Episode 209 - Shadow Rangers

This episode started off SO WELL. And then it turned into... well, Turbo. *sob*

So, Justin is helping Tommy work on his car. Justin's shoelace gets caught on the gas peddle. The car's engine blows. Tommy still insists that this isn't Justin's fault. EXCEPT IT TOTALLY IS. Oh, and we find out that someone has been stealing stuff from the garage, so Justin builds a homing beacon that he'll put on something in the hope that it's stolen and will lead them to the thief.

Divatox has a new monster, the Chromite. Chromite appears to be marrying Elgar. Congratulations, may you two live happily ever after SOMEWHERE FAR AWAY. Divatox is going to send the Chromite down to leave a detonator in the construction site.

Adam and Tanya are off on a date walking together (after engaging in some practice to better get their Zords together) when Kat joins them. They promptly get attacked by the Chromite, who steals their morphing energy and creates shadow versions of them! We're actually really excited, because HEY, EVIL RANGERS. It's a thing that we like! The unmorphed fight against themselves is seriously great! Adam gets beaten up a lot! *approves so hard* Of course, then they get captured and thrown in a cave.

Then Justin and Tommy get attacked. Tommy has seen this before, and tries to stop Justin from morphing, but that doesn't work, and Justin gets his power stolen and he's kidnapped. There is a nice fight where fake!Kat and Adam beat up Tommy. I approve.

Now that he's all alone, Tommy goes back to the Power Chamber to get Dimitria's help. Unfortunately, since she's from the planet Inquirus, she can only inquire about things, so she answers all questions in the form of a question. At least she'd be good on jeopardy. BUT SERIOUSLY, she is so annoying. If they wanted to frame it instead as a "you are adults now and need to learn to figure things out yourself" I might not be as annoyed. But really, part of the reason they've always had a mentor/support staff is so that they don't need to do everything themselves, because sometimes they have to be out there fighting while someone else DOES THE IMPORTANT RESEARCH. Instead, Tommy is left to be the science guy (and this is where I start laughing hysterically and wondering if this is what leads to him faking his doctorate) and he discovers that the shadow rangers are made out of light, so if he just makes it dark, everything will be okay.

He fights the shadows and even though it's daylight out he manages to destroy them all. I call bullshit.

Justin has activated the homing beacon, so Tommy goes and rescues everyone else. Then they morph and fight the chromite and summon zords, and wow, this episode sucks.

Turns out that monkey!Bulk and Skull are the thieves. They're now living in the youth center, which is under new management. Ernie's foreign service unit has recalled him (he's going to build a bridge in the amazon or something) and now Lt. Stone is running things. (And hey, isn't anyone WORRIED about Bulk and Skull being missing? WORST FRIENDS EVER.)

So in the last few episodes, we've lost Billy, Jason, Rocky, Zordon, Alpha, human!Bulk and Skull, and Ernie. WHY DO YOU DO THIS TO US, SHOW?

Fish: 5. EVERYTHING IS BAD AND WRONG.

Episode 208- Shift Into Turbo Part 3

This should have been a stand alone episode. Just saying.

Principal Caplan finds Justin in the Youth Center. He tells him his test scores were through the roof and he gets to skip two grades and start Angel Grove High in the fall.

At the Power Chamber, Zordon calls them in to tell them he's leaving. Lerigot is there and they all assume it's for the graduation (not everything is about YOU, guys), but really he's there to release Zordon and send him home. Alpha will accompany him. It is very sad. Apparently Tommy was told first. He already knows. WHY???? And why didn't he tell them if he knew in advance? No wonder he's late showing up to the goodbye party. Zordon and Alpha will travel through the wormhole they've been monitoring. THAT IS NOT HOW WORMHOLES WORK. Well, they thought it might be, but we know now it's not. NOT EVEN CLOSE.

Divatox summons a monster that can disrupt the energy of the wormhole. He does a bang up job of it, and Zordon has to leave immediately. They have to stop the monster so Zordon can get through the wormhole before it collapses. Otherwise he'll be gone forever. Wow, science really really doesn't work like that.

They summon the zords. They have trouble combining the zords. At least Tommy reads the manual! They work it out, form the Megazord, and that fight is over. Mkay... special?

Then they go to destroy the device. They fight the monster and send Justin over to do the job. Why him, I have no idea. The monster attacks him (duh!) and he goes back to fighting it instead of destroying that all important device. The monster grows, they form the Megazord again, and do a spinning finish. At least it's a short fight?

Back in the Power Chamber, everyone is sad. Alpha is gone. Zordon is gone. Lerigot says goodbye and then is gone. They mope for a minute and then the most obnoxious voice starts talking. Alpha 6 has arrived. Then Dimitria arrives. I do not like either. Apparently neither does Divatox. She is trying to explain why it's bad while Elgar attempts to destroy a flying fish. A literal fish in the episode! Our scale is so canon.

5 fish. This did not need to be a three parter. This was SO BORING.

Episode 207 - Shift Into Turbo - Part 2

Previously on WHAT THE SHIT IS THIS - Bulk and Skull got turned into monkeys, and the Rangers are the worst friends ever. Also, it's time for them to graduate high school in their gender segregated robes.

This is going to be one of those multi-parters where they stretch it out way longer than they need to, isn't it? *checks* YEP.

I'm somehow the one who ends up commenting on theme song & costume changes. So. Theme song - I like it, QR doesn't. It's not quite as great as the original, but it's still catchy. I do miss the go go power rangers, though. :( As for the costumes, even with all of my reservations about this season, it's actually one of my favorite Ranger suit designs. It's a lot better than Zeo, anyway.

Okay, the episode. So, Adam and his awful hair are all concerned about Justin, who has not shown up to graduation. Adam, you've known Justin for 30 seconds, and he has a communicator. Stop it. So instead Adam WALKS OUT OF GRADUATION and then calls Zordon, who tells him that Justin was supposed to call if there's any trouble. Adam still has a bad feeling, so he pulls Kat and Tanya out of the ceremony right before Kat is about to give her valedictorian speech. Principal Caplan is all "... what are you three doing?" but since he totally knows they're Rangers, he lets them go and stalls until Kat can go and give her speech. I totally feel bad for the person who was talking before Kat, since they're totally ignoring her.

The Rangers barely make it into the parking lot, before Divatox shows up herself with some Pirahnatrons and there's an unmorphed fight, and it's GLORIOUS. You know JYB was thinking "THANK GOD. LAST SEASON WAS SO DULL FOR ME" because there's a ton of him showing off, and I am totally NOT complaining, although seriously, his HAIR. Adam volunteers to fight the Pirahnatrons himself, while the girls go and help Justin, and then I was randomly reminded that back in 97 I read a ton of Divatox/Adam, which I personally don't get, but it makes me sad that there is more Divatox/Adam bad and wrong fic than there is Scorpina/Adam bad and wrong fic. *pout*

Zordon calls Tommy for backup so that he can help Adam, and then all five Rangers end up at the power plant. The fight scene ends with the Rangers winning, but the detonator is still ticking. Just as I'm discussing with QR about how stupid it is that they're all looking together and they should split up, Tommy says they should split up, and man, I hate it when he agrees with me. So Adam and Tanya go off together, and so do Tommy and Kat, and Justin is sent to the Power Chamber to retrieve the Turbo Navigator so that they can find stuff.

Up in the Power Chamber, Alpha is all distracted by wormhole opening and is totally confused when Justin shows up. Yes, the wormhole is very important for them, but HI, THERE IS A FIGHT GOING ON. Stop failing so hard, Alpha and Zordon. Justin goes back with the navigator and Zordon summons Lerigot.

The Turbo Navigator finds the detonator, and Tommy plugs it into some car, which lets it explode safely or something.

Back at graduation, Kat delivers her speech and then Caplan pronounces them all graduated. They didn't walk at all! At the Youth Center, we find out Tanya has a summer internship working at a radio station, and Adam is going to be a stuntman at the amusement park.

Lt. Stone has taken charge of monkey!Bulk and Skull, and this ends with him being covered in both banana split and monkey.

Oh, and Divatox knows about the wormhole, and she's determined to prevent Zordon from going back to Eltar. To be continued...

Fish: 4.5. Honestly, if we gave this a 5, we'd have to increase the fish scale to 10!

Episode 206- Shift Into Turbo Part 1

THESE GUYS ARE THE WORST FRIENDS EVER.

