Haim Saban’s big Power Rangers movie is days away from release. This is the point in a movie’s lifespan where the people involved make ridiculously bold, incredibly optimistic predictions about the success of the thing they labored over for years. Which, from that perspective, I understand, but going by the middling reviews and the dour, unappealing-looking trailers now running on TV, I would not jump the gun so far as to predict you’ll be making six sequels.
Saban sure seems to think so, though. “We already have a six-movie story arc,” he told Variety. And believe it or not, movie studio Lionsgate was also talking that many sequels BEFORE this.
Power Rangers could have a good opening weekend purely based on nostalgia and the pent-up desire to see childhood heroes targeted at an ‘adult audience” — only problem is, the people going in hoping for that kind of thing aren’t going to get it. There are a couple of spicy lines that give the flick its PG-13, but largely Saban is targeting a new generation of kids with this. Hence why the photography has this angsty, Twilight vibe to it.
It’s the decision to YA-Novelize what should be a butt-kicking Sentai slamfest that’s annoying the critics. Director Dean Israelite makes no apologies for the direction he took, though. “I just love coming-of-age stories. I love stories about people who are disenfranchised and people who have to go through an intense growth to figure out who they are and own who they are….I want us to earn them becoming the Power Rangers at the end of the film.”
There’s nothing wrong with that approach on paper, and I get that we can’t go from zero to sixty right away (even though the show did that). The general critical reaction, however, is that the Rangers do not feel “earned” and that all the time spent at high school is wasted.
Don’t be surprised if at least one more sequel is put into production — this is Saban we’re talking about. From this perspective, though, seven movies is unlikely.
