Mighty Morphin Power Rangers starts off when astronauts open up a space-dumpster and inadvertently release one of the galaxy's worst enemies, an evil witch that has been imprisoned for 10,000 years.
Finally out of her cramped prison, Rita Repulsa, along with her minions, target Earth. Thankfully, the ancient wizard responsible for her imprisonment has a command station secreted away on Earth and upon learning of Rita's escape, Zordon tells his robot-friend, Alpha 5, to summon "five teenagers with attitude." These skilled teenagers will form a team to hold off Rita and her barrage of monsters. Not only will they have to use their own skills and the powers Zordon bestows upon the Power Rangers, but they will also pilot giant mechanical creatures known as Zords. You know, the Power Rangers formula that holds strong even to this day.
The first Power Rangers include Jason (Austin St. John), Zack (Walter Emmanuel), Billy (David Yost), Trini (Thuy Trang) and Kimberly (Amy Jo Johnson), and each have their own unique traits. Jason was the lead martial artist in the school. Zack liked to dance and incorporated it into his fighting, while Billy was the genius of the group and Trini was reluctant to get into any fight. Kimberly, a gymnast, seems like the typical valley-girl mall rat, but isn't near as shallow as she seems.
As the series starts off, it is only those five Rangers against a series of monsters created by Rita. Pretty much every episode followed a formula. The monster attacks with some minions, the kids fight the monster out of costume, then they morph and defeat the monster. Once the bad guy is down, Rita casts a spell that causes it to grow Godzilla-sized and the Rangers have to jump into their Zords and form the Megazord in order to win the day's fight once and for all. Actually, this isn't just the formula for those first episodes, it is the typical pattern found throughout the different Power Rangers series.
The first game changer in Mighty Morphin Power Rangers comes when Rita recruits a teenager of her own to become the evil Green Ranger. She puts a spell on new-kid Tommy (Jason David Frank) and the first five Rangers are forced to take on someone with their own powers. That is, until they break the spell and Tommy and his Dragon Zord becomes the sixth member of their team.
Tommy's storyline has a few ups and downs as he loses his powers early in the series, only to temporarily gain them again to help his friends. Eventually, the Green Ranger is retired completely, but Tommy returns when Zordon and Alpha 5 make the White Ranger. With the new suit, Zord and a talking sword, Tommy also takes leadership of the team from Jason.
During Tommy's power troubles, there are a few more changes taking place in the rest of the series. For one, Rita's boss, Lord Zedd, arrives and kicks her out for not being able to take over the little planet. With Zedd in control, the Rangers find themselves outmatched and they have to replace their prehistoric-styled Zords for a new round of creatures - these based on mythological beasts like Dragons, Griffins and Unicorns.
It isn't long after Zedd's appearance that three of the show's original cast decide to leave and pursue other projects. St John, Emmanuel and Trang bow out and the Red, Black and Yellow powers get transferred into Rocky (Steve Cardenas), Adam (Johnny Yong Bosch) and Aisha (Karen Ashley). Of course, the new Rangers only have a little bit of time to get used to their new powers before yet another wrench is thrown into the works. Rita reappears and uses a love potion to convince Zedd he has fallen for her. Now, with the two married, they are even more powerful than before, but it isn't until Rita's brother shows up that the Rangers lose their power again and change Zords another time.
With the Ninjazords in their control, the Rangers once again take on the various enemies Zedd's team sends down with little or no difficulty. Mind you, Rita, Zedd and the others have put the Rangers through their paces. They have been turned into kids, they've been sent into the past (a couple of times), and they've had various teammates turned on them because of Rita's spells. It's downright impressive that these six teens not only save the world over and over again, but they also keep up with all of their training and schoolwork.
As Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Complete Series starts to wrap up, Zedd uncovers some Zords of his own. By kidnapping Kimberly, the White Falconzord and their friend Ninjor, Zedd forces the Rangers to pilot the unearthed Shogunzords and wreak havoc on the Earth. At the same time, Rita has put someone else under a spell and sent the young Kat (Catherine Sutherland) out into the world to become friends with the Rangers and try to break them apart. While this plot is also foiled, Kimberly comes out of the ordeal deciding to leave the Rangers in order to become an Olympic (err... I mean "Pan Global") gymnast. Kat takes her place as the Pink Ranger, but she isn't the last cast member to leave before this 155 episode boxed set is finished.
When yet another of Zedd and Rita's plots fail, Master Vile, Rita's father, shows up to take control. He uses his powers to turn time backwards and make the Rangers a group of kids without their powers. Zordon and the Rangers are forced to ask for help, so they contact an alien planet known as Aquitar. They also have Rangers on their planet and can teleport to Earth in order to stop the trouble here while Zordon and the others try to bring things back to normal. While the new Alien Rangers have no problem taking on the enemies, they do have one flaw, they need water and a lot of it. Pretty much every episode involves them getting too dried out and having to find some source of pure water to rejuvenate themselves.
Before this last storyline is over, each of the children Rangers will have to go on a quest to find parts of the Zeo Crystal. With it, they will be able to fix the Earth and regain their own powers. While on her quest, Aisha decides to stay behind and sends her cousin, Tanya (Nakia Burrise), back to the Command Center as the Yellow Ranger in her stead.
Throughout all of this, there are several side characters that really help to make the show more than just masked fighters attacking rubber-suited monsters. For one, the actors portraying the different Rangers in their daily lives do a decent job. Sure, there are cheesy lines and some overacting, but quite frankly, it's nothing compared to a lot of Disney Channel shows these days. Those other characters include the comedic relief duo of Bulk (Paul Schrier) and Skull (Jason Narvy). This pair of school bully punks always lighten up the mood and their outrageous physical comedy balance out the fighting elements of the series a lot. They even have a bit of character growth throughout this collection. In the first season, they are simply the school bullies, but then they decide to try and figure out who the Power Rangers really are, and eventually trade their leather jackets and punk style for uniforms when they join the Junior Police Force.
As for special features, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Complete Series comes with two discs of extras crammed full of everything related to those early Power Ranger seasons, both the good and the bad. There are a couple of interesting new documentaries that look at the casting of the show, how the series was created and the cult following that the show has inspired. All of these should be interesting to the fans of the series. The rest of the extras are collections of old promotional materials and one-off episodes.
These one-off specials include "Alpha's Magical Christmas," "Lord Zedd's Monster Heads" and "The Good, the Bad and the Stupid, Best of Bulk and Skull." The first has a depressed Alpha 5 needing some Christmas cheer, so Zordon teleports a bunch of kids into the Command Center to sing carols. The Lord Zedd special is a re-edit of past episodes in an attempt to throw as many monsters together as possible, while the third is an hour-long clip episode of Bulk and Skull's exploits, apparently to test the waters for a spin-off series.
Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Complete Series also comes with the video included in the Power Rangers Fan Club as well as a lengthy lesson taught by Jason David Frank as he goes over some basic moves, principles of martial arts and a kata. The last piece of bonus footage in this boxed set was a filming of the stage show "Power Rangers Live!" that toured the country in the mid-90's.
Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Complete Series not only covers a major chunk of the show's original continuity (before it became a series of one-season story archs), but it has a lot of extras that anyone who is enough of a fan to even consider picking up this boxed set should truly enjoy watching. Obviously this isn't for everyone, but for those of us that watched the series in it's early years and enjoyed what they saw, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Complete Series is a solid purchase.
