Saturday, August 30, 2014

Retro Force Fan, Power Down


The time has come my readers. As of today, Retro Force Fan will become nothing more then an archived blog. Yes, you read that correctly, Retro Force Fan will no longer be updated.

I created this blog back in late 2010/early 2011 before the premiere of "Power Rangers Samurai". Since I was new to this, my posts were amateur. But over time, I improved and got better at making my posts more attractive and impressive.

Probably the hardest post to do was my Samurai Wrap Up. That took well over two weeks to do and it was quite a project. My favorite by far though was doing My History With Power Rangers. It was fun to try and remember things from oh so many years ago. 

The reason I'm no longer updating this blog is because, I feel it's time to step my game up. Not only in the website universe, but also on my other social media outlets like my YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. I've been a part of the online fandom for 4 and a half years now and it is the time to move on to a much more elaborate look. 

This doesn't mean that I've left the online PR universe for good. I have moved my blogging skills over to WordPress under the name "TucsonPowerZealot". For those who have never heard of  the word Zealot, it means, as Dictionary.com states:
"a person who shows zeal."
 and Zeal means:
"fervor for a person, cause, or object; eager desire or endeavor;enthusiastic diligence; ardor."
Basically, it means a fan of a certain object, or it's often defined as an enthusiast of something. I decided to chose that word because it sounds creative and clever. 

For those who have read and supported Retro Force Fan over the past 4 and a half years, I thank you. It's been a tremendous experience working on this site and sharing my views on Power Rangers to the world. It was the perfect introduction to the online fandom and thanks to this blog, I was introduced to many toy reviewers, bloggers and forums.

I hope you'll join me as I take the next step forward and put my improved and absorbed skills to good use under the name "TucsonPowerZealot" on the following sites:

Thank you all for the support over the years and I will leave Blogger with this. 

"The world is very lucky to have you, and so am I. May the Power protect you, always."-Zordon, Doomsday Part 2

Thursday, August 28, 2014

PMC 2014 Videos

Here are some videos I took at Power Morphicon 2014!

One will reveal something special! (Hint, it's the one I'm in)

Will be updated as time goes one ;)

All Red Rangers Morph

Saban Brands Panel

SHOUT! Factory Trivia Panel


Happy 21st Birthday Power Rangers!

ALL IMAGES BELOW ARE LINKED TO THEIR SOURCES 
AND BELONG TO SABAN BRANDS LLC



On August 28th, 1993, the world was introduced to what would become the longest running live action super-hero show in the world, Power Rangers.

Today marks the 21st Anniversary of when a space witch and her army of goons was released from their dumpster after 10'000 years and was ready to conquer earth. A floating head in a tube asked his assistant to "recruit a team of teenagers with attitude". And that little scene, led to this:


From then on, it's been success year after year after year. From very successful toy sales to retail items to live shows to movies to charities to internet contribution and even to conventions, Power Rangers has (and still is) a big hit through out the world. The franchise has seen no sign of dying completely, escaping cancellation 4 times thanks to toy sales, high ratings and/or corporate buyouts. 

I wasn't even born when Power Rangers premiered. I was born about a year later, the day when Tommy was coming down as the White Ranger. 

I got into the PR ring when I was 6 years old when Lightspeed Rescue was on. I explain how I got into it in My History With Power Rangers post. I then fell out of the franchise after Dino Thunder. Saw bits and pieces of SPD and Mystic Force and then fell through completely.

Around late 2008/early 2009, I got into it again, just as a casual look back at it. Didn't even touch the Disney material at all. Then Saban Brands announced they bought the rights back from Disney and then I decided to become a fan full swing starting with Samurai. While not the best Power Rangers season out there, it introduced me to the online fandom by listening to people's comments about what they liked and didn't like about certain things. This also encouraged me to join online forums such as RangerBoard and RangerCrew, Subscribe to YouTube channels such as MMPRtoysRanger Review, and DatabaseRanger, as well as beginning my own, and it encouraged me to begin my own blog following in the footsteps of Henshin Grid and Morphin Legacy among others. It also got me into toy collecting which is a mix of both American and Japanese items. 

Today, Power Rangers is stronger then ever. With complete season DVD releases, streaming on Netflix, Nintendo games, impressive toys by Bandai, social media accounts on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter and a recently announced student charity foundation, the brand has gone to new heights.

