The Mighty Morphin Power Rangers reboot, set for release next March, landed a hell of a casting coup when Bryan Cranston agreed to play the role of Zordon. The de facto leader / mentor of the Power Rangers, Zordon has typically been known as nothing more than a floating head. But naturally, if you cast someone like Cranston in a pivotal role such as this, you're going to want to get more out of his performance than just a stoic hologram.
Entertainment Tonight caught up with Bryan Cranston, during the promotional rounds for his latest film, The Infiltrator, and the actor was generous with information about his presence in the would-be blockbuster reboot. The following limited, but helpful, information was his gift to his adoring public:
The tenant of that storyline is that this a real person who is trapped in this etherworld and it becomes this in-the-wall so to speak of [the command center]. He still has a heart and mind, but an agenda that he's got to get these five Power Rangers to defend the earth or else everyone they know will be killed.
So far, the details above track pretty well with the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers mythos, as Zordon was trapped in a time warp while doing battle with his nemesis, Rita Repulsa. Being trapped in said predicament is what prompted Zordon to draft the five ordinary teenagers he selected to become the Power Rangers, and the rest was franchise history. However, with further mention of motion capture and CGI work being used on Bryan Cranston's performance, it sounds like we might be getting a little more than just a floating face. If anything, it sounds like we'll be getting a full hologram of Zordon's person.
With a full CGI / Motion Capture treatment of Bryan Cranston's performance, there's a possibility that director Dean Israelite may have decided that he wasn't satisfied with just showing the audience Cranston's head for 90% of his film. Considering how much the Breaking Bad star must be paid for his participation in the film, one could assume that Israelite will want to get every penny's worth of performance on the big screen.
Come to think about it, there may even be a chance that we'll get to see Zordon's physical form go head to head with Rita in their ultimate duel, leading to the previously mentioned imprisonment of Zordon. Should that be the case, we'll get to see Bryan Cranston and Elizabeth Banks go head to head with all of the power in their respective corners, making for a hell of a prologue to the new reboot to the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers franchise. And to be honest, that's exactly the type of opening you want to give the parents who are left dragging their kids to this movie, as the meat of the action will be more in line with the film's demographic proper.
Mighty Morphin Power Rangers is set to storm into theaters on March 24th, 2017, which gives Bryan Cranston a fair amount of time to practice his voice of authority.
