Once & Always

Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Once & Always premiers today on Netflix and I was happy to watch it while doing my morning exercises. The special is meant to serve as a 30th anniversary of the series reunion... and it's exactly that. Without going into spoilers, the special reunites much of the MMPR cast in a new adventure to stop Robo Rita Repulsa's newest plan. What's that? Rita is a robot? Go watch the show... you'll love it. I did.

I'd say it's hard to believe it's been 30 years since Power Rangers debuted... but no, it's totally been a long time. For me, I was a kid who liked Godzilla and Transformers when discovering Dynaman late one Friday night on the USA Network. A few years later, MMPR started airing on Fox Kids... and I kinda wondered why they weren't playing Cheap Trick during the fights. Regardless, I loved the cheesy jokes and super hero action. All these years later and I still love classic MMPR better than the series that followed (not knocking those either, mind you).

It's a little bittersweet with the recent passing of Jason David Frank that the series got such a perfect love letter. However even with his and Thuy Trang's unfortunately leaving us much too early, the special honors their memory and treats the cast lovingly. I'm admittedly in post show glow still, but that was great. While playing to nostalgia, it still feels like a brand new episode of MMPR and I guess that's what it really is. I also appreciate how it's very much a modern tokusatsu production. I'd almost have expected this to have been airing on Tokushoutsu during a special event. I'm gushing, it was really that great.