Shogun UltraZord

Mighty Morphin Power Rangers 1.4

Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, Bandai, 1995

When you talk about long-running sci-fi shows, everybody mentions Star Trek, Dr Who, X-Files, and others. But one show that many people neglect is not just one of the longest-running sci-fi shows but one of the longest running television shows with a total of sixteen seasons that ran back-to-back. The show? Power Rangers.

Oh, true, most of the seasons were only tenuously linked, with the primary story arc ending with Power Rangers in Space. But sixteen seasons is not a trivial accomplishment, especially for a sci-fi show and doubly-especially for a kid’s show. Power Rangers has survived with the best of them and become the brand most synonymous with the genre. With the arguable exception of Voltron, Power Rangers is the face of teen-team-mecha shows and its legacy is proving to be quite enduring.

Background

To understand this toy, you need to understand the nature of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. Not in the sense of it being about a group of teens with attitude, or that its got way more spandex than it should. What needs to be understood is the hierarchy of mecha in the show. You’ve got the individual mecha (called ‘Zords’), piloted by each Power Ranger. The (usually) five combine to form the Megazord. The Megazord combines with the Sixth Ranger’s Zord and the rarely-seen Seventh Zord (who pretty much never has a Ranger) to form the Ultrazord. The Ultrazord is the veritable big gun in the Power Rangers’ arsenal. In the case of the Shogun Ultrazord, you have the combination of the Shogun Megazord (made up of the individual Shogun Zords), the White Falcon Zord (actually a holdover from the earlier team of Zords, the Ninja Zords), and Titanus (a holdover from the first team of Zords, the Dino Zords).

It’s those last two Zords that are important with this toy because this was a rare glimpse at something the mecha show/toy field needs to embrace; interchangeability. Within the Power Ranger shows/toy lines, it wasn’t unusual at all to have various combinations of Zords. In the original Mighty Morphin Power Rangers (MMPR), the Dino Zords combined to form the Megazord, or could combine with the Dragonzord to form the Dragonzord Battlemode. The Dragonzord could also combine with the Megazord to give you the Mega Dragonzord. And then Titanus entered into the picture and, well, yeah. But once the Thunderzords entered into the picture (the replacements for the Dinozords and the precursor to the Ninja Zords), all your Dinozords were effectively useless. Narratively, this was explained with the destruction of the Dinozords, but from a toy standpoint, this kind of sucked.

The same thing occurred when the Thunderzords were replaced with the Ninja Zords. They all just kind of went away. But when the Ninja Zords were replaced by the Shogun Zords, the White Falcon Zord stuck around. Moreover, with both the Ninja Zords and the Shogun Zords, Titanus (who hadn’t been destroyed with the Dino Zords) returned to complete the Ultrazord forms.

Logistically, many of these problems trace back to either the narrative or, more often, the fact that MMPR was a single show while the Japanese footage (which was almost all the mecha footage) was derived from different and generally unrelated shows. But it still leaves behind this brief period were toys from one line (MMPR in the case of Titanus and the Ninja Zords in the case of the Falcon Zord) were useable in the current line (the Shogun Zords). It would have been beyond words to express how unbelievably awesome it would be if every new mecha line could combine with the previous line…or all the previous lines. Imagine if the Dinozords and the Thunderzords could combine into one big-ass fourteen-mech behemoth. Hell, chase the dream and imagine if EVERY Power Ranger toy line could combine. With at least a minimum of six zords per line and sixteen seasons, you’d be looking at a mech composed of no less than NINETY-SIX robots. Just gazing upon that thing’s majesty could single-handedly bring about world peace. I understand that no toy engineer in their right mind would want to design it, and narratively explaining that would be a nightmare beyond words. And that doesn’t even address the fact that the toy probably couldn’t actually even move. But still! That thing would be the very face of toy heaven. Power Rangers skirted with this idea ever-so-brief with the Shogun Ultrazord and hopefully, it’s an idea that will return in order to realize the dream.

