Power Rangers, based off the nineties live action cartoon, is the origin story of the mighty morphers and likely the first installment in a cinematic franchise. It tells the story of how a group of misfit teenagers came to don their respective suits and fight some crazy alien lady that wants some crystals for, like, power and world domination or something. It also sucks. And it’s boring, lame and lame. But unlike most terrible movies, it’s not even fun to trash because it was just 90 minutes of coma-inducing exposition followed by twenty minutes of Transformers-esque ‘splosions and destruction. Aside from the hilariously blatant product placement, there really weren’t any laughs to be had — Power Rangers is stuck in that awkward middle ground between mediocre and awful, too competent to laugh at and too poorly made to be genuinely entertaining.
Technically speaking, the film is subpar on pretty much every conceivable level. The color scheme is monotonous and the lighting so poor that I was genuinely confused as to what was happening on screen during any low light scene. Director Dean Israelite — with the aid of cinematographer Matthew J. Lloyd — seems to be doing his best impression of Zack Snyder (Batman v. Superman) here, copying the ‘dark and edgy’ thing with similarly lackluster results. But unlike BvS, which was consistent in its horribly depressing mood, Power Rangers suffers from a serious case of tone deafness. While the cinematography is that of a grim crime thriller, the screenwriting is somewhere between a mindless big budget action flick and an overly sentimental and sappy coming of age story. Then you throw in the all over the place soundtrack that rarely fits the mood of the scene, and the tone of the film is atrociously inconsistent.
For as much of an effort as the writers make in presenting a thorough backstory of the Rangers, I never found myself really caring about any of them as actual characters as opposed to just cool looking action figures in CGI suits. Most of the characterization in the story is lazy and awkward exposition and leaves you waiting for the action to start, a problem which is compounded by the fact that the movie doesn’t actually get into its main conflict until around the 90-minute mark. If you’re going into the theater expecting some mindless big budget explosions and stuff, you better bring a nice pillow or a book to read, because the first hour and a half is just unbearable.
It’s probably just because I’m in a bad mood and am tired of reviewing movies at this point in the year, but Power Rangers didn’t just suck — it genuinely annoyed the hell out of me. I could have spent those two hours listening to Kendrick’s new album back to back, and you should too. Don’t give Hollywood your money. Or do. Make decisions for yourself, not based on the opinions of strangers.
One and a half stars (out of five).
