Did you know once upon a time Disney was seriously entertaining the idea of doing Power Rangers the Animated Series in order to cut production costs? True story. Animator and illustrator Mike McGraw gives MMPR Era Black and Pink Rangers the animated overhaul, showing us what it might have looked like… and damn does it look good! Click on and check it out after the jump.
Black Ranger Animated
Pink Ranger Animated
July 30, 2012 @ 10:48 am
Looks pretty cool.
July 30, 2012 @ 11:00 am
I’ve never commented on here before, but I just had to get my feelings out about this. I wish Disney had kept Power Rangers, and this is the reason why.
Power Rangers: The Animated Series was the shake-up the franchise needed. It would have freed the franchise from the constraints of having to utilize action sequences from Super Sentai and turn over the cast every season, thus enabling them to tell genuinely interesting stories about these characters and this world. It could have been amazing. It WOULD have been amazing. Alas, we’ll never know, because Saban bought the franchise back.
There, I said it.
July 30, 2012 @ 7:50 pm
I agree. The current series is essentially Super Sentai, the multi-racial edition with slightly edited stories that do not completely copy the source or ones that are different.
In its primary influences AKA Gatchaman and the super robot genre of the 70’s and 80’s (yes, Voltron/Golion came from this ) , it basically shown that if you combined the robot action ( Which would be far more flexible than not in the live action.) with the action, you can totally do far better stories unconstrained by stock footage.
I mean, if Power Rangers is just the Westernification of the brand and its most prominent season IS the first 3-5 seasons, why not take advantage of the general audience and make it so?
Obviously the Sentai dynamic of a different team per year is only making SOME money, but not enough to bring back the phenomenon. Toei may HATE this sort of idea, but why should they care as long as they are making money from the licensing of the Rangers brand worldwide either way? Wait a minute its not like they couldn’t release a second toy line that had its comic adaptation…. And who’s not to say they could not have taken ADVANTAGE of Disney’s acquisition of Marvel and took the fan-based dynamic of the franchise with comics that would reboot and or continue the MMPR saga. I believe one of Disney’s failings was that they never gave the series the Disney treatment, meaning their huge influence and clout globally as well as their stock in Apple. If they got a director to make a live action film to cash in and suck in Transformers success while promoting their series as their own, maybe they would have had a great investment than a dud.
To be frank , they had many missed opportunities with the franchise and an animated could have revived it or killed it. But either way, a potential animated series would be jumping the shark unless it was done right. As I recall, Star Trek died after it went animated until it got its own film, but then again, the franchise has been dying for some time.
Well Saban got ONE thing right after all these years, merchandise wise because next year they are releasing a diecast megazord and even the Sentai Series Megazords and they do have some comics in the midst. However, I hope they try to cater to the general nostalgic audience and make a high budget film based around the original series with Paramount alongside better TV series , promotion and scheduling.
July 30, 2012 @ 11:40 am
@Aaron:
But then that would destroy the point in Power Rangers.
I’m going to assume by your typing skills and fanboyism, you must be in your mid-late teens or early 20’s?
Power Rangers is a kids show, always has been a kids show and always will be a kids show, I mean I can be completely fanboyish over Mighty Morphin at times but this is a punch in the power coin. Power Rangers only began because Saban literally borrowed elements and footage from the Super Sentai series and made a western adaption of it. If that didn’t happen, there would be no Power Rangers. Sure if it was animated, it could allow for more freedom in stories, but as a cartoon series, it would stick to the same cast and only last so long like all cartoon series, after that people would eventually get bored with the cast, they’d run out of idea’s and it would be no more. With the show refreshing every year with a new cast, basing it’s stories on it’s Sentai counterparts then it stays fresh; with the show being live action and the cast being standard actors instead of voice actors is better for the kids who watch it, seeing what appears to them as “real” heroes (till they grow old enough to realise) which is better than an over-the-top cartoon.
And on a more critical note, the colour and animation was a bit shitty, seeing that on TV would disgust me, I’ve seen Youtuber’s do better.
July 30, 2012 @ 11:47 am
Considering that these clips were most likely test animations, the final product would’ve probably looked vastly different.
Regardless, I agree. Making PR animated, while a novel idea, would destroy the whole point of the franchise.
July 30, 2012 @ 1:23 pm
@Scott Burns:
You have a point too. There are pros and cons to both approaches, and we could (and I’m starting to get the feeling we WILL) debate this all day.
I was just giving my opinion. It’s good to hear yours!
July 30, 2012 @ 6:55 pm
this is old i saw this a couple months ago…on youtube i think its just fan-made.not an actual show in works. @scott burns this is work in progress not a finished cartoon. no need to judge it so harshly
July 30, 2012 @ 10:04 pm
If they replaced animated with live action- sure. But I’m not sure the damage if it’s a spin off like the mmpr was gonna be.
So I’m sorry I disagree that it would completely destroy the franchise.
July 31, 2012 @ 4:48 am
Pretty awesome. 🙂 Definitely has the MMPR touch.
July 31, 2012 @ 10:02 pm
that would’ve look a bit too graphic for disney standards
August 1, 2012 @ 4:21 am
This is beyond awesome. Wish there was a MMPR movie (modern reboot) … -sigh-