If you have not seen this episode yet and don’t wish to be spoiled, don’t continue reading. It’s not like we’re MEGAFORCEing you to, or anything.
Recap
The Rangers are granted a day off by Gosei, and decide to take a joyride on the Skyship. However, they are attacked by Prince Vekar directly–his father has granted him his own Megazord, and to Damaras’s dismay, he’s piloting it himself. Alongside the powerful Megazord are Vekar’s father’s Knightsmen, and together they take out the Rangers incredibly quickly. Vekar nearly destroys the Megazord, and Troy ejects his friends in hopes that he can contain Vekar’s blast; it doesn’t work, and Troy is launched away and potentially killed, to his friends’ horror. After being ejected from the exploding Megazord, Noah is separated from the rest of the group. Confronted with Argus, Noah stands alone, and uses all his Ranger power to repell one of Argus’s blasts back onto him and destroy him. The Rangers regroup, Troy reveals himself to be alive, and the Rangers’ bravery unlocks the Ultimate Legendary Megazord, which destroy’s Vekar and his Zord. Now left without leadership, Damaras swears revenge on the Rangers.
Review
At different points, “All Hail Prince Vekar” is either the best of Super Megaforce or the worst. It’s the most inconsistent, ill-paced, poorly edited episode of the season, but it also sports some of the best and most visceral action sequences and finally, finally advances the plot. It also teases more moments of genuine pathos than any other episode, only to immediately undo them in the next few minutes. This isn’t a failure in the way that “The Grass is Always Greener…or Bluer” was, because it’s not a bad episode, really. The biggest problem with “All Hail Prince Vekar” is how many good pieces it throws out without any of them fitting together for a satisfying conclusion. Or, perhaps more importantly, that they’re dependent on our investment in these characters’ journeys, which we just don’t have because of how minimal the growth has been.
Barring that, the episode proceeds to set up a great threat, not only with Vekar’s Megazord but also with the Kingsmen bodyguards, a monster duo that takes down the Rangers easily. Vekar and his Megazord is the only thing that really works, and they only do because the progression is played straight (villain gets too powerful, gets cocky, gets killed.) More specifically, though, we’ve gotten to know Vekar as a character over the course of this series. Even if we were never “invested” in him, since he still never has an arc, we saw a seemingly generic villain steadily revealed to be the pathetic, spoiled child he is–and it’s been consistently entertaining as a result. It’s actually quite a change that we don’t see Vekar revealed to have some innate fighting prowess; he really is as weak and lame as his facade suggests, and dies practically screaming and crying. The massive downside to seeing him go like this is that he’d pretty much been the most entertaining character this season. The final bit with Damaras in the wreckage swearing revenge is genuinely good; with characters this poorly developed, just his tiny bit of backstory lifts Damaras above most of the Rangers in terms of characterization. It will be interesting how he deals with Vekar’s death, given his failure to protect his charge.
The middle of the episode is where the bulk of the discussion lies, though, and it begins with a genuinely affecting sacrifice from Troy. It’s a good moment for him; he doesn’t have much of a character aside from always striving overly hard to be the typical leader anyway, so it works. But what should be more important is everyone else’s reactions–directly before the commercial, we get wonderful facial reactions from the team, providing one of the most riveting act breaks of this season. Obviously we’re not going to believe Troy is dead, but that’s not the point. The apparent destruction of the Megazord and death of Troy should spark a change in the Rangers, providing new motivation as the stakes are finally raised. We see Troy again far too soon, undoing the fake-out immediately, but it could still work; we shouldn’t be focused on whether or not he’s dead or alive, but how the characters would react in that situation.
But then, that’s about it; Noah gets the biggest solo face-off any Ranger has gotten, and it’s certainly played up as important, but why? There’s been no build-up of a rivalry between Noah and Argus, no reason for this to be a big moment for Noah more than anyone else. Even in the much-maligned Samurai, there was build-up for the face-offs and character relationships, such as the rivalry between Deker and Jayden. Not so in this case, where it’s purely a coincidence that Noah happens to be separated from the Rangers. There’s nothing wrong with giving random Rangers the spotlight sometimes, but Noah’s already gotten it. Why not give it to Gia, who hasn’t been given anything to do all season? Or Orion, who has an entire revenge-based backstory against the Armada to deal with? Noah is a random choice, clearly only thrown in because of the source footage. “It’s the source footage” isn’t an excuse when there could have easily been a way to lead-up to it.
The Noah face-off wouldn’t seem so random if this section of the episode was all about the Rangers’ reactions to Troy’s apparent demise. But no one else gets the special privilege of standing against a villain alone in the name of their friend’s sacrifice. Orion immediately finds the rest of the group, and Noah and Troy make their way back. It’s as if this episode was set-up to be a big two-parter–and it might have made a darn good one–but mid-way through the writers decided to haphazardly wrap it all up, instead. And that’s exactly what happens. The Rangers hastily regroup, the Skyship is absolutely 100% fine despite its crash landing, Noah putting all his energy in the battle makes no impact, the Rangers magically unlock a new “Ultimate” Megazord yet again, and that’s that. That’s not even touching on the awful editing of the Rangers’ return, with an awkward dissolve mid-morph and mid-explosion to switch from American to Sentai footage, and Orion somehow getting his Gold Mode activated off-screen.
Any good will the middle part of the episode establishes is squandered, and there’s no reason for it other than an extremely poor use of time. That’s especially frustrating since “All Prince Vekar” is the closest we’d have gotten to turning this season up a notch. Instead, it’s another disappointment–slightly better than all the pointless silliness we’d been getting lately, but too many wasted opportunities for drama and creativity to make it work.
Odds & Ends
- You know things are supposed to be relaxing when none of the Rangers have their jackets on.
- Between Gosei on the morphers and Vekar on his own Megazord, this show has a real thing for putting people’s faces on stuff.
- The only Legendary Mode this week is Orion turning into the Wolf Warrior, a surprising transformation given he wasn’t really an official Sixth Ranger in Mystic Force. It would be fun to see more of those less-Ranger-y “Extra Rangers,” like Lost Galaxy’s Magna Defender or SPD‘s Shadow Ranger. That said, there are so many regular or official Rangers we haven’t seen use of yet, either, and we’re running out of time.
- Why is the “Ultimate” combination of this Megazord only made up of the Legendary Megazord, Q-Rex, and Turbo Falcon? Just seems weird that Turbo Falcon, of all things, is the key to the strongest transformation.
- Orion’s response to getting the most powerful Megazord ever: “I choose that!”
- “It’s like…Armageddon.” They probably shouldn’t have given that line to the guy who did, literally, face Armageddon by way of the death of his planet. This episode barely even compares to the premiere.
- Megazord photo credit: Rangerboard.