What can we expect in the future though? We have a highly anticipated "Legendary Battle" in November which features every single Power Ranger coming together (11 past Rangers reprising their roles) to fight an army of foot soldiers, a brand new season in 2015 called "Power Rangers Dino Charge" which features the return of former writer Judd Lynn as Executive Producer and a brand new MMPR Reboot Movie launching on July 22, 2016. And of course, plenty of other unknown surprises.

Special Thanks to Haim Saban, Saban Entertainment, Disney, Saban Brands, FOX, Nickelodeon, Bandai, Lionsgate, Shout! Factory and of course, the fans for the success that has spawned for the past 2 decades. Every little thing you do, whether it's a feature film, a toy review or putting the Red Ranger on a bath towel, it pulls in a new fan every time. And the fan base will continue to grow and grow. 

Here's to 21 Years of Success!

GO GO POWER RANGERS!

Wednesday, August 27, 2014

#PowerRangers21 Celebration Day 3: Favorite Villain and Livetweeting of "Once A Ranger" Parts 1 & 2

Today's #PowerRangers21 Celebraration Topic:

Favorite Villain:


My favorite villain of all time has got to be Ransik of Power Rangers Time Force. I like him because his back story is a lot more different and realistic then other villains. He was born from a DNA accident and was half-human, half mutant. Because he was different from everyone else, people shunned him for it. So, he decided to return the favor and punish those who ignored him. He also has a condition, thanks to a bit from a mutant, that makes him mutate at an alarming rate. Because of this, he has to take cyrem given to him by a man named Dr. Louis Ferex....who became his vengeful robot assistant, Frax. In the finale, he went even further by brainwashing Frax and making him control his own robot, Doomtron. After both of them are destroyed, he takes on the Rangers with ease. However, vengeance came with a price. He almost killed his daughter, Nadira in a warehouse after mistaking it as Jen, the Pink Ranger/ After seeing this, he realizes what he's caused and he turns himself in. He and his daughter come back a year later in Wild Force to help the Time Force and Wild Force Rangers and his mutant DNA is gone. He now lives in piece with his daughter.

I have to give credit to Vernon Wells for bringing this character to life. His accent and his mannerisms were just perfect for the character. This is due to him, of course, being in bigger projects such as "Mad Max" and "Commando". Ransik is also a perfect example of how people can change no matter what. I kind of wish that more villains were like him. It's better then them being killed off at the end. Plus, who doesn't love a guy who pulls bones out of his knee and spine and says witty lines so professionally like this one?


Today's #PowerRangers21 Celebration Episode: 

"Once A Ranger"
Parts 1 &2: 


While the 10th Anniversary had one episode to celebrate, the 15th Anniversary had a 2-parter......and to be honest, it wasn't that good. Unlike "Forever Red" though, this one did something a little bit different. They chose a mixture of Rangers from the past. 4 from the Disney era and one from the Saban era. The "Retro Rangers": 

Adam-Mighty Morphin Black
Tori-Ninja Storm Blue
Kira-Dino Thunder Yellow
Bridge-SPD Red (Yes, that's true)
Xander-Mystic Force Green

So, where are the Rangers representing Zeo-Wild Force? Nice job, guys.

Anyway, like I said, they tried to do something different with this one, but it really didn't turn out like we would expect. Then again, this is Operation Overdrive, so what ISN'T wrong about it? 

I'll be livetweeting the episode on my Twitter page using the hashtag #CountdownToPR21. Day 4 will come later today and then I'll be all caught up. 

Let the Power Protect you my friends.

Tuesday, August 26, 2014

#PowerRangers21 Celebration Day 2: Favorite Crew Member and Livetweeting of "Forever Red"

Today's #PowerRangers21 Celebration Topic:

Favorite Crew Member:


By no stretch of the imagination, my favorite crew member on Power Rangers is writer/current executive producer, Judd Lynn. (And yes, that's him at Power Morphicon 4 with the Dino Charge cast. More on that later.) For those who are not aware, Judd Lynn was the head writer on Power Rangers from the 2nd half of Turbo in 1997 all the way up through Time Force in 2001. He returned to the franchise as an executive producer in 2009 to finish up RPM after Disney fired Eddie Guzelian for going over budget. He is now back in the franchise again as Executive Producer for Power Rangers Dino Charge (and beyond hopefully) taking Johnathan Tzachor's place (Executive producer of MMPR-Wild Force/Samurai & MegaForce).