We get a new Divatox. She is wearing more clothing than the movie, and she's seeking only to mess with the Rangers, not to attract a man/lava monster/thing, so I like this one better! Elgar is not dead. The fish missed him too much and went into the lava pit to rescue him, apparently. Stupid fish. He is, apparently, still a little crispy. The Piranatron design is much better than the movie, at least.

The Rangers are graduating high school. This means it's the end of the year. Justin is taking a placement test to determine what grade he should be in (apparently he moved around a lot? I don't get it...). At the end of the school year. For some reason they decide they don't need to use his previous school records. Whatever. He finishes the test with an hour to spare and Mrs. Applebee compares his scantron with one of the correct answers, her eyes wide. THAT IS NOT HOW SCANTRONS WORK.

Anyway, here is where they are horrible horrible friends. THEY HAVE NOT TOLD ROCKY ALL OF WHAT HAPPENED WITH THE TURBO POWERS. IT HAS BEEN AN ENTIRE MONTH SINCE THE EVENTS OF THE MOVIE. HE DOESN'T EVEN KNOW WHO DIVATOX IS, YOU GUYS. Worst. Friends. Ever. They decide to wait for Justin to get there to tell Rocky more about the events from the movie. Y'know, so Rocky can see how very excited his replacement is and all the Super Fun Adventure Times is had without him. Great job, guys! Way to rub it in!

We then get a really long and boring montage of clips from the movie. We could have skipped the movie and recapped that instead. There's an hour and a half of my life gone.

Justin then asks if Rocky is sure he doesn't want his powers back. Rocky is still suffering from his back injury (duh, it's only been a month!) and is fine letting Justin keep them. Adam tells him he'll always be a ranger in spirit. Rocky's response? "That's nice." HAHAHAHHA ROCKY I LOVE YOU.

An aside here. TSB and I love the theory of power addiction. They have a hard time giving up their powers because they are addicted to the power itself, and after it's gone, they always want it back (see: Adam and Tommy, for the best examples). I have head!canon that Rocky is one of the very very few in the history of rangers who really doesn't get addicted. He loves being a ranger, but he's actually okay with handing his powers over, with just stopping. It doesn't bother him. Unlike Adam. ahem

So, back to the episode. Rocky is opening a dojo after graduation instead of going to college. I like this theory! Especially since we know Adam also has a dojo in Angel Grove (thank you, Once a Ranger!). I stand by my theory they run the dojo together. As partners. In ALL respects.

Tommy is skipping graduation. Because he's driving a racecar instead. This... is not how racecars work.

Alpha calls them to the Power Chamber, and they scamper off leaving Rocky on his own. Alpha has a surprise! He's baked them a graduation cake. It has little Power Ranger toppers on it. AWWWWWW. The seniors go off to do graduation stuff and Justin tries to sneak some of the icing from the cake. Alpha won't let him. He calls him Young Man. My heart squishes in delight at the adorableness.

Meanwhile, Bulk and Skull are patrolling an empty parking lot. Lt. Stone comes up and sends them to the power plant. Divatox's ship lands in the lake behind him, but he won't listen to Bulk and Skull try to tell him that. He drives off and Bulk tells Skull they will forget what they saw and not tell anybody. Boys, YOU LIVE IN ANGEL GROVE. That is a VERY BAD idea. They go to the power plant where they meet up with Elgar who is trying to set a bomb. He uses some kind of ray gun to turn them into chimpanzees. BULK AND SKULL ARE CHIMPANZEES FOR AGES AND WE DON'T EVEN GET THE SPIN-OFF SHOW. I am so disappointed. *sadface* Elgar sets the detonator for 60 minutes. An entire hour? Really? That's more than enough time to disarm the darn thing. Oh villains. You suck at being... villain-like.

Bulk and Skull attempt to contact the police on their radios. They just make chimp noises, however, and the other police assume it's kids messing about and TURN OFF THE SCANNER. These police should be FIRED.

Justin decides to go check out what's going on with the chimp noises. He stops by the power plant on his way to graduation and finds Elgar there.

To Be Continued.

4.5 fish. Ugh. Let's just get this season over with.

Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie - Part 2

PREVIOUSLY: Rocky is lifted up by fish and thrown over a railing so that he hurts his back and in a drug induced haze, passes his powers over to a 12 year old. There's also a mutant Ewok who has been captured by the CAMPIEST SPACE PIRATE EVER and Adam has HORRIBLE HAIR and EVERYTHING IS BAD AND WRONG.

So, Divatox has shot missiles at the ship which have sent these ugly pod things to them. They don't matter quite yet, because instead it's time for Justin to have backstory and angst. (And um, holy crap Justin grew up to be wicked hot.)

Kat goes to check on Justin, and we find out that his dad basically had a nervous breakdown after his mom died and dumped Justin in the shelter. Justin just wants his dad to be proud of him, and wonders what his dad and all the kids in the shelter would think if they knew he was a Ranger. Kat does not look impressed and Justin agrees that he knows the rules - it's for them to find out. EXCEPT NOT, JUSTIN. Also, I am SO SHOCKED that Justin's dad ran a dojo. REALLY. Seriously, Angel Grove runs on martial arts, but this is RIDICULOUS.

Kat tells Justin that he'll need to come downstairs and get some sleep soon, since it'll be a big day tomorrow, and he agrees, so she goes back downstairs to join the cuddle pile in progress until Justin interrupts. Of course, he soon discovers there's a really ugly foot soldier thing and freaks out a little, totally losing his voice. However, he does manage to kick it, and Adam hears and gets the others, and we get an unmorphed fight scene. Oh, unmorphed fights, I have missed you SO MUCH.

There's a downside to the unmorphed fight, I mean, besides Adam's hair. Tommy manages to scare the last one away. .... Really? REALLY? (And Adam gets his hand covered in slime. Whatever.) But Tanya's reaction is absolutely priceless. She seriously gets the best moments in the movie. Her delivery of "This sure ain't the Love Boat" is perfect. (And if it was, she would be off making out with Adam by the pool. So.)

Kim and Jason (who are the best part of the movie, except for Tanya) are all captured, and possibly the loss of the Gold Ranger powers are screwing with Jason's head because his plan to OPEN THE SUBMARINE WHILE THEY ARE UNDERWATER is the STUPIDEST PLAN IN ALL OF POWER RANGERS. Kim is clearly not impressed and she keeps pointing out the flaws in the plan, but Jason isn't listening to her at all so she helps him.

The Rangers retrieve their keys and go downstairs in the ship to combine their key power and pass through the giant wall of water, but Justin promptly drops his key. This is... somehow supposed to make him look like a good replacement for Rocky? Really? Anyway, he retrieves the key at the last minute, and the Rangers pass through the barrier.

In Divatox's sub, Kim and the amnesia boys manage to escape and surface, but Jason doesn't manage to get out of the sub. Divatox has a glorious freak out about them sinking. I really do love her. PLUS, then she calls Rita to ask her advice about how to handle the Rangers, and Rita's advice is very simple - RUN. (Now, why did Rita run, when last we saw she and Zedd had blown up the Machine Empire?)

The next thing is... I said on twitter that I can forgive awful, but I really can't forgive this. It's time for another descent into stereotype!land, except this time we're hitting every single awful island native stereotype. Like, really? Basically, there was a full scale rage blackout. Kim ends up getting captured (after the camera spends a really long time pointed at her ass) and then she gets tied up. I approve of the bondage, okay?

Adam heads out in his minivan (and I stand by my fanon that a) he ends up with a really nice car at some point and b) he and Tanya totally had sex in the back of that zord) and goes to inspect the island and see if he can find Lerigot. Divatox manages to notice that there are four humans floating in the water, so she shoots a missile at the ship and for about 30 seconds Adam thinks that everyone is dead, and if I wasn't busy being distracted by how awful his hair was, it would be a great moment. But everyone got out safe

Divatox recognizes that racist stereotypes as Maligore's priests, and Jason is handcuffed and Kim is tied up, and that is really the only important thing. Oh, and she forces Lerigot to open the temple.

The rangers morph, except Justin does it the wrong way. You are not filling me with hope for the next season, show! *sob* On the other hand, the look of disgust on Tommy's face is priceless. And I've got to say, Justin adjusts rather well for suddenly being a foot taller once he morphs. Oh, and apparently the Rangers can all run really fast. Because their powers are based on cars. Right. Justin manages to hear the chanting of Maligore, and leads the Rangers into the temple where Kim and Jason are suspended over a volcano. Kim and Jason are SO GLAD to see them, and there's an incredibly boring fight scene but then Kim and Jason are knocked into the volcano and they come out evil. (Divatox says something about them being perfect specimens and also pure. She's right about the first, but I'm not sure about the latter.)

