There seem to be three distinct trends in the world of Hollywood blockbusters: superheroes, nostalgia, and reboots. And Lionsgate is attempting to cash in on all three with its upcoming Power Rangers movie. Adapted from the campy 90's TV series Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, the upcoming action adventure film will be taking a much more mature approach at the property, while also bringing back all of the iconography from the original series. Anticipation for Power Rangers has been slowly growing over the course of the last few months, mostly due to the recently released trailers and images.
And now a trailer has hit the web which shows off a ton of new aspects to the movie that are sure to please diehard fans, as well as some naysayers. Check it out.
I don't care how you feel about the Power Rangers franchise; that trailer makes the upcoming film look fun as hell. And it also gave us a bunch of new information. Let's break it all down.
To start, we now know more about how the teenagers with attitude accrued their awesome new powers. It was actually none other than Billy the Blue Ranger (originated by David Yost) who found the Rangers' power coins. The other kids just happened to be at the right place at the right time, and got superpowers and giant badass robots out of the deal. Lucky them.
Perhaps the most obvious message sent to audiences through Power Rangers' new trailer is that the film will contain plenty of laughs. Almost every line of dialogue in the new trailer was a one liner, which is sure to help the hardcore fans feel at ease. Early footage made Power Rangers seem super serious, which wasn't anything like the original series. Alas, it appears that the new movie took a page from the Marvel Cinematic Universe's handbook, balancing moments of levity and comedy with the action and badassery.
Speaking of Marvel, there was a pretty great reference to the comic book juggernaut. In the trailer, we're shown Bryan Cranton's Zordon attempt to guide the Rangers through their new roles and powers. When asking the kids if they have any questions, RJ Cyler's Billy asked the big talking head if they were more like Spider-Man or Iron Man. This line should ring true for critics of the new power suits. When the first glimpse of Power Rangers was released months ago, critics loathed how robotic and Iron Man-ish the Rangers looked. But now it appears that the filmmakers are in on the joke, and are able to poke fun at the new costumes in a sly way.
And the trailer ended with the first real glimpse we've gotten of Alpha 5 in action. Alpha is Zordon's bumbling sidekick, and will be voiced by SNL alum Bill Hader in Power Rangers. We all assumed this would lead to a fair amount of comedy for the character, and the above trailer seems to confirm this suspicion. Although it looks like they'll be teasing us for a bit more before we hear him exclaim "Ay-ay-ay!"
Power Rangers will fly into theaters on March 24, 2017.
