockpit of the White Shogunzord. The Rangers ask how Billy's coming with reformatting the Shogunzords, but Blue has yet to fix them yet. Oh wait, were we still supposed to be worried about the Shogunzords being in control of Zedd? I thought Kimberly being back with the Rangers would fix that. Wasn't that what they said earlier? It feels like Power Rangers wants to keep tensions high, so they keep situations nice and vague in order to keep scenes going past their expiration date.

Or I'm missing something incredibly obvious in a children's program.

Zedd gets back to the palace and is forced to admit to his wife how bad he screwed the pooch. Tommy beat him, they got away with Kimberly, and now all they have left is the hopes that the Shogunzords will work out.

…Which doesn't work out, because Billy just got them under the Ranger's control. Woopsy daisy! Maybe you'll do better in the next three-parter, Zedd.

Zedd is absolutely furious that his trump card has been swindled. Realizing he only has one option left to battle the Rangers, Zedd nabs Rita's wand and makes See Monster grow giant to battle the Shogunzords. Yeah, hopefully the sight of his chewed-up, gnarled, grotesque penis will be enough to get the Rangers to return the Shogunzords to Zedd.

Well, it doesn't quite work out like that, as the Shogunzords combine powers to turn into the mighty, invincible, reasonably-priced, Shogun Megazord!

Gun to my head I don't know which Zord goes where on this thing.

See Monster fires a blast of perversion at the Shogun Megazord, which rocks the Rangers to and fro inside of their cockpit. Which doesn't really fit because the Shogun Megazord is obviously deflecting the beam in Japanese footage, but whatever. If I don't have a nit to pick, I don't have much to do.

The Shogun Megazord blasts See Monster with a stream of flower petals, because Japan, and our brand new toy whips out its finishing move. And I've got to admit, it's pretty awesome.

If you can't appreciate lighting a prop on fire for a good shot, this show ain't for you.

Back on the Moon, Rita and Zedd sob over their debilitating loss, as the villains come to grips with the fact that they've lost their precious Shogunzords. Though Rita reminds her hubby that not all has been lost. They still have Kim's Power Coin, the Falconzord, and Ninjor shoved into a jar. Which is…actually quite a lot still on their side. This is the finale of a trilogy and the Rangers may have some new Zords, but they're still down quite a few assets. Though it leaves me sad that we're going to be missing out on my boy, Ninjor. R.I.Pepperonis, buddy..

Oh yeah, remember how Bulk, Skull, and Lt. Stone were asleep in the park? Well Lt. Stone is awoken by a kite that has a picture of a dragon on it, and thinks there's a monster in the park. Flawless resolution. Couldn't be better. Glad we spent any time on this B-Plot whatsoever. No thanks.

Inside of the Command Center, Kim thanks all of her friends for helping her through that bout of death she was going through. She offers an extra special thanks to Tommy, because he's better than all five of them put together and can beat Lord Zedd by throwing a hunk of plastic at him. Zordon asks Kimberly how she's feeling, and what the likelihood of her death would be if he sent her into another battle in a few days. Kim says that she's fine, albeit a little tired, and Alpha informs Kim that he's been able to remove the Power Coin's connection to Kimberly. So you other 5 Rangers? Keep your heads down and your mouths shut, because this terror could still happen to you too.

Billy and Zordon come to the conclusion that Kim can still become the Pink Ranger, but she'll need to be charged with energy from the other Rangers' coins. If they don't retrieve the Power Coin from Rita and Zedd, she'll no longer be able to become a Ranger. In addition, the Ninjazords have been rendered inoperable now that Zedd is in control of the Falconzord. Thankfully the Ninjazords have been recently moved into the bargain bin and the Rangers now have control of something new we can shove in children's faces until their begrudging parents relent and buy more toy robots for their spoiled, fat children.

Thanks for the Shogunzords, Mom and Dad!

Zordon's final statement on the Shogunzords is that Kimberly and Tommy will have to share a Zord. Not because her powers are waning or anything like that, but because there's only five of them and we didn't really do the math on this whole Shogunzord thing. Sorry!

Later that day, Kim and Tommy go for a walk on the beach together. Kim says she feels like this is the end of the Pink Ranger, and grabs her boyfriend's hands. She admits that she's really afraid of what's to come. Tommy reminds Kim what she said to him when he lost his powers.

"Delete my number from your phone or I'm calling the police."

Oh wait. The other thing.

"You'll always be one of us as long as you work for scale."

Tommy promises that he'll always be here for Kimberly and gives her a romantic peck on the cheek. Settle down Power Rangers! You trying to give kids a sexual awakening? Well the next time you want kids to realize their innermost lust, all you've gotta do is throw a giant frog monster eating people at them. That'll wake em right the fuck up.

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Personal Thoughts

Not an outstanding conclusion to this trilogy, but I think it's plenty serviceable enough. The fight with Zedd was an excellent idea on paper, but clearly the show wasn't able to live up to that. The bits with Kimberly were a nice bit of tension. Though the big moment is obviously the Shogunzord debut. Well here's where I might lose some of you good readers.

I really don't care for the Shogunzords. I think they're massive, blocky, ugly, and look too samey. Get a good look at the Shogun Megazord and you might see what I mean. It looks like five black bricks were stacked on top of each other to make the final product. I don't think the Shogun Megazord in of itself is a bad design, but I much preferred the Ninjazords in comparison. Though part of my complaints about the Shogun Megazord involves how it introduces some of the most boring goddmned Zord battles in the whole series. Though we'll discuss those as they occur.

I mentioned when the Ninjazords showed up that they came from halfway through the Kakuranger series, which means these Shogunzords were originally the first set of Zords in Kaku. To summarize, the first episode with the Ninjazords was Kakuranger Episode 31, whereas the episode when the Shogunzords fought See Monster was Kakuranger Episode 6. Since there are only five Kakurangers from the start, this would explain why Kimberly is relegated to Tommy's co-pilot in future Zord battles. They didn't have a Pink Shogunzord to give her after all.

This also explains why Ninjor is no longer around and had to be shoved into a bottle. Ninjor's counterpart debuted in Kakuranger Episode 36, so there's no footage of him battling alongside the Shogunzords that can be used. Writing him off for now was a necessity because they don't have much more footage of him that can be adapted.

For now.

The five Shogunzords themselves didn't get an awful lot to do in this episode did they? They stood around while the Rangers had to pilot them, and they got blasted by See Monster. The White Shogunzord cut him with a weird little blade weapon, but that was really it. That's because the Shogunzords don't really have a fight where they all get to strut their stuff before they combine. Though we do see a quick scene of them holding weapons in this episode, and they look pretty cool. Shame we're probably never going to see any of them get used again.

Oh, and one more note on the Shogunzords. The U.S. production crew was shipped the individual Shogunzord costumes for filming, so that means there's a few scenes with the Rangers in the same shot as them. It's kind of cool. They only use the Shogunzord suits one other time if I recall correctly, but that's coming up in a few weeks, so I won't spoil it now.

Last thing worth mentioning is how international soundtracked versions of this episode have the Rangers referring to their Shogunzords as "Ancient Zords." There's a line at the end of this episode where Zordon informs the Rangers that these new Zords are named Shogunzords, which makes little sense considering Rocky and the others were flinging around the Shogunzord name for the last 10 minutes. If you want proof, then check it out. If not, then take my word for it and enjoy your day.