... If this WHOLE MOVIE was about Kim and Jason being evil it would be a billion times better. Seriously, we're continuing the grand tradition of Rangers being better when evil. Tommy tries to pull a Kat and convince Kim that she's not evil, but instead he gets punched. Kim isn't listening to Kat either, with a "Sweetie? Pink is out" and holy crap do I ship them. Meanwhile, Jason is chocking Tommy up against the edge of the volcano, and I'm getting flashbacks to the Kirk/Spock fight in Star Trek 2009, but sadly I have no clips to share.

Adam has freed Lerigot, and he breaks the spell on Kim, and Jason is pulled off of Tommy, and blah blah blah, this fight was only interesting while Kim was beating everyone up. On the bright side, Elgar gets knocked into the volcano. This releases Maligore, who is an ugly lava monster, which Divatox did not seem to be aware of.

This is how boring the fight is: Adam gets knocked down and I don't even care. Because this fight is BORING. With the spell on Jason and Kim broken courtesy of Lerigot, the Rangers summon their weapons and then the volcano explodes and they summon Zords and look, I can forgive bad but I can't forgive boring. Zord fight, sword destroys monster, etc. On the bright side, Kim and Jason (and Bulk and Skull) get a ride in the Zord. That's pretty great.

Divatox swears revenge, setting up the season.

Back in Angel Grove, Tommy, Adam and Jason are competing in the martial arts championship for $25,000 which will supposedly keep the shelter open indefinitely. Oh, and Rocky is out of the hospital.

.... Right. They win, and Tommy hugs Kat, and honestly, I am more interested in the conversation that Kim, Kat and Tommy sit down and have later. Someone should write that fic immediately. I want it to exist, and the only combination I ship out of those three is Kim/Kat!

Fish: FIVE. ALL OF THE FISH.

Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie Part 1

Oh god this movie, guys. THIS MOVIE, GUYS. THERE IS NOT ENOUGH ALCOHOL IN ALL THE LAND.

So we start off with a really bad scrolling text Star Wars ripoff. Only this movie is the tiniest fraction of coolness that Star Wars is. And I'm even talking Episode 1 here, people, that's how much I hate this movie.

Lerigot is a wizard. He's actually the mutated child of an Ewok and a Monchichi. He is being chased by weird fish robot looking things. He manages to get himself to Earth, where he is stranded somewhere in Stereotype Land Africa. I keep hoping he'll run into Aisha. That would totally make this movie worthwhile. Alas, he meets a family of chimpanzee instead.

In Angel Grove, Rocky is trying Very Hard in a boxing ring while doing martial arts. He fails at fighting Tommy. He fails at fighting Adam. He fails at kicking a gloved fist, falls out of the ring, and messes up his back. THIS IS NOT PHYSICALLY POSSIBLE. THIS CANNOT HAPPEN. And that's not just my love for Rocky talking, that's "this actually cannot happen" talking.

Meanwhile, Kat and Tanya are on a bus full of children from the local orphanage. They are singing rounds of Row, Row, Row Your Boat. NOBODY wants to sing that on a bus. No wonder Justin looks all sad and mopey. I'd be sad too if I were trapped on a bus full of people singing rounds of Row, Row, Row Your Boat. Justin sees Rocky being hauled away in an ambulance. Justin now REALLY has a sad.

Then we meet Divatox. She is strong and powerful and awesome. Except I'd respect her a lot more if she wore more clothing. I mean, why does an amazing woman need to wear what amounts to underwear and a bit of string... while attempting to attract a man/monster/lava thing? Really? *sigh* I do not like any of her henchmen. This... is not going to be the best season ever.

Justin goes to visit Rocky in the hospital. He is flat in bed with a neck brace on and an IV. He is clearly high on morphine. He doesn't notice Justin and the rangers come in right behind him, so Justin hides under the bed. Instead of asking how Rocky is doing or trying to make him feel better, they have a conversation about Justin. Because they are BAD FRIENDS. Zordon contacts them and they teleport away. Justin witnesses it all.

Kat and Tommy are sent to Africa to find Lerigot using a Star Trek The Original Series tricorder (Billy totally created Starfleet). Why, I have no idea. Wouldn't Tanya be the better choice, since on Planet Angel Grove, Africa is a small continent where everybody knows everybody else and there is only one small grouping of animals, mainly lions, which is where Aisha is? WE SHOULD HAVE SEEN AISHA. Kat gets hurt, of course, after spending lots of time screaming for Tommy and flailing in the water... she was the Olympic diver, y'know, not Tommy! Oh show. Anyway, they get Lerigot and get him back to the Power Chamber. Moving on.

Somehow Bulk and Skull are back on the Police Force. No talk of France or leaving their fake!Daddy or anything. They managed to get captured by Divatox and her crew, but not before accidentally covering Lt. Stone in mustard. Their minds have been wiped. Bulk now thinks he's German and Skull thinks he's Spanish. It's... odd. Jason and Kim are scuba diving near Divatox's ship and they get captured too. We like to believe Kim went to comfort Jason after his power loss. Divatox uses Lerigot's wife, whom she has kidnapped, to send him a message. She shows Zordon that she has Lerigot's wife and child, plus Kim and Jason. Lerigot prepares to give himself up.

Zordon shows them the new Turbo Zords and gives them Turbo powers. Adam gets a minivan. I love minivans, and I'm not being sarcastic. I really actually love minivans. *is weird* So anyway, we get no mention of why the Zeo powers cannot be used. No mention of what happened to the Zeo powers. It's as if they just... disappeared. Adam asks about Rocky's Zord and is told it'll just stay there for awhile. They take off for a lost pirate ship. Once they get there, the blue Turbo Zord shows up. Out steps the new blue ranger, who is presented as THE NEW BLUE RANGER, and not the Temporary Replacement Blue Ranger. It's Justin. IT'S JUSTIN YOU GUYS. Tanya makes the exact face I made the first few times I watched this. It is the BEST FACE EVER. She is clearly confused and horrified at this new turn of events. WHAT THE EVER LOVING FUCK? I BLAME THE IMMENSE AMOUNT OF MORPHINE ROCKY WAS CLEARLY ON.

They see the pirate ship off in the distance. They manage to get to the pirate ship with their zords. They manage to get ON the pirate ship where Justin finds a box of treasure. They use their Turbo morphers to make the ship set sail. Meanwhile, Divatox has found them and launches living torpedoes at their ship. GOONIES NEVER SAY DIE.

To be continued in Part 2...

5 fish. Oh god, why isn't it over yet???? I hate this movie. I HATE THIS MOVIE.

Season 4 Roundup

Not technically Power Rangers related, but very important - Help Japan is a fandom auction raising money to help Japan recover from the earthquake/tsunami.

*

SO. ZEO.

This is actually one of my favorite seasons, so let's talk about it!

Highlights!
ADAM/TANYA FOR THE WIN.
Mystery party!
Tanya being so awesome and dumping Shawn when he treats her badly. Because she deserves better.
Billy is totally smarter than Alpha.
Another Song and Dance
The Bulk and Skull character development, including Bulk's amazing poetry. And their love for their fake!Daddy
Jason came back!
Instrument of Destruction! Skull is seriously the best actor on the show, and his friendship with Bulk is incredible.
King for a Day is pretty great. Especially Kat's role in it.
Emotional consequences to things!
Rocky/Jason
It Came from Angel Grove is pretty much the best. I love Adam's ridiculous nightmares.
David Truehart is wicked hot.
Gasket and Archerina were such fun villains, and they needed more screentime.

Lowlights
... FISH FISH FISH FISH FISH. You know, what they did to Billy.
That's a lot of Tommy episodes.
Seriously, why wasn't Billy the Gold Ranger?
Poor Kat got stuck with the worst boyfriend ever
So Angel Grove has a biker gang?
Slave!Rito and Goldar
Poor Kat got some REALLY shitty episodes. Like the dog one.

Overall, this season is GREAT. And Sunday night, we shift into Turbo!

Episode 205- A Season to Remember

For the record, this episode is entirely AU in our minds. Mkay?