　

Appearance – 4 out of 5

The Power Ranger toys aren’t without their problems, but one area they never fail to excel at is their appearance. The toys just LOOK cool and the mecha is the belle of the ball. The Shogun Ultrazord is visually imposing and it has the perfect amount of detail to keep the eye engaged without looking too busy. The toy looks shot-for-shot like the figure in the show, which is surprisingly hard to find in mecha toy lines.

Breaking down the toy a bit, the individual parts look just as good. The Shogun Megazord, the Shogun Zords, the White Falcon Zord, Titanus, they all look every bit the part of their show’s counterparts.

Construction – 3 out of 5

This toy is pretty well put-together and is relatively solid. Unfortunately, one of the principal elements that I praise is also one of its major flaws. The quality of Titanus’ construction is noticeably higher than that of the Falcon Zord, and both are better put together and more solid than the Shogun Megazord. Even still, individual elements of each toy are disappointing. Titanus’ body and neck are beautifully constructed and very sturdy, while the legs and guns/tail are almost laughable. The Shogun Zords are right on the cusp of feeling cheap with their hollow torsos and arms, being saved almost solely by the texture and detail found on each figure. The Falcon Zord is the only element that is consistent in its quality, and even then it’s only above-average.

Movement – 2 out of 5

And this is where the figure really shows its weakness. Combiner mecha traditionally aren’t the most mobile of toys, but this one is really pushing the boundaries between being a toy and simply a statue. The individual Shogun Zords have relatively mobile shoulder joints and the Yellow, Black, and Red Shogun Zords also have rotating arms, but that’s it (and that’s as much connected to the transformation sequence as anything else). The Shogun Megazord has no moving parts aside from the strict rotation of the shoulders. Titanus has no movements beyond those connected to the battery-powered forward-only locomotion. The Falcon Zord has shoulder joints for the wings, a neck and beak joint (it’s opening mouth is actually kind of cool), hip joints, and claw joints. Unfortunately, none of this is particularly impressive or does much to make the Falcon Zord memorably articulate. As for the Shogun Ultrazord, forget about it. Shogun Megazord’s arms go up and down and Titanus can roll forward. That’s it. While this is in keeping with the concept from the show (as that’s about all it), it’s still abysmally low.

Extras – 2 out of 5

Scoring the extras was a little hard because this toy had some great extras…they just weren’t very well made. Each Shogun Zord came with a little weapon that, when combined, became a shield and staff weapon for the Shogun Megazord. It was a cool idea, except the execution was a bit week. All the weapons are a bit flimsy and only the shield has any coloring other than the same generic red. The Shogun Megazord also came with a pretty awesome sword…except it’s almost too flimsy to stay straight. Titanus came with a handful of additional parts, but none of which are of note but most of which had a place to be put on Titanus (with the exception of a pair of sleds used to pull the Dinozord Megazord in Tank mode). The Falcon Zord came with no bonus features.

Packaging – 3 out of 5

Yet again, the different toys have different packaging styles, making this a bit tricky to score. All three toys came in packages that clearly explained the basic story and the individual mechs to the uninitiated. Only Titanus came with anything extra, though, namely a small card that could be cut out that matched the cards from the other toys in the original MMPR Dinozords line (a trend discontinued by the time the Falcon Zord and the Shogun Megazord arrived on the scene).

　

Overall – 3 out of 5

I felt a little let down when tallying up the scores with this toy because I was certain it would rank higher. I really want to give it a Four, but the truth is that no matter how awesome a concept, if it doesn’t execute well, it’s largely for naught. And that was the case with the Shogun UltraZord. The Shogun Megazord’s…average and Titanus and the Falcon Zord aren’t that much better. Ultimately, it really was the lack of movement and mobility that killed this toy. Conceptually, it should have scored much higher. But then, maybe that’s not too off-the-mark. For a lot of people, the Power Rangers have long been a legacy of almosts and could’ve-beens. But this toy is fun to play with and has a lot of elements that, were they to be realized more successfully, would have made it legendary in its awesomeness. Maybe next time around.