His writing was excellent and he really knew his stuff. He's the one who said "The audience is getting older, so let's have the show grow up with them." Through his original tenure, every season got more and more mature as time went on. In Space was the first example of that. Lost Galaxy was considerably more dark then its predecessor. Lightspeed Rescue was also a bit darker then it's predecessor given it's war against demons and Time Force was it's darkest of them all. Even Wild Force, while he had no involvement with that season at all, was probably influenced by his writing tone. That was thanks to "Chip" Lynn himself. He knows his stuff well and was the king of Power Rangers writing. His stories are for all ages, not just children. Trust me, when the Time Force finale aired, my mom cried a few times due to the things going on and the dialogue that was being said. Kinda wish that he held a writer's workshop for the writers for Samurai and MegaForce.

Now he's back and his biggest push is in the writing department. He is actually moving the writing staff over to New Zealand so that they can interact with the cast more. An influence that Samurai or MegaForce never had since those episodes were all written by 4 or 5 people at an office building in Los Angeles and were just mailed (or emailed) to Auckland.

He'll make the show enjoyable again. I'm sure of it. , Just about a week and a half ago, he did an interview with Henshin Justice. Go check it out.

Today's #PowerRangers21 Celebration Episode: 

"Forever Red":


This episode doesn't need any introduction from me. Every single Power Rangers fan knows of this episode and they either love it or hate it. I am in the "love it" category as it is my favorite episode of the whole entire show. As stated above, while not written by Judd Lynn, it was probably influenced by him. This was going to be a 2 parter, but with Saban transferring over to Disney at the time, it was shrunk down to a single episode...and it was the best 22 minutes in the entire series. At least that's what I think.

I'll be live tweeting this episode on my Twitter page using the hashtag #CountdownToPR21. Day 3 and 4 will come tomorrow. 

Let the Power Protect you my friends. 

#PowerRangers21 Celebration Day 1: Fan Creation and Livetweeting Of "To The Tenth Power" & "The Power Of Pink"

So yeah, I'm LATE to this thing. Post-PMC madness people. You'll get to see my post-PMC post later, trust me. 

Any who, fellow Power Rangers fan, SilurianRanger came up with an event via Facebook to celebrate the upcoming 21st anniversary of when the show first premiered. It consists of a show-n-tell topic such as your favorite Ranger, crew member, fan work you've created and etc. along with an episode or two highlighting a major event within the franchise as well as live tweeting it as you' watch it using the hashtag #CountdownToPR21 . This will happen up till Thursday, August 28 when the hashtag will be #PowerRangers21 to commemorate the event. 

As I am late to the party, I will do the first 2 days today (in two separate posts) as this started on Sunday. I couldn't do it since I was traveling back home from Morphicon and I was busy yesterday. But hey, better late then never. 

With that said, let's get started.

Today's #PowerRangers21 Celebration Topic:

Fan Creations:


I myself haven't created anything PR related in terms of drawing or custom props or anything like that. However, I have created some PR-related material in terms of creative writing. A few years ago, before MegaForce was announced (publically that is), I created an outline for my own take on a Gokaiger adaptation under the title "Power Rangers Pirates". Yeah great title...I know. It basically contained the list of Rangers, Villains, Allies, Zords, Episodes, what Ranger Keys were used, who used them,  Episode titles, descriptions and which episodes used footage from Gokaiger and which didn't use Sentai footage period. Again, these were just ideas of my own and it was fun to come up with. Take a look and tell me what you think.

Today's #PowerRangers21 Celebration Episodes:

"To The Tenth Power" &
"The Power Of Pink":


These two PR episodes marked two major milestones. The first was the beginning of the annual team up episodes with the current season and the previous season. This was tried before in the Zeo two-parter, "Rangers Of Two Worlds" with the Alien Rangers, but it didn't go to well. In Space had 3 team up episodes. One with the Ninja Turtles (which never happened), one with Justin, the Blue Turbo Ranger and one with Adam, the 2nd Black Mighty Morphin Ranger. Aside from the Ninja Turtles one, the other two were pretty good, but these two episodes are the first to have the past team together at once, minus Zhane. It also featured the first time a Ranger is actually killed off in the series. It's pretty grim for a kids show, but hey, this was back in the day when Power Rangers were taking big risks by putting ANYTHING dark on screen no matter the level. 

I will be live tweeting these episodes on my Twitter page using the hashtag #CountdownToPR21. I will do Day 2's later. 

Let the Power Protect you my friends. 

Thursday, August 21, 2014

Morphicon "Pronouncement" Video







Tomorrow is the beginning of Power Morphicon 4 and here is my "pronouncement" (promo+announcement) video. Might want to wear headphones. I was very quiet since I wanted to consider others. 


I'll be back next week for a follow up post. 

ITS MORPHICON TIME!