So we couldn't move on to Turbo without doing this monstrosity of a holiday special. The great thing about this is? We're recapping it NOT during the holiday season this is supposed to be about. This would be a very grumpy recap indeed were I doing it anytime from October-January. But instead we're doing it really really close to Purim! Which is the best holiday EVER! So I'm HAPPY! Which made this far more tolerable than it is any other time of year.

So! We start off with an opening that pegs this as a 90's Christmas special. Blurred ornaments, a tree, close up of a Santa ornament, roaring fire, and finally an old man with The Grandson on his knee. He begins to tell The Grandson a story about his best Christmas. In Tommy's very bad old man voice.

In the Youth Center, many years prior to the previous scene (yet oddly with the same fashion sense...), everybody is setting up some sort of holiday decoration. Rocky brings in tamales made by his mother. He is looking forward to all the food. Raymond is there as the Token Jew and he has the BEST HAIR EVER. Oh Raymond, I LOVE YOU. They all miss Billy, who is apparently off at a family holiday reunion.

Meanwhile, Bulk and Skull are being detectives wrapping presents. Skull wishes there were round wrapping paper as he's trying to wrap a bowling ball. They hide the presents quickly when Detective Stone comes in and mentions the latest caper. Skull mishears and thinks he's asking about capers and gets all excited. He wants a bagel with lox and onion. SKULL IS MY FAVOURITE. I would gift a limb for a good bagel with lox and red onion. Mmmmm. Now I'm hungry. And we're totally thinking Skull is Jewish now. Eugene Skullovitch? Could be! Bulk could be as well with the name Bulkmeier. Or he could not. But we think Power Rangers could use more than Token Jew Guest Star and Bridge so... we're going with Jewish!Skull. Anyway, they're supposed to find a missing fruitcake.

At the Power Chamber, it's all decorated for Christmas. Even the outside has lights. Zordon gives Alpha fuzzy ducky slippers. Alpha wrote a program that gives Zordon a Santa hat. WHY are they celebrating Christmas? They aren't even from Earth!

Meanwhile, Raymond is explaining Chanukah to everybody else. For all of ten seconds. He mentions the eight candles being lit, one per night, and that represents freedom for the Jews. And that is all he says, while everyone else is really patronizing with "That's really interesting" and "I had no idea there were so many different ways to celebrate.". Mkay then. On the plus side, Raymond puts on a kippah that looks just like my son's baby kippah, which he cannot wear anymore, alas. Then we get Tanya explaining Kwanzaa in great detail, which I think is awesome because usually Kwanzaa gets overlooked even more than Chanukah. Thank you, show! You win, at this part at least.

Anyway, Mondo doesn't like all this goodwill and cheer going around, so he and Sprocket decide to make everybody hate each other instead. Sprocket goes down to the Youth Center right after Ernie leaves and turns the rangers and Token Jew Raymond against each other. They start snipping and fighting. Tanya gets upset when they talk about Christmas and we get that she celebrates Kwanzaa, but it's not mutually exclusive! You can celebrate both Kwanzaa and Christmas! TANYA MOCKS TOMMY AND IT IS THE BEST EVER. And then Tommy orders Raymond to go get him a Christmas tree. Stupid Tommy. Raymond tries to leave. They're okay with that because they can't have the Jew getting in the way of their Christmas celebration. Y'know, this bit here? With the fighting and the My Holiday Is Better Than Yours and the Why Can't You All Shut Up So I Can Celebrate? THIS IS HOW REAL LIFE IS.

The only good part is there is at least some acknowledgment of Adam's history here. He is Korean-American. He snipes that not everybody even celebrates holidays at that time of year, LIKE IN KOREA. Atheist or Buddhist Adam? YES PLEASE. (and yes, I know many atheists that celebrate Christmas because they were brought up with it... I also know many that don't)

So there are no weapons that can fight this hatred. Only the kindness of their hearts can fight it. And they can't find any kindness right now. Then Sprocket steals all their stuff. A Tiny Child comes in with a poster of togetherness she wants to hang up. Everybody is still very angry at each other and are mean to the Tiny Child. Tiny Child says the greatest gift of all is love (which I agree with) and then sings a song her mother sings when she's angry or sad. Tiny Child cannot sing. The song makes no sense for the situation it's supposed to come from. It's about taking hands and being stronger. This breaks the spell. Everyone apologizes.

Bulk and Skull find a really huge fruitcake. It was made for them by Rito and Goldar. AWWWWW. That's so sweet. Skull has to call his Aunt Milly to get her to replace the missing fruitcake, because they can't take the one Rito and Goldar made for them. He uses his SHOE PHONE. SHOE PHONE PEOPLE.

At the Youth Center, they found Raymond's chanukiah. Kat asks him to show her how to light the candles. He agrees and then they walk off camera. Really? We can't even get that?

Back in Not Really Future Land, Old!Kat tells Old!Tommy to stop telling stories because it's late. Older The Grandson comes to pick up Younger The Grandson and they are clearly NOT in Angel Grove because he's brushing snow off his jacket. His "watch" beeps that old familiar calling, and he asks them to watch Younger The Grandson a little while longer. "Must run in the family". *barf*

And that's that, thank goodness it's over.

2 fish. Mostly because it's AU. Rage-inducing in a lot of places, yeah, but again... AU.

Episode 203 - Hawaii Zeo

Today on Power Rangers - Tommy is so bad at romance, it's hilarious. Seriously, Adam is better at talking to girls than he is. How the hell did Tommy get Kim and Kat to go out with him? SERIOUSLY.

Anyway, we open with a fight scene. Previous episodes have shown that this is almost never a good thing. High fight content usually equals more fish. But this time there's something different about it - Jason is having trouble fighting three cogs. But the other Rangers help, and Kat and Tommy support Jason when his powers are beginning to fail. Tommy should totally be sympathetic and honestly, I come out of the scene wanting a Tommy/Jason/Kat threesome. Up at the Power Chamber, everyone's really worried about Jason, and also there's some explanation about how Tommy hurt his face, that honestly just makes it sound like he's covering up some sort of abuse. (NGL, I would read that fic.) Zordon was apparently always secretly worried about Jason's powers. That's news to us!

While Sprocket tricks Gasket into working with him by promising to help him grow, Rocky pulls a Zack and takes advantage of Tommy watching a Pink Ranger to beat him at sparring. The others all mock Tommy for being bad at asking out girls, as Tommy tries and fails to ask out Kat. He is hilariously bad at this. Also, Tommy, don't try asking someone out in front of all your friends.

After Kat leaves, everyone mocks Tommy, and Adam is clearly thinking "DUDE, even I am smoother than that." Tanya basically tells Tommy that he's a moron, and of course Kat will go out with him, and Tommy says something about making it perfect. Of course, at this exact moment Ernie walks in, supposedly back from Hawaii, with grand plans to host a luau. Since Detective Stone's detective agency has a lot of bills, Bulk and Skull volunteer for security, and Tommy badly manages to ask Kat out to the luau. For the record, Tanya has clearly had a conversation with Kat beforehand as she's pretty blatantly encouraging him.

At the luau, everyone moves to sit with Tommy and Kat, but Tanya is just all "DO I NEED TO THINK OF EVERYTHING?" and moves them to another table. Bulk and Skull are in horribly offensive supposedly "native" costumes, and Tanya and Ernie both call them out for being awful. Good job, show!

Ernie calls for volunteers, and when Tanya asks him to, Adam dances. Of course, they are quickly interrupted by Cogs doing the hula, which is AMAZING. Gasket and Archerina grow, and Jason handles the hula cogs while the other Rangers all summon the Zords. Of course, they still need help, so Alpha remotely summons the other Zords. The Rangers look like they destroy Gasket and Archerina, except for some reason they only shrink, and then they run away when Mondo shows up. Too bad.

Ernie is planning another luau, and he's happy that someone cleaned up everything. (The other Rangers are so great.) Tommy and Kat show up, looking very happy. Apparently they went to a dinner and the movie date. Tommy calls the date boring. Kat, that's totally grounds for dumping him. Seriously, Tommy is the worst boyfriend ever.

Bulk and Skull show up, and they still have the ink on their faces from the bad stereotypes. Oh, BOYS. *bangs head on wall repeatedly*

Fish: 4. Gasket and Archerina aren't destroyed WHY?

Episode 204- Good As Gold

Today on Power Rangers- Rita and Zedd have a good plan, Bulk and Skull make their Fake!Daddy sad, and Rocky can't win life.

