Power Rangers as a whole

Well, both

But in recent years, the Bandai of America stuff have been REALLY bad

The US toys always had cut corners (no/less die cast, smaller size, less paint apps), but for the most part, it was very minor, more a "you're getting less bang for your bucks than the Japanese toys". The recent years have been FAR worse. Some zords barely resemble their japanese counterparts (and I mean toys, not the in show models). Some toys aren't so much "Missing paint aps" but more "lucky to have had paint". Rather than downsizing the toys and using less metal, electronics or paint, Bandai of America has taken to designing new, worst figures whole cloth.

The Ninja Steel Megazord in particular stands out. The original one isn't great, (like you said, the sentai's aethetics, especially for robots, has been very hit and miss), but the US one looks and feels like a chinese knock off. On the american one, you can't even tell the Dump Truck is supposed to be a dump truck.

I'm actually stoked of the idea of Hasbro making Power Rangers toys. Power Rangers toys have not evolved in 30 years. They are bricks, with barely any articulation. Hasbro's been producing high quality combiners via transformers for years (They had an entire line dedicated to it 2 years ago). If they put that engineering to work on Power Rangers (Keep in mind that Zords don't even need a robot mode), for the first time the US might have superior zords. A megazord with working elbows and knees? Ankle tilts? (Outside of the 300$ one Bandai made last year). For collectors, it could be a really good news.

edited 16th Feb '18 7:30:00 PM by Ghilz

While speaking of the Ninja Steel zords, I absolutely hate those things. I mean, when the rangers get zords there's usually a theme, be it animals or vehicles. But the Ninja Steel zords are all over the place. Red has a ninja/human robot, which would be fine, but then blue is a dragon and white is a dog or something. Is there a theme? There could be one. But then pink has a train and yellow has a dump truck. A freaking dump truck! The zords have nothing in common, they're just a bunch of random shapes thrown together.

Yeah. In an interview with the designer of the sentai, they decided "What if we didn't have a unifying theme!"

Mind you, even when they do have a theme.... I love the suits for Kyuranger. The helmets are downright inspired. The zords are all.... really awful.

I also dislike the way the whole Megazord is a chair that the red zord sits in. I mean, they get points for originality, but that doesn't mean I have to like it.

Agreed

To be fair, this is sort of a point where the Sentai makes a tiny bit more sense.

In that the theme (I use the term loosely), is supposed to be "things kids find awesome".

IE: Ninjas are awesome. Dogs are awesome. Dragons are Awesome. Trucks are awesome. Trains are awesome. It's very "Things a 5 year old loves". It's sort of a minor theme. Sort of like how Dino Charge's sentai countpart had a Carnival theme the Ranger show tried to cut around (and sort of succeeded).

Though unlike the Carnival theme, this theme isn't really carried by the plot.

edited 16th Feb '18 7:39:38 PM by Ghilz

To think about it, both car-themed season so far have been "half serious take on the goofy parody Sentai."

2019 season revealed

Power Rangers Beast Morphers

Apparently this will be using footage from Go-Busters

Plot synopsis:

"Set in the future, a secret agency combines a newly discovered substance called “Morph-X” with animal DNA to create the Power Rangers Beast Morphers team. The Rangers must fight off an evil sentient computer virus bent on taking over the source of all Ranger power, the Morphin Grid itself. Featuring never-before-seen leather suits and an all-new beast-themed arsenal (including dynamic new Zords), fans should get ready for a season full of secret ops and morphinominal fun."

...So...Is Venjix back ?

edited 17th Feb '18 11:41:09 AM by Zarius

Sounds like Zyuohger. I hope not.

If it really adapts Go-Buster then Cyber Corps is still a more appropriate name.

edited 17th Feb '18 11:52:19 AM by RAlexa21th

Go-Buster is finally being adapted?

Oh, shoot will we get a real Enter this time?

edited 17th Feb '18 12:16:59 PM by Mizerous

God I hope it's not Zyuohgers.

edited 17th Feb '18 12:30:44 PM by Ghilz

Wait, Zyuohgers doesn't use leather suits.

But the animal emphasis in the title is weird. I guess they did it with Jungle Fury, but at least Gekirangers has 50% emphasis on animals.

edited 17th Feb '18 12:46:03 PM by RAlexa21th

It's Go-Busters, they played a promo video at Toyfare

Wait, wasn't Go-Busters released between Mega Force and Dino Charge's Japanese counterparts? Are we going backwards now? Has that ever happened before?

Go-Buster was in 2009.

Either they planned on doing this or Hasbro wanted to do this season over the new space season.

I doubt Hasbro gets to pick the season.

I'm guessing they might have picked an older season to give themselves more time? Kyuranger just finished this month, and if the new season already DOES have footage shot of it, that's a tight production delay.

Assuming they don't want to do Zyuohgers and To Qgers, picking Go-Buster to fill the gap and give themselves more production time to produce the new space season makes sense.

Not only that, but Bandai still has the contract for this year (Hasbro only starts in 2019). Which means by doing go-Buster, Bandai can keep porting the Go-Buster toys for a year, and it gives Hasbro a year to R&D their own toys for Kyurangers.

In fact, Hasbro sort of necessitates a longer run up time between Sentai and Ranger seasons, as Hasbro has to make the new toys from scratch (less Hasbro somehow got a licensing deal with Bandai)

edited 17th Feb '18 1:04:30 PM by Ghilz

Go-Busters was 2012 and Kyoryuger was 2013. Since we'e going backwards this opens up the possibility of a ToQger adaptation though given that they already used Nero's costume for Ninja Steel that seems unlikely.

2019 is a 10 year anniversary of RPM.

IIRC, it had been mentioned a while back by some execs from Saban that they didn't care for Toqger or Zyuohgers because they didn't believe the toys would sells as well in the USA, the former because the focus on Penis trains doesn't resonate as much with american kids as it does in Japan, and the later about the goddawful cube zords.

EDIT: Having found the interview, that was a Bandai of America Exec saying that, so I suppose Toqger could be back on. God, I hope not.

edited 17th Feb '18 2:34:38 PM by Ghilz

I do. To Qger was one of my favorite Sentais, and I honestly just want to see how they'd go about adapting it.

My only experience in Hasbro toys are the GI Joe die-cast. How are they in terms of mecha toys?

The Transformers stuff tends to vary from iteration to iteration.

I think the movie toys are pretty good... most of the time.

The Unicron Trilogy toys are rather iffy.

Most of their recent stuff has been pretty good. Combiner Wars was a line of combiners (duh) and it was really well recieved by the fandom for the most part.

Gotta go fast.