Episode 16- Dark Warrior

This is a public service announcement letting readers of this blog know that Saturday will bring an update of mammoth proportions. We'll be marathoning all 5 parts of Green With Evil and posting a recap. That's right. We won't make you wait a week between pieces of the only decent Tommy storyline in existence. No, we'll be marathoning the fail for you and saving your brain cells by compiling it into one special weekend update. It may take copious amounts of alcohol and I can't guarantee our intelligence coming out of it, but it will be done.

Now, back to your regularly scheduled update.

This episode is... well it's lots of fail. It contains a character that somehow embodies every stereotype of Asians in popular American media. It doesn't make a lot of sense in the first place, but I'm not sure there's even really a plot.

So we start with Stereotype Man. He's a small, grey-haired, glasses wearing Asian man puttering about a lab full of nefariously bubbling liquids of vibrantly coloured questionable content. Surely this means he's a mad scientist! Or at least we hope so because they are ever so much fun.

He is delighted when his invisibility formula is complete, but then perplexed when he pours some onto a plant and it disappears. It's an invisibility formula. It's supposed to make things, y'know, disappear. So begins the fail.

We find Trini in the Youth Center following Jason's expert tutelage... in a class of beginning white belts. Why Trini is in the back of this class we're not sure. She's far too awesome for it. Jason ends class and tells his students their test will be later that day. Um... what? Shouldn't they be tested next class session? I'm a bit confused but alas, no time to puzzle it out because Ernie enlists Billy for some free labour and then Bulk and Skull dump him in the recycle bin. We're 16 episodes in of him being a Ranger and while he could hold his own before and was, in fact taunting Bulk and Skull in previous episodes, Billy apparently can't even fend off bullies anymore... again. Fishy fish fish. Billy in this episode makes NO SENSE.

Trini helps him up and tells him not to worry, that he can meet her Uncle Howard later. He's apparently a world famous scientist. Billy is so depressed, however, that "even scientific achievement isn't much comfort." Poor Billy. He must be really upset!

He decides what he needs to do is re-enlist in Jason's karate class. And hello, we do a double take, pause the episode, and flail for a minute. RE-enlist? As in, he'd dropped out? In what world does this even make sense? Why would the LEADER of the Power Rangers allow his weakest member to DROP OUT of a class that can help him in is Ranger fighting skills? Seriously? What? Some leader you are, Jason Scott. Also, why would super smart excessively logical BILLY say "Hey, I'm a Power Ranger now. I shouldn't at all attend these martial arts classes my friend teaches because they certainly couldn't help me." Fail, Power Rangers, fail.

Back to the show. Rita wins at stalking the Rangers and knows immediately what's going on. She commissions an awesome monster from Finster. He will have the speed of a panther, the wisdom of the ages, and the strength of ten something (we think). Sounds fantastic!

Trini mentions to the group that her Uncle Howard is coming and Jason does a bit of a fanboy flip out. Apparently Uncle Howard is not only a world famous scientist, but he's also a world famous martial artist. So Uncle Howard is a world famous Karate Scientist. That is all kinds of amazingly awesome and wow way to stereotype there, show. Uncle Howard, having lost his invisibility formula (having set it down on the counter and then... turned his back?), finally finds Trini and introductions all around. Billy gets a special separate introduction and Uncle Howard says he'll give Billy special instruction. Meanwhile, Ernie sees a jar of bright neon green liquid and... walks off with it while polishing it? Mmkay?

Goldar, Squat, and Baboo head to Uncle Howard's lab. Squat and Baboo drink something from an unlabeled bottle instead of looking for the invisibility formula like they ought to. Why they drank it we're not sure, but apparently it happens often as Rita then yells at them for doing so. I feel the need to mention here that Rita's plan makes no sense. She wants the invisibility formula to make the Rangers disappear. The only problem with that is they'd still be there physically, still able to fight, but they'd be invisible so the monsters wouldn't be able to see them. That's... not really very evil. It's actually somewhat helpful to the Rangers.

Meanwhile, Uncle Howard spends maybe five minutes training Billy in the park before they are attacked by putties. Billy handles one on his own but is quickly overwhelmed. Meanwhile, three putties take down and make off with Uncle Howard. He, Stereotype Man, world famous Karate Scientist, is taken down by three putties. Do you see the sense this episode is not making? He is placed in a cave with a bunch of dynamite and told he has one hour to give them the invisibility formula. Rita also contacts Trini with a note in a bunch of black balloons.

Billy then RUNS to the Youth Center. He doesn't bother to use the COMMUNICATOR strapped tightly to his wrist to say "Hey Zordon, Uncle Howard has been kidnapped by Rita!" or "Hey guys, could use a little help here with the putties and the kidnapping and stuff." No, he runs to the Youth Center to tell them. They have the ability to teleport. Fish fish fish.

They go to the Command Center where Zordon says he's been expecting them. Um... really? Why not, y'know, contact them yourself there Zordon? Or teleport them when you notice something amiss with the Big Bad? Zordon!fail abounds in this episode.

They somehow find Uncle Howard really really quickly (I guess because Rita uses the same cave for all her kidnappings) and find only a few seconds left on the bomb. Zack asks Billy if he can dismantle it. Yes, because being a genius scientist means you have the ability to diffuse a bomb. Of course. Uncle Howard tells Billy to use his karate training to focus his mental energy. How that's going to help DIFFUSE A BOMB I'm not sure. But it works. Somehow. Billy stops the bomb, they free Uncle Howard, he wanders off, and then they morph. Morph. With Uncle Howard basically right there. He hadn't even left the cave yet. Secret identity fail!

There is an odd battle when the Dark Warrior finally shows up again. He's kind of awesome with a cannon in his arm and everything, but the fight is rather easy and they beat him relatively quickly overall. It wasn't very memorable, as fights and bad guys go.

Back at the Youth Center, Jason is conducting his tests for his beginning white belt students. Most of them have made it to yellow belt, it seems, and Jason is testing Billy in this shot. Y'know, Billy. Who had dropped out of the class ages ago. The one who decided to rejoin the class AFTER the previous session was over. Apparently he gets no class time and jumps straight into the test. Jason pretty much just gives him a yellow belt for doing... well... nothing. I never took martial arts as a kid but TSB assures me this is not how testing for your belt works in the real world.

Ernie puts the jar of neon green liquid on the counter and Uncle Howard, who apparently made it out of the cave just fine, is delighted to see his invisibility formula again. He picks it up and cuddles it. Meanwhile, Bulk and Skull are picking on Billy. He allows them to torment him and his friends just stand there and watch. They don't intervene, they don't say anything, they just let Billy get harrassed. What wonderful friends. Uncle Howard doesn't agree with their pacifist views and drinks some of his invisibility formula. He knocks Bulk and Skull around a bit and then Billy taunts them. For somebody who was about to get an atomic wedgie, Billy is awfully confident. Uncle Howard defies logic and reappears at will.

The only saving grace of this episode really is that at the very end, as the credits roll, we get a voiceover of Jubilee from the old X-Men cartoon telling us to watch her show on Fox Kids. Aw, old school X-Men cartoon! We love it so.

List time!

Five fish. Solidly. If there was a plot, I couldn't find it. The monster of the week was all but non-existent. Stereotypes galore in a single man made me cringe repeatedly. BILLY MADE NO SENSE.

Billy speak? NONE. How sad is that? A Billy-centric episode and not an inkling of Billy speak.

Nobody was covered in food, though Billy was shoved into a recycle bin.