Subplot first because it doesn't really fit in with the rest. Bulk and Skull are cleaning because, for some reason, Detective Stone doesn't trust them with their own case. GEE I WONDER WHY. They get a note inside a balloon to meet somebody in the park at 4pm. They go in drag and Bulk's old lady voice is PURE GOLD. There is a random bad-French inspector who offers them a job. They take it, and go to Detective Stone to quit. Skull is very sad. Detective Stone is even more sad. HIS SADFACE, I CANNOT EVEN TELL YOU. It broke my heart. Fake!Daddy will miss them.

We start off the main plot with Tommy teaching some teenagers in the Youth Center. I was unaware he was still teaching. Adam is too, apparently, and Jason must have started because everybody keeps wondering where he is. Even Emily shows up looking for him! He was supposed to meet her to show her some martial arts move but never showed. This kind of bothers me, actually. Why must ALL the girlfriends "learn some martial arts"? Can't one of them, at some point in time, just say "Hey, I really love watching your moves. But martial arts just isn't for me, sorry." and then go play soccer or read a book or something? GIRLS HAVE THEIR OWN INTERESTS OUTSIDE OF THEIR SIGNIFICANT OTHERS INTERESTS SHOW. Seriously. Does everything have to revolve around martial arts in Angel Grove?

Ahem. Anyway. So Jason is apparently fighting a bunch of cogs in the forest. Mondo is there. Then Rita and Zedd are there. Then there are Tengas there, too. I'm beginning to wonder if this is a dream. Jason never uses his communicator. Zordon never notices something is amiss and calls for backup. JASON IS LEFT TO FIGHT ALL OF THAT ON HIS OWN. FAIL ZORDON. Major fail. Luckily, there is fighting between the Tengas and the Cogs which gives Jason a chance to run away. He makes it to the Youth Center, barely, where he promptly passes out on the floor. Everyone crowds around him. Ernie says he'll call an ambulance. YES. THIS IS WHAT YOU DO WHEN AN OTHERWISE HEALTHY YOUNG MAN COLLAPSES IN YOUR BUSINESS ESTABLISHMENT. Tommy tells him not to bother and they take Jason away. NO TOMMY. YOU CALL THE AMBULANCE AND DEAL WITH THE FALLOUT LATER.

Zordon and Alpha analyze Jason, showing off his very, very pretty arms, and discover the powers are leaving him and draining him of his life force in the process. They must contact Triforia and get the Treys there to fix things. Except Trey hasn't been able to form back into one. He cannot take the powers. Zordon knows of a way he can bounce a communication beam off a specific spot on Triforia, Aquitar, and Earth and it can restore Trey to one. Luckily that spot happens to be in Angel Grove. Except that makes no sense and really wouldn't work. Not in any way, shape, or form.

Jason is determined to try, however, so Tommy and Adam support him while Kat and Rocky lead with the map Alpha gave them. The Treys just kind of follow along. They are attacked by cogs, however, and everybody runs as fast as they can towards the right spot. Jason calls on the Gold Ranger staff and uses it to beat cogs about the head. He is too weak to fight, though, and Rocky has to teleport in right in front of him to take the blows meant for him. OH ROCKY. I COULDN'T LOVE YOU MORE THAN I DO RIGHT NOW. (the whole jumping in front to take the beating meant for somebody else? Yeah, it's a thing I love) Jason makes it to the correct spot and, surrounded by the Treys, manages to catch the beam bouncing back from the planets. Y'know, the planets that are millions of light years away. SCIENCE DOES NOT WORK LIKE THIS. NOT EVEN CLOSE TO LIKE THIS.

The powers transfer to a newly unified Trey and Jason sits out the rest of the fight. The fight where Mondo is HUGE and then the rangers grow HUGE as well. They win the fight and Mondo runs away. Whereupon he finds Rita and Zedd waiting to deliver a present to them after stoking their ego a lot. Sprocket takes it, Zedd says he'll "catch them on the flipside" (awwwwKim), and they run far far away. The present explodes. The rulers of the Machine Empire are in pieces. Literally.

Back on Earth, Jason is semi-emo on a hill. Tommy comes to talk to him and is very bad at the "Losing your powers sucks, but we'll always be friends" speech. At least he tries, though. Jason says it's okay. Things aren't that bad. He has Emily. They walk off into the sunset together, so ten years down the line they can have their only son and name him Schuyler, but everybody will call him Sky.

Poor Rocky. Once again, left behind by his boyfriend for a girl.

4.5 fish. The science fail was overwhelming in this episode.

Fic we want: A GOOD Tommy and Jason powers/it's okay talk.

Episode 202 - Ranger of Two Worlds - Part 2

I was already cranky before this episode started, and now I'm EXTRA cranky. And unlike Queenriley, I didn't even have anything to drink to dull the pain.

WHATEVER.

Look, this episode should be awesome. It's our first teamup! You know what my feelings about teamups are? Pretty much that they are the BEST THINGS EVER. And it isn't even that I have an objection to the old!Billy plot. I don't even really have an objection to him moving to Aquitar. It is the execution of this combined with the poor acting on the part of fake!old!Billy and the poor dubbing that PISSES ME OFF. Well, that and the behind the scenes thing, but we've ranted about that before and I'm going to try not to curse a lot.

So, the episode begins with the Zeo Megazord under evil control with Billy stuck inside it. The other Rangers realize that hey, they have another Zord, so they take off after it, in what should be a great Megazord vs Megazord fight. Of course, they promptly lose control of their Zord to the ugly purse monster (because Finster is the best), while Cestro hits a control panel a few times which allows them to teleport Billy out.

Bulk and Skull are taking their detective license test (completely unsupervised) and a monster attack starts. They assume that this is part of the test and just keep working. Oh boys. They are... not very smart.

The Rangers decide to summon Auric, who attempts to convince the monsters that they are behaving badly. Seriously, he asks them if their behavior is really fair to the citizens of Angel Grove. How great is that? Kat's plan to take control of the Megazords again works, but wasn't much of a plan. They just... jump in, and also take advantage of the fact that Ugly Purse Monster is stupid.

Meanwhile, Delphine suggests that they use the Fountain of Youth Water from Aquitar and summon Cestria to bring it, and we're busy all capsing NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO for a while, and also we're distracted by old!fake!Billy's weird folksy southern accent. Also, Cestria's outfit is the fugliest thing I've ever seen on this show. So Billy leaves with Cestria to get more treatment, and he doesn't even say goodbye and there is some SERIOUS RAGE.

While we're busy protesting Billy's departure, we get our first real teamup. THIS SHOULD BE AWESOME. 11 Rangers fighting together? WHY IS THIS EPISODE NOT GREAT? The Aquitians are just awesome and I love Delphine and just... why are they in such a shitty episode? Anyway, while the Aquitians + Jason handle the Cogs, the other Rangers calls their Zords to fight the monster, which includes such things as Kat and Tanya's zords doing the care bears stare. Then the monsters combine into one monster, and the Zeo Rangers summon their Zords and are all "yeah, we're done playing around" so they just pretty much bring out all the toys and smash the monsters to bits.

Bulk and Skull discover that a) they passed the test and b) they only passed because the examiners were impressed that they finished the test during a monster attack and promptly pass out into their ice cream.

AND THEN IT HAPPENS. We honestly debated just pasting our chat, but it's just a giant string of profanity interlaced with "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" so that's pretty pointless.

Cestria and Billy call and it is SO BADLY DUBBED and the words don't match the mouth at all and it doesn't even SOUND like Billy and DISTRACTED BY RAGE and basically for some reason Billy is staying behind to marry Cestria OR WHATEVER. Personally, I choose to believe one of the following possibilities.
1-The anti-aging thing actually worked too well and Billy is about to be 10 again and doesn't want everyone to feel guilty. (THIS IS BACKED UP BY HIM "BEING SPEECHLESS" AND VANISHING FROM THE SCREEN)
2-Billy is actually going to be busy creating the Turbo and/or Phantom powers and/or has been offered the opportunity to be a Grid Master.
3-BILLY CRANSTON, INTERGALACTIC SUPER SPY. Someone write me this immediately.
4-He's actually headed back to Earth to join Torchwood with Trini and Zack.

Fish: FIVE. ALL THE FISH.

Covered in food: REALLY, BULK AND SKULL? REALLY?

