It’s simple common sense that dictates the difficulty in finding a self-sustaining franchise. As such, you often see people go back to wells they believe have not run dry, making questionable/cynical business decisions because a certain audience hasn’t had a taste of whatever a previous generation was suckered into buying. Hence, Saban re-acquiring their crown jewel, the Power Rangers, from the clutches of disinterested Disney, with eyes towards a relaunch through television, toys, merchandising, and yes, movies. Probably 3D.
The “Mighty Morphin Power Rangers” debuted on television in 1993 and undemanding children made the series, a live-action story of teens “with attitude” who morph into superhero spandex and then giant mechs, into a huge multimedia hit. This current generation of late twenties slackers remembers nothing about where they were when Timothy McVeigh staged terrorism attacks, but you just know they all recall pushing and shoving each other in the aisles to bag a super-rare White Ranger figurine. For some, it’s an ironic memory. Not many, though.
The brand previous crossed into movies before, with “Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie” pulling in $66 million worldwide, but by the time “Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie” hit screens two years later, the fad had passed. Saban is looking to avoid this malaise with an aggressive nine figure bid (wha…?) followed by a Power Rangers revival platform consisting of twenty new episodes for television, with the re-aquisition and promotion of the currently-existing 700 segments (holy…) on both Nickelodeon and Nicktoons. As for movies, we can only hope they remember to bring Devo back for the soundtrack.