Fic we want: There are four possibilities up there! *points*

Episode 201- Rangers of Two Worlds Part 1

Today on Power Rangers:


Yes, it's THOSE episodes. The ones for which we created our fish scale. Please note this recap required two beers and I'm about to go start my third. I can't take these episodes otherwise. *SOB*

We start out with Bulk and Skull studying to take their detective exams. Aw, boys. They keep getting distracted, though, because Kat is distraught that she's crap at making fashion accessories. She made a purse. A really ugly purse. Tanya tries to make her feel better and Adam tells her it's the first thing he's ever known her to be not perfect at. Oh show. At least you realize what you did to her character. Jason rushes in to grab them all fast. There is an emergency at the Power Chamber.

Billy is aging. Rapidly. THIS IS NOT BILLY. THIS IS FAKE!BILLY. There is exposition where we learn there were consequences to aging him up during the time they were all turned into kids. At least they sort of half-assed TRIED to make this part make sense? This part, anyway. So nobody can think of anything, except Adam and Rocky are off in the corner being all suspicious. They have contacted the Aquitian Rangers. They are on their way.

Cestro and Delphine show up and immediately asses the situation. They can totes fix this, you guys. EXCEPT THEY CAN'T. THEIR DEVICE FAILS (and totally destroys the teleportation system in the process). BILLY IS SMARTER THAN THE AQUITIANS. At least his first device didn't blow up. THEY FAIL. Billy is still rapidly aging.

Meanwhile, Finster has recreated Rita's staff and made some cool improvements. She tries to point it at Kat to make her evil again (good plan, except it totally failed last time you tried it). Instead, she zaps Kat's god awful purse instead, turning it into a monster. It's as if Kirby and Oogie Boogie had an evil, malformed love child.

Mondo, upon regaining his throne from his Wayward Son Gasket, shan't be outdone by Rita and Zedd. He has his own monster. It turns cogs into... things. He plants an evil cog device inside the Megazord and ends up controlling it.

The rangers fight the monsters. They kind of fail. Mondo teleports Evil Deformed Kirby Jr. away and the rangers retreat. Billy detects something malfunctioning in the zord and so he goes in to check it out. It takes off with him inside and he can't get out.

To be continued. Unfortunately.

5 fish. All the fish in the LAND came together for this episode. And they brought their Aquitian Fish buddies, too.

Episode 200 - Another Song and Dance

*stares* Wait. WAIT. Episode 200? Did we really hit 200? When we started this nearly two years ago, I don't think either of us actually expected that we would keep going with it as long as we did. But it has been SO MUCH FUN and we're seriously looking forward to the next 500+ episodes. :D

So, we begin with Tommy dancing. Or something that's supposed to be dancing. It's really just him gyrating on the couch and kicking his feet in the air with some martial arts thrown in. Tanya comes down the stairs and sees him, and clearly is wondering if he's been brainwashed/under a spell/has finally cracked. Tommy seems very embarrassed, and if he was, then why was he practicing in school in full view of anyone? It turns out that his lip syncing performance was actually him practicing for music class, where he has to sing.

Hint: Tommy, lip syncing is not actually singing.

Tanya agrees to give Tommy some singing lessons, probably in the hope that she will never have to see him do that again. Ever.

Out on the lake, Bulk and Skull are on a male bonding fishing trip with their fake!daddy. He's given them some sort of nonsense explanation about how catching criminals is a lot like catching fish, but not to worry, he has a secret weapon. I don't know why they need a secret weapon to catch fish in Angel Grove, the city is full of them.

Meanwhile, the Machine Empire plans to combine these two things by a) turning Lt. Stone's secret weapon fish bait into a monster and b) placing a spell on Tommy and Tanya that will make them sing everything. Supposedly this will alter their telepathic links to the Zords or something, but personally, we believe that the real purpose is to drive the other Rangers crazy.

Because Tommy? CANNOT SING.

Anyway, this is one of the worst plans ever, but I so don't actually care, because it's hilarious and one of my favorite episodes of all time.

Tommy and Tanya's singing is so ridiculously over the top and dramatic and the other Rangers are all cringing and it's GREAT.

While Tommy and Tanya are singing their explanation to Zordon, the fish bait thing has been transformed into a giant caterpillar monster, and well... you might want to get out of the water.

The Rangers are clued into some serious destruction of the city, with Cogs blowing apart buildings and everything. Of course, Rocky then informs us that this is the abandoned warehouse district, and I spent the next few minutes laughing hysterically and trying to figure out how Angel Grove functions. We guess that after the first few attacks from Rita the city created a protective barrier of abandoned buildings for monsters to squash or something.

Meanwhile, Adam asks if he can pilot Tommy's Zord, because he's that awesome. Jason stays with him, while the other Rangers morph (and Tommy and Tanya sing their morphs. SO GREAT) and go fight.

This is actually a pretty cool Zord fight, mostly because the monster looks like it's right out of Labyrinth. The cogs are even attacking the Zord Bay! I mean, this is pretty epic destruction, it's great.

While Alpha changes the link so Adam can pilot the Red Battle Zord, we figured out that we're recapping Ranger of Two Worlds on Wednesday, and then there were EPIC TEARS. At least that explains where Billy is, but some in universe explanation would be great.

Adam goes and beats up the robot, but apparently Tommy's mental state is too foreign, so he loses control of the Zord. The other Rangers also lose control of their Zords which... leads to the Zords dancing? Why is there a Zord shaking its ass at the camera? NO, SERIOUSLY.

Everyone gets thrown out of their Zords, and there's a fight, and Tommy vs Archerina was pretty great. The monster gets destroyed, and while Machina is sulking about it, Mondo comes back.

At the Youth Center, we discover that Tommy got an A on his assignment. .... Really? Did his teacher give him the A to make him stop? Rocky tells Tommy that he's glad that Tommy stopped singing because he couldn't take it anymore.

Bulk and Skull come in, smelling like fish. They say they never want to see another fish again. Boys, I suggest moving far away from Angel Grove. Then they are incredibly rude to Emily, who unveils Ernie's new fish special.

.... What sort of juice bar serves fish anyway?

Fish: 4. How on earth does singing alter a telepathic link?

Fic we want: PEOPLE MAKING FUN OF TOMMY FOREVER.

Episode 199- A Mystery To Me

It's a murder mystery party! Those are so much fun. Except this one doesn't quite work like a murder mystery party. Is this the best murder mystery? Not even close. But it's fun at least!

So the rangers and Bulk and Skull are sitting around a table. Everybody is in costume. It is AWESOME. Tanya is a flapper, Jason is some kind of mafia guy in the worst hat EVER (and if I can tell it's a bad hat, it's a REALLY REALLY bad hat), Tommy is a cowboy, ROCKY IS DISTRESSED OVER BEING THE BUTLER (butlers in murder mysteries are awesome!). You get the idea.

Detective Stone is about to reveal who the culprit is (culprit of what? The mystery hasn't even started yet!) when he vanishes! And so it begins. Kat jumps in immediately as the Super Sleuth and starts questioning everybody. Tanya immediately jumps to Rocky as the culprit. They all pull some pretty bad accents and then Adam tells everybody to split up and search the house. EVERYBODY ACCUSES ROCKY AGAIN. Poor Rocky.

Unfortunately, Archerina and Gasket are watching. Archerina doesn't like Kat much. Gasket thinks she's spunky and this makes Archerina jealous. She wants to go toe to toe with Kat and see who comes out on top. I approve of this!

Adam finds a glowing door and manages to get trapped in a dungeon. Tanya follows shortly thereafter. They just assume that is the room where victims get held, but they don't think to ask or explore or anything. After awhile, Tommy gets eaten by the glowing door and interrupts them. This makes them all very grumpy. Rocky ends up in there a few minutes later, the third wheel as usual. Then, and only then, does Tommy suggest that something isn't quite right about that and tries to contact Zordon.

Meanwhile, Bulk and Skull stop Jason from going through the glowing door and they all end up in the ACTUAL victim room. Bored. Playing cards. Twiddling their thumbs. But at least it's obvious it's the victim room and not some cold, damp, weird, dark DUNGEON like the others are trapped in and just assume is the victim room. This leaves Kat on her own. Archerina materializes in the room and Kat STANDS HER GROUND. IN THE FACE OF EVIL ROYALTY. Because she's awesome like that. Archerina challenges her to a duel, which she accepts, and then vanishes.

Kat, clearly the brains of this whole team, CONTACTS ZORDON. LIKE SHE'S SUPPOSED TO. He agrees something is up and tries to find the others, but can't. Kat goes to fight Archerina. Alone.

Except then Auric has to come and defend her and she's not allowed to do this on her own. But she should have been! She could have handled it! Auric gets hurt, but that's okay because Zordon is finally able to contact the others. Well, minus Jason. Apparently it's easier to contact rangers in an EVIL DUNGEON than it is in the plain drawing room of an old house that is hosting a murder mystery. Whatever.

So they go help Kat. Because Archerina tricked her and brought a monster, too. As if that was a surprise. It takes all the rangers and Auric, but they beat the monster and make it back to the murder mystery just in time to find out who dunnit. Turns out it was Detective Stone the whole time. That... is not how a murder mystery works. But whatever.

2.5 fish. It wasn't bad! It's just not how things actually work.

Episode 198 - A Brief Mystery of Time

Oh hey, there are actually consequences to the whole Brain Drain thing. Unfortunately, the consequences do not involve Tommy getting telepathy and making out with Adam but I'll take what I can get.

What we actually get is the Groundhog Day episode. Personally, I think that Xena did it best.

Day 1

The first day opens with some kid named Steven rollerblading down the hallway, while the Worst Guidance Counselor Ever chases after him. He knocks into Tommy and Kat, who joke about the school needing a stop sign. Then they stop by Kat's locker, where Jason asks them if they're worried about the test, and then tells them they should stop by the Juice Bar after school to meet Adam and Tanya and try Emily's new shaved ice. Then some poor kid's locker breaks and his books fall onto the floor.

Tommy, Jason, Kat and Rocky go and take some final exam. Rocky has forgotten his pencil, and Ms. Appleby is there, which is pretty great. We're gearing up for graduation, apparently!

After the test is over, Adam and Tanya are being really cute in the youth center when the other Rangers show up. Bulk and Skull order some drinks and talk loudly about being undercover, and then Bulk ends up covered in soda.

Meanwhile, both Gasket and Sprocket have plans to prove that they are the best. DUN DUN DUN.

Day 2

Steven is skating through the halls again, and Tommy is starting to get a feeling of deja vu. Then he starts responding to Jason before Jason actually says anything. Yet nobody thinks to call Zordon. Nobody even wonders if this is a side effect from the brain drain.

In the park, they get attacked by Cogs, which is new and when they finally get to the Youth Center Adam clearly thinks Tommy is crazy. Tommy tries to explain that All of this has happened before and shall happen again but nobody listens to him. Nobody even suggests talking to Zordon.

Day 3

We get the same ridiculous scene at the school again, and this time at the park Tommy stops everyone and shows that there are Cogs waiting for them around the next hill. Since they have clearly discovered that Tommy is psychic, everyone teleports to the Power Chamber, where they have Alpha scan Tommy's brainwaves for irregularities, which QR says is like scanning for alien activity in the vicinity of London on Christmas Day.

Now that they've scanned Tommy, everyone is able to figure out that they're stuck in a time loop created by the Machine Empire so that they could move in an invasion fleet. Maybe the time loop will also explain Tommy's eventual doctorate. They locate the crystal thing that is looping time, and everyone goes down to destroy it. Tommy manages to smash it, and there's a fight, and zords are called, and we spend half of the fight talking about Jason/Rocky instead.

The next day, there's still a feeling of deja vu as Adam and Tanya are still being ridiculously cute, but Bulk and Skull both get covered with soda. Oh, show. I don't even know what to say about you.

Fish: 3. One for each day.

Covered in: Bulk and Skull, are you really making us bring back this category? Booo.

Episode 197- King for a Day Part 2

THIS is the episode where I think Kat's character was handled the BEST. Seriously, she should have been like this ALL the time. Plus, Bulk and Skull are BIG DAMN HEROES!!!!!!!!!!!!

So last time on Power Rangers, Tommy had induced amnesia and thought he was king of the Machine Empire. He was in an arena. Fighting Jason. And a billion shippy fics were born.

Jason wants to save Tommy with the power of friendship. He says "Tommy" a lot and this seems to trigger something, and I keep screaming at Tommy to just look at how he's dressed because HELLO! POWER RANGER! Tommy, unfortunately, is not very smart.

In a cell, Bulk and Skull are discussing The Way Things Are with Fish Hat guy. He is a master warrior from his planet. Gasket is collecting warriors from every planet for his arena and he just assumes Bulk and Skull are warriors as well. They do not correct him. Best part of this exchange?
Fish Hat Guy: "What planet are you from?"
Bulk and Skull: "We're from Earth."
Fish Hat Guy: "Oh, I'm sorry to hear that."
BWAAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHA. HE KNOWS.

On the moon, Rita and Zedd are watching. Rita makes a comment about as soon as the rangers destroy each other, they'll rule the Earth. Except they WON'T. And the moment they realize that is SAD. They are so distraught! Zedd realizes there is only one way to win, and that's take out the Machine Empire. And the only way to do that is to HELP THE RANGERS. It physically pained him to say this, and Rita fainted, but he's RIGHT.

Tommy and Jason are fighting and Billy is trying desperately to get the other rangers there to help. He gets them as far as the lake where Tommy first was kidnapped and that's it. He loses the signal. They can't go anywhere. So they stand around near the lake helpless, hoping Billy will do his usual and pull a miracle out of thin air to get them there. He doesn't. Instead, FINSTER DOES IT FOR HIM. Finster has been working on his own teleportation device and convinced Zedd that five rangers are more annoying than one, and he should teleport the other rangers to help win back Tommy. Zedd takes credit, of course, and Finster blows out his machine doing it. BUT HE DID IT. FINSTER TELEPORTED THE RANGERS TO JASON AND TOMMY. BECAUSE HE IS AWESOME. (and now we feel Billy and Finster should bond. Best friendship ever y/y/mfy?)

Meanwhile, Bulk, Skull, and Fish Hat Guy defeat a cog and escape. The plan is to travel to the control room and destroy the mind wipe device, thus restoring Tommy's memories. Then they're going to destroy the force field device and allow EVERYBODY to escape and go home. Good plan, guys! Except there are lots of cogs near the control room. Fish Hat Guy locks himself in to destroy everything, leaving Bulk and Skull outside to fight the cogs. AND THEY DO. AND IT IS AMAZING. They handle more cogs unmorphed and without the benefit of any special power flowing through them than the rangers EVER do MORPHED. BECAUSE BULK AND SKULL ARE AWESOME AND I LOVE THEM AND THIS IS THE BEST FIGHT OF THE WHOLE SERIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So the five rangers attempt to restrain Tommy and convince him he's on their side. It's not working too well. Until Kat pulls the MOST AWESOME MOVE EVER. She DEMORPHS. Right there. Mid fight. She refuses to fight any longer and just demorphs, trying to convince Tommy that she is his friend, not his enemy. She stand there while he attempts to attack her, but he can't do it, because part of him KNOWS. She hugs him tight and talks to him, willing him with the sheer power of friendship, that he is GOOD and they are GOOD and it's OKAY. AND I LOVE HER FOR IT. IT WORKS. Tommy starts to remember. Jason demorphs to help Kat. Tommy remembers more. The others join in. Tommy is struggling with this, and almost attacks again. Instead he fully realizes himself, demorphs, and stands with his friends! Yay for the power of friendship! Seriously, this is one of my favourite tropes.

So the rangers can't morph and they can't teleport out and Gasket comes down to start monologuing them. Except Bulk and Skull and Fish Hat Guy WON. They destroyed everything, in a big explosion, and the force field vanishes. The rangers bid their farewells and teleport the hell out of there. Bulk and Skull aren't sure Fish Hat Guy made it out, but he comes striding out of the fire and it is awesome. They're so happy to see him! He congratulates them, they do the grunt, and they congratulate him. Except they have no way home, so he honours them by taking them home himself. AWWWWWW.

Back on Earth, Bulk and Skull regale Emily with their tales of heroics. She doesn't believe them and even taunts them about it. It makes me sad. So they go tell Jason, Kat, and Tommy. Who DO believe them! And talk about how the rangers would surely thank them. Except Tommy and Kat, in attempting that whole Secret Identity thing, come across sarcastic. Bulk and Skull stomp off, upset that nobody believes them, even though the trio call after them that they do believe them and please don't go. They were actually trying to be nice this time which is a very welcome change from similar interactions in MMPR!

2 fish. Anything fishy is completely overshadowed by the awesome that is Kat AND Bulk and Skull!

(I really need a good Bulk and Skull icon)

Episode 196 - King For A Day - Part 1

First, I'm really sorry we've been so long without recaps. I moved into a new apartment, and that's taken precedence over pretty much everything, including recapping. But I am moved in now, so recaps are back on schedule! (Err, for version of schedule that means we're still 3 months behind where we said we'd be.)

SO. Onto the recap.

Tommy has been kidnapped, and how much do I love that we get to use that tag again? A LOT, let me tell you.

The episode begins with Tommy's brainwashing, where he's fighting the white ranger version of himself, and some cogs. I maintain that this is one of the events that contributes to Tommy's MPD. But we'll discuss that when we get to Dino Thunder. Gasket is being all great and menacing and going on about how he's manipulating Tommy's mind and will brainwash him to destroy the Rangers, while also giving Tommy's powers to some monster.

This is... actually a great plan! Good job, Gasket!

Meanwhile, Rocky, Jason and Kat are at the Youth Center since there's nothing they can do at the moment, where they stumble upon Bulk and Skull insisting to a mocking crowd that they saw Zeo Ranger 5 at the lake, except they could see right through him. You would think that the people of Angel Grove would be way more tolerant of these things, considering they get attacked by monsters all the time, but nobody is willing to listen to Bulk and Skull. Probably because they have cried wolf a few too many times. They're dared to go get some proof (by some tiny children) and they agree. Meanwhile, the Rangers also decide to check it out.

With the brainwashing complete, Tommy's powers are transferred to some monster that they now claim has the power of 100 warriors. That is BULLSHIT. Maybe 100 putties or something. Then we get transferred to the arena, and I am not going to lie, I am absolutely craving a bad and wrong gladiator AU where the Rangers are all captured and forced to fight each other. *cough* I mean, seriously, we have a great setup for it! (We like torturing our favorites, WHAT?)

So it turns out that Tommy hasn't been brainwashed to be evil again, he just has amnesia and Gasket is telling him that the Rangers are the evil ones. This sucks, because frankly, Tommy is better when he's evil. Also, no evil laugh. BOO. On the other hand, amnesia is still pretty great for fic writing.

At the Power Chamber, the Rangers are all discussing what to do, and Jason and Kat are pretty much fighting over who gets to rescue Tommy. Seriously, they should just date each other instead of fighting over him. But Jason's hero complex is in full effect, and he goes on about how he can't fail Tommy again. Hey, continuity!

They head to the lake, and see holographic!Tommy, and Jason runs right to it while Kat realizes that It's a trap! Jason gets caught, and Kat does not. Bulk and Skull, who show up to investigate, also get caught. Walking chaos magnets, for real.

Gasket has convinced Tommy that the Rangers are evil by showing him three images of the Rangers shooting things and then things blowing up. Tommy decides that his best warrior will destroy the Rangers, starting with the Gold Ranger, who is now stuck in the arena. GLADIATOR AU. FOR REAL. For some reason, Tommy doesn't wonder why he is dressed as a Ranger.

Bulk and Skull are also being held captive in a cell, where some guy with a fish hat asks them if they want to argue with each other, or escape.

Back at the Power Chamber, Billy has returned and is scanning for Tommy's missing brainwaves, and they also manage to find Jason, and Bulk and Skull. Billy is so not surprised to see Bulk and Skull have been captured, because they are walking chaos magnets. He refers to them as a couple of hitchhikers, which explains so much. They're all freaked out because they don't know where their towel is! Oh, and the portal is now closed, so the rest of the Rangers can't get in.

Then they manage to get a picture, because Gasket is BROADCASTING THIS. Even Rito and Goldar pick it up on the moon! To be fair, if I was going to destroy a Ranger, I would probably also broadcast it. It would be great ratings. Except I'd do it timedelayed, since, you know, the Rangers aren't that easy to destroy.

Jason fights the monster, and then figures out that it has Tommy's powers because only Tommy can match him move for move, so he just calls the monster Tommy a lot and somehow that makes it lose Tommy's powers? That whole part makes no sense. He tries to get through to Tommy, but Tommy just says he will fight him instead.

Fish: 4.5. LOOK, that thing with the brainwaves makes NO SENSE. A good plan, but NO SENSE. If you cut out the whole thing with the monster using Tommy's powers, it would drop down a lot, but it made NO SENSE.

Fic we want: GLADIATOR AU.

Questions: Why are some of Rita and Zedd's monsters in the audience?

Episode 195- Where in the World is Zeo Ranger 5

Today on Power Rangers... Tommy is Super Awesome and Everything to Everyone. Sprocket is whiny and has jealousy issues with Gasket. Rito and Goldar are put in charge of fixing the RV (and we all know how that will turn out). And Bulk and Skull win back Detective Stone's trust in guarding his expensive machines thanks to Gasket.

We start off with a very long Tommy-is-awesome montage. Because clearly this show has not had enough of them up to this point. He's on a wave runner in the lake and Kat is really nervous for some reason. Jason and Emily admire Tommy. Jason is very pretty and hot damn does he have some nice arms. Jason, be on my screen more often, please.

Bulk and Skull are put in charge of Detective Stone's wave runner. This is also not going to end well (and doesn't, because Gasket turns it into the monster of the week). Luckily it is restored in better working order, so Bulk and Skull finally gain Detective Stone's trust. FINALLY.

Mid-ride, and just at the end of the Tommy-is-awesome montage, Tommy is kidnapped! I missed that tag. This happens to him rather a lot. Kat and Jason run off to a random wave runner and go searching the lake. Tommy is nowhere to be found and in a shout out to the name of this episode, they wonder where in the world he's gone. Kat uses her brain and contacts Zordon immediately. Clearly she is the smarts of this episode. Unfortunately, Billy is on Triforia being an Intergalactic Spy, so he's not going to be able to help. Alpha discovers Tommy has been teleported off planet, however the fish are blocking his signal. With a barcode scanner with flashy lights detection device, they can find the remnants of the signal and trace it back.

So, as TSB put it, "The fish are blocking everything, but maybe you can find the right fish in the lake." This... makes a weird sort of sense for Power Rangers...

Anyway, Jason and Kat get attacked by cogs while searching for this signal. They do not call the other rangers. Adam and Tanya must be busy doing... each other. Rocky is probably busy wondering why Jason is hanging out with Kat instead of studying anatomy with him. Poor Rocky gets left out of everything now. So the cogs break the scanner and then Kat screams for Tommy Jason. Tommy Jason rushes to her side, a cog sticks his tongue out at them, and then they vanish. Kat and Jason are left wondering what's going on.

Gasket sends down a monster, whom Sprocket is sure is not powerful enough to beat the rangers (but Gasket doesn't believe him, because what does Sprocket know... he's just an inexperienced kid... I have sibling issues as well). The monster knocks people unconscious by spraying them with a water hose. ALL the rangers go after him this time and he likes to taunt them, apparently. He calls Jason a second rate substitute for a leader. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA NO. Jason did it first and Jason did it BETTER. Sprocket is subtlely cheering the rangers on. I love that about him.

Apparently the monster proves too tough because he sprays them, they get disoriented, and then the rangers pull a Sir Robin and bravely run away. Alpha gives them some weed medication in an oxygen mask and Rocky totally hits that up. Then they all go back to fight some more.

This monster has a boomerang. Which he threatens to use a lot, but then charges at the rangers instead of, y'know, THROWING IT. Gasket makes him grow and Tanya is all "We need Tommy!" But no! Alpha, in a rare burst of continuity, remembers the remote for the white falcon zord, and says there is one of the zeo zords as well and they can use that. Tanya should have been upset by this, seeing as they could have used it when she was called away from rescuing her parents, but whatever. Anyway, as expected, the rangers win. Sprocket pulls an "I told you so" to his big brother. *pats Sprocket*

Back at the lake, Kat and Jason are trying to see if there are still fish. And there ARE! Are we at all surprised? OF COURSE NOT. They take the data back to Alpha who uses it to track down Tommy. Except he's getting "unusually high brainwaves" from Tommy. This would be because normally he doesn't get ANY brainwaves from Tommy. :P

We end this episode with a gratuitous shot of Tommy, morphed (why... he was kidnapped off his wave runner in a bathing suit and life jacket), a device on his head, his legs spread wide, and in clearly what is a lot of pain. I'm sure there is bad and wrong fic about this somewhere (no, I don't want to read it).

This episode had far too little Rocky-and-Jason on the same screen, and no Billy. This makes me sad.

3 fish. They were all in that barcode